Wednesday 30 November 2011

373 The Monster of Peladon Part Four

EPISODE: The Monster of Peladon Part Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 373
STORY NUMBER: 073
TRANSMITTED: 13 April 1974
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Lennie Mayne
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Peladon Tales: Curse of Peladon & Monster of Peladon
Episode Format: 625 video

The Ice Warrior commander Azaxyr arrives and declares martial law. He threatens to kill the miners if they do not work and takes hostages to force them. Ettis leads his miners into the citadel. They storm the throne room but all bar Ettis are killed by the Ice Warriors. The Doctor is sent to negotiate with Gebek to persuade the miners back to work. Sarah is convinced she saw Azaxyr's lieutenant Sskel in the refinery before the Ice Warriors were meant to have landed making them suspicious of the Ice Warriors. Alpha Centauri finds their communications jammed while the miners are persuaded to pretend to cooperate while the Doctor deals with the Martian troops. Locked in the communications room the Doctor increases the heat in the mines to incapacitate the Ice Warriors. The miners rebel against the Martians. The Doctor goes to stop the unhinged Ettis from firing the sonic lance to destroy the citadel. Azaxyr sets the sonic lance to self destruct remotely when activated causing an explosion when Ettis attempts to fire it.

Ah that's better, the arrival of the Ice Warriors instantly adds a spark to proceedings as the fall out with the Doctor and unite the Pels against them. But I thought the Ice Warriors were meant to be the good guys now?

It's good to see lots of warriors on the screen together: at one stage there's Azaxyr plus four warriors in the throne room. Sskel is using the Vaaga suit that Sonny Caldinez has used since Seeds of Death but it's be interesting to try to work out which warrior in the Ice Warriors the other costumes are from, some of which appear to be in some disrepair. The warrior behind Gebek at 17:10 into the episode appears to have a flat face where most of the others have make up covering the actor's lower face whereas the one visible at 18:50 appear to have just solid armour covering the lower face which I'm not sure any of the others did before. And just why are the Ice Warriors using these odd upright hand weapons? They've still got the sonic disrupters built into the forearms of the costumes and these new weapons produce the same effect these always did. The Ice Warrior armour looks like it's had a repaint too and is very bright green.

I did enjoy Azaxyr's Judge Dredd impersonation with "here on Peladon, I Am The Law". Come to think of it there is a certain similarity in design between the helmets of the Mega City Lawman and the Ice Lord.....

So the Ice Warriors are back and that means two familiar acting names are back with us. Alan Bennion plays Commander Azaxyr just as he played Slaar in The Seeds of Death & Izlyr in The Curse of Peladon. His chief lieutenant Sskel is played by Sonny Caldinez who's been in every Ice Warrior story playing Turoc in The Ice Warriors, an Ice Warrior in The Seeds of Death and Ssorg in The Curse of Peladon as well as the mute Kemel in The Evil of the Daleks. Both are making their final Doctor Who appearances in this story. As per Ssorg in the Curse of Peladon, Sskel's fleeting lines aren't delivered by the actor in the costume but rather by, uncredited, Doctor who's producer Barry Letts. Listen to Ssorg/Sskel, it's obvious when you realise, especially if you've ever heard Sonny Caldinez interviewed on the DVDs!

Tuesday 29 November 2011

372 The Monster of Peladon Part Three

EPISODE: The Monster of Peladon Part Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 372
STORY NUMBER: 073
TRANSMITTED: 06 April 1974
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Lennie Mayne
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Peladon Tales: Curse of Peladon & Monster of Peladon
Episode Format: 625 video

The Doctor once again calms his old friend using a Venusian lullaby and they are released. Eckersley advises Alpha Centauri to summon Federation troops which he does. The Doctor advises Queen Thalira to negotiate with Gebek to help appease the miners and spread the benefits of Federation membership wider than the royal court. The Doctor isn't pleased that troops are coming and is interested in what Sarah saw in the refinery. Ortron arrests the Doctor when he tries to leave the citadel. Gebek & Ettis capture the sonic lance. Gebek helps free the Doctor. Ettis has taken the sonic lance to a nearby mountain top and aimed it at the citadel. Alpha Centauri receives a transmission that the Federation troops are coming. Finding their way to the refinery, the Doctor deactivates the alarm. Eckersley spots them and Sarah confesses that they think the Aggedor trickery is being run from the refinery. Ortron persuades the miners back to work, but as soon as they return they are attacked by the Aggedor apparition. Opening the refinery door the Doctor & Gebek find an Ice Warrior inside!

Ortron hasn't thought this through properly at all: The Doctor is the man that led Aggedor into the throne room 50 years ago so chances are they're going to get on ok in a put together. Then, having submitted him to the judgement of Aggedor he finds he doesn't like the verdict so has him banged up again anyway. Deary me. Still the Ice Warriors are here now so things will get better won't they?

There's no location work at all in this story, something Monster of Peladon shares with only one of the other 23 Third Doctor tales: it's anticendant Curse of Peladon. Another returning actor from that story is Nick Hobbs, once again playing Aggedor. He'll be back shortly as a Wirrn Operator in The Ark in Space and we recently saw him as Mr Nainby in Amy's Choice. One of the miners is played by the distinctive looking Roy Evans who was Trantis in The Daleks' Master Plan and we last saw as Bert in The Green Death. Evans has credits on IMDB through to 2004 by which point he would have been 74 when he appeared on The Green Death DVD.

Monday 28 November 2011

371 The Monster of Peladon Part Two

EPISODE: The Monster of Peladon Part Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 371
STORY NUMBER: 073
TRANSMITTED: 30 March 1974
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Lennie Mayne
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Peladon Tales: Curse of Peladon & Monster of Peladon
Episode Format: 625 video

Gebek digs the Doctor out with Eckersley's sonic lance to dig the Doctor out. Hearing an alarm Sarah searches for the Doctor. The Doctor promises to help the miners. Lost in the tunnels Sarah glimpses someone in the Federation refinery but is attacked by it's defence system. The Doctor believes the Aggedor he's seen is a product of technological trickery. Eckersley & Alpha Centauri rescue Sarah with the shadowy figure again seen in the refinery. Ortron wants the miners revolt crushed and the Doctor, who he thinks is a traitor, killed. Alpha Centauri & Sarah are seized by Ettis and threatened to allow his miners access to the armoury and Federation weapons. Ettis takes Sarah as a hostage, and escaping she is seized by Ortron's guards. The Doctor comes to rescue her but he too is seized. They are both sentenced to be cast into a pit under the temple where they encounter Aggedor.

Oh dear, lets play the escape & recapture game again. I'm wondering if there's anyone out there who didn't know what it was in the refinery as it's absolutely obvious especially if you've seen the previous Peladon story. I do worry that the guard, helping his injured comrade outside the refinery, hadn't followed his direction too well as his manner of speech is modern English and doesn't fit with any of the other Peladon natives at all!

The story is that while Curse of Peladon is based on the UK's entry into the European Common Market, Monster is inspired by the Miner's strikes that occurred during the early 70s.

Sunday 27 November 2011

370 The Monster of Peladon Part One

EPISODE: The Monster of Peladon Part One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 370
STORY NUMBER: 073
TRANSMITTED: 23 March 1974
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Lennie Mayne
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Peladon Tales: Curse of Peladon & Monster of Peladon
Episode Format: 625 video

We're back on DVD for this episode and indeed will be for the next 32 episodes and seven stories.

On the planet Peladon miners are menaced by the spirit of Aggedor and Federation mining expert Vega Nexos is slain. The miners, fearing Aggedor, refuse to work and use Federation equipment which the Federation need them to use to mine enough Trisilicate to win their war with Galaxy Five. The Doctor & Sarah arrive and are chased by guards who think they're spies and then are arrested for violating the temple of Aggedor. They are taken to the throne room of Queen Thalira, the daughter of King Peladon, where they are recognised by the Doctor's old friend Alpha Centauri who vouches for them. Disgruntled miner Gebek comes to the citadel to speak with the Queen to put his view that the aliens should be sent home. Militant miner Ettis leads miners to the citadel to try and seize Federation weapons. They take engineer Eckersley hostage but the Doctor frees him and takes the captive Ettis to the Queen. Chancellor Ortron demands Ettis & Gebek's execution but the Doctor allows them to escape. The Doctor believes Aggedor's appearances are caused by trickery and asks to investigate. The Queen's champion Blor takes the Doctor to where the apparitions were seen but the miner Ettis sets off explosives sealing them in a cave. Aggedor appears and disintegrates Blor.

Back to Peladon we go. Same tunnels as before, but a new Queen on the throne and some disorder amongst the miners. Is this the first time that Doctor Who has done a direct sequel to a story? Not just brought the monsters back, but the same location and some of the same characters? Hmmm. No. Web of Fear is a sequel to the Abominable Snowman (Yeti & Travers) and The Invasion is in turn a direct sequel to Web of Fear.

