The Surprising Connections Between Star Trek And Doctor Who

You've most likely seen or heard character actor Guy Siner before. He played a harbormaster in "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl" and twice has voiced the supervillain Man-Ray in "Spongebob Squarepants." He's also provided voice work for a number of "Star Wars" video games and appeared in guest roles in shows in the U.K. and America, including "Diagnosis Murder" and "'Allo 'Allo!" But before all of that, he appeared as Ravon in two parts of the "Doctor Who" story "Genesis of the Daleks" in 1975. Ravon was a Kaled officer who served during the Thousand Year War and oversaw the construction of the very first Daleks built by the mastermind Davros.

Hop forward nearly 30 years, and Siner would appear in an episode of "Star Trek: Enterprise." There he played Stuart, the father of Malcolm Reed, the ship's security officer. In the Season 1 episode "Silent Enemy," Stuart Reed is contacted over subspace by Captain Archer in an attempt to learn more about Malcolm, as the officer's birthday is coming up and they are hoping to throw him a surprise party. Though a small role, it cemented him as one of the few to be part of both sci-fi franchises.

The second season of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" is generally considered to be pretty rough, but for all its faults, it still includes a number of notable guest stars including Billy Campbell, Mick Fleetwood, and Mitch Ryan. While Barrie Ingham may not have been as big of a name as those others at the time, he's the only one who had previously appeared on "Doctor Who." In the episode "Up The Long Ladder," two separate groups of colonists come aboard the Enterprise looking for relocation: one is a highly advanced people who've embraced cloning as a means of reproduction, while the Bringloidi are Luddites who eschew technology in all forms. Ingham plays the Bringloidi leader Odell, whose daughter he wishes to marry off. The two groups eventually solve their mutual problems by forming a new colony together.

Back in 1965, Ingham appeared twice in the "Doctor Who" franchise. In the series, Ingham played Paris, the son of King Priam of Troy in the adventure serial "The Myth Makers." In the episode, it's Paris who finds the TARDIS and brings it into Troy, and he befriends companion Steven Taylor during the tale. Ingham would get another turn in the non-canonical "Dr. Who and the Daleks" feature film starring Peter Cushing, where he played an alien called Alydon whose people were being hunted by the Doctor's mortal foes. Ironically, Ingham's character discovers the TARDIS and befriends the Doctor's companion again in the movie.

With a long career in science fiction and fantasy films, Deep Roy has done and seen it all. He's played the Oompa Loompas in Tim Burton's "Willy Wonka" remake, performed as Droopy McCool and Yoda in the "Star Wars" franchise, and appeared in such classics as "Return To Oz," "The Neverending Story," "Planet of the Apes," and "The X-Files." But after featuring in so many major franchises, Roy still hadn't appeared in "Star Trek." That is, not until the 2009 reboot from J.J. Abrams. There he played Keenser, the small alien friend to engineer Scotty (Simon Pegg) when he was stationed at a remote outpost. Keenser would later accompany Scotty to the Enterprise after his recruitment by Kirk, appearing in all three films in the series.

Deep Roy often played fantasy creatures and outer space aliens. That would again be the case in "Doctor Who," where he made appeared in the classic 1977 serial "The Talons of Wein Chiang." In the story, Roy plays Mr. Sin, a robotic servant to magician Li H'sen Chang, who turns out to be much more than he appears.

William Morgan Sheppard has made multiple major guest appearances in the "Star Trek" franchise. He was first featured in the "Next Generation" episode "The Schizoid Man" as a reclusive scientist named Ira Graves. Graves meets Commander Data on his deathbed and is able to transfer his consciousness to the android's body before his passing. In the 1991 feature film "Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country," Sheppard played a Klingon overlord on the penal colony Rura Penthe who tormented Captain Kirk and Dr. McCoy. Later, in "Star Trek: Voyager," Sheppard guest-starred as alien monster hunter Qatai in "Bliss," who's engaged in a hunt for a massive space-borne life form that's feeding off of Voyager. A decade after that appearance, Sheppard would play a Vulcan official overseeing Spock's application to the Science Academy in the 2009 "Star Trek" reboot.

Sheppard's one appearance on "Doctor Who" is closely tied to his son, Mark Sheppard. In "Day of the Moon," the action of the episode takes place in 1969, where the younger Sheppard plays FBI agent Canton Everett Delaware III. In a bookend to that story, we meet a much older Canton in 2011 played by William Morgan Sheppard. At the conclusion of their adventure together in 1969, the Doctor gives him instructions to meet him, River, Amy, and Rory at Lake Silencio in Utah, where they'll burn the remnants of his body after his death at the hands of a mysterious astronaut.

