Professor George Challenger (Peter McCauley) is an adventurer, scholar and visionary. The driving force behind the expedition to 'The Lost World', he leaves his wife in England, seeking glory above all else.
His great failing is that he not only needs to be right, but he needs the world to see that he is right as well. Rather a selfish man, his sole reason for trying to find the plateau is to be remembered in history forever.
Initially, the only reason he wanted the explorers to find a way off of the plateau was because he was eager to present positive proof to the Zoological Society that he was right about its existence and not because he felt obligated to save any of the people who had joined him.
Since they've been stranded, his views have slowly changed and he's beginning to discover his humanity. He's gradually regarding the other members of the group as not only friends, but also the family he never had.
He has a close friendship with
Lord John Roxton, who has vowed to protect him to the death, and is developing an even closer bond with Veronica Layton, taking on the role of a father figure in the absence of her own parents.He likes
Ned Malone and is happy that the young man is recording all his triumphs in his journals. As for Marguerite Krux, he is fond of her but can't understand why she and Roxton just don't admit their feelings for each other.His vast knowledge of science has helped and, on occasion, hindered the explorers in their quest for a way off of the plateau. Regarded as possessing 'magic' by some of the more uncivilised natives, this has sometimes caused a lot of trouble for the group.
His main aim at the moment is to build a balloon that will transport the expedition survivors high enough above the plateau that they won't get caught in the updrafts at the edge and so finally go home.
If he succeeds, he will definitely go home and receive the adulation he craved but, he will also be a much wiser and nicer man - something, I'm sure, that he realises and will be valued by him much more than having his name in the history books.
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