So as you'd expect there's some returning personnel: Director Lennie Mayne & Writer Brian Hayles were both present for the earlier Curse of Peladon as were Stuart Fell, who is inside Alpha Centauri and Ysanne Churchman who provides the voice, while Terry Walsh, who's the Guard Captain here, was fight arranger on the earlier story.

Shall we say we'll be seeing some more of Curse's cast before this story is out and leave it at that for now ;-)

Alpha Centauri's engineer friend Eckersley is played by Donald Gee who was Major Ian Warne in the awful Space Pirates, coincidentally the penultimate second Doctor story as this one is the penultimate Third Doctor story. The slain Federation miner Vega Nexos, made famous by the Doctor Whocards given away with Weetabix in the 1970s is played by Gerald Taylor here making his final Doctor Who appearance. He'd previously been a Dalek Operator in The Daleks, The Dalek Invasion of Earth, The Chase, Mission to the Unknown, The Daleks' Master Plan, The Power of the Daleks & The Evil of the Daleks plus the Doctor Who & The Daleks feature film, a Zarbi in The Web Planet, the Machine Operator in The War Machines, Damon's Assistant in The Underwater Menace and the Baker's Man in The Dæmons. We've also seen both main Peladon miners before: Ettis is played by Ralph Watson who was the Generator Scientist, also in The Underwater Menace, Captain Knight in The Web of Fear and will be Ben in Horror of Fang Rock while Rex Robinson plays Gebek. He was Dr. Tyler in The Three Doctors, and will be Dr. Carter in The Hand of Fear. Both were directed by Lennie Mayne who helms this story.

Saturday 26 November 2011

369 Death to the Daleks Part Four

EPISODE: Death to the Daleks Part Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 369
STORY NUMBER: 072
TRANSMITTED: 16 March 1974
WRITER: Terry Nation
DIRECTOR: Michael Briant
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Death To The Daleks
Episode Format: 625 video

The Doctor & Bellal penetrate deeper & deeper into the city passing more tests with the Daleks always one step behind them. As the Daleks destroy one of the traps they witness it restoring itself. The Doctor & Bellal's progress is being monitored when Bellal is taken under the hypnotic influence of the city and tried to attack the Doctor who breaks the hold. Galloway & Hamilton are ordered by the Daleks to climb the beacon to position explosives. Sarah & Jill substitute the stored Parinnium for sand. The Doctor believes they are being subjected to intelligence tests. The final test is a psychological assault which they survive permitting them to enter an inner control room where they find the body of an Exillon sat at a control console. As they watch it crumbles away in the air current from the open door, the first to penetrate the room in centuries. The city creates anti-bodies to attack them. Hamilton & Galloway set their charges but Galloway retains one. A Dalek discovers Jill missing and self destructs. The Doctor attacks the city's electronic brain but is attacked by the anti-bodies who are quickly distracted by the arrival of the Daleks which allow the Doctor & Bellal to escape. Hamilton & Galloway are ordered to load the Parrinium onto the Dalek ship. The Doctor & Bellal are reunited with Jill & Sarah. The bomb explodes restoring the power supply to the Dalek ship. Galloway hides himself on the Dalek ship. The Daleks tell the Doctor they will fire a plague missile at the planet Exillon once they are in orbit but Galloway uses the bomb to destroy the Dalek ship killing himself in the process. The Exillon city crumbles away now it's cut off from power. The Doctor mourns the city's loss realising the universe is down to 799 wonders.

Oh. It's our first "brave the series of traps to reach the inner sanctum". We started the journey into the city in this last episode but The Doctor & Bellal's trials are mostly contained in this episode. Bar the Doctor's instinctive reaction to the floor trap at the end of the previous episode I don't have a problem with the idea of the brain teasing tests and traps here. I have a problem with it's repetition wholesale in the last episode of the Pyramids of Mars (albeit some decent reasoning), the last episode of the Hand of Fear, where we even get an ancient observer at a console crumbling away to dust when disturbed, and the Five Doctor which contains a modified version of the electrified floor seen here. I'm not sure who's idea it was. Terry Nation's, because he wrote the script? Maybe. But Script Editor Terrance Dicks is responsible for the lifting of the floor sequence in Five Doctors and by this point he's being shadowed by his successor Robert Holmes who wrote Pyramids of Mars and script edited it & Hand of Fear.

Then we have the Dalek on guard duty. why oh why does it self destruct when it finds that Jill has escaped?. Deary me. There's a lovely touch as the power comes back on following the destruction of the beacon: as the lights come up in the Dalek ship the familiar Dalek control room noise starts. Fabulous.

We've also got a rather nasty insinuation from the script towards the end of the episode: The Daleks intend to contaminate Exillon by firing a plague missile at the planet. Can we then assume that they're responsible for the plague full stop? They have form for similar behaviour in Dalek Invasion of Earth.

It's not a bad Dalek story truth be told: They're devious and nasty plus they look the best the have done in colour so far. It's almost a shame they revert back to the grey in their next appearance from the silver they use here. This is also the last time until Remembrance of the Daleks that we see them operating without the command or influence of Davros hanging over them.

Novelised by Terrance Dicks in 1978 Death to the Daleks appeared after the novelization of the subsequent Dalek story, Genesis of the Daleks. The cover to this book was used as a poster by Target in the mid 1980s. Death to the Daleks was the second Pertwee story issued on video tape in 1987, following Day of the Daleks, and was the first story to be issued at the budget price of £9.99, previous releases having costed in the region of £25. It is the last remaining Dalek story and the latest story from the Third Doctor/Jon Pertwee era not yet released on DVD
and is also one of two stories that were available as compilation video releases not yet released on DVD: The other is Terror of the Zygons.

That brings us to the end of a 10 episode run on video and is also our last pair of consecutive stories not released on DVD.

Friday 25 November 2011

368 Death to the Daleks Part Three

EPISODE: Death to the Daleks Part Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 368
STORY NUMBER: 072
TRANSMITTED: 09 March 1974
WRITER: Terry Nation
DIRECTOR: Michael Briant
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Death To The Daleks
Episode Format: 625 video

Sarah is helped by Bellal, an Exillon that doesn't share the majority's religious beliefs who shelters her from the pursuing Daleks. The Doctor is saved from the metal snake creature by the two pursuing Daleks which the snake destroys. The Doctor deduces the snake is a root of the city. Bellal & his friend Gotal take the Doctor to safety. Bellal tells The Doctor of the origins of the city and how it destroyed it's creators. The Daleks make preparations to destroy the city's beacon after exploring the city to gain knowledge. One of the Daleks is destroyed by another city root at a pool in the quarry workings. The Doctor recognises Exillon markings from an temple in Peru on Earth. The Doctor & Bellal go to the city to attempt to stop the power drain. Jill is sent by the Daleks to assist the Exillon miners while Galloway & Hamilton are taken for another task. The Doctor sends Sarah to get the Earthmen to load the Parrinium into their ship while the Doctor & Bellal enter the city, gaining entry narrowly in front of two Daleks and brave the brainteasing test & traps within.

You can't beat Daleks in tunnels and they're great during the first part of the episode, thought I note that the first Dalek has orange dome lights when moving but white when attacked. Another detail that jumped out on me was the badge on the MSC uniforms. It's the Federation Badge from Blake's 7, as seen behind the original series logo. The idea that Earth may have been visited in ancient times by alien astronauts isn't new: it was proposed in 1968 by Erich von Däniken in his book Chariots of the Gods? and later followed up in the BBC Horizon documentary The Case of the Ancient Astronauts in 1978.

I have a question about the ending of this episode: what possessed the Doctor to yell stop when he saw the pattern on the floor? He didn't know it was dangerous..... unless he's encountered something similar before that we haven't seen. And given the number of times he runs into similar traps in the next few years that wouldn't surprise me. Come back tomorrow for some more raving on this subject.

Roy Heymann, playing the Exillon Gotal, was previously an Alien Priest in Colony in Space, directed by (you've guessed it) Michael Briant.

All the exterior sequences in this story were filmed at ARC Sand Pits at Gallows Hill, Dorset close to similar sites that will be used for Destiny of the Daleks and Caves of Androzani. There's a fair few Doctor Who locations nearby so if you fancy a locations visiting holiday Dorset might be the place to go.