The only American actor on this list, Daphne Ashbrook had serious potential to become a major player in the "Doctor Who" franchise. She appeared in the 1996 "Doctor Who" TV movie co-produced by the BBC and Fox. The film was intended to spark a whole new series that would have brought the British icon to American shores. As such, the cast was a mix of British and American talent, with Ashbrook starring as the Eighth Doctor's companion, an actual doctor named Grace Holloway who attempts to save the life of the Time Lord after he's attacked by a street gang in 20th-century San Francisco. The movie wasn't a success in the ratings, but it has its bright spots, and Ashbrook is definitely one of them.

Three years before her role as Holloway, Ashbrook appeared in an episode of "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" Season 2. In the episode "Melora," she plays the title character, an alien scientist and Starfleet officer who visits the Deep Space Nine station. Ashbrook's character falls in love with the station's resident physician Julian Bashir. Melora is wheelchair-bound thanks to the unusual properties of her homeworld, but Bashir comes up with a new treatment that could allow her to walk at the expense of never being able to return home.

In 1995, British actor Christopher Neame appeared in the "Star Trek: Voyager" episode "Heroes And Demons." In the story, he played a warrior named Unferth in a holodeck simulation of "Beowulf" run by Harry Kim. Oddly enough, Unferth is encountered by the ship's doctor when Kim goes missing within the virtual world. Later, in "Star Trek: Enterprise," Neame pops up again as a German general during World War II. But this is no holodeck recreation, as the NX-01 Enterprise had found itself transported back in time. An alien race had altered Earth's history to assist the Third Reich in its plans for global domination

Neame's role in "Doctor Who" is a bit less straightforward, and certainly one of the most unique appearances featured on this list. He played the role of Skagra, an alien engineer in the infamous serial "Shada," written by Douglas Adams. The story became infamous because, due to a number of reasons, production was halted halfway through and wouldn't be completed for decades. A combination of animation and newly filmed sequences were eventually used to finish things up. Neame himself would take part in the completion of the story, including providing commentary on the 2013 home video release.

Actor David Warner has appeared three times in the "Star Trek" franchise, beginning with his role as St. John Talbot in "Star Trek V: The Final Frontier." Talbot was a human representative for the Federation stationed on Nimbus III, a planet in the Neutral Zone. Just one film later, Warner would return, this time playing the key role of Klingon Chancellor Gorkon, whose assassination in the first act of "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country" is what drives the main adventure. Two years after that, Warner would join "Trek" on the small screen when he boarded both parts of the "Star Trek: The Next Generation" episode "Chain of Command." There he'd play a cruel Cardassian interrogator who tortures Captain Picard.

For "Doctor Who," Warner played roles in several audio dramas before joining the franchise on screen. In the Season 7 episode "Cold War," he plays Professor Grisenko, a Soviet-era scientist aboard the submarine Жар-птица (Firebird). While aboard the sub, Grisenko and his crew inadvertently awaken a Martian Ice Warrior who attempts to take over the vessel. 

The "Star Trek: The Next Generation" Season 7 episode "The Chase" is a divisive one among Trekkies, with a story that rewrites universal history and the "Star Trek" canon (per Den of Geek). In the episode, it's revealed that a race of ancient aliens is responsible for species throughout the franchise all being bipedal humanoids. Throughout the story, the Enterprise, a Klingon captain, and a Cardassian scientist compete to uncover the secrets of an ancient computer program. At the episode's climax, actor Maurice Roëves plays a Romulan commander who's been shadowing them all, hoping to steal the secrets for himself.

In the 1984 "Doctor Who" story "The Caves Of Androzani," Roëves appeared as Stotz, an illegal arms dealer hired by the villain Morgus to get weapons into the hands of renegade Sharaz Jek. The ensuing war on Androzani Minor draws in the Fifth Doctor (Peter Davison), who, along with his companion Peri, becomes poisoned by a dangerous substance called Spectrox, which is at the heart of the conflict. 

The Paramount+ series "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" features an ensemble cast that includes Christina Chong, who also appeared in a small but memorable role on "Doctor Who" in 2011. Set aboard the original U.S.S. Enterprise, "Strange New Worlds" puts Chong into the role of security officer La'An Noonien Singh. The character's name connects her to the classic "Star Trek" villain Khan Noonien Singh, played by Ricardo Montalban in the "Original Series" episode "Space Seed" and later in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan."

Chong appears in the sixth series of the "Doctor Who" revival in the episode "A Good Man Goes To War." She plays a young soldier named Lorna Bucket, a member of the Church of the Papal Mainframe, which is dedicated to the Doctor's destruction. Bucket herself only joined so she might one day meet the Doctor again, however, after encountering him as a young girl growing up in the Gamma Forests. Sadly, Bucket would meet her end in the Battle of Demon's Run, and viewers never learned much else about her.