NICHOLAS COURTNEY - IN MEMORIAL

Hard to believe that it's been four years since Doctor Who lost one its greatest stars - the Brigadier himself, Nicholas Courtney.

December 16th 1929, William Nicholas Stone Courtney was born in Cairo, Egypt, the son of a British diplomat. Courtney went into acting in the late '50s after eighteen months of National Service as a private. His first television role was in 1957. He first brush with Doctor Who came in 1965 was he played Brett Vyon in the twelve-part serial, The Daleks' Masterplan (although prior to that he was considered for the role of Richard the Lionheart in The Crusade). He returned to Doctor Who in 1968 in the six-part serial The Web of Fear as the intended one-off role of Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart of the Scots Guards. He was cast by Douglas 'Dougie' Camfield, the same director who had earlier considered him for the role of Richard the Lionheart. The happenstance that brought him to the role of Lethbridge-Stewart is something that cannot be forgotten, since it led him to him returning the following year as the now-promoted Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, commander of the British devision of UNIT in The Invasion. 

It was a role that would see him returning as a semi-regular cast member for the following six years, right up until 1975s Terror of the Zygons. Neither Courtney nor the Brigadier were ever forgotten, and both returned in 1983 for two appearances alongside Peter Davison's Doctor and reuniting him with both Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee in The Five Doctors. He returned once more to television Doctor Who in 1989 to star alongside Sylvester McCoy in Battelfield. Although the character never returned to Doctor Who, he was never forgotten and made appearances in many short stories, comics and novels over the following years. Courtney even returned to the role in several audio dramas produced by Big Finish. The character has been mentioned several times since Doctor Who returned in 2005, and Courtney even returned as Brigadier Sir Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart in the spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures in 2008. Ill health prevented any further appearances, and shortly after his death in 2011, the passing of the Brigadier was noted on screen in the episode The Wedding of River Song.

The legacy of the character continues, of course, in the shape of Kate Lethbridge-Stewart, now head of UNIT in the current series. She has appeared three times since 2012, and will return later this year in the opening episodes of series nine and later heading her own audio series of adventures for Big Finish.

Although the Brigadier himself is no longer with us, Candy Jar Books are all set to chronicle the history of this legendary character in the Lethbridge-Stewart series of novels, the first of which can be ordered directly from Candy Jar now (any orders now taken will be dispatched almost immediately) and is officially launched on Thursday 26th February (only four days away!) with an event at The Who Shop in London on Saturday 28th (in attendance will be author and range editor Andy Frankham-Allen, licensor Hannah Haisman, Terrance Dicks [the script editor who oversaw most of Nicholas Courtney's appearances during the late '60s and 1970s] and Ralph Watson who played Captain Knight alongside Courtney in The Web of Fear. Also popping by will be other Lethbridge-Stewart authors David A McIntee, Nick Walters and Jonathan Cooper).

Please do enjoy the following video put together by BabelColour, and remember that legend that was, and always will be, Nicholas Courtney.

We salute you, Nick!

HANNAH HAISMAN - MERVYN & ME

It's Christmas... well, almost. And we have a special gift from all of us at Candy Jar Books, to all of you at home. A follow-up interview with Hannah Haisman, who is now able to talk more freely about Lethbridge-Stewart and her grandfather's inspirations... now the cat is out of the bag, as Sir Alistair would say.

Mervyn and Hannah Haisman

Type 40: First, how does it feel knowing that Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, a character your grandfather helped to create almost forty-seven years ago, is about to make a grand literary return for a new generation of Doctor Who fans?

Hannah: It is very exciting indeed! I am extremely proud that Lethbridge-Stewart is held in such high regard with Doctor Who fans. There has been a lot of positive feedback on social media over the release of these novels and I am truly humbled that fans old and new cannot wait for a character my grandfather co-created to make a literary comeback.

Type 40: In your previous interview with Type 40 you talked a lot about your early memories of your grandfather. Can you share with us some your earliest memories of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart?

