C is for... Connolly, Eddie

Bullying patriarch of the Connolly family, who lived on Florizel Street in North London. Eddie prided himself on his military accomplishments, often wearing his medals when he was going out to meet friends at the local pub. He hated the fact that the house he lived in belonged to his mother-in-law, who stayed there with him, his wife Rita, and his son, Tommy. He was talked into purchasing a TV set by his son, due to the forthcoming Coronation. He got the set cheap from Magpie's Electricals, unaware that this shop had been taken over by the alien Wire. When people started to be struck down with a bizarre condition - their faces seemingly wiped smooth - Eddie began to inform on his neighbours who had been affected. The police would come and take the victims away, and this included his own mother-in-law. Tommy alerted the Doctor and Rose to what was going on, and they turned up at Eddie's home one evening pretending to be surveying how people were preparing for the big event. Spotting Eddie's bullying ways, they endeavoured to bring him down a peg or two, but he quickly resented their interference and threw them out.
During the Coronation ceremony, Tommy turned on his father and revealed that he knew that he had been the one informing on the neighbours. After putting up with years of abuse, Rita threw him out of the house.

Played by: Jamie Foreman. Appearances: The Idiot's Lantern (2006).

• Just before the Doctor Who role, Foreman had played Bill Sykes in the Roman Polanski version of Oliver Twist. He tends to be cast as policemen or villains. The latter is a little ironic, as he is the son of Freddie Foreman, an associate of the Krays.

C is for... Condo

Servant to Dr Mehendri Solon on the planet Karn. Solon had pulled Condo from the wreck of a Dravidian slaveship. He claimed to have had to amputate Condo's left arm in order to save his life. This was replaced with a fierce hook. Condo longed to have the new arm which Solon claimed to have for him, and would go looking for it when his master was busy elsewhere. Condo was tasked with obtaining body parts from the victims of other space wrecks on the planet, which Solon could use in his great work. This was to construct a new body in which to house the brain of the rogue Time Lord Morbius. Condo was of limited intelligence, and his loyalty was only bought with the promise that he would get his new arm. He was quite prepared to kill Solon if the surgeon threatened him - as when he offered to substitute his servant for the Doctor when the latter was going to be sacrificed by the Sisterhood. In his own brutish way, Condo became quite protective towards Sarah after she had been blinded.
Condo finally turned against Solon when he discovered that the arm promised to him had been used for Morbius' new body. Solon was forced to shoot him. Condo survived, badly wounded. When the Morbius monster threatened Sarah, Condo went to her rescue - only to be killed himself by the creature.

Played by: Colin Fay. Appearances: The Brain of Morbius (1976).

• Fay was new to TV acting. His background was in opera. He later became a Production Manager with the BBC, and one of his jobs was to oversee the 1987 Victoria Wood Doctor Who sketch which featured Jim Broadbent as the Doctor.

C is for... Commander

Unnamed leader of an Earth space mission which visited the planet Sense-Sphere in the 28th Century. The crew discovered that the planet was rich in minerals such as molybdenum, and the Sensorites feared that their world would be plundered. They launched a mental attack on the astronauts. The Earth ship took off and exploded, and the Sensorites assumed that all of the humans had been on board. However, the Commander and two of his men had been left behind, and had arranged for the destruction of their ship to kill their colleagues who were trying to abandon them. The trio sabotaged the lights in the aqueduct which provided the Sensorite city with its water, and soon rumours spread of a monster hiding in the tunnels. Driven mad by the isolation and the darkness, the Commander began to poison the water supply using Deadly Nightshade. When the Doctor arrived on the planet, he decided to investigate the "disease" afflicting the Sensorites after Ian fell ill. He identified the poisoning. He went into the aqueduct and was attacked by the Commander and his men. Later, he and Ian re-entered the tunnels and met the humans. They succeeded in convincing the Commander that his war against the Sensorites was over and he was victorious, so could now return to Earth. This was a ruse to get the humans to leave the tunnels and they were ambushed by Sensorite warriors. The Commander was shot and stunned, the others taken prisoner. Captain Maitland and his crew agreed to take the men back to Earth where they could no longer cause the Sensorites any more harm.

