The Meddling Monk is one of the Doctor’s oldest enemies, and one who hasn’t been seen on TV since 1966. Could now be the time for his return?
Strangely for such an important and ground-breaking character, the Meddling Monk has disappeared into relative obscurity since his first appearance in 1965’s ‘The Time Meddler.’ We say ‘ground-breaking’ because his character marked the first time that the Doctor encountered another member of his own race, the Time Lords, although of course, at this point in the series’ history, they weren’t referred to by that name.
In ‘The Time Meddler,’ the Meddling Monk is attempting to pervert the course of Earth history by tampering with the famous Battle of Hastings in 1066. He plans to destroy the Viking fleet before it reaches England, meaning that the famous Battle of Stamford Bridge will not take place. This was the fight which preceded the Battle of Hastings, when the English had to fight off William of Normandy and his invaders from France.
The Meddling Monk reasons that, with the Battle of Stamford Bridge having been averted, Harold Godwinson and his army will be better-placed to defeat William the Conqueror and win the Battle of Hastings, altering the course of human history. The Meddling Monk boasts that this slight alteration to the timeline will accelerate human development by centuries.
Of course, the Doctor cannot abide such scandalous interference, and sets about trying to defeat the Meddling Monk and keep history on track. And this is another reason why ‘The Time Meddler’ was such an important adventure. Prior to this, the established rules in Doctor Who about time travel were that “you can’t rewrite history, not one line!” as the Doctor himself had proclaimed in ‘The Aztecs,’ when his companion Barbara sought to change the nature of Aztec society.
But in the case of the Meddling Monk, the ‘rules’ appear to have been altered. Time can, indeed, be re-written, and it’s up to the Doctor and his friends to stop the renegade Time Lord in his tracks. As such (and ironically) ‘The Time Meddler’ actually changed the course of Doctor Who history, as this new rule became the standard, and it is now readily accepted in the Whoniverse that time can be re-written, apart from certain ‘fixed’ events which are unchangeable.
‘The Time Meddler’ was also interesting in that it actually showed the Meddling Monk’s TARDIS, which was similar in every way to the Doctor’s machine. This cemented the idea that such vehicles were commonplace on the Doctor’s home planet, but again, it did make an alteration to the established Doctor Who canon. Before ‘The Time Meddler,’ it was stated that the name TARDIS was invented by the Doctor’s granddaughter Susan, who made up the words based on the ship’s initials: Time and Relative Dimension in Space. But in this story, the word ‘TARDIS’ is used in such a way that it suggests that all of these machines bear this name.
This doesn’t mean that Susan couldn’t still have come up with the acronym, but it does stretch credulity somewhat. At the same time, the sight of another TARDIS in Doctor Who is an exciting moment, and the writer Dennis Spooner has fun with this idea in the final episode. The Doctor steals the Meddling Monk’s dimensional control, shrinking the TARDIS interior down to the size of a doll’s house, meaning that the Monk can neither get inside nor use his machine, and is therefore stranded in 1066.
However, such was the popularity of the Meddling Monk’s character, he was not stranded in the 11th century for long. The producers decided to bring him back in the following season for the epic ‘Daleks’ Master Plan,’ which spanned an eye-watering 12 episodes. The co-writer of this adventure was, again, Dennis Spooner, and he was reportedly the one who suggested bringing back the Meddling Monk. His thinking was that the Monk’s character could provide some much-needed comic relief to what was a fairly bleak adventure, as well as alleviating some of the pressure on William Hartnell who, by this stage in the show’s history, was struggling with the workload due to the long seasons and declining health.
Alas, we only have one of the Meddling Monk’s episodes from ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan‘ in the archive (episode 10) but it’s an important one as it marks the Meddling Monk’s final TV appearance in Doctor Who. In the episode, he is helping the Daleks in their battle against the Doctor, as he seeks revenge for being stranded in 1066. But once again, the Doctor gets the better of his interfering enemy and steals the directional control from the Monk’s TARDIS, leaving him unable to properly control his machine.
“Now I’ll have to wander through time and space as lost as he is,” he cries. “I’ll get you for this, Doctor! I’ll get you one day!”
Ironically, the Meddling Monk never did ‘get’ the Doctor, and this moment marked his final TV appearance in Doctor Who, possibly because of the actor Peter Butterworth’s subsequent fame in the Carry On film series. At the same time, in 1971 Doctor Who featured another renegade Time Lord in the shape of Roger Delgado’s Master. Perhaps the production team thought there wasn’t enough room in the Whoniverse for two evil Time Lords.
But like all great Doctor Who enemies, the Meddling Monk did see something of a revival in audio form at Big Finish, and even appeared in a female incarnation in 2021’s ‘The Wrong Woman’ as the Nun. But beyond that, the Meddling Monk has disappeared into obscurity in the Whoniverse, and hasn’t even been referenced in the TV show. So if there is any villain who is ripe for a revival, the Monk must surely be high on the list.
Would you like the Meddling Monk to return to the Whoniverse in the future? Let us know in the comments below.
I think I would prefer to see the return of the War Chief,putting to rest the fan theory that he is the Master.
I will like to see the Meddling Monk return to Doctor Who