Hannah: To be honest, I never really had early memories of Lethbridge-Stewart. Doctor Who was a snapshot in time of my grandfather’s writing career, one that only spanned a period of a few years. The first memory I have is when organising his literary estate and compiling a record of all the works and characters he created.

Type 40: In your earlier interview you also mentioned your grandfather’s deep love for books and literature. Did he have any particularly favourite stories in his collection? Do you know of any stories that may have inspired him to help craft the character of Lethbridge-Stewart?

Hannah: Most of the books in his study were for research purposes, ranging from historical to spiritual, travel to black magic! As for stories that inspired the creation of Lethbridge-Stewart, I think that was more down to his time in the army than any book on his shelf, but I feel he based the character, as he usually did, on someone he knew or had met. Certainly when the Brigadier barks orders, I reminded of my grandfather. 

Colonel Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart

Type 40: All characters, like people, have a name and the Brigadier has an especially dignified one. Do you know anything of how your grandfather came up with the name for Lethbridge-Stewart? I have heard before that the original surname was simply Lethbridge.

Hannah: Lethbridge-Stewart was created over fifteen years before I was born, and growing up Doctor Who wasn’t really talked about, in fact none of my grandfather's work was. Although he was passionate about writing, it was a job. It was only in his twilight years that we sat and talked about things that he had done. Looking back, I wish I had asked him so many more questions. If I had, I would be in a better position to fill in the gaps!

Type 40: Was there ever a point where you realised that in creating the character of the Brigadier your grandfather had also created a television icon?

Hannah: Not until recently! It was only when I had die-hard Doctor Who fans tell me the importance of Lethbridge-Stewart. I’m being educated in the importance of certain characters and thankfully Andy (Frankham-Allen, range editor of Lethbridge-Stewart) has been brilliant. I know by this statement some people will recoil in horror, but I didn’t see my grandfather as a creator of icons. To me he was the icon.

Type 40: Many people credit Nicholas Courtney’s performance as Lethbridge-Stewart as the source of the Brigadier’s popularity. Certainly the actor’s forty-one year association in playing the role is a testament to his incredible contribution to the character. Did your grandfather ever discuss his thoughts on Courtney’s performance in the role?

Hannah: The last time I visited my grandfather, we sat up till 3am just chatting. He spoke about the Doctor Who years and his other credits. He was very vocal about those he liked and those he didn’t! He didn’t go into detail of his thoughts on an individual’s performance, but I know that out of the three series he penned, Lethbridge-Stewart was a character he felt fondly about. This was probably due to the way Mr Courtney brought him to life.

Type 40: Did you ever have the chance to meet Mr Courtney and what do you feel he brought to the character of the Lethbridge-Stewart?

Hannah: Unfortunately I never had that honour. I feel that the role couldn’t have been played any better by any other actor, and Mr Courtney is as much of an icon as Lethbridge-Stewart himself.

Type 40: Due to the BBC’s now defunct policy of destroying film to conserve storage space, many Doctor Who episodes from the 1960s are currently missing from the BBC archives. Because of this sad loss of material, The Web of Fear was thought to be lost to viewers. But just last year most of the missing episodes from that story were triumphantly returned to the BBC and have since been released on DVD. For many fans this was their first time to see Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart in action. How did it feel to learn that one of your grandfather’s Doctor Who adventures was available again to see and enjoy?

Hannah: I was over the moon when I found out that most of that story had been found. Nobody from the BBC had told me of this momentous news; I found out the same time as the general public. My twitter feed went crazy on the news of its release and I suppose that was the first time I realised just what grandad had created, and what part he had played in the formative years of Doctor Who.

Type 40: Have you since seen The Web of Fear, and if so, what are your thoughts on the adventure?

