The only companion who joined the TARDIS crew with a signed contract to kill the Doctor. Now that’s career ambition.
Character Overview
Ah, Turlough (Mark Strickson). Introduced in Mawdryn Undead (1983), he was the ginger schoolboy who turned out to be a stranded alien, exiled on Earth, and bribed by the Black Guardian to murder the Doctor. Imagine being grounded by your headmaster and forced into a cosmic assassination gig — rough week.
Turlough didn’t exactly scream “companion material” (unless it was “screaming while plotting behind your back”). He was cowardly, manipulative, and constantly looking for the nearest escape route. Which, ironically, made him one of the most interesting and realistic companions of the Fifth Doctor’s era. Not everyone reacts to Daleks by grabbing a stick and charging. Some of us, like Turlough, dive under a table and hope the extermination beam misses. Relatable.
Over time, though, Turlough grew less “assassin” and more “sulky redhead who doesn’t want to be here.” By the time of Planet of Fire (1984), he finally came clean about his past and returned to his homeworld of Trion, leaving the Doctor to break in another set of companions who hopefully wouldn’t be contract killers.
Despite being introduced as a villain-in-waiting, Turlough carved out his niche as the TARDIS’s resident schemer, eye-roller, and reluctant ally. He was basically the sarcastic middle child of the crew — not a hero, not quite a villain, just perpetually annoyed to be stuck in intergalactic field trips.