Played by: John Bailey. Appearances: The Sensorites (1964).

• Bailey only appears in the final episode - A Desperate Venture. He will return to the series in the more substantial role of Edward Waterfield - Victoria's father - in Evil of the Daleks. A final appearance will be as Sezom in The Horns of Nimon.
• William Hartnell famously fluffs a line when he reads aloud the letters on a uniform badge which Ian finds in the aqueduct. On screen we clearly see INEER - the end of the word ENGINEER. However, Hartnell reads it as INNER. Rather pointlessly, the novelisation claims the Commander and his men belong to an organisation named after Hartnell's fluff - the clumsily titled INterstellar Navigation, Exploration and Research.

C is for... Commandant

The official responsible for the day to day running of Gatwick Airport, south of London. He was based in the air traffic control centre, and was assisted by the capable Jean Rock. Under the Commandant, the airport ran smoothly, until one day there was a near miss on the runway when an inbound aircraft almost hit a Police Box. Assuming this to be some student prank, the Commandant ordered that the Police remove their Box. Later, passport control reported a couple of unauthorised people who appeared to have disembarked from a flight from Switzerland without passports. This was the Doctor and Jamie. Polly had seen a man murdered in the hangar belonging to Chameleon Tours. She disappeared after informing the Doctor. He attempted to warn the Commandant, but he refused to accept his story of ray guns and murder as there was no body. However, the Doctor was soon able to convince him that the airport was being used as a base by aliens after showing him one of their freezing weapons. The Commandant was talked into co-operating with the Doctor by Inspector Crossland. He ordered the search of the airport for the people who had been abducted by the Chameleons in order to have their identities copied. He helped play for time until the people had been located - which forced the Chameleons to negotiate with the Doctor.

Played by: Colin Gordon. Appearances: The Faceless Ones (1967).

• Gordon appeared in a huge number of British films and TV series between 1947 and 1970, usually playing stuffy officials of one type or another. He was Number Two twice in The Prisoner, and a regular on The Baron. 
• The Commandant's name is never mentioned. The novelisation gives him the name Charles Gordon, clearly inspired by the actor who played him.

C is for... Colony Sarff

Davros' personal chief of security. Sarff was dispatched to find the Doctor when it appeared that Davros was dying, visiting the Maldovarium, the Shadow Proclamation headquarters, and the planet Karn in his quest. His message to the Doctor was: "Davros remembers". The Doctor was present on Karn when he arrived, but remained hidden. He knew what the message meant - an allusion to a meeting he had with Davros when the Kaled scientist was still a boy. Colony Sarff finally tracked the Doctor down in medieval England. Here he revealed his true form. His humanoid shape was actually composed of a colony of snakes - hence his name. The snakes could inject Dalek nanogenes into people they bit - turning them into Dalek drones.

Sarff took the Doctor to Skaro, along with Clara and Missy. Some of his snakes were employed to bind the prisoners' wrists. When the Doctor tried to escape by stealing Davros' chair, he was overpowered as the unit was full of snakes. Later, Sarff disguised himself as energy cables on Davros' intensive care unit. This was part of a ploy for Davros to steal some of the Doctor's regeneration energy for himself and his Daleks. Missy arrived and blasted the unit with a Dalek gun, destroying Sarff.

Played by Jamie Reid-Quarrell. Appearances: The Magician's Apprentice / The Witch's Familiar (2015).

• Sarff is the Welsh word for serpent.
• The character's distinctive gliding motion was created by the actor using a segway hover-board under his robes. Reid-Quarrell put it to further use when he later played one of the gliding Cloister Wraiths in the series finale.

A Sarff prosthesis, as seen at the Doctor Who Festival in 2015.