Hannah: I re-watched watched it today in preparation for this interview, and I have to admit, I love it! In a way it is like watching a ghost as I can see so much of my grandfather and other people in certain characters. Examples of this would be Ann Travers; she is very like my grandmother in her speech and mannerisms, and I can see a lot of my grandfather in the Doctor and Professor Travers. I have reasons to believe, from conversations I had with my grandfather about his time working on The Web of Fear, that Chorley’s character is loosely based on Derrick Sherwin!

Anne Travers, inspired by Mervyn's wife.

Type 40: The Web of Fear also featured as its monster the Great Intelligence and its robotic Yeti, which your grandfather co-created for the 1967 Doctor Who adventure The Abominable Snowmen, which is sadly still missing from the BBC archives. Whereas abominable snowmen are the stuff of myths and legends, the Intelligence, a formless, shapeless eternal entity, was a very novel concept your grandfather introduced to the world of Doctor Who. Can you give us any insight into what inspired him to create such an intriguing character?

Hannah: My grandfather’s parents were very spiritual people, which before the war was rare. The majority of people back then were either Catholic or Christian, but after the untimely death of my grandfather’s sister Stella, the family found the Spiritualist movement, in particular Buddhism. When looking at the beliefs of Buddhists, they include a belief in an infinite intelligence, a continuous existence of the human soul where energy will change form to spirit and that the spiritual world penetrates the material world on a different dimension. It was this belief that formed the central concept of the Great Intelligence, something I feel was lacking in its most recent television appearances.

Type 40: Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart and a few other familiar faces from The Web of Fear will be returning next year in The Forgotten Son, the first book for the new Lethbridge-Stewart novel range. What has been your involvement in the development of this upcoming series?

Hannah: After chatting with Andy, he introduced me to Candy Jar Books, where we discussed the possibility of me granting the rights to use Lethbridge-Stewart. I have given Candy Jar complete creative control over the characters and concepts my grandfather created for Doctor Who. I chat very regularly with Andy, and he consulted me when he put together the official timeline for the Great Intelligence, and I’m being kept in the loop with other authors. Most of all, I trust the authors and if I have any questions, they are more than happy to talk me through them.

Type 40: Without giving too much away about the future of the series, can we expect to see some appearance of other Doctor Who characters and concepts associated with Lethbridge-Stewart along the way, such as UNIT, Cybermen, or – dare we hope – the Doctor?

Hannah: Never say never! I think you will see certain characters and concepts owned by various authors, but I’ve been sworn to secrecy!

Type 40: Although Nicholas Courtney died nearly four years ago and the character of the Brigadier was declared dead three years ago, it seems Lethbridge-Stewart is alive once more, but now as a Cyberman. Were you surprised to see Lethbridge-Stewart’s return as one of first monsters he faced onscreen?

Hannah: It is documented that I haven’t been a life-long Doctor Who fan, but, under orders from Andy, I watched Death in Heaven and as soon as the Twelfth Doctor saluted the Cyberman, I got it. I was very surprised and more than happy to see Lethbridge-Stewart return as a Cyberman; I really wasn’t expecting that and I don’t think the fans were either.

Type 40: In your last interview with Type 40, you expressed your feelings of joy at the Brigadier’s unexpected return but also your clear opinion that he should not remain as a Cyberman (and yes, those monsters still make me hide, too) but perhaps as a sort of ‘higher consciousness’ to aid his daughter in future episodes. Do you think it might be possible we may yet see the Brigadier again in Doctor Who, perhaps even with a new actor, fighting alongside the Doctor?

Hannah: It would be nice to see the spirit of Lethbridge-Stewart live on, but it would have to be done right for it to work. If you have ever lost someone who is close, there are times when you feel their presence with you. If it were to be done, it would have to be in that way and not as a Cyberman!

Type 40: Now seems to be a time when the character of Lethbridge-Stewart is rising once more in popularity and awareness amongst Doctor Who fans. What do you feel makes your grandfather’s character so special and so beloved and, I would say, even immortal?

