The Doctor has come across several nemesis throughout their lifetime, considering the various iterations of the character in the BBC series that has run for six decades already. One of their nemesis is coming back in the most recent Doctor Who spinoff.
Doctor Who is one of the longest-running sci-fi franchises and will be celebrating its 60th anniversary in November. The series has scored a number of spinoffs and featured numerous villains. One of them will appear in its newest spinoffs. According to producer David Richardson, they have been planning to bring back the said character and finally, it will be joining the Eighth Doctor (Paul McGann) in his most recent adventure.
In the upcoming episode of Doctor Who – The Eighth Doctor Adventures: Deadly Strangers titled “The Gloaming,” the Mara will return to bring chaos. The villain made its debut in the show in Doctor Who’s “Kinda” episode, which aired in 1982, and returned in “Snakedance.” The Mara is an ancient and evil entity that takes the form of a snake-like creature preying on hosts through their dreams. In the audio episode, the Mara will find a perfect place for its return — a luxury sleep clinic where the wealthy rest amid their turmoil in their planets. This gives the Mara the perfect environment to infiltrate its victims. The Eight Doctor, his companions Lady Audacity Montague (Jaye Griffiths), and Charley (India Fisher) arrive in Gloaming and soon realize that an old enemy is back.
“We’ve been wanting to bring the Mara back to Doctor Who for a while now, and I thought it would be interesting to see how they would work in the context of a different TARDIS team,” Richardson explained about the villain’s return to the series through the spinoff, Digital Spy reported. “Every previous TV and audio tale has focused on the fantastic Fifth Doctor team, but it’s good to shake things up and here it’s the Eighth Doctor and his friends who face their malign influence.” Lauren Mooney, who co-wrote the said episode, said the Mara will open Audacity’s insecurities because the Eighth Doctor and Charley have a long history, and she is new to the team. Co-writer Stewart Pringle was excited to bring back the Mara, who reportedly had literary influences. “It’s been so exciting to dive back into ‘Kinda’ and ‘Snakedance,’ two incredible stories, and also into the world and the mythology that Christopher Bailey wrote for the Mara, which is this incredibly deep and very literate conceptual world, heavily influenced by modernist poetry, TS Eliot in particular,” Pringle said. He added that they wanted to “lean deeper into that and the idea of the Mara as a creature that emerges at the death of an empire.”
The Mara is one of the most exciting villains in Doctor Who. Its ability to manipulate emotions, fear, and insecurity taps into the show’s psychological horror genre. It feeds on one’s weaknesses and plays one’s mind, making it a powerful symbol of one’s emotional and mental battles. Also, the episodes “Kinda” and “Snakedance” were thought-provoking and unconventional and were among the episodes that solid Doctor Who fans loved to revisit. The Mara’s return is a blend of nostalgia, thrill, and psychological horror that will surely leave an impression on the audience.