Thursday 24 November 2011

367 Death to the Daleks Part Two

EPISODE: Death to the Daleks Part Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 367
STORY NUMBER: 072
TRANSMITTED: 02 March 1974
WRITER: Terry Nation
DIRECTOR: Michael Briant
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Death To The Daleks
Episode Format: 625 video

The Daleks guns malfunction failing to produce any energy: they too are affected by the power drain and reluctantly join forces with the humans. In temple cavern the Exillons have set a fire. The Daleks claim to have come to Exillon because they need the Parrinium to treat sickness of their worlds but they actually have another motive and conceal that there are more Daleks in the ship than the four that emerged. While returning to the human dome the party is attacked, Railton is killed by an Exillon arrow and one of the four Daleks is battered with Exillon weapons to the point where it is destroyed. The captive Commander Stewart orders them to give up. Doctor, Humans & the two captured Daleks are taken to the caves where Sarah is being sacrificed. The Doctor attempts to rescue her and is beaten to unconsciousness. He wakes in a cage imprisoned in a cage. The Daleks try to bargain with the Exillons. The third surviving Dalek from patrol has returned to it's ship and informed it's comrades of what has happened. The Daleks there have been equipped with new machine gun weaponry. Commander Stewart dies, promoting Hamilton over Galloway but Galloway refuses to pass his dying commanders wishes on. The Exillons agree to co-operate with the Daleks after the sacrifice, now consisting of the Doctor and Sarah, but the ceremony is interrupted by the arrival of the armed Daleks who exterminate many of the Exillons and allow the Doctor & Sarah to escape. The Daleks put the remaining Exillons to work mining the Parrinium. The Doctor & Sarah hide in a cave tunnel, in which odd noises echo, and are pursued by the Daleks. The Doctor leaves Sarah at a junction while he explores but he encounters an odd robotic snake creature.

The concept of Daleks unable to kill is a superb one and sadly done away with far too quickly here as the Machine Gun Daleks (another fab idea) show up. I love the testing target for the machine guns in the Dalek ship: a small Tardis model :-) Sarah quickly cottons on that the Daleks are still moving which the Doctor explaining that they "move by psychokinetic power". We'll have to assume that several of the other Dalek systems are also powered by the mutant inside, superbly described here as a "living bubbling lump of hate", as the eye lights seem to work as do the arms.... In which case is anything else other than the guns powered by another power source? Well possibly something structural or defensive judging by the way that Dalek went up when battered by the Exillons' hand weapons.

We've said bye bye to two of the cast already. Captain Richard Railton was played by John Abineri who we've heard in Fury from the Deep as van Lutyens and seen in The Ambassadors of Death as General Carrington. He's got one more appearance to come in The Power of Kroll as Ranquin. He's famous to telefantasy fans as Herne The Hunter in Robin of Sherwood and has probably been seen by most people as the butler in the Ferrero Rocher Ambassador's reception advert. Neil Seiler, playing Commander Stewart, was the Radio Operator in The Sea Devils (director: Michael Briant) and Mostyn Evans, the High Priest, was Dai Evans in The Green Death (director: Michael Briant) On the recent Colony in Space DVD director Michael Briant cops to using the same people regularly for the very good reason that he knows them and knows he can work with them. An excellent commentary participant I hope we hear Briant on the Death to the Daleks DVD. Duncan Lamont plays Dan Galloway on his only Doctor Who appearance. He was in the original 1953 The Quatermass Experiment playing the infected astronaut Victor Carroon. When he died in 1978 in he was working at the time on the Blake's 7 episode Hostage and had already filmed location material. He was replaced by, and the footage reshot using, his co-star here John Abineri.

The Daleks meanwhile are a selection of the usual suspects Michael Wisher does the Dalek Voices while the operators are John Scott Martin, who's been in every Dalek story since the Chase while Cy Town is making his third appearance following Frontier in Space & Planet of the Daleks. Making his final appearance in a Dalek shell is Murphy Grumbar, misspelled Murphy Grunbar throughout the credits in this story. He made his debut as a Dalek Operator in The Daleks followed by The Dalek Invasion of Earth (for both of which he was credited as Peter Murphy) before returning under his own name in The Space Museum, The Evil of the Daleks, Day of the Daleks, Frontier in Space & Planet of the Daleks.

Wednesday 23 November 2011

Happy Doctor Who Day!

Happy 48th Anniversary everyone! Who's watching an Unearthly Child later today?

It's also the first anniversary of me starting the blog. We started for proper a year ago today with Unearthly Child and somehow the blog hasn't missed a day since despite holidays & a convention taking me away from home and the best efforts of BTInternet! For the highlights of the year I suggest you read Episode 134 Tenth Planet Part 4 and 253 War Games Episode 10 which sum up the first two Doctors eras. The last Pertwee story is fast approaching so they'll be a summary of the high & low lights of the Third Doctor's Era then..... but let's just say that INFERNO is the best story we've seen so far.

We've got nearly another year to go with the original episodes: see The Long Game for a list of dates which we're still on track for. And we're likely to be on track for some while yet: Although I'm publishing Death to the Daleks part 1 today. I might just be a tinsy tiny bit ahead with my viewing. How far? Well let's just say that Eldrad must Live and leave it at that ;-)

Anyway I hop you're enjoying reading this still: The blog numbers show I've got a steady readership. Thanks to my regular commentators here and elsewhere: much appreciated, it's always nice to know you're reading.

366 Death to the Daleks Part One

EPISODE: Death to the Daleks Part One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 366
STORY NUMBER: 072
TRANSMITTED: 23 February 1974
WRITER: Terry Nation
DIRECTOR: Michael Briant
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Death To The Daleks
Episode Format: 525 video (625 video now exists)

On the cold & dark planet a man is shot with an arrow and collapses into a pond. The Doctor & Sarah are heading to Florana when the Tardis finds it's power drained and materialises. Even an emergency torch quickly dies. The Doctor manually cranks the door handle allowing them to venture outside into a barren wasteland. While Sarah changes into warmer clothes the Doctor explores and is attacked. Sarah is stalked by the alien beings, then finds one waiting for her in the Tardis from which she flees. The Doctor escapes from his captors. Sarah finds herself near a starkly white city with a flashing beacon on top. As dawn breaks the Doctor encounters a group of humans who have crashed on the planet Exillon. The survivors are Dan Galloway, Captain Richard Railton, Peter Hamilton & Jill Tarrant along with the injured Commander Stewart. Their colleague Jack has been missing since the last night. They are from the Marine Space Core and explain about the Exillon's forbidden city that Sarah has found. They treat is as a shrine and sacrifice anyone who goes near it. Approaching the city Sarah is captured. The humans report their ship was drained of power as it neared Exillon. They came here to mine Parrinium a mineral needed to cure a space plague threatening millions. A ship comes into land nearby that the humans think is their relief ship. They go to find it, leaving their injured commander alone & at the mercy of the Exillons while in an underground chamber Sarah is prepared for sacrifice. The ship lands revealing not humans but Daleks who order the humans Extermination and begin to open fire.....

Another Terry Nation script, another Tardis immobilising. He also gets his new favourite device, a plague (see the virus in Planet of the Daleks and 1975's Survivors. A decent enough opening episode but I think even from what little you can see of the cliffhanger at the end you've seen enough to see that *something* is wrong with the Dalek guns because there's usually some sort of negative effect quite quickly. I'd have had the Dalek order Exterminate, a crash zoom on the first movement of the weapon out and straight into the titles instead of all the waggling of the guns in and out. Still it's good to see the Daleks back in Silver looking quite nifty in their spruced up colour scheme.

Death to the Daleks 1 was the latest episode of Doctor Who broadcast to be missing from the BBC archives when Ian Levene visited in 1978. In 1981 a 524 line NTSC conversion of episode 1 was found in Canada and returned to the BBC completing this story. In 1985 ABC TV in Australia was found to be holding an edited copy of episode 1, missing a scene where a crewmember is killed by a spear courtesy of our friends the Australian sensors. Due to this omission BBC Video used the 525 line copy of the episode to produce the first compilation release of Death to the Daleks in 1987. In 1991 a set of videotapes was returned to BBC Enterprises by Dubai Radio & Colour Television and left unattended and outside exposed to the elements. BBC Employee & Doctor Who fan David Stead rescued the Death to the Daleks episode 1 video and passed it to Paul Vanezis, who discovered it kept sticking on playback, similar to Curse of Peladon 3, and had the tape salvaged by playing it back in segments which were recorded onto D3 tape, the then default transmission format. The original videotape of Death to the Daleks 1 now serves as a doorstop in the study of Richard Molesworth, the author of Wiped! Doctor Who's Missing Episodes which has been an invaluable aid during the first year of writing this block. If you have any interest in the first eleven years of Doctor Who and why it's not all there then this is well worth a read. But now we must say goodbye to it because after this episode, one minor edit aside, every broadcast episode of Doctor Who exists in it's original format.

