The history of Doctor Who is littered with one-hit wonders. Many creatures were set up to be the next Daleks, only to never be seen again in the series. This is the first of an infrequent series, tying in with the relevant "Episodes" posts, where we look at what happened to some of these also-rans...
The Keys of Marinus was the only television story to feature the Voord. The reasons for this are explained in yesterday's "Episode 26: The Keys of Marinus" post.
Naturally the BBC would not have known in 1964 that the Voord were not coming back, so were happy for them to be exploited. Following his lucrative agreement for the commercial exploitation of the Daleks, Terry Nation would have been more than pleased to have a second cash-cow on his books.
The first post-Keys of Marinus appearance for the Voord came later in 1964 in a storyline known simply as "Doctor Who and the Daleks". There were actually two stories, told over 50 cards which came free with sweet cigarettes from the Cadet company. Voord feature in the first of these.
Cards 1 - 25 tell of the Doctor's return to Marinus, where the Voord are at war with the Daleks. The Voord then enter into an alliance with the Daleks to go to Earth and find a great power source. They will travel in a huge Voord spaceship, with the Doctor their prisoner. He discovers that the Daleks intend to turn on the Voord as soon as they get what they are after. He informs the Chief Voord. A fight breaks out in which the Daleks destroy the ship, but the Doctor is able to use an escape pod to get to Earth, along with the Chief Voord. Arriving in the jungles of South America, the Doctor saves the Chief Voord from alligators. The pair agree to join forces against the Daleks. The Chief lures the Daleks into a trap (poisoned mushrooms!), but is killed himself when a Dalek hoverbout crashes onto him.
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The second half of the story featured only the Daleks, including a trip to Skaro and a meeting with the golden domed Emperor from the TV Century 21 comic strips.
The Doctor is represented by an odd figure who wears a strange futuristic costume and colourful cloak.
The action on Cards 1 - 25 starts on Marinus, but here the Voord are presented as a space-faring race. Their huge spaceship is so advanced, the Daleks favour it over one of their own to travel to Earth. The Voord leader is referred to as "Chief". None of them appear to have the strange antenna-like shapes on their heads as see on TV.
Their next appearance was the cover of the first ever Dr Who Annual from World Distributors. Covering the year 1966, this was issued in September 1965. William Hartnell's Doctor was seen in close-up in the foreground, and behind him in a moon-like setting were creatures familiar from TV stories - a Sensorite, a Zarbi, a Menoptra and, at the back, a Voord.
Within the book was a story called "The Fishmen of Kandalinga". The accompanying artwork was by Walter Howarth.
The TARDIS lands underwater on the planet of Kandalinga and the Doctor moves it to dry land, where he meets a race of amphibious Fishmen. A flying barge appears and lands on the shore, and Voord emerge. The Doctor is captured and taken to the barge for interrogation. When he shouts to be released the interrogator demands that he keep the noise down, and the Doctor realises that the Voord are susceptible to loud noise and communicate telepathically via the antenna on their heads.
The next time we saw the Voord was in comic form, in the story "The World-Shapers". This Sixth Doctor tale appeared in DWM issues 127 - 129, in the summer of 1987. It has subsequently been released in compilation form.
The events seen in "The World-Shapers" would be 'canonised' in the 2017 TV episode The Doctor Falls. Here the Twelfth Doctor states that Cybermen can evolve anywhere humans are to be found, not just on the planet Mondas. He specifically mentions Marinus as one of the places where Cybermen have come into being. However, whilst the comic strip claimed that Marinus and Planet 14 (first mentioned in The Invasion) are one and the same, the TV story says that Planet 14 is a wholly different world. It should also be noted that the Cyber-Director told Tobias Vaughn about Planet 14, when neither the Doctor nor Jamie were present.
The Doctor learns that the Voord were forced to flee from Marinus and crash-landed here on Kandalinga. They are attempting to create an artificial land mass on which to settle. The Fishmen are their slaves, who will be killed when their usefulness is over.
The Voord plan to return to Marinus and avenge themselves on the people who expelled them - the Arbitans. The interrogator has travel dials and wants to use these to take the Doctor to the TARDIS, thinking the Voord will be able to strip it for useful parts. He controls the other Voord and keeps the Fishmen docile with his telepathic powers. Only he insists on returning to Marinus - the others having little interest.
The Doctor attacks this lead Voord and snaps off his antenna, leaving him unable to sense what is going on around him. Freed from his mental control, the Fishmen turn against the Voord and destroy them.
Clearly the writer has seen the TV story, or is familiar with the script at the very least. We have reference to Marinus and the inclusion of travel dials. Again, a single Voord seems to dominate the others. The people of Marinus are given the overall title of Arbitans, named for the character played by George Coulouris - unless they are just followers of Arbitan who expelled them.
The Voord here are definitely portrayed as rubbery black alien creatures rather than men in suits. Something new is that the strange geometric shapes on their helmets are said to be an antenna, allowing for telepathic communication. On TV, Yartek did not have one of these antenna
The suggestion must be that this story marks the end of the Voord.
The Doctor, Peri and Frobisher arrive on Marinus long after the events of The Keys of Marinus. They are responding to a distress signal coming from another TARDIS. Its dying owner mentions "Planet 14" before expiring. They discover that there is a temporal disturbance on the planet, with time apparently running fast.
The Doctor heads to Earth to find Jamie McCrimmon, who was with him when Planet 14 was last mentioned. Jamie is now an old man, thought crazy because of his tales of other planets.
All travel back to Marinus to discover that the world has changed drastically in the space of a week. The oceans have dried up, and the Voord are transforming into Cybermen.
A device known as a World-Shaper is responsible for all this - rapidly evolving the planet, including turning the Voord into Cybermen. This is the 14th planet visited by it. The Doctor realises that the device would prove to be a powerful weapon in the hands of the Cybermen. Jamie sacrifices himself to destroy it. The Doctor wants to tackle the Cybermen but is prevented from doing so by the arrival of other Time Lords.
It transpires that they want the Cybermen to evolve rapidly as one day they will transcend their physical forms and actually become a force for peace across the universe. The Doctor has stormed off before he learns of this future.
Finally, bringing things more up to date, the Voord have - inevitably - featured in a couple of Big Finish audios - "Domain of the Voord" which featured the original TARDIS crew, and "Beachhead" with the Eighth Doctor.
They have also appeared in novels, though never in a principal role, and the odd comic book.
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