Hannah: I really couldn’t pinpoint what it is. My grandfather wrote his best works when he believed in the characters. When a writer believes in the characters he creates and the part is cast to the right actor, as it was with Nicholas Courtney, the character becomes believable and even more special amongst fans. With Lethbridge-Stewart it was a combination of the two – great writing and a great performance. My grandfather could not have hoped for a better legacy, and alongside Candy Jar Books and Andy, we’ll make sure it continues to be honoured.

Interview conducted by Chris McKeon, co-author of Time's Champion (with Craig Hinton).

Lethbridge-Stewart begins in February with The Forgotten Son, set directly after The Web of Fear. Pre-order it now from Candy Jar Books.

Or you can pre-order the first four books in the series. 

They are;

The Forgotten Son by Andy Frankham-Allen
Horror of Det-Sen by Lance Parkin
The Schizoid Earth by David A McIntee
Mutually Assured Domination by Nick Walters

More exclusive interviews with the creative minds behind Lethbridge-Stewart coming up over the next two months. The New Year begins with Simon Williams, the cover artist, who will discuss his career with Marvel UK and own original projects.

Until then, a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS to all our readers at home, from Hannah Haisman, Andy Frankham-Allen, Shaun Russell, Lance Parkin, David A McIntee, Nick Walters, Simon Williams, and everybody at Candy Jar Books!

BEST BRIGADIER STORY

Everybody loves the Brigadier, but what are your favourite stories? Please vote below (you can vote for more than one story). The poll will run until the New Year, at which point the results shall be announced.

TV Stories

The Web of Fear

The Invasion

Spearhead from Space

The Silurians

Inferno

Terror of the Autons

The Mind of Evil

The Claws of Axos

The Daemons

Day of the Daleks

The Time Monster

The Three Doctors

The Green Death

The Time Warrior

Invasion of the Dinosaurs

Planet of the Spiders

Robot

Terror of the Zygons

Mawdryn Undead

The Five Doctors

Battlefield

Enemy of the Bane

Poll Maker

Lethbridge-Stewart series now available for pre-order...

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO... THE BRIGADIER, part 3

Chris McKeon returns with the third and final part of his look at the Brigadier's influence, and absence, in Nu Who. Taking us full circle, back to his very first appearance.

My Dad often has this perspective to share: ‘If you don’t have a health problem, you don’t have a problem.’ Well, Nicholas Courtney had a problem, and a pretty terrible one. In January 2009, the legendary actor suffered a stroke and therefore could no longer take part in filming his return appearance for The Sarah Jane Adventures, series three. When that two-part adventure aired on 29 and 30 October 2009, the Tenth Doctor alone saved Sarah. Sir Alistair was again on assignment in Peru.

Nicholas Courtney - a true gentleman.

Over five years after this televised loss, I still cannot completely describe or dwell upon how much Courtney’s absence devastated my feelings as a fan and as a person. As a Brigadier fan I was heartbroken, shocked and deep in mourning: what should have been a celebrated reunion between two beloved television icons became an omission, an emptiness, an inexplicable loss. Even when Clyde Langer informed the viewer of Sir Alistair’s Peruvian whereabouts during Sarah’s wedding I felt my emotions almost swell with helpless turmoil. Even now, I still feel that story should have given the Brigadier’s absence a greater sense of loss and longing, maybe at least one moment where the Tenth Doctor asks someone, ‘Where’s the Brigadier?’

But on the personal level I felt worse for Nicholas Courtney and his well-being. I was not a personal friend or a family friend, or even a distant acquaintance, but the man and his character had been and still was – and is – one of my childhood heroes, perhaps in some ways more than the Doctor, simply because there was only one Sir Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart. And it was suddenly very real that he was a nearly eighty-year-old man.