Tuesday 22 November 2011

365 Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Six

EPISODE: Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Six
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 365
STORY NUMBER: 071
TRANSMITTED: 16 February 1974
WRITER: Malcolm Hulke
DIRECTOR: Paddy Russell
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Invasion Of The Dinosaurs
Episode Format: 625 video

The Doctor escapes, and runs into an army patrol where Finch tries to recapture him but he is rescued by Benton & the Brigadier. Sarah is locked up in a store cupboard but escapes through an air vent. Finding Finch has ordered his men to evacuate the Brigadier realises he's been duped and calls Geneva but is held at gunpoint by Mike Yates. He explains the plan to the Doctor who tries to talk him out of it. Distracted by a soldier bringing tea, Yates is overpowered by Benton. Sarah returns to the ship and explains to Mark they are under London. Benton arms the Doctor & Brigadier with ropes & explosives so they can raid the base under the tube station. The Elders don't believe Sarah's story and summon Sir Charles from one of the other ships. Journeying to Moorgate the Doctor & Brigadier encounter several dinosaurs. Grover admitting his story is overheard by Adam. The Doctor & Brigadier are menaced by a Triceratops on the station platform as they set their explosives. Adam releases Mark & Sarah as the Doctor blows his way into the lift shaft descending by rope while the Brigadier calls Benton on the radio and summons reinforcements. Benton is being held at gunpoint by Finch but manages to overpowers him. Sarah steps out the airlock demonstrating it's a fake. The Doctor knocks Butler out. The Elders move out the ship to stop Grover & Whitaker when the Doctor arrives with the Brigadier. Whitaker activates the machine, but the Doctor resists the time field and shuts it down. As he resets the machine Whitaker attempts to reactivate it, not realising that the Doctor has reversed the polarity sending him & Grover back to the past. The Brigadier tells them that Finch will be court martialed while the Yates will be given an opportunity to resign quietly. Benton tells the Doctor he's proud to be one of the few sergeants who have punched a general on the nose. The Doctor tries to tempt Sarah back into the Tardis with a trip to Florana......

Liz was watching the opening of this episode with and commented "Here I am a placid vegetarian dinosaur and I will run into your mouth" as it "attack" the Tyrannosaur. But after that point the episode is go go go all the way to the end that I can't fault at all and is a cracking resolution to the story. I'm pretty sure Sir Charles' spacesuit is a recycled one from Moonbase 3.

A couple of returning actors for you: Colin Bell plays Private Bryson, the soldier who distracts Captain Yates. He was C.P.O. Summers in The Sea Devils. Robinson, one of the newly awakened members of the ship's crew, is played by Timothy Craven who was a cell guard in Frontier in Space, and will be Short in Robot.

So Invasion of the Dinosaurs: The Dinosaurs aren't great. Let me rephrase that: The Tyrannosaurus Rex is really very very poor, or as my friend Karl pointed out "He is a little bit Chewits Monster isn't he?" The other Dinosaurs aren't bad especially those seen in this last episode - The "Brontosaur" ain't bad and the Triceratops, hidden in shadow, is really good. It's just we see the Tyrannosaur most often. Yes half the guest cast turn out to be in on the plan to wind back time: even the Brigadier comments "Is anyone not a traitor?" It's an interesting counterpoint to The Green Death where the environmentalists were the good guys: here they're trying to turn back time and commit mass genocide. The Doctor sympathises with their ideals, if not their methods, and that might have caused a few raised eyebrows at the time. Now that environmental concerns are much more mainstream I wonder how this story would go down and it's a bit of a shame it's not had a modern repeat. For my money it's one of the better Pertwee stories too and I thought that even before I realised how much of it was filmed in my home town! It's also Malcolm Hulke's last story for the show and is easily my favourite of the tales he wrote. He would novelise his tales, plus one of the Letts/Sloman stories, for Target Books until his death on 6th July 1979. His adaptation of the War Games was published posthumously. A lifelong atheist with communist sympathies, Hulke left instructions that his funeral should have no religious songs or reading. Terrance Dicks recalls turning up and finding himself sitting there with a bunch of his friends unsure of what to do. After a few minutes his friend and fellow writer Eric Paice got up, slapped the coffin, said "Cheerio Mac" and wandered out with the other guests following!

One last Kingston location for you: The Doctor & Brigadier drive under the "brontosaur" at Riverside Drive in Ham, close to Teddington Lock & Studios. It is also the closest location to Greycourt Court School where I had my secondary education.

The Invasion of the Dinosaurs was novelised by Malcolm Hulke as the Dinosaur Invasion and published on 19th February. It had one of the shortest availabilities of any Doctor Who book with this cover and was rejacketed in 1978, the second book to get a new cover. My local library, near to several of the filming locations, had a copy and following it's withdrawal from lending it now sits on my bookshelves.

Invasion of the Dinosaurs was the final complete story to be released by BBC Worldwide on VHS, in 2003. It is currently scheduled for a DVD release in January 2012 where it will be paired with another favourite of mine, The Android Invasion, in the UNIT Box. Attempts have been made to recolour episode one for release but because the results aren't up to broadcast standard both the best recolourisation and a black & white copy will be included. I don't yet know the identity of the commentary team, but I do know that like Inferno & Time Monster we are going to be treated to solo contributions from John Levene which I shall look forward to.

Monday 21 November 2011

364 Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Five

EPISODE: Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Five
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 364
STORY NUMBER: 071
TRANSMITTED: 09 February 1974
WRITER: Malcolm Hulke
DIRECTOR: Paddy Russell
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Invasion Of The Dinosaurs
Episode Format: 625 video

Mark tells Sarah that the elders are thinking of killing her so she feigns co-operation to escape. Finch has the Doctor locked up but refuses to interrogate him. Captain Yates refuses to listen to him, ordering Benton to lock him up. The Doctor deduces Mike Yates is the traitor and Benton allows himself to be overpowered so the Doctor can escape. Whitaker demonstrates his ability to reverse time to Grover. Sarah attempts to escape through the spaceship's airlock. Finch threatens to court martial Benton. Finch orders the Doctor hunted down and killed. The Brigadier orders Benton to raise some UNIT troops. Sarah realises from her bruise that she's only been on ship a matter of hours and demonstrates to Mark the place is a fake. As the Doctor is pursued by troops Sarah escapes into the base but the lift she uses to escape takes her straight to Sir Charles Grover's office where she escapes. Returning to UNIT's temporary HQ she leaves a message for the Brigadier and takes General Finch back to the government offices where he pulls a gun on her and returns her to the underground base. Whitaker is ordered to produce a new wave of Monsters to clear London while Finch removes the troops. Grover explains he will use Whitaker's machines to roll back time taking the people on the "ships" back to an earlier age. The Doctor finds himself trapped between two battling Dinosaurs.......

Oh dear. Sarah does the escape/recapture routine while the Doctor escapes and spends the entire episode running around and evading the the troops on Wimbledon Common, close to where he picked up Dodo in the closing moments of the Massacre. In fact Dodo's first full story, The Ark, also features the human race in deep sleep being shipped off to a new planet like the people in the ships believe is happening to them here. It's a theme we'll return to shortly in the Ark in Space. Talking of reused things I'm pretty sure I can see the UFO Moonbase panels again in the wall of Whitaker's control room!

Doctor Who likes Invasion stories. The word has been used several times over the years in story titles:

The Dalek Invasion of Earth
The Web Planet 5: Invasion
The Invasion
Invasion of the Dinosaurs
The Android Invasion (These last two will be paired in January 2012's UNIT box)
The Invasion of Time

The day before this episode was transmitted it was revealed to the press that Jon Pertwee would be leaving Doctor Who at the end of the Eleventh season. A week later his successor was unveiled: a little known actor called Tom Baker who we will hear more about shortly.....

Sunday 20 November 2011

363 Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Four

EPISODE: Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 363
STORY NUMBER: 071
TRANSMITTED: 02 February 1974
WRITER: Malcolm Hulke
DIRECTOR: Paddy Russell
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Invasion Of The Dinosaurs
Episode Format: 625 video

Finch objects to the Doctor's scheme as Yates confers with Finch and objects to what he has been asked to do. The Doctor takes his new futuristic car out to take readings on the time fields. Sarah is taken to meet the elders on the ship Ruth & Adam. She recognises them as Lady Cullingford, environmentalist, & Nigel Castle, novelist, while Mark is John Crichton, a British athlete who jumped 2.6362 meters at the last Olympics. The majority of the remaining members of the human race are asleep on one of the seven ships on the voyage to the new Earth like planet. The Doctor tracks the signals to Moorgate tube station where he sees Butler enter a cupboard, a disguised lift, and vanish. Discovering the controls he descends into their base. He finds himself herded back to the lift by a series of closing doors and returned to the underground station where he is attacked by a pterodactyl. Sarah argues with the elders who lock her up forcing her to watch environmental propaganda films. The Doctor brings the Brigadier to Moorgate but they find the lift control mechanism gone. Charles Grover doesn't believe the Doctor's story and shows him files indicating the bunker project under London was abandoned. Grover tells The Doctor that Sarah returned to UNIT HQ and Butler, posing as Grover's chauffeur confirms the story. The Elders decide to destroy Sarah if she doesn't respond. Grover, Finch, Whitaker, Butler & Yates confer and decide to discredit the Doctor. The Doctor has deduced Grover is involved but doesn't know why. Professor Whitaker calls the Doctor and lures him to the hanger where the Tyrannosaur was kept. Returning to the hanger he finds some strange equipment installed. A Stegosaur materialises as the Brigadier arrives with General Finch who has the Doctor arrested for summoning the monsters.

