| Spoiler warning! This article contains plot details that people who haven't experienced the source material yet might wish to avoid. |
| Li H'sen Chang | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| |||
| Naming | |||
| Others | The Celestial Chang | ||
| Personal information | |||
| Species | Human (with psychic abilities) | ||
| Gender | Male | ||
| Place of origin | China | ||
| Affiliation | Tong of the Black Scorpion Weng-Chiang Mr. Sin Palace Theatre | ||
| Occupation | Stage magician Ventriloquist Tong leader | ||
| Current status | Deceased | ||
| Cause of death | Blood loss after being wounded by giant rats | ||
| Biology | |||
| Body type | Human | ||
| Abilities | Hypnotism Mind reading Telekinesis Erasing memories | ||
| Sentience | Sentient | ||
| Sapience | Sapient | ||
| Behind the scenes | |||
| Universe | Doctor Who | ||
| Created by | Robert Holmes | ||
| Performed by | John Bennett | ||
| “ | Chang, I have given you mental powers undreamt of in this century. You are thousands of years ahead of your time. What can you fear from these primitives? |
” |
Li H'sen Chang was a 19th century Chinese magician, illusionist and ventriloquist who operated in London and was secretly the leader of the Tong of the Black Scorpion and a servant of the mysterious Weng-Chiang, who gave him real psychic powers, including the ability to read minds, hypnotize people and make them forget certain events.
Biography[]
As a young peasant in mid-19th century China, Chang witnessed the inexplicable arrival of what he would later describe as a blazing cabinet of fire. Actually, it was an experimental time machine, powered by extremely dangerous and unstable zygma energy, and crewed by two 51st century war criminals: Magnus Greel, who had created the craft; and the artificial homunculus known as Mr. Sin. Finding Greel to be horribly disfigured by his own experiments and at the brink of death, Chang nevertheless believed him to be none other than the god Weng-Chiang, that the Tong of the Black Scorpion worshiped. While he hid Greel in a sanctuary and nursed him, the time cabinet was confiscated by Imperial forces who later presented it as a parting gift to a British Brigadier-General named Litefoot.
Some decades later, the Tong had tracked the time cabinet to London and operated there, under the command of Greel, who kept posing as their god, Weng-Chiang, and insisting that the cabinet must be retrieved. Greel's base of operations was located beneath the Palace Theatre, in which Chang found employment as a celebrated stage magician and performed a ventriloquist act using Mr. Sin as his "dummy". Due to the effects of temporal displacement on his metabolism, however, Greel was forced to hide his disfigurement under a mask, and tried to cure his condition by killing young women to consume their life force. For that purpose, he used his scientific knowledge to give Chang real psychic abilities and ordered him to kidnap victims (which were selected from his audience and mesmerized on stage, to be easily abducted later), leading to a series of mysterious disappearances that caught the attention of the police.
As his condition worsened and he grew more desperate, Greel ordered Chang to kidnap more victims, much to the concern of Chang, who worried that they would eventually get caught. While the time cabinet was found to be in Prof. Litefoot's possession and retrieved; the alien time-traveler known as the Doctor conducted his own investigation and started to unravel the plot. When the Doctor's companion, Leela, managed to trade places with one of the abducted women and escaped from Greel's clutches, his wrath grew even stronger. Displeased with Chang, Greel not only abandoned him, but sabotaged his stage act and ruined his career. Devastated after being humiliated and abandoned by his god and master, Chang ventured into the sewers where one of Greel's giant rats attacked him and tore off his leg. He spent the last minutes of his life smoking opium to erase the pain, and assisted the Doctor and Leela by offering information about where they could find Greel.
Appearances[]
- Doctor Who, season 14, "The Talons of Weng-Chiang" (1977)