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| Delta and the Bannermen - DVD |
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 Name: Gavrok, Leader of the Bannermen
Format: Television show
Time of Origin: specified point in
the future; confronted The Doctor on Earth in 1953.
Appearances: "Delta
and the Bannermen"
Doctors: Seventh
Doctor
Companions: Melanie
Bush
History: The leader of the ruthless Bannermen,
Gavrok is unquestionably one of The Doctor’s most ruthless
humanoid enemies, freely resorting to indiscriminate murder to
accomplish his goal of the destruction of the Chimeron race -
a race where the females looked like simply slightly green-tinted
humans while the males had green, scale-like skin -, destroying
an entire bus full of innocent tourists because he thought there
was a chance that the last Chimeron was on board. Although the
reasons for his ‘vendetta’ against the Chimerons
were never specified, it seems likely that the two races are
natural enemies, given that a young Chimeron had a natural defence
that allowed her to repel the Bannermen by emitting a high-pitched
scream while still a child.
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| Gavrok |
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Whatever
the origins of the Bannermen/Chimeron conflict, by the time their
war attracted The Doctor’s attention, the Bannermen had
almost completely annihilated the Chimerons, the last known survivors
of the race being Delta, a Chimeron queen, and a single Chimeron
egg. Retreating to a space tollport, Delta hitched a ride with
time-travelling tour organisation Nostalgia Tours, travelling
back to the 1950s with a group of Navarino tourists - aliens
capable of transforming themselves into a human appearance -,
accompanied by the Seventh Doctor and his companion Mel after
the two of them won a free trip after becoming the tollport’s
ten millionth customers. Although the ship - disguised as a 1950s
tour bus - sustained damage when it hit a satellite after arriving
in the past, The Doctor was able to guide it to a safe landing
in the TARDIS, arriving at the Shangri-La Holiday Camp in South
Wales.
With Delta sharing a room with Mel while The Doctor
helped to repair the bus, she was forced to share the
truth about her past with her roommate after her egg
hatched into a bright green baby that grew at an exceptional
rate. Trying to take her mind off her peoples’ fate,
Delta attended a dance at the camp, attracting the attention
of camp mechanic Billy, much to the disappointment of
his old friend Rachel (Nicknamed Ray). Although Gavrok
was able to follow Delta to the tollport, questioning
the tollmaster failed to reveal where the bus had landed,
Gavrok simply killing the tollmaster after he proved
useless. While attempting to comfort Ray, The Doctor
discovered a mercenary among the tour group who alerted
the Bannermen to Delta’s presence, but he and Ray
were rendered unconscious when Gavrok sent an ionisation
pulse along the bounty hunter’s radio signal, vaporising
him to avoid having to pay the mercenary.
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| Gavrok and the Bannermen |
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Regaining consciousness the following morning, The Doctor
was forced to reveal the truth about the ‘tour group’ to
Burton, the camp’s owner, while he went off to find Delta
and Billy after they left for a romantic retreat after Delta
had told her story to Billy and Mel. Although The Doctor and
Ray found Delta and Billy, things became increasingly dire when
they returned to the camp to find that the Bannermen had already
arrived, Gavrok having destroyed the Navarino tour bus on the
chance that Delta had been on board, leaving Mel and Burton alive
simply to use them as hostages after seeing that Delta was still
alive. Confronting Gavrok under a flag of truce - which Gavrok
promptly shot down -, The Doctor coldly rejected Gavrok’s ‘offer’ to
give The Doctor his life if he gave Gavrok Delta, informing the
Bannerman leader that he knew nothing of life, dealing only in
lies, destruction and murder as his currency, and that his methods
would catch up with him eventually.
Although Gavrok allowed The Doctor to depart with Mel
and Burton, he only permitted it because he had planted a tracking
device on the three in the hope that they would lead him to Delta
- although The Doctor swiftly found and disposed of the device
-, simultaneously booby-trapping the TARDIS by surrounding it
with an energy field that would incinerate anything that made
contact with it. Taking refuge with Goronwy, the local beekeeper,
and Hawk and Weismuller - two American agents who had been sent
to find the satellite that the tour bus had crashed into earlier
-, the small group lured the Bannermen into a trap, tipping shelves
of Goronwy’s honey over the Bannermen and releasing his
bees on them.
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| Gavrok |
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Returning to the Shangri-La camp, Billy and Burton were
able to rig up the camp’s sound system to amplify the scream
of the Chimeron princess, the young girl having entered the ‘singing
time’, a point in her development when her vocal chords
were capable of controlling her ‘song’ so that she
could choose to sooth or attack those around her. With this weapon,
she was able to effectively traumatise the attackers, leaving
the majority of the Bannermen off-balance. Gavrok in particular
was so shaken that he accidentally fell against the force field
he’d erected around the TARDIS, absorbing so much energy
that his body was completely atomised and the shield shut down.
With the Bannermen defeated, Delta and the princess departed,
accompanied by Billy, now transforming into a Chimeron himself
after consuming the ‘royal jelly’ that Delta had
been feeding the infant so that he could be with her (Inspired
by Goronwy’s tales about bees creating queens with royal
jelly). The final fate of Gavrok’s remaining Bannermen
was never established; given that Delta spoke of contacting galactic
authorities about the Bannermens’ genocide of her people,
the most likely explanation is that they were collected and taken
to answer for their crimes. |
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