Best Of Who Awards: Top 10 Greatest Villains

Our Best Of Who Awards continue with the Top 10 Greatest Villains of Doctor Who's 50-Year History revealed...
In the past few weeks, we've recapped Doctor Who's Greatest Doctors, Greatest Companions, Greatest Aliens and Greatest Alien Planets, all vital components of what make the show such a success to this day. This week, it's the turn of another crucial element of the science-fiction drama- yep, it's the Big Bads of Who who the Time Lord must face off against every week. Although the monsters who terrorise humans and extraterresterials alike are brilliant throughout, it's often their leaders who prove the most memorable parts of the programme. Here's our guide, then, to Doctor Who's Top 10 Greatest Villains...
10. KAHLER-JEX (A Town Called Mercy)- An unexpected late inclusion from 2012's Season Seven Part One, Adrian Scarbrough provided us with a complex and layered adversary for the Doctor in Kahler-Jex. At first, his motives seemed unclear, yet his own lack of remorse for the fates of his arch-foes echoed those sentiments of the Time Lord in the Time War's aftermath, which gave the character such a fantastic ambiguity that will be forever remembered.
9. THE CELESTIAL TOYMAKER (The Celestial Toymaker)- This mysterious enemy appeared in a William Hartnell tale in 1966. He subjected the Doctor and his companions to a host of dangerous mind games (not unlike in Amy's Choice...more on that in a moment) that really played with the perceptions of the characters and shook up the TARDIS crew in a devastating way.
8. SHARAZ-JEK (The Caves Of Androzani)- Christopher Gable appeared in a one-off Doctor Who adventure with a bang, aiding in the conclusion of the Peter Davison era of the show. This Phantom Of The Opera-riffing foe was a truly genius creation, torturing Peri and a threatening a deadly fate for the Doctor's most faithful companion that if it had come to pass, could quite possibly have been even worse than death by poison itself...
7. SKY SILVESTRY (Midnight)- Just as the unseen Midnight monster held a high position on our Top 5 Greatest Monsters awards list, so too does the human she possesses make an incredible effect on the viewer as a villain. Before her conversion, Sky was just a compelling passenger for the Doctor to make conversation with, yet once her body was taken ever, Lesley Sharp proved one of the most memorable pseudo-villains of Doctor Who so far, scaring the majority of fans out of their good wits thanks to Russell T Davies' cunning writing.
6. OMEGA (The Three Doctors-Arc Of Infinity)- What is the true defining quality of rejected Time Lord Omega as a villain on Who? Put simply, it has to be the concept that a man who discovered so many revelations for his race lost his soul and mind as a result, and thus only commits his atrocious actions in order to claim dominance of his own mind and self. It's an intriguing arc to be sure, and one that I reckon would work well in redefining the villain for use in the post-2013 series.
5. THE DREAM LORD (Amy's Choice)- Few fans could have anticipated when Toby Jones was announced to play a villain in Doctor Who's 2010 fifth season of the high iconic status he would achieve as the Dream Lord. A vengeful personification of the Time Lord's dark side, the Dream Lord turned Amy and Rory's worst nightmares against them, allowing for one of the most innovative and daring episodes of Doctor Who in a long time, in no small part thanks to Jones' ace portrayal.

4. DAVROS (Genesis Of The Daleks-Journey's End)- As much as the Daleks are iconic classic villains of Who, it was their narcistic and genocidal leader Davros that turned them into the fully-fledged legions of darkness we know today. From Terry Molloy to Julian Bleach, each and every star who's played Davros as added new levels of corruption and total anarchy to their versions of the alien character, providing an intriguing glimpse into one of the darkest and most extremist minds ever to grace the show!
3. THE MASTER (Spearhead In Space-The End Of Time)- You'd have to have been living under a rock to miss this iconic Who villain. John Simm's incarnation of the Master was in my honest opinion the perfect rendition of this renegade Time Lord, a superbly insane echo of Heath Legder's Joker that really showcased the character's pure madness in a way that Roger Delegado and his successors never could.
2. MR FINCH (School Reunion)- Another one-shot wonder, Anthony Head's Mr Finch remained a superb highlight of Sarah-Jane's returning episode of Who. Finch was a memorable leader for the Krillitanes, challenging every one of the Doctor's core beliefs by almost convincing the Time Lord to shift the events of the universe and resurrect those lost in the Time Lords. We learn more of why this would have meant the end of time later on, but for now, Head's Finch is a truly iconic character to recall from Who's grand history.
1. SON OF MINE (Human Nature/The Family Of Blood)- At the top of the list comes a villain whose inception is every bit as masterful as his execution. Paul Cornell conceived Son Of Mine and his Family Of Blood in the Seventh Doctor novel Human Nature, yet it was thanks to Robin Hood and Game Of Thrones' Harry Lloyd that the character truly came alive. Lloyd relished in the pure desperation and hunger for power that Son Of Mine possessed, transforming a page villain into the most logistical and thus terrifying adversary that Doctor Who has ever seen in its fifty-year history...