One silver-lining in this darkening time for Brigadier fans was when the character managed to make one final on-screen appearance in a BBC-produced mini-episode, Liberty Hall, filmed in the early autumn of 2008 as part of the Mawdryn Undead DVD release for the following year. The nostalgic, seven-minute story features the Brigadier’s return to Brendan School to share some vague details of his storied UNIT career with a local reporter, including some sly references to the 1995 BBV-produced drama Downtime, as well as a few of the Big Finish audio adventures. When I watched that mini-episode I felt such a joyous swell to see Nicholas Courtney in, if not action, then at least in presence once more.

Sir Alistair returns for 'Liberty Hall'

But every presence, no matter how welcome, fades to black, even for the Brigadier. Nicholas Courtney’s health struggles in 2009 and 2010 are now a matter of public record and private feelings, and of which I don’t wish to dwell too much. It suffices to write that although the good man eventually recovered from his stroke and bravely continued to attend various conventions and public appearances throughout 2009, by the early months of 2010 he announced an even graver health condition, that of cancer. This affliction was the final monster, the last battle for the storied gentleman and cultural hero, who entered hospice care in the final days of 2010 before dying peacefully on 22 February, 2011.

Before his death Nicholas Courtney never returned to Doctor Who or The Sarah Jane Adventures, although the character was mentioned once more during Courtney’s lifetime in latter programme’s fourth series adventure Death of the Doctor (according to Russell T Davies’s book The Writer’s Tale, Courtney was approached to feature in that story but the actor’s then rapidly failing health prohibited any further filming). In the months following Courtney’s death there was a tremendous online outpouring of grief and remembrance for the actor as a professional and as a gentleman. I was at the time too devastated to share my feelings too much online, but almost exactly a year later I had the privilege of being selected to participate in the Nicholas Courtney tribute panel at the GallifreyOne convention in Los Angeles, California in February 2012. It was there I had the chance, before a few kind people, to share how much Nicholas Courtney and his famous character had meant to me as a child and as a young adult: that alongside my Dad and Grandfathers, I wanted to be the type of person that Nicholas Courtney had been, someone good and kind of whom other people spoke well. And I told the audience that it was my childhood dream to be not like the Doctor but to be like the Brigadier.

In the months following Nicholas Courtney’s there as for me as a Doctor Who fan a sense of deep loss but also of cautious hope. For even without Nicholas Courtney  to return onscreen as the Brigadier there was the knowledge that the series would continue and in such a vast and ever-possible vault of fiction there was still room for some future expectations. Indeed, I consoled myself with the certainty that although the actor had died the character of the Brigadier was still alive out there in the Doctor’s reality and perhaps would reunite with the Eleventh Doctor and his successors one future day in other story-telling media, such as the comics, novels or audiobooks.

But when the finale for Doctor Who’s sixth series, The Wedding of River Song, aired on 1 October 2011, I received one of the worst shocks I have ever experienced as a Doctor Who fan. Matt Smith’s Doctor learned by telephone that the Brigadier had died some months earlier. I will be very honest: although at the time I could see why the series decided to pay tribute to Courtney’s passing by having the Brigadier also pass away, I also felt it was somehow wrong or off. Perhaps it was how the Brigadier died that disturbed me: he waited every day for the Doctor’s return but the Doctor never came. Or perhaps it was the sense that there was no need to kill off the character of the Brigadier in-universe to honour the actor’s passing, such as when the series had honoured the passing of Elisabeth Sladen with a memorial title card after the airing of The Impossible Astronaut but explicitly kept Sladen’s character of Sarah alive in later-produced spin-off media. It may be enough to say that I hope not to see another Doctor Who episode with the words ‘The Wedding of’ in its title.

Now I am still a Doctor Who fan and I will be always be a fan. But I cannot deny that on some emotional level I enjoy the programme less without the Brigadier, without the chance that maybe, perhaps, possibly, somewhere, some-when, the character can and might return. Not even the main-series debut of Sir Alistair’s daughter Kate in the series seven episode The Power of Three on 22 September 2012 could shift my sense that something fundamental was missing within the contextual structure and sentiment of Doctor Who. Perhaps that sense stems from my perception that Kate Stewart oversees a very different, almost overly-scientific version of UNIT, or perhaps it is my extreme difficulty in believing that even in his final days Sir Alistair would ever declare that science leads over soldiering. Or maybe, at the end of the day, a cosmos without the Brigadier is just unthinkable.