What? You hadn't figured out General Finch was in it too? He's was hanging around with Mike at the start of the first episode and he's regular army, and any member of the regular forces in the Third Doctor stories is either evil, under the control of the enemy or obeying orders from some incompetent. It's not a bad episode at all, but the way we keep cutting back from Sarah to Earth without a wibbly wobbly back in time effect (ala the different Earths in Inferno) does rather undermine the idea that she's on a spaceship 3 months away from Earth quite quickly. I wonder if any thought was given to doing a complete episode on the spaceship? as it is the sequence of the Doctor in the base and being herded out again smacks a little of filling in time.

This episode introduces us the Whomobile, a vehicle Jon Pertwee has build for his personal appearances and persuaded Barry Letts to use in the show. It's not quite finished yet, missing it's roof and sporting a temporary windscreen. Both Jon Pertwee & Elizabeth Sladen tell stories of their trip to work during the location filming of this story and driving down Kingston Upon Thames high street and getting a lot of attention. We get another Kingston location in this story as the Doctor pauses to take readings in South Lane, just south of the town centre and adjacent to the previously seen Kent Road location.

Saturday 19 November 2011

362 Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Three

EPISODE: Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 362
STORY NUMBER: 071
TRANSMITTED: 26 January 1974
WRITER: Malcolm Hulke
DIRECTOR: Paddy Russell
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Invasion Of The Dinosaurs
Episode Format: 625 video

Seeing the Doctor's life in danger Captain Yates removes the device sabotaging the gun and stuns the Tyrannosaur. Later he argues with Butler & Whitaker pleading for them to bring him in on the plan. Yates is ordered to sabotage the Doctor's instruments tracking where the time distortions are coming from. The Tyrannosaur is chained up in a aircraft hanger and surrounded by instrumentation. Sarah has been researching current time travel scientists and has come up with Whitaker's name, who the Brigadier recognises. Six months ago he disappeared. The Brigadier decides to check up on him. Charles Grover was on the committee assessing Whitaker's grant application and dismisses him as a crank. General Finch takes an interest in Sarah's theory that Whitaker might be behind it and gives Sarah instructions so she may get a pass to photograph the dinosaur. While she takes the photographs the Tyrannosaur awakes and enraged by the flash breaks it's bonds & attacks her. She hides in an office but finds the exterior door locked behind her, but is rescued by the Doctor. She & the Doctor believe someone tried to kill her a suspicion confirmed when the chains are found to have been cut and the machine has been sabotaged. The Doctor starts to build a new detection device but Sarah decides to trace the power supply that the time equipment needs. She goes to see Sir Charles Grover in his Whitehall offices and asks to see some files relating to the construction of government bunkers in central London. She is lured into his records office, a secret lift down to the bunker under his offices and Grover takes her to Butler & Whitaker. She is locked into a room, subjected to a hypnotic effect and collapses. When she wakes up she is greeted by a man named Mark on a spaceship voyaging to the new home for humanity. Mark tells her they left Earth three months ago.

More sabotage from Yates here, and Sarah's curiosity keeps getting her into trouble: first with the dinosaur & the camera and then as she's captured by Grover, the second member of the conspiracy revealed. Hearing he had environmental leanings in the previous episode and listening to what Captain Yates is saying lets you easily draw a line between the two drawing him into the web. But what an episode ending! Sarah's been captured and she's three months away from the Earth and her friends in deep space.

I didn't see Invasion of the Dinosaurs till the mid 90s when a friend recorded it for me off UK Gold. I vaguely knew by this point that some of the story had been filmed in Kingston though didn't have access to the detailed location guides (Richard Bignell's book Doctor Who on Location or http://www.doctorwholocations.net/) that I do now. But as I watched the Doctor drive the jeep towards the hanger I sat up in astonishment recognising the location! In 1979 my family moved to a house in Woodcote Close, just off Park Road in Kingston Upon Thames. Out of the back window you can see allotments and the Barnfield Youth Centre. And between these is Parkfields Road where this sequence was filmed. Every Sunday morning I was walking up Parkfields to go to church - King's Church Kingston were meeting there at the time but they're now in Kingston TA Hall, very close to the Kent Road & South Lane locations. Doctor Who was effectively filmed at the bottom of my garden!!! It always amuses me that the Doctor turns left as he comes out of Parkfields Road, in the process driving past the Wilmer Close location in episode 1, as left from there leads to a dead end ! There's a housing estate there now but at the time it was overgrown ground, a brownies meeting hall and more allotments, where my father had a patch of ground for many years!

Friday 18 November 2011

361 Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Two

EPISODE: Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 361
STORY NUMBER: 071
TRANSMITTED: 19 January 1974
WRITER: Malcolm Hulke
DIRECTOR: Paddy Russell
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Invasion Of The Dinosaurs
Episode Format: 625 video

Fleeing the battle The Doctor & Sarah hide in a garage where they confront a peasant from the middle ages who vanishes before their eyes. They are found by the Brigadier and taken to UNIT's temporary HQ where he explains how the Dinosaurs started to appear in central London. The Doctor meets General Finch who immediately dismisses the Doctor's theory that the dinosaurs are being brought from the past. The Doctor & Brigadier go to a nearby sighting of a stegosaurus which the Doctor studies. Mike Yates expresses the opinion that he likes London better deserted with cleaner air. As the Doctor approaches the stegosaurus to capture it, it vanishes in front of their eyes. The Doctor deduces someone in central London is bringing the Dinosaurs to this time. In a hidden control room Butler plans the next time transference to bring dinosaurs to London but Professor Whitaker wishes to get on with the main project. The Doctor builds a weapon to immobilise a dinosaur, explaining it to Mike. General Finch wants Sarah evacuated but Sarah gets Mike to get her a pass to stay in London. Butler & Whitaker are visited by their friend from UNIT: Captain Yates. The Doctor is visited by Charles Grover, the minister responsible for the crisis. Yates warns Butler & Whitaker that the Doctor can trace them and they fear he will jeopardise Operation Golden age and he is ordered to sabotage the Doctor's weapon. The Doctor believes the the Dinosaurs are being used to clear London in order for something to be carried out in secret. The Doctor goes to capture a platiosaurus but discovers the gun doesn't work as the platiosaur vanishes and a tyrannosaurus bears down on him!

MIKE YATES IS A DIRTY STINKING TRAITOR! Jaw Drops! Here's a character that we've seen on screen for the last 3 years serving with UNIT and helping the Doctor yet here he's conspiring with those bringing the dinosaurs to London and sabotaging the Doctor's efforts. What's happened to Mike between the end of the Green Death, where something rather nasty happened to him, and here? This is a huge thing for the series to have done and they're to be applauded for it. Real character development. We're also getting a hint of environmentalist leanings from Mike, judging by his speech to Sarah. In the Green Death the environmentalists were the good guys - are they the bad guys here? Already there's enough hints for the viewer to join up the dots and work out who else is involved. The start of this episode features the worst worst cut from film to video ever as the soldiers return to their vehicle after confronting the tyrannosaur.

How many sugars does the Doctor take in his tea? He's piling them in for a while as we watch! His dinosaur stun gun is reused prop from Frontier in Space but it's more familiar here as publicity photos taken during this story keep cropping up showing Pertwee holding it! The Doctor points out that platiosaur is more commonly known as the brontosaur: in fact the brontosaur, a popular name for the large long necked & tail four legged dinosaur doesn't actually exist.

Most of the major guest cast for this serial appear in this episode. John Bennett plays General Finch in every episode of the series. He'll be back, somewhat controversially in make up, as Li H'sen Chang in The Talons of Weng-Chiang. Sir Charles Grover is Noel Johnson was King Thous in The Underwater Menace. Peter Miles, previously Dr. Lawrence in the Silurians, is Professor Whitaker here a year before his defining Doctor Who role as Nyder in Genesis of the Daleks. We've also seen the actor playing Butler, Martin Jarvis, before as Hilio in The Web Planet, and he too will return, this time as the Governor in Vengeance on Varos. Regular extra Pat Gorman appears in this episode as a UNIT Corporal while James Marcus, the Peasant, played Rask in Underworld. Outside of Doctor Who, he played Georgie in A Clockwork Orange.

In 1976 when the archive was audited for a Doctor Who documentary and then again in 1978 when Ian Levene first came to the BBC looking to buy episodes of Doctor Who the film and video library possessed no copies of Invasion of the Dinosaurs. In 1976 BBC Enterprises had black & white film copies of the first three episodes, the last episodes of Doctor Who to be telerecorded onto black & white film, but by 1978 these had been destroyed. And yet by 1981 transmission tapes of episodes 2-6 now resided in the film & video library. The original tapes were pulled out of storage for the story's release on video and were found to be covered in British Rail transit labels. In 1974 BBC Wales had opted out of showing Doctor Who on a Saturday evening instead showing a regional music show Gwerin 74. That year Doctor Who was shown on a Monday night (Time Warrior 1), Tuesday night (Time Warrior 2 - Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1) and then Sunday afternoons (Invasion of the Dinosaurs 2 onwards) This in itself may have seen Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 separated from it's brethren. The theory is that BBC Wales accidentally held onto the tapes for longer than necessary only returning them at a later date accounting for their 1976 absence and yet their presence in 1981.

