Where are the Eremites now? *down the back of the sofa*
Well, besides their recent Hulu appearance…
In 2016's Doctor Who Christmas special, The Return of Doctor Mysterio, the Superman stand-in Grant Gordon receives his superpowers when, as a child, he swallows a gift from the Twelfth Doctor which he thought was a cough drop. As the Doctor later explained, it was much more than a cough drop:
DOCTOR: [It's] like a kind of on-board computer. Come here. Can you see, can you see that little yellow star at the end of that curve? It comes from near there. Formed in the heart of a red hole and stabilised in pure dwarf star crystal. The gemstone is intuitive. It knows what you want and draws energy from the nearest star to make it happen. There's only four of them left in the universe. The Apocalypse Monks of the Andurax called this one the Hazandra, the Ghost of Love and Wishes. Okay, then, pop it in.
Beginning the day after Christmas, Titan Comics released an eight-part comic series called Ghost Stories featuring the Twelfth Doctor's later adventures with Grant and his family, and in the final issue we actually got to meet these "Apocalypse Monnks of the Andurax". But when we do, the Doctor calls them something slightly different:
In its entry on "Faction Precursors", The Book of the War says of the Eremites,
Some commentators have drawn tenuous comparisons between Faction Paradox and the Eremites [… But] members of the Faction decorate themselves in ceremonial armour, and only draw their own blood when absolutely necessary, whereas Eremites were more likely to find expression through severe self-mutilation and the abnegation of pain.
And indeed, what do we see in Ghost Stories when some Vigilant Eremites pull back their hoods to operate a bit of machinery? Distinctly Faction-like visages:
The Book of the War concludes,
There’s a maxim that history repeats itself first as tragedy, then as comedy, then as farce. If any parallels can reasonably be drawn between the Eremites and Faction Paradox, then perhaps it could be said that the Eremites are the tragedy and the Faction the comedy.
When comparing Doctor Mysterio to The Book of the War, that comparison may be flipped around – but the point remains.
(My friend Ryan Fogarty, writer and canonwelder extraordinaire, has noted further, even more remarkable connections between Ghost Stories' Vigilant Eremites and some other figures from ancient Time Lord myth. I hope we'll all get to see his vision of the Eremites some day!)
