The twisty history of the different incarnations of specific Time Lords in Doctor Who could fill several books. In fact, if you count all the tie-in novels and epic audio dramas from Big Finish, there is perhaps more offscreen information about Time Lords like the Doctor and the Master than there is onscreen in the actual show. But recently, Doctor Who has gone back to a classic episode, and changed a few details to make it very clear that the first Master isn’t who you thought it was.
On December 23, 2024, the BBC aired a new colorized and condensed version of the 2nd Doctor (Patrick Troughton) adventure, “The War Games.” This was Troughton’s final appearance as the 2nd Doctor, which resulted in the character regenerating into the 3rd Doctor (Jon Pertwee) and ending up exiled on Earth. But now, with this new special edition, there are some eyebrow-raising changes that have retroactively altered Doctor Who lore forever.
Like the special edition of “The Day of Daleks” in 2013, which added contemporary sound effects and some contemporary visual effects to the 1972 original, the newly colorized and condensed “War Games” also makes aesthetic alterations to match up this early Who story with more contemporary canon. The most obvious change happens at the very end when the Time Lords are sending the Doctor into exile, and telling him that his appearance will be altered. In the new version, the 2nd Doctor is presented with a few choices, including the 10th (David Tennant), 11th (Matt Smith), 12th (Peter Capaldi), and 13th (Jodie Whittaker) versions of the Doctor.
This now implies that the 2nd Doctor was aware of these future faces, meaning when they later regenerated into each of those incarnations, those versions of the Doctor should have theoretically remembered each of those faces. Were the Time Lords of this era aware of the Doctor’s future forms? If so, this concept slightly contradicts the existence of the 12th Doctor, simply because the episode “The Girl Who Died” strongly asserted that the Doctor obtained that 12th Doctor obtained that specific face to remind him of his actions in “The Fires of Pompeii.” Then again, the Doctor forgets things a lot, so they could very well have forgotten about the events of “The War Games,” too.
And speaking of details that the Doctor clearly forgot, the new version of “The War Games” also asserts that the renegade Time Lord character, the War Chief (Edward Brayshaw), is in fact the earliest known incarnation of The Master. While hinted at in various Who novels and audio dramas over the years, most fans have tended to treat the War Chief and the Master as separate characters. Previously, the earliest appearance of the Master wasn’t until the era of the 3rd Doctor, when the Master was famously played by Roger Delgado in the 1971 serial, “Terror of the Autons.” But now, the new version of “The War Games” makes it clear that Edward Brayshaw, the War Chief, is also the Master.
While this makes a certain amount of sense, it does change Doctor Who history, now and forever. Because “The War Game” featured the Time Lords so heavily, it was a very formative episode when it first aired in 1969. But now that it’s altered the timeline of the Master and given the Doctor advanced knowledge of their own future, it has paradoxically become even more important than it was before.
The 2nd Doctor would likely not approve of the phrase “timey wimey,” but it’s literally the only way to reconcile the new version of “The War Games.” The War Chief is the Master now, and the Doctor knows about various future versions of themselves. Is this a new timeline or the old one from a new point of view? Thankfully, because it’s Doctor Who, we may never know the true answer.