We're back the Kent Road location in Kingston for more filming in this episode as the Doctor & Unit confront a stegosaurus. This location is now under the Seven King's car park but most of the buildings seen in the background still exist. The white edged brick building in the background is the Kingston Guildhall where the council sits. Another building, the one with four chimney stack, currently houses a Jamie Oliver restaurant and was the site of a 371 bus crash some years ago the scars of which are still visible on the walls. When I first brought my wife Liz to Kingston she parked her car on the road very close to where the Doctor & Brigadier are standing..... and then had to leave it there for a week when she discovered the keys had gone missing! Did we mention the Riverside Vegetaria restaurant round the corner from this site already? We did, oh well, another plug, it really is that good :-)

Thursday 17 November 2011

360 Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part One

EPISODE: Invasion of the Dinosaurs Part One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 360
STORY NUMBER: 071
TRANSMITTED: 12 January 1974
WRITER: Malcolm Hulke
DIRECTOR: Paddy Russell
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: VHS: Doctor Who - Invasion Of The Dinosaurs
Episode Format: 16mm b&w film recording

For the first time in ages we're watching a VHS Video! And for the very last time the episode we're watching is in black & white.

The Doctor & Sarah materialise in a park in a deserted London with the phones cut off. Elsewhere the army are patrolling the streets looking for looters, one of whom nearly mows the Doctor & Sarah down as they wait for a non arriving bus. Following they find the man breaking into a jewellers. He escapes but moments later they here a crash and find him dead with his car crushed. At UNIT HQ sightings are recorded and looters noted as the Brigadier hopes that the Doctor will show up soon. Pursuing a second vehicle the Doctor & Sarah are trapped in a garage where they attacked by a Pterodactyl, escaping by driving a land rover through the doors. The Brigadier's liaison with the regular army, General Finch, is ordering him to shoot looters. The Doctor & Sarah are themselves arrested as looters. On the streets soldiers battle a Tyrannosaur but their report to hq is subject to radio interference. The Brigadier sees photos of the Doctor & Sarah when they were arrested and arranges to collect them. On the way to the detention centre the land rover they are being carried in is attacked by a Tyrannosaur.....

Oh that's a fabulous episode, with an almost Dalek Invasion of Earth feel to the central London location seen at the start, filmed in a unauthorised covert filming session undertaken by director Paddy Russell, returning for the first time since her debut on 1966's The Massacre. This session earned her a reprimand from BBC bosses but it looks superb on the screen as does the sequence of the Doctor & Sarah landing and finding themselves in a deserted park filled with abandoned everyday items. The Doctor's comment "It's a Sunday, Great Britain always closes on Sundays" is accurate for the time period but isn't recognisably to anyone who lives in any town in the UK now. There's a small bit of escape & recapture padding the episode later on but apart from the it uses the time wisely setting up the situation as the Brigadier tries to discover why the dinosaurs keep turning up.

Lots of the cast of this episode only appear in this episode: Lieutenant Shears, the officer staging the looters' trials, is played by Ben Aris a man with two major comedy roles to his name. From 1980 to 1981 he played Mr Spalding in To the Manor Born, and then from 1982 onwards, he played ballroom dancer Julian Dalrymple-Sykes in Hi-de-Hi! Two very familiar faces Dave Carter & Terry Walsh appear as Sergeant Duffy & the Looter respectively. John Caesar, who plays the R/T Soldier had been in several previous stories: The Romans (as 2nd Man in Market), The Daleks' Master Plan (uncredited; as an Egyptian Soldier), The Ark (as a Monoid), The Macra Terror (as a Guard) & The Sea Devils (as C.P.O. Myers). Gordon Reid, who played Phillips, has a somewhat notable end to his life: He collapsed and died on stage at the Finborough Theatre at Earls Court, London on the evening of 26 November 2003 halfway through Act Two of a performance of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot in the role of Vladimir, aged 64.

Oddly this episode is entitled on screen Invasion part 1, supposedly to keep the appearance of the dinosaurs a secret...... despite a picture appearing in the Radio Times and the Dinosaurs making sporadic appearances during the episode, not being saved till the end. At the time the decision angered story author Malcolm Hulke, for which he later received an apology from producer Barry Letts & the head of serials. This had led to rumours over the years that the videotape for this episode was junked because it was confused with the video for the first episode of the Invasion, the 1968 Cyberman story. However since the videos for the Invasion were junked in 1971, three years before this story was made, this seems unlikely.

At the point that the BBC archives were first audited all six episodes of Invasion of the Dinosaurs were missing. We'll cover the whereabouts of the later episodes later but by 1981 Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 was the only Pertwee episode missing from the Archives. Ian Levine was put in touch with a fan, Roger Stevens, who has provided him with black & white film copies of Abominable Snowman 2 & Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 which he had obtained through a colleague at the BBC. Abominable Snowman 2 was returned to the BBC in February 1982 but Levene held onto Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 till June 1983 to use as a bargaining chip in case any other Doctor Who episodes came to light.

Quite how this episode comes to exist as a black & white film, and then not a terribly good copy, and what happened to the original videotape is something of a mystery. The Time Warrior was the last complete story to have a black & white telerecording made of it, but the first three episodes of Invasion of the Dinosaurs are known to have been recorded and were believed to have later been destroyed. When it was recently passed through the chroma dot recovery process to recover the colour information to use on the forthcoming Invasion of the Dinosaurs DVD it was discovered that the blue part of the signal could not be recovered (I presume due to the blue chroma dots being absent) and a manual recolour of certain blue elements became necessary (like the Tardis and the River Thames on the map)

When I was young I wanted to see the town were I lived, Kingston Upon Thames on TV. After all it was the most important place in the entire world. In particular I wanted Doctor Who to film there. Little did I know that it had in the year I was born! This episode features several locations from my home town.

Firstly near the end of the opening sequence is a shot of an abandoned Milk Float. This was filmed in Wilmer Close. The trees you can see in the background of the shot are the edge of Richmond Park. This sequence was filmed 26th September 1973 along with another nearby from episode 3 which actually shows the entrance to Wilmer Close. Six years later my parents bought a house in nearby Woodcote Close. I've walked past this road many a time without ever realising Doctor Who was filmed there. (I went to a rather good garage sale in Wilmer Close once leaving with a load of early Star Wars weeklys that still sit in my long boxes today)

The sequence where the Tardis materialises was filmed on 27th September 1973 at Canbury Gardens which runs alongside the River Thames. Shooting here without capturing the river or the Power Station which once dominated one end of the site is some achievement.

Along the other side of Canbury Gardens to the river runs Lower Ham Road which forms the location where Sarah & The Doctor try to call UNIT, wait for a bus and nearly get run down by a car. This road is now a dead end at the south but when this story was filmed it was possible to drive through Kingston from the Portsmouth Road (near to the Meat Market Location bellow), through the Market Place, along Thames Street, under the railway line by Bentalls and along Lower Ham Road emerging as you do now by the former Britsh Aerospace Site which in turn is close to a third location used later in the story!

Palmer Crescent, where the Doctor & Sarah see a van, is to the south of the town centre near to Kingston University and the GPO Sorting Office location, used very briefly as a substitute for a police station. Both sequences were also filmed on 26th September 1973.

The Doctor & Sarah are mistaken for looters and captured at Kingston Meat Market, a site which the majority of is no longer there. Several shots filmed nearby close to this location are used in the next episode and these were filmed on the 26th& 27th September 1973. If you decide to visit it we can heartily recommend the Riverside Vegetaria for a meal.

Wednesday 16 November 2011

359 The Time Warrior Part Four

EPISODE: The Time Warrior Part Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 359
STORY NUMBER: 070
TRANSMITTED: 05 January 1974
WRITER: Robert Holmes
DIRECTOR: Alan Bromly
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Time Warrior
Episode Format: 625 video

Sarah knocks Linx's aim off and Ruebish, listening to the Doctor, strikes the probic vent on the back of the Sontaran's neck knocking him out. The Doctor teaches Ruebish how to break Linx's conditioning. While Sarah infiltrates the kitchens and drugs the food he distracts Irongron but is captured. Sarah rescues him and both retreat to Lord Edward's castle while the drug takes effect. Returning with Hal the Doctor then instructs Ruebish in the use of Linx's time device to return the scientists home. Irongron, enraged at the drugging of his troops blames Linx and attacks him but Linx slays him. As Linx activates the engines of his ship Hal shoots an arrow into his probic vent slaying him with the resulting explosion from the faulty ship destroying the castle. Hal watches in amazement as the Doctor & Sarah leave in the Tardis.

And that's that. Suddenly the mighty Sontaran warrior has a fatal weakness which gets exploited twice in the episode. As you might have gathered from my comments neither this episode or the entire serial has exactly set my world on fire. It's competently done, it just doesn't do anything for me. Sorry.

Location filming for this story took place in and around Peckforton Castle from the 7th - 10th May 1973, the week following the broadcast of Planet of the Daleks 5. Time Warrior, although it launched the show's eleventh season, was filmed as the last story of the tenth recording block.

