Leela (Doctor Who)

Leela is a fictional character played by Louise Jameson in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Leela was a companion of the Fourth Doctor and a regular in the programme from 1977 to 1978. Writer Chris Boucher named her after the Palestinian hijacker Leila Khaled. Leela appeared in 9 stories (40 episodes).

Appearances

Television

Leela was the daughter of Sole. She first appears in the 1977 serial, The Face of Evil, where she was a warrior of the savage Sevateem tribe, who were amongst the descendants of the crew of an Earth ship from The Mordee Expedition that crash-landed on an unnamed planet in the far future. The name of her tribe, "Sevateem", was a corruption of "survey team". Although the Doctor at this point was content to travel alone, Leela barged into the TARDIS and continued to accompany the Doctor on his journeys.

Although Leela was a primitive, she was also highly intelligent, grasping advanced concepts easily and translating them into terms she could cope with. Despite the Doctor's attempts at "civilizing" her, however, Leela was strong-willed enough to continue in her ways. She usually dressed in animal skins, and was armed with a knife or a set of poisonous Janis thorns which she did not hesitate to use on people who threatened her, much to the Doctor's disapproval. Leela frequently demonstrated a highly accurate sense of danger.

Doctor Who (season 5)

The fifth season of British science fiction television series Doctor Who began on 2 September 1967 with the first story of season 5 The Tomb of the Cybermen and ended on 1 June 1968 with The Wheel in Space.

Casting

Main cast

Patrick Troughton, Frazer Hines and Deborah Watling appear as The Second Doctor, Jamie McCrimmon and Victoria Waterfield respectively. Deborah Watling departs in the penultimate story Fury from the Deep. Wendy Padbury makes her debut as Zoe Heriot in the season finale, The Wheel in Space.

Guest stars

Jack Watling makes his first and last appearances in the series as Professor Edward Travers in the serials The Abominable Snowmen and The Web of fear. Watling would go on to reprise his role of Travers thirty years on in the spin-off TV film Downtime.

Michael Kilgarriff makes his first appearance as the Cyber-Controller in Tomb of the Cybermen. Kilgarriff would reprise the role eighteen years later in Attack of the Cybermen (1985).

Doctor Who (season 13)

The thirteenth season of British science fiction television series Doctor Who began on 30 August 1975 with the story Terror of the Zygons, and ended with The Seeds of Doom.

Casting

Main cast

Tom Baker continued his role as The Fourth Doctor along with Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen). Harry Sullivan, played by Ian Marter, departed in Terror of the Zygons and reappeared in The Android Invasion as a guest star.

Recurring cast

Nicholas Courtney returned as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart in Terror of the Zygons having last appeared in Robot. John Levene makes his final appearance as Sergeant Benton in The Android Invasion after six years in the role.

Serials

Terror of the Zygons was produced as part of the production schedule for Season 12, but was held for transmission from the end of that season to the beginning of Season 13, to coincide with a move from the new season starting at the beginning of the calendar year, to starting in late summer. Terror of the Zygons was also the last appearance of the Brigadier until Mawdryn Undead in Season 20. The season took a transmission break of two weeks over the Christmas 1975 period, between the broadcasts of The Android Invasion and The Brain of Morbius.

Doctor Who (season 7)

The seventh season of British science fiction television series Doctor Who began on 3 January 1970 with Jon Pertwee's first story Spearhead from Space and ended with Inferno.

Casting

Main cast

Jon Pertwee makes his first appearance as the Third Doctor replacing Patrick Troughton in the role. Caroline John makes her first appearance as companion and assistant Liz Shaw in Spearhead from Space and last in Inferno.

Recurring cast

Nicholas Courtney returns as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and he would continue to make regular appearances in Doctor Who until season 13.

John Levene also makes his first appearance as Sergeant Benton since The Invasion in The Ambassadors of Death and would continue to make regular appearances until season 13.

Serials

Barry Letts took over as producer from Derrick Sherwin after Spearhead from Space. From this season onwards the programme was produced in colour. To accommodate the new production methods the number of episodes in a season was cut: season 6 has 44 episodes; season 7 has 25 episodes. The seasons would continue to have between 20 and 26 episodes until season 22. Following the opening four parter, the remaining episodes were divided into three serials each of seven episodes. This, along with setting the entire season exclusively on Earth, had been the choice of Peter Bryant and Derrick Sherwin, which Letts and script editor Terrance Dicks were unhappy with.

Leela (2002 film)

Leela is a 2002 drama film directed by Somnath Sen. The movie stars Dimple Kapadia and Deepti Naval. The film's story is loosely based on Summer of '42. The film premiered at Reel World Film Festivalm, Toronto, in 2005. It also was featured in the 2002 edition of the IAAC Film Festival, conducted by the Indian diaspora, which works to showcase the Indian films to the West.

Plot

Leela is a professor from Bombay. Married to a popular poet, her life has always been prefixed with the title 'Nashaad's wife'. She wins a chance to be sent as a visiting professor to California, where she rediscovers herself, the woman she is, beyond the duties of a wife that she had always devoted her life to. Kris comes as a bright sunshine in her life, who makes her realise her own desires, the desires of the body. Is it going to be an happily ever after fairy tale? Or another Bollywood melodrama?

Cast

Dr. Who (Dalek films)

Dr. Who is a character based on the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. Although based on the Doctor appearing in the TV series, the film version of the character is fundamentally different.

The character, portrayed by the actor Peter Cushing, appeared in two films made by AARU Productions: Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965), which was based on the televised serial The Daleks (1963), and Daleks – Invasion Earth: 2150 A.D. (1966), based on The Dalek Invasion of Earth (1964). Plans for a third film, to be based on the serial The Chase (1965), were abandoned following the poor box office reception of the second film.

Cushing made no mention of the films in his autobiography, although he kept a collection of newspaper clippings about them in a scrapbook.

Personality

Dr. Who, as portrayed by Cushing, is an eccentric inventor who claims to have created his TARDIS in his back garden. He is a gentle, grandfatherly figure, naturally curious and sometimes absent-minded, but at the same time is not afraid to fight for justice. He is shown to have a keen and somewhat juvenile sense of humour, and a strong sense of adventure with a will of iron and very strong morals.

Eighth Doctor

The Eighth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who. He is portrayed by Paul McGann.

The character was introduced in the 1996 TV film Doctor Who, a back-door pilot produced in an unsuccessful attempt to relaunch the series following its 1989 cancellation. While the Eighth Doctor initially had only one on-screen appearance, his adventures were portrayed extensively in subsequent spin-off media, including more than 70 audio dramas starring McGann. In 2013, the actor reprised the role in the mini-episode "The Night of the Doctor", which depicts the Eighth Doctor's final adventure.

Within the series' narrative, the Doctor is a centuries-old alien, a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey, who travels in time and space in his TARDIS, frequently with companions. When the Doctor is critically injured, he can regenerate his body but in doing so gains a new physical appearance and with it, a distinct new personality. McGann portrays the eighth such incarnation, a passionate, enthusiastic, and eccentric character. His only companion in the television film is Grace Holloway (Daphne Ashbrook), a medical doctor whose surgery is partly responsible for triggering his regeneration. In the continued adventures of the character depicted in audio dramas, novels and comic books he travels alongside numerous other companions, including self-styled "Edwardian Adventuress" Charley, the alien Destrii and present-day humans Lucie and Sam.