This thought brings me to a final point of discussion regarding the Brigadier’s status in the new series. When Doctor Who’s eighth series concluded on 8 November 2014 there was already a massive stir and shift amongst fandom, thanks to the introduction of a new, female version of the Master (which definitely holds enough material for another article). During the episode Death in Heaven, the Twelfth Doctor, as played by Peter Capaldi, was reunited once more Kate Stewart and UNIT. As had happened when Kate and UNIT appeared in the 50th anniversary episode The Day of the Doctor, there was a lovely picture of Lethbridge-Stewart on display to recall the great man’s legacy. And then, without going into too much detail for those who haven’t yet seen the episode, both Kate and the Doctor’s life were in turn saved by a lone Cyberman, a Cyberman who somehow reminded Kate of her father and who reminded the Doctor of his oldest friend.

The Doctor salutes Sir Alistair, finally.

I cannot yet say exactly how I feel about this moment. On the one hand there is the distinct sense that the Brigadier is still alive and out there in the Doctor’s reality once more, which should give me nothing but joy. But I cannot forget that this version of Sir Alistair came about through a rather gruesome and horrific process of Cyber-Conversion, and that what remains is arguably not the Brigadier at all but a friendly ghost. And the thought of Sir Alistair as an eternally wandering ghost is too terrible to consider. I suppose my best takeaway thought is while I am grateful for some version of the Brigadier, I don’t really want to see CyberBrig again.

All I know for certain is that the Doctor needs Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart and Doctor Who needs the Brigadier. I know I am not the only fan who holds this to be true. When the announcement came in October 2013 that nine previously-thought lost Second Doctor television episodes had been discovered in Africa, what I read in blog posts and forum exclamations to be the most tangible and ebullient rejoicing amongst fandom was that five of these recovered episodes were from The Web of Fear, the very first appearance of Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart. I feel that one particular YouTube comment that I read summarizes this sensational time perfectly: ‘The Brigadier. I’m going to cry.’ And I’m not ashamed to say when I saw The Web of Fear for the first time I cried, too.

So now, with the first of Lethbridge-Stewart’s episodes restored and the most recent episode of Doctor Who featuring a return-of-sorts of the Brigadier, it feels that now is a time of rising and renewed interest in the Doctor’s best military friend. And in a few short months there will be a new narration of the Brigadier’s life: On 8 December 2014, Type 40’s own Andy Frankham-Allen announced the upcoming publication of the Lethbridge-Stewart novels, which will cover the events in the Brigadier’s life after the events of The Web of Fear. The series has received full approval and licensing from the estate of Mervyn Haisman and the endorsement of Henry Lincoln, who are the co-creators of Lethbridge-Stewart. The first novel, titled The Forgotten Son, will be available out on 22 February 2015, the fourth anniversary of Nicholas Courtney’s death, and will also feature the return of the Great Intelligence, the principal villain of the classic series adventures The Abominable Snowmen and The Web of Fear, as well as the 2012/2013 series episodes The Snowmen and The Name of the Doctor. I’m looking forward to purchasing my copy of this and subsequent novels and I’m confident that through this book range new fans of Doctor Who will come to learn just how fundamentally important Lethbridge-Stewart is to the programme.

Returning to where it all began...

And this now begs the question: will the Brigadier return again? Before Death in Heaven I would have said no, at least not onscreen. But now that Steven Moffat has, to be very honest, risked the feelings of fandom by reviving and cyber-converting one of the programme’s most, if not the most, beloved iconic characters after already giving the character an on-screen farewell, then it easily stands to reason that he could and perhaps should recast the role. And who could possibly fill Nicholas Courtney’s UNIT boots? That, like all important and, I feel, necessary decisions I leave to the experts, just as long as they make sure he can hit five rounds rapid.