The novel of the Time Warrior was written by Terrance Dicks but apparently Robert Holmes was originally commissioned to novelise his own scripts. He eventually managed to finish the first chapter, gave up then phoned his friend Terrance Dicks and asked him to finish it!

The Time Warrior was released as a compilation video in 1989, one of the last videos to be released in this format. It is one of only three, the others being Seeds of Death & Talons of Weng Chiang, not to have a subsequent episodic VHS release. It was released on DVD on 3rd September 2007 the last of these three stories to get a DVD release and thus the last Doctor Who story to be released episodically. It was also included in the Doctor Who : Bred for War Boxset which collects The Time Warrior with the other three Sontaran stories: The Sontaran Experiment, The Invasion Of Time & The Two Doctors. Bred for War was released on 5th May 2008 to tie in with their return in the fourth series of the new Doctor Who.

This bring us to the end of a run of 52 episodes watched on DVD from Curse of Peladon 1 to Time Warrior 4. During the course of me watching these episodes Day of the Daleks was released bringing the total to 56 and this will extended to 62 episodes in January with the release of the next story, Invasion of the Dinosaurs, in the UNIT Box set. This is the longest DVD run so far in our journey and the longest run spent on any one format. Larger runs are coming: 74 consecutive episodes exist on DVD from Robots of Death - Creature from the Pit and then a MASSIVE 139 from the Leisure Hive - Delta and the Bannermen.

Tuesday 15 November 2011

358 The Time Warrior Part Three

EPISODE: The Time Warrior Part Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 358
STORY NUMBER: 070
TRANSMITTED: 29 December 1973
WRITER: Robert Holmes
DIRECTOR: Alan Bromly
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Time Warrior
Episode Format: 625 video

Hal shoots the axe out of Irongron's hand allowing he & Sarah to rescue the Doctor. They take him captive to Sir Edward's castle where the Doctor explains what is actually happening and that Linx is helping Irongron. Irongron attacks Sir Edward's castle but is repelled by the Doctor using a superior stink & smoke bomb. The Doctor & Sarah, disguised as wandering monks, sneak into Irongron's castle and into the dungeon where they are reunited with Professor Ruebish. While trying to revive & release the exhausted enslaved scientists so he can return them home the Doctor is captured by Linx who fires his weapon at him.

Or "Sarah learns she has jumped to the wrong conclusions". Won't be the last time either ;-)

The word TIME crops up in Doctor Who story names quite a bit. Well it's a series about time travel, you'd expect it to.

The Space Museum 2: The Dimensions of Time
The Chase 2: The Death of Time
The Time Meddler
The Daleks' Master Plan 12: Destruction of Time

The Time Monster
The Time Warrior
The Invasion of Time
Time-Flight
Timelash
Trial a Timelord
Time and the Rani

Yeah. Not some of the series finest hours, Time Meddler & Destruction of Time excepting. What then shall we conclude? The series is better doing stuff about death than time?

Monday 14 November 2011

357 The Time Warrior Part Two

EPISODE: The Time Warrior Part Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 357
STORY NUMBER: 070
TRANSMITTED: 22 December 1973
WRITER: Robert Holmes
DIRECTOR: Alan Bromly
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Time Warrior
Episode Format: 625 video

Sarah is taken to Irongron, who she believes is taking part in some form of role play. Linx hypnotises her and she reveals she's from the 20th century & that the Doctor brought her here. Linx demonstrates his new robot which fights the captures archer Hal. Hal escapes with Sarah. The Doctor penetrates Linx's rooms in the castle dungeon and finds the missing scientist under Linx's control. Ruebish has resisted the hypnotic effect due to his short sightedness. The Doctor is captured by Linx. Hal returns to Edward's castle bringing Sarah with him who tells them that she thinks the Doctor is responsible for aiding Irongron and must be stopped. The Doctor tells Linx he's from Gallifrey and is a Time Lord. Linx connects the Doctor to one of his machines to monitor the slave working scientists. Ruebish helps the Doctor escape, but while fleeing he attacks Irongron who raises his axe to kill him.

I find the Time Warrior a bit hard to really get interested in when I watch it. I get that it's big and important but it doesn't float my boat like some other stories do. We've already had a new companion and a new monster. Now 357 episodes into the series, and a week shy of the first anniversary of this blog, we learn the name of the place the Doctor is from: The planet Gallifrey. OK we've already seen it three times in the War Games, briefly in the Colony in Space and most recently in the Three Doctors but this is the first time it's named.

Oh look, there's the control bank from UFO again in Linx's dungeon!

The Doctor's "Would you excuse me I've got to go and find a young girl" is well worth a giggle and even gets picked on in the story.

Our lead villain, the Sontaran Linx is played by Kevin Lindsay on his Doctor Who debut. During this story he keeled over during the recording due to a heart condition exasapated by the costume which led to a redesign before the Sontarans next appearance. He got on well with the show's star Jon Pertwee and returns as Cho Je in Planet of the Spiders, the third Doctor's farewell story, before making his own final appearance in 1975's The Sontaran Experiment as both Styre & The Marshal. He died of his heart condition at the age of 49 on 26th April 1975. Barry Letts first offered roll of human warlord Irongron to up & coming actor Bob Hoskins who was forced to turn it down but instead recommended David Daker. He'll return as Captain Rigg in Nightmare of Eden, but is a familiar television face as Harry Crawford in the hit series Boon, PC Owen Culshaw in Z-Cars, Jarvis in Porridge and Captain Nathan Spiker in Dick Turpin amongst many others. Both he and his deputy Bloodaxe, played by John J. Carne are for some reason uncredited on episode 1. We've seen Jeremy Bulloch, playing Hal, before as Tor in The Space Museum, but he's more famous now for being Boba Fett in The Empire Strikes Back. We've also seen Lord Edward of Wessex, actor Alan Rowe before in the Moonbase as Dr. Evans and the Space Control voice. He'll be back as James Skinsale in The Horror of Fang Rock and in Full Circle as Garif. I learn that he was the partner of fellow Doctor Who guest star Geoffrey Bayldon who was offered the role of the Doctor and eventually shows up in the series as Organon in The Creature from the Pit. Lady Eleanor, Lord Edward's wife, is played by the most obviously recognisable member of the cast in this story now: June Brown is now well known for her 28 years to date playing Dot Cotton in Eastenders. Donald Pelmear's IMDB entry makes me think I've seen a few things that he's been in but every time I see him here as Professor Rubeish I have to convince myself that he's not Sam Kelly because Pelmear's appearance and mannerisms remind me of the well known comedy actor so much.

Sunday 13 November 2011

356 The Time Warrior Part One

EPISODE: The Time Warrior Part One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 356
STORY NUMBER: 070
TRANSMITTED: 15 December 1973
WRITER: Robert Holmes
DIRECTOR: Alan Bromly
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Time Warrior
Episode Format: 625 video

A silver ball like spaceship lands in the England of the middle ages. Local Warlord Irongron claims it as his own but a Sontaran officer Linx emerges claiming Earth for the Sontaran empire and requests Irongron's help in exchange for modern weapons so that he may attack local Lord Edward of Wessex. In the 20th century a number of top scientists have disappeared from a research establishment so the Brigadier has taken some of the remainder into protective custody and the Doctor has joined them. The Doctor meets Professor Rubeish, who is complaining at being kept there, and the journalist Sarah Jane Smith who is posing as her aunt, Lavinia, a noted virologiost. She's heard what is going on and is there looking for a story. She begins to suspect the Doctor of being responsible. During the night the Doctor detects delta particles indicating a time disturbance. He & Sarah find Rubeish gone and the Doctor uses a device to detect the image of the armoured Sontaran Warrior. The Doctor traces his through time and follows him in the Tardis little knowing Miss Smith is aboard. The Tardis materialises in the forest scaring Edward's remaining archer Hal. The Doctor emerges and pursues the signal shortly followed by Sarah who disturbs Hal's shot at Irongron. He runs but she is captured by Irongron's warriors at which point the Doctor spots her and follows. He sees Linx enter the courtyard as he removes his helmet revealing the alien face underneath.

The story has it that Robert Holmes submitted his storyline for this story to his Script Editor as a report from a scouting Sontaran Hol Mes to his superior Terran Cedicks. It succeeded and the Time Warrior makes it to the screen introducing us to both the Sontarans, the sixth and final great race of returning monsters in Doctor Who but also his new companion Sarah Jane Smith. Both are well served by the episode getting a decent introduction. We discover Sarah is a journalist, that she has an Aunt Lavinia, who we will eventually meet in eight years time, and we get a quite clear view on her attitude to life & women's role in it. The Sontaran meanwhile is revealed to be a member of a high technology warlike race.

