Synopsis:
Polly desperately asks Ben if he succeeded in sabotaging the Z-Bomb, but he is still groggy and cannot remember. The countdown reaches zero and the rockets flare...
Seconds later, however, the engines shut down.
Cutler is furious and demands to know from Barclay how long it will take to repair the fault, but he calmly states that there is not enough time - confirmed by the Doctor, who returns to the tracking room. He explains cryptically to his young companions that he is subject to some external influence, and that his old body is wearing a bit thin...
The General's mind snaps, and he threatens to kill them. So fixated is he that he fails to heed warnings from a radar technician that another spaceship has landed close by.
A trio of Cybermen break in and kill Cutler before he can shoot Barclay and the time-travellers.
The new leader is Krang, who informs the tracking room crew that they are aware that a missile has been aimed at Mondas. He demands that it be disarmed.
The Doctor attempts to reason with him, stating that he knows Mondas is doomed due to its excessive energy absorption, then offering to help the Cybermen. As the creatures confer, the Doctor explains that he is merely trying to buy time. The tenth planet is rapidly destroying itself.
The Cybermen have now landed in force and taken over the planet's key installations - including Wigner's Geneva ISC headquarters. Their overall controller - Gern - is there.
Krang commands that a number of scientists go to the silo room to disarm the Z-Bomb. Polly will be taken to their spaceship as a hostage to force their compliance.
Ben agrees to go with Barclay and Dyson to the silo room, with the Doctor urging him to delay their work as long as possible.
The young seaman wonders why the Cybermen do not carry out the task themselves, and they realise that there is something in the area which is a threat to them. They realise that this is radiation, and their theory proves correct as the Cybermen on guard are forced to retreat when tempted inside after Dyson feigns illness.
They will lock themselves in the room and hold out there until Mondas destroys itself. Krang gives them an ultimatum to leave the silo, and the Doctor will now also be sent to the spaceship as a further hostage. The Doctor warns Ben over the intercom that the Cybermen are now plotting to use the Z-Bomb to destroy the Earth, in order to save their own planet.
The group in the silo elect to go on the offensive as they know the Cybermen will attempt to break in shortly. Sure enough Krang sends Cybermen to the room armed with a paralysing gas.
In the Cybership, the Doctor and Polly notice a strange vibration affecting the craft, which he believes to be a sign that the Cybermen draw all their power from the planet. Polly is concerned by his failing health.
Ben seeks a weapon, and Barclay confirms that the base's reactor has removeable radioactive fuel rods which can be portable for short periods of time.
Krang and the rest of the Cybermen are destroyed. Unsure how many of the creatures are waiting nearby, Ben decides to use one of their communications devices to lure them here.
With the fuel rods removed, the lights and heating fail and in the darkness a third group of Cybermen enter the base. Before they can do anything, however, everyone's attention is drawn to a monitor screen showing Mondas. They see the planet begin to break up.
The Cybermen across the planet collapse and die - having been totally reliant on drawing their energy from their homeworld, just as the Doctor had suspected.
As Barclay and Dyson concentrate on getting the power supply reinstated and ensuring the safe return of the Zeus 5 capsule, Ben slips away to find Polly and the Doctor. He releases them and the increasingly frail Doctor wanders out into the snow to get back to the TARDIS. His concerned companions follow, and initially find the ship's doors locked against them.
The Doctor begins operating controls on the console, before the ship starts to function by itself. He collapses to the floor as Ben and Polly finally manage to enter - just in time to see his features begin to blur and change.
Seconds later, a smaller, dark-haired man lies on the spot where the Doctor had been...
Next time: The Power of the Daleks
Written by Kit Pedler & Gerry Davis
Recorded: Saturday 8th October 1966 - Riverside Studio 1
First broadcast: 5:50pm, Saturday 29th October 1966
Ratings: 7.5 million / AI 47
Designer: Peter Kindred
Director: Derek Martinus
Additional cast: Harry Brooks (Krang), Reg Whitehead (Jarl), Gregg Palmer (Gern), Bruce Wells (Cyberman), Peter Hawkins (Cyberman voices)
Critique:
As we mentioned last week, the final half of The Tenth Planet was written by Gerry Davis alone due to Kit Pedler's ill health over the summer of 1966, though the finished Episodes 3 and 4 credited both men.
Davis kept more detailed notes of his work, so we can enjoy a much closer look at the development of the final instalment.
The paralysing gas was first used by the Cybermen at the beginning of the episode - using it to break into the base in the first place. An extra scene set in Geneva saw Wigner demand that the Doctor make contact with the ruling body on Mondas to negotiate a peaceful resolution. It was claimed that radio contact would be most effective from the South Pole.
The Cybermen spoke now of taking only certain individuals to Mondas, and they would need to be converted during the space flight to survive there.
There was some dialogue about Cutler's last hours - with the Doctor advising that Terry Cutler should never know about his father's behaviour, and indeed should not be told he is dead at all until after he has safely landed. The Doctor also spoke of some short-term disruptions to Earth's weather as a result of Mondas' destruction.
It has been noted by fans that the Cyberman decision to use the Z-Bomb to destroy Earth seems to come out of nowhere, and it is assumed that this is a sign of Davis' late take-over of the scripts due to Kit Pedler's illness. Whilst Pedler strove to maintain some sort of ambiguity about the Cybermen's motivations, Davis presents them as much more straightforward villains.
Something which remains unclear is the exact nature of Mondas. Has its return to the Solar System been a natural phenomenon - some sort of vast elliptical orbit - or has it been deliberately guided back into the Solar System?
Krail simply states that the planet has now returned. There is nothing in the dialogue to state that the planet was artificially powered here - though this is what Attack of the Cybermen will later claim.
The other issue is the energy drain. Is this a deliberate technological process initiated by the Cybermen, or some natural process of the planet? When asked how they are going to stop the energy drain Krail states: "We cannot. It is beyond our powers".
It can't simply be a machine that can be switched on and off - otherwise the Cybermen would have stopped Mondas from absorbing too much energy.
Mondas actually burned up on Tuesday 30th August - when a model of the planet was attacked with a blow-torch at Ealing Film Studios.
Establishing shots of the Cybership in relation to the base, seen in earlier episodes, were reused for this instalment.
The other filming for this episode took place on Wednesday 31st, for the scene of Ben and Polly returning to the TARDIS.
Patrick Troughton had been contracted for the