RARE VIDEO INTERVIEW WITH NICHOLAS COURTNEY

A rare treat for fans of the Brigadier... An uncut interview with Nicholas Courtney from 1996, filmed shortly after the Doctor Who TV Movie was transmitted, and conducted by Shaun Russell, editor-in-chief of Candy Jar Books.

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO... THE BRIGADIER, part one

Our Brigadier theme continues with a new three-part article looking at the Brigadier's presence, or lack thereof, in the series since it returned in 2005, with guest contributor, Chris McKeon...

I am a Doctor Who fan. Although this is always special to say in late 2014 it is nothing unique to state – since the program’s return to television in early 2005 (or really mid-2004 if you were lucky enough to see Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper filming in person) practically everyone in the world is either a fan of the show or will be tomorrow. It’s just that popular to be a Who fan in modern life.

I can remember very clearly when it wasn’t. I may be one of many today, but not too long ago I was the only person in my school, my city, maybe even (as I probably flattered myself), my entire country, who proudly claimed to be a Doctor Who fan. Although these days I don’t attract so much constant attention to myself about my personal program preferences, I still think I am one of the few American twenty-somethings who was an active and unashamed Who fan during the series’ barren Wilderness Years, or as real-life calls it, the 1990s.

Bret Vyon, descendent of the Brigadier?

So if there is anything I can claim rightfully, it is I am a lifelong Doctor Who fan. I am also a never-say-die supporter of the series’ arguably (but in my opinion there is no such argument) greatest supporting character: Brigadier Sir Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart.

Anyone who reads this article probably already knows who the Brigadier is and that he was portrayed on-screen and in audio adventures by the late and sorrowfully missed Nicholas Courtney. Therefore I need not rehearse in detail Courtney’s roughly forty-six year association with the program, during forty-three of which years he played Lethbridge-Stewart (if someone reading this wonders what Mr Courtney was doing with Doctor Who before there was a Brigadier and UNIT, I recommend a fun internet search with the words ‘Bret Vyon’). 

I will take a moment, but only a moment, to describe how much I love the character. Never mind that my formative years watching the program were the repeat airings of Jon Pertwee’s UNIT Years, where the Brigadier and other stalwart UNIT friends helped the Doctor and companions defeat monsters, madmen and the Master; never mind that while watching every story between Planet of Evil and Snakedance not an episode passed that I didn’t wonder (as Tom Baker’s Doctor forcefully demanded in The Seeds of Doom) ‘Where’s the Brigadier?’. Never mind that when Lethbridge-Stewart finally returned in Mawdryn Undead my heart swelled with joy; and certainly never mind that when the adventure Battlefield reached my screens something special happened that made my less than ten-year-old self leap across the room. If I may, I will recreate the moment here in prose (please keep in mind I somehow missed the opening scene at first viewing).

“This is a nice story. Future knights and that lady from Willow and Ace and Merlin is the Doctor. And there’s now a grey-haired man with a moustache in a military uniform. Wait, that grey-haired moustache man looks like – IT’S THE BRIGADIER!”

Never mind all of that (although I will always remember it). I love the Brigadier’s character so much because he reminds me of my Dad and my Grandpa, men I hope to emulate in my life. My Dad I still have. My Grandpa I don’t, not since March of 2002. That was a sad day that I had to accept emotionally, and which I have, but as long as Nicholas Courtney (whom as I grew up I became happily aware was a kind and good man deservedly beloved by countless people) and his Lethbridge-Stewart character were both still alive I felt, in some small way, that I still had a part of Grandpa (who amongst many things was a World War II naval veteran) still alive with me.