We can't go much further with talking about Sarah Jane without mentioning that she wasn't the Third Doctor's original third female companion. At some point an unknown actress was cast in an unknown role but for unknown reasons the show did not proceed with her in the part. (page 336 of the The Doctor Who Television Companion) The information, and the why the companion wasn't used, have been kept so secret that even noted Doctor Who historian Andrew Pixley (don't bother looking on Wikipedia: he's not the murderer listed there!) does not know her identity. Barry Letts took the secret to his grave with him and if Jon Pertwee knew he did likewise, leaving just Terrance Dicks as the only possible person who might know. And he's not telling either!

So that then leads to the casting of Liverpool born actress Elizabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith. Born 1st February 1946 she was by this point married to the actor Brian Miller who we'll be hearing from later. She had appeared in Coronation Street, Z-Cars, Some Mothers Do Have Em & Doomwatch so had some amount of television experience already.

For the eleventh season of Doctor Who we get a new title featuring the famed Diamond Logo for the first time. You can watch it on YouTube if you've not seen it before but it is broadly similar to the Tom Baker sequence that replaces it after just 26 episodes. I remember my shock when putting the VHS of Death to the Daleks (the first season 11 story that I saw) in the machine and not seeing the familiar red, orange and green sequence. What I love about this one is the very start of it with the streaks of light shooting towards the screen and resolving themselves into a tunnel. It's almost a shame this element isn't retained for it's replacement. Meanwhile the end titles are also revised with the diamond shaped tunnel, previously seen approaching us in the opening sequence, receding from us into the distance with the credits over the top. Good, but in this case Tom's version is far superior.

From this episode onwards each episode (with one exception) is named "Part" and then the number of the episode within the story, replacing the word "Episode" used previously.

Saturday 12 November 2011

344 The Green Death Episode Six

EPISODE: The Green Death Episode Six
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 355
STORY NUMBER: 069
TRANSMITTED: 23 June 1973
WRITER: Robert Sloman (and Barry Letts - Uncredited)
DIRECTOR: Michael Briant
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - the Green Death
Episode Format: 625 video

The Doctor tries to find an antibiotic agent to attack the virus in Professor Jones' body, wondering what he meant by serendipity. Benton brings the Doctor a maggot chrysalis that he's found. Nancy finds the escaped Maggot dead, Benton wonders if what it ate killed him and the Doctor realises it's the fungus. The BOSS orders that Yates be subjected to total processing. Benton & the Doctor sprinkle the fungus on the hillside killing the maggots. Cliff is getting worse at the Wholeweal. Yates escapes from Global Chemicals. Benton & the Doctor are attacked by a giant fly, the metamorphosed form of the Maggot which the Doctor kills. Jo tells the Doctor of the accident she had with the fungus powder which enables the Doctor to produce a treatment. Yates tells the Doctor about BOSS's plans and the Doctor goes to Global Chemicals where BOSS prepares to link himself to seven other computers internationally. The Doctor goes to destroy the Boss ordering the Brigadier to attack the site if he's not finished by the deadline. As the plan draws near to fruition Stevens connects himself to the BOSS acting as BOSS's mouthpiece when the Doctor confronts him. The Doctor uses the blue crystal on Stevens to break his conditioning and released from BOSS's hold he destroys Global Chemicals and the BOSS. Jo & Professor Stevens decide to get married and go down the Amazon together to look for the fungus. The Brigadier receives word that Wholeweal has been granted status as a UN Priority One research centre, thanks to Jo making a request of her Uncle at the UN. The Doctor gives her the blue crystal he brought back from Metebelis 3, before silently slipping away from the celebratory party and driving off in Bessie into the night.

Usually deadlines or countdowns add some urgency to an episode but they don't really seem to here. We know that BOSS's plan comes into affect at 4pm but he's been very vague about what it is and as far as I can figure it's a poor man's attempt at knocking off WOTAN from the War Machines. And that's only really been introduced in this episode as is the idea of the maggots pupating and turning into flies. Maybe introducing both plot elements a little earlier in the story would have helped. So we're left with Cliff Jones illness and imminent death as the plot element we're invested in, mainly because Jo's obviously fallen for him in a big way. Fortunately the treatment for the illness, and the solution to the maggot problem has been in plain sight for some while. Two odd points to this episode.... well three, but we've already done the dodgy CSO earlier in the story. BOSS spends most of this episode behaving very oddly, humming Wagner and the like, which isn't behaviour you expect from a super computer and isn't really explained. Then we have Terry Walsh's guard on the gate..... OK I get he's been immobilised, when BOSS tries to take control of his slaves, so he stands there wobbling around. But why doesn't anyone take his gun off him when the Doctor rushes past? He's still holding it when the Doctor returns some while afterwards. So UNIT just stood there while someone wobbles around for how many minutes leaving him holding a double barrelled shot gun ?????

But what the Green Death episode Six is best known as is it's Katy Manning's final episode of Doctor Who. Katy Manning's impending departure had been known about for some time and throughout this season her character shows some real development resisting the Masters hypnotism and fear machine in Frontier in Space and being given a potential love interest in Planet of the Daleks. Right through this story her attraction Cliff is obvious, as is his to her, which sets her departure up nicely and gives her probably the best departure story of any companion. Oddly enough this story also marks the start of real character development for another of our characters: Captain Mike Yates. The effects of what has happened to him here will be felt for some time and will tie into Jo's last influence on the series towards the end of the next series/

Katy Manning's eclectic career post Doctor Who includes presenting the arts & craft program Serendipity, posing naked with a Gold Dalek and many stage appearances. After having twins in 1978 she emigrated to Australia where she eventually became the partner of Barry Crocker, the writer of the theme music for the Australian Soap Opera Neighbours. Her best friend is Liza Minelli who is godmother to her children. No, honestly, I'm not making any of this up! She appeared opposite Eleventh Doctor Matt Smith and Elizabeth Sladen, her successor as companion, in the Sarah Jane Adventures episode The Death of Doctor Who where her character is credited as Jo Jones.

Jo Grant appears in 77 episodes of Doctor Who, which is exactly equal to the number of episodes the Ian & Barbara, the Doctor's original human companions, travelled with him albeit with the small caveat that they weren't both in all those episodes. At the moment that stands joint second behind Jamie McCrimmon who has 113 episodes spanning his first and last appearance with the same caveat that applies to Ian & Barbara. Nobody will ever overtake Jamie's record but Jo, Ian & Barbara will find themselves relegated to joint third place in a few years time.

As well a being the last episode to feature Jo Grant/Katy Manning this is the last appearance of the original Third Doctor/Jon Pertwee opening & closing title sequences which have been on the last 102 episodes. The record here is 152 episodes held by the original Hartnell sequence, and this only just beats the Troughton tally of 101 episodes. The next sequence will be the shortest, at just 26 episodes, but will serve as the template for what follows with Tom Baker's first title sequence being used on 150 episodes, of which 144 were broadcast. And to celebrate the final appearance of these titles the end sequence is once again, like episodes 2 & 5, broadcast the wrong way up and in reverse. This also the last time an episode is entitled "episode " & the number.

The Green Death has been repeated three times by the BBC. Firstly on 27th December 1973 it was shown as a 90-minute compilation. This no longer survives in the BBC archives, unlike the original transmission tapes for all 6 episodes which have always been there allowing it to be shown from the 2nd January to 6th February 1994 on BBC2. Then in 2006 on the 3rd to 5th April it was shown 2 episodes a night on BBC4. In fact more of this season, the tenth, of Doctor Who has been repeated than any other with The Three Doctors & Carnival of Monsters being shown as part of the Five Faces of Doctor Who in 1981 and Planet of the Daleks being shown to celebrate the 30th anniversary in 1993. The runners up here are Davison's first season & Pertwee's third with 14 episodes apiece shown and then Tom Baker's First & Last both of which have has twelve episodes of Doctor Who repeated.

The Green Death is the only story to be novelised by Malcolm Hulke that he did not write the television script for, but the anti big business and environmental issues click very nicely with themes expressed in his other stories, especially Colony in Space. Hulke gets round actor Tony Adams illness by restoring to Elgin all the lines taken by James in the fifth episode.

The Green Death was released in double video pack in August 1996 as a tribute to Jon Pertwee who died earlier that year. It was the first release after the break in the classic Doctor Who video range for the Paul McGann Doctor Who TV Movie and sports a modified style to the covers not yet quite in the style they would be for the last few years of the Doctor Who video range.

The Green Death was released on DVD 10th May 2004, as the fourth Jon Pertwee release, and includes a great mock documentary by Mark Gatiss. If you were at my wedding two month later then Rob Leitch gave the sermon there with his notes up against my copy which he'd borrowed and, knowing I wouldn't be back in Kingston for a while, thought he aught to return then!

So while Doctor Who was off air Terrance Dicks & Barry Letts were busy with Moonbase 3, a more realistic science fiction show. It didn't fare that well in the ratings and was for many years thought lost. However 525 line NTSC copies were recovered from the USA during the 90s. It was released on DVD but is long out of print.

Oddly enough when I dug out the Doctor Who Magazine Third Doctor Special Edition to check something to do with Frontier in Space I discovered an advert for The Moonbase on DVD on the back!