Ever since he stole a blue box and ran away, he’s been in the nation’s living rooms – even when fighting monsters on far-flung planets. And now the man known only as ‘the Doctor’ has won our showdown and is named the greatest sci-fi character of all time.

Since August, you’ve been voting in your thousands. In terms of overall votes the Timelord triumphed, but when it came down to a battle of the sexes – madman in a box versus Ellen Ripley’s tortured lone warrior – it was very, very close. But for all her bravery, the Nostromo’s warrant-officer-turned-warrior could not beat Gallifrey’s greatest hero, who pipped her to the post by just 110 votes. Ripley emerges, however, as your favourite character from sci-fi cinema by some margin.





You were overwhelmingly fonder of characters from television than cinema, with characters originating on the small screen taking 61% of the vote. This may tie in with the date statistics, which are heavily weighted in favour of a halcyon period: 22% of votes went for characters from the 1980s, 28% from the 1990s and 20% from the 2000s. This means our most popular decade was when our winner, the Doctor, was not on air, save for a divisive TV movie in 1996.

Sci-Fi still looks like having some way to go when it comes to gender equality. 60% of votes were for male characters, with 33% for female, non-specific entities chalking up 6% and one character qualifying as both – following Michelle Gomez’ casting as the Master/Missy in this year’s series of Doctor Who.

Humanity as whole came out well though, with 67% of you polling for your own species. Aliens took 19%, while robots and computers trailed behind at 14%. Some 82% of the vote went to characters that can broadly be described as heroes, with just 15% for villains and 3% for characters in that ambiguous grey area. Anti-heroes certainly played their part: that most iconic of villains, Darth Vader, makes an impressive stab for domination at number three, closely followed by Avon from Blake’s 7 at four, and Captain Malcolm Reynolds from Firefly one place behind.





The top 100

The Doctor, Doctor Who Ellen Ripley, Alien saga Darth Vader, Star Wars saga Kerr Avon, Blake’s 7 Captain Malcolm Reynolds, Firefly / Serenity G’Kar, Babylon 5 HAL-9000, 2001: A Space Odyssey Rick Deckard, Blade Runner Han Solo, Star Wars saga Spock, Star Trek saga John Crichton, Farscape Roy Batty, Blade Runner Captain Jack Harkness, Torchwood Captain James T Kirk, Star Trek saga Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Star Trek: The Next Generation Londo Mollari, Babylon 5 The Alien, Alien Dana Scully, The X Files Ianto Jones, Torchwood Yoda, Star Wars saga Aeryn Sun, Farscape Kara ‘Starbuck’ Thrace, Battlestar Galactica Sarah Connor, The Terminator saga Doctor Emmet Brown, Back to the Future trilogy Fox Mulder, The X Files Professor Bernard Quatermass, Quatermass and the Pit The Terminator, The Terminator saga Susan Ivanova, Babylon 5 Captain John Sheridan, Babylon 5 Delenn, Babylon 5 Jack O’Neill, Stargate SG-1 Daleks, Doctor Who Data, Star Trek: The Next Generation Luke Skywalker, Star Wars saga Gort / Klaatu, The Day the Earth Stood Still Maria the Robot, Metropolis Judge Dredd, Judge Dredd E.T., E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial Ben ‘Obi-Wan’ Kenobi, Star Wars saga Neo, The Matrix trilogy Robbie the Robot, Forbidden Planet Marvin the Paranoid Android, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Marty McFly, Back to the Future trilogy Rose Tyler, Doctor Who Samantha Carter, Stargate SG-1 Donna Noble, Doctor Who Walter Bishop, Fringe Admiral William Adama, Battlestar Galactica River Tam, Firefly / Serenity Arthur Dent, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Wall-E, Wall-E R2-D2, Star Wars Boba Fett, Star Wars Arnold J Rimmer, Red Dwarf Sam Bell, Moon Leeloo, The Fifth Element Roj Blake, Blake’s 7 Elim Garak, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Scorpius, Farscape Thomas Jerome Newton, The Man Who Fell to Earth Captain Kathryn Janeway, Star Trek Voyager Gaius Baltar, Battlestar Galactica Chiana, Farscape Kaylee, Firefly / Serenity Sarah-Jane Smith, Doctor Who David, Prometheus Q, Star Trek saga Dave Lister, Red Dwarf Amy Pond, Doctor Who Flash Gordon, Flash Gordon Princess Leia Organa, Star Wars saga RoboCop, RoboCop River Song / Melody Pond, Doctor Who Snake Plissken, Escape from New York Alfred Bester, Babylon 5 Barbarella, Barbarella John Sheppard, Stargate Atlantis Seven of Nine, Star Trek: Voyager Daniel Jackson, Stargate SG-1 R.J. MacReady, The Thing Dave Bowman, 2001: A Space Odyssey Commander Jeffrey Sinclair, Babylon 5 Lyta Alexander, Babylon 5 Tetsuo Shima, Akira The Predator, Predator Benjamin Sisko, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Gwen Cooper, Torchwood Kryten, Red Dwarf Servalan, Blake’s 7 The Master, Doctor Who Vala Mal Doran, Stargate SG-1 Bo Dennis, Lost Girl Michael Garibaldi, Babylon 5 Number Six, Battlestar Galactica Hoban ‘Wash’ Washburn, Firefly / Serenity C3PO, Star Wars Riddick, The Chronicles of Riddick Motoko Kusanagi, Ghost in the Shell Laura Roslin, Battlestar Galactica Doctor Ellie Arroway, Contact

Please note: this page was updated on 19 December to reflect the fact Ambassador Delenn at 73 and Delenn at 35 were the same character. As a result she has moved to position 30, allowing for a new entry at number 100.