C is for... Collector

A diminutive, bald headed man who governed the planet Pluto in the far distant future. He was confined to an electronic wheelchair. Based in Megropolis One, he represented a business concern known simply as the Company which had paid for the human race to move to the planet. Everyone was heavily taxed on every aspect of their life - and death. The Collector employed an official called a Gatherer in each of Pluto's Megropoleis to oversee tax collection. He was protected by his own personal guard - the Internal Retinue - and the population was kept in check through the distribution of an anxiety-inducing gas throughout the city.
The Collector could be quite sadistic, enjoying personally overseeing executions. The Doctor joined a rebel group who were opposed to the Collector's tyranny. A revolution began, and the Doctor broke into the Collector's inner sanctum and reprogrammed his computer with a growth tax to create massive losses. The Collector could not cope with this and reverted to his natural form - a small green plant-form akin to seaweed. He was really an alien Usurian - his humanoid shape having been an illusion maintained by the chair he always travelled in. The Doctor sealed him in the base of the chair.

Played by: Henry Woolf. Appearances: The Sunmakers (1977).

• Woolf was one of the Transylvanians performing the 'Time Warp' in the Rocky Horror Picture Show. A close friend of Harold Pinter, the playwright dedicated one of his works to Woolf. He moved to Canada in 1978, and helped found a Shakespeare festival, which he chaired until 1997 when he retired, though he has acted a little since.
• The Collector's bushy eyebrows were a reference to then Chancellor of the Exchequer Denis Healey.

Inspirations - The Highlanders

The final historical story of the 1960's, the last of a regular run that began with the fourth story back in 1964. Some would argue that it's the final historical story of them all, as Black Orchid could have been set in any time period, and makes use of George Cranleigh as the monster-of-the-week.
Not only has the TARDIS travelled back into Earth's past, but it has arrived at a significant historical event - or at least the immediate aftermath of one. No real people are seen, but Bonnie Prince Charlie is mentioned several times and the Doctor pretends that Jamie is the Prince in disguise to fool Solicitor Grey and the Redcoats.
The year is 1746, and the Doctor, Ben and Polly have arrived at the site of the Battle of Culloden, in the Scottish Highlands. The battle has ended, with the Jacobite forces who have survived fleeing in disarray.
Story Editor Gerry Davis had approached veteran writer Elwyn Jones for a script. Jones had created the police series Softly, Softly, and had been the BBC's first Head of Drama (Series) after Sydney Newman had reorganised the drama group. As things turned out, Jones was busy on other things - mainly his own creation - and so Davis wrote much of this story on his own. As with The Smugglers, this is more a story from the literary history genre. An obvious antecedent is Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson. This is also set just after the Jacobite rebellion, and features a young man who is going to be sold into slavery, as Jamie is here. Highlanders are hunted by a villainous agent of the King, and the young hero poses as someone more important at one point.

The other big inspiration is the 1964 BBC docudrama Culloden. This was directed by Peter Watkins, and was based on the book by Scots historian John Prebble. It was innovative for being made in the style of contemporary war reporting, and utilised an amateur cast. Much of the camerawork was done with a hand-held camera, to provide a cinema verite look. The action was co-ordinated by Derek Ware -  a name very familiar to Doctor Who fans.
As far as the historical background is concerned, we have to start with the death of Charles II. Despite fathering numerous children, none were legitimate. On his death, therefore, the throne went to his brother James. This wasn't popular with Parliament, as James was openly Catholic and pro-French. It was also feared that he wanted to become an absolute monarch. When he had a son and heir, Parliament approached his daughter Mary to come over and take the throne. She was married to the Dutch Protestant King William III of Orange. In 1688 James was forced to flee, with one attempt to reclaim his throne thwarted after the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. After Mary's death in 1702, her younger sister Anne became Queen. On her death, in 1714, James' son - James Francis Edward - claimed the throne, and this led to the first Jacobite rebellion of 1715. It should be noted that 'Jacobite' derives from Jacob, another version of James. Then, in 1745, James' grandson - Charles Edward Stuart - launched his bid to reclaim the British throne. Initially successful, Bonnie Prince Charlie got all the way to Derby, before being forced back up into the Highlands. He was known as the Young Pretender, whilst his father was known as the Old Pretender. The Jacobite forces were finally routed on 16th April 1746 at Culloden, not far from Inverness. Charles had failed to take military advice, and fled the battle early when he suspected that he had been betrayed. In command of the Hanoverian forces was the King's son - the Duke of Cumberland - who earned himself the nickname "Butcher" Cumberland due to the bloody reprisals he ordered against the defeated Jacobites.