Memories of good people sweeten my life; in fact, I think those flavoured memories are what keep me alive and happy. So let’s take a trip down a recent alley of Memory Lane, through a brief corridor I saw as leading to something special, which really led to something more bitter than sweet, but which I now feel may one day have a sweeter, if uncertain future.

Wind back the clock just over eleven years to 25^th September, 2003. On this date the world heard the official announcement of Doctor Who’s approaching return to television. Now for me this date of destiny was deferred to 8^th June, 2004, when I learned about the good Doctor’s return in a postcard from a friend (I was serving as a church missionary during 2003 in Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas and so was mostly removed from all matters science fiction). But from that day onwards I was more than excited, I felt liberated, almost vindicated: all those teenage years of waiting and hoping and defending the good Doctor with the honest, heartfelt anticipation that one day I would hear of his imminent – and I considered inevitable – return had finally proven the adage of waiting for good things.

The Brigadier and the woman from WILLOW

First and foremost on my mind were all the old friends and foes that would return to reunite with the Doctor. I was honestly never worried about the chances of creatures like the Daleks, Cybermen or the Master – I was nearly certain those most frequent of villainous favourites would drive children behind their sofas once more. In fact, although I wanted all of the great monsters and allies to strike the screen again (and some of those greats have only recently arrived to terrorise; is there no love for Ice Warriors and Zygons?) these are the few characters that I felt were either secure in their returns, simply because to me without their presence Doctor Who almost cannot be Doctor Who:

• The Daleks
• The Cybermen
• The Master
• Davros
• The Time Lords
• The Brigadier

Almost from the beginning the Daleks proved their essentiality to the series’ renaissance in the spring on 2005. On 5^th March, 2005 I was happily surprised to see the Autons return even before the horrible pepperpots, but seeing the Nestene soldiers awaken in a manner shatteringly similar to their first appearance in Spearhead in Space made me long for the stalwart presence of the Brigadier even more. UNIT’s brief cameo in the Aliens of London/World War Three two-parter did nothing to make me forget that Nicholas Courtney’s signature role was absent from the main proceedings of the 2005 series. And this absence worried me, for although Lethbridge-Stewart was undoubtedly on my list of ‘must-returns’ to Doctor Who, I could not then nor can I now deny that his space on that most wanted list came with not only the most heart-warmth but also the least guarantee.

As Doctor Who series one aired on television I enjoyed the Doctor, the companion, the new TARDIS interior, and the new monsters. But my familiar face-longing thoughts kept returning to what Craig Hinton told me at the January 2005 Gallifrey One Los Angeles convention, when I asked him if he thought the producers would ask the then 75-year-old Nicholas Courtney for one more go. I will never forget the sad look in Craig’s eyes as he sighed and said: ‘Well, he’s not getting any younger’. I wanted to hope that what Craig really meant was that the almost-elderly Courtney and his enduring Lethbridge-Stewart were far too valuable to the program to delay their reappearance. But when series one ended with no Brigadier in sight or mention, and a departing Doctor who never (and still has not) met his best military friend, I began to find it hard to ignore that Craig had really meant something else.

Still, Doctor Who was on television again and with a cliffhanger ending that meant there would be more stories to tell. With the casting announcement of the then relatively unknown but highly promising David Tennant in the role of the Tenth Doctor, the future of the series seemed bright with expanding horizons. By the time series two debuted on 15^th April, 2006 fandom was aware of not only the returning Cybermen (another checked for my ‘must-returns’) but also the welcoming home of former 1970s companions Sarah Jane Smith and K9. And their return was a spiking moment of rising hope for me: for not only were two long-departed companions crossing paths with the Doctor again but they were returning after decades of absence and the series was not afraid to show it: Sarah was middle-aged; K9 was rusted and broken down. And as I enjoyed a healthy dose of Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker nostalgia, I felt a swell of hope that if one UNIT-era companion could return then so could another, even a then 76-year-old man called out of retirement. Surely Lethbridge-Stewart could return.

And then, he did. Just not quite in the way I expected.

Part two... soon!