In November 2006 we reported that former Doctor Who star Christopher Eccleston would be appearing in some of the new episodes of NBC’s hit “Heroes.” At that time it was all hush-hush whether he would actually be one of the heroes or some other related cast member. Now we are happy to report that he will indeed be a hero and an invisible one at that.

Eccleston will be starring as an invisible-man named Claude, in a homage to the late actor Claude Rains who starred as the original invisible man in the great 1933 classic SF film “The Invisible Man.”

Tim Kring, the show’s creator and executive producer, said in a interview at the Television Critics Association this week that, “So far, he’s [Eccleston] been in four [episodes], and then we’re trying to work out his dates with his movie that he’s doing.” “We’d like to have him come and play with us for a while,” added Kring.

You can see Claude in the very first new episode called “Godsend,” when it airs this coming Monday, January 22nd on NBC.

“His character acts as a sort of mentor for Milo’s [Ventimiglia] character, Peter, who’s having trouble controlling all of these crazy powers that he seems to have,” Kring said.

Kring added: “So he runs into this character, literally, and forces him, basically, to teach him what’s going on and to tell him what’s going on. And it’s the first indication for the audience that these powers have been around longer than we seem to have sensed it as an audience based on what we’ve seen so far.”

Eccleston’s newest film, “New Orleans, Mon Amour” is currentily in post-production. In it he plays Dr. Jekyll to Elizabeth Moss’ Hyde. Look for it in theaters sometime in 2008.