So, The Highlanders begins with the aftermath of the battle. The Doctor and his companions find themselves captured by a pair of Highlanders. One of these is James Robert McCrimmon - who will be better known simply as Jamie. Jamie is piper to one of the Jacobite clan chiefs - Colin McLaren. With them are the laird's son Alexander and daughter Kirsty. Alexander is soon killed by Redcoats, who capture the Doctor, Ben, Jamie and Colin. Kirsty and Polly manage to remain at large, and set about rescuing the menfolk. They succeed in blackmailing a young English Lieutenant - Algernon ffinch.
Historically, the McCrimmons were a famous piping family, but they were loyal to the MacLeod clan of Skye rather than to any McLarens. One fanciful theory is that the name is a corruption of the Italian town of Cremona, as the family were founded by a Cremonese who migrated to Ireland. It's more likely to come from Mac (son of) Ruimein - an old Norse name. It needs to be noted that the MacLeods and their McCrimmon pipers were opposed to the Jacobites and fought on the side of the Hanoverian forces in 1745.
Jamie's battle cry of "Creag an Tuirc!" does belong to the McLaren clan. It means 'hill of the boar' and refers to a rocky outcrop outside Balqhidder where the clan would rally before going into battle.

This being a Gerry Davis script, he thinks that the Doctor's name really is "Who". It was under his watch that WOTAN demanded that "Doctor Who is required", and here the Doctor adopts the name Von Wer when posing as a German physician - 'wer' being German for 'who'. Steven Moffat seems to have recently come round to this way of thinking as well.
This story sees the Doctor assume a number of disguises - something that it was hoped would become a regular thing for the Second Doctor. He plays an old washerwoman in Inverness, then dresses as a wounded Redcoat. Apart from a bit of a hat fetish, this disguising act doesn't last beyond this one story.
Captain Trask is even more of a fictional pirate than the ones we saw in The Smugglers - the story that really should have been called "The Pirates". As played by Dallas Cavell, he is pure Long John Silver.
Many Jacobite prisoners were sold into slavery in the West Indies and the Carolinas. Being white men, however, they would more likely have gained positions as overseers on the plantations. As slavery was legal in 1746, and Scots prisoners were being officially shipped out to the colonies, it is unlikely that any serious action would have been taken against the crooked solicitor Grey.

Frazer Hines had acted alongside Patrick Troughton before, and was a friend of producer Innes Lloyd. It was whilst filming that the decision was made to keep him on as a regular companion, with an initial contract of a further three stories. Hines has claimed that public reaction to Jamie led to him getting the companion role, but he is mis-remembering, as his departure in the TARDIS had been filmed before the first episode aired. It was still a last minute decision, as they had already filmed the scene once with him staying behind.
A couple of things you might like to know before we finish. Director Hugh David had been first choice by Rex Tucker to play the First Doctor, but when he was replaced by Verity Lambert she thought David too young, and he didn't want to commit to a long series, having recently come off Knight Errant.
The Highlanders was the first Doctor Who story to be deleted from the archives - the tapes being wiped only a couple of months after broadcast. It was clear that Innes Lloyd believed the historical stories had no future. It was claimed that the poor ratings for The Gunfighters were one of the reasons to ditch the historicals, but this isn't the case. It fared better than The Tenth Planet - the model which Lloyd was to use for his vision for the programme. What The Gunfighters did get was the lowest Audience Appreciation figures.
Next time: there's a mad scientist at work in Atlantis, and nothing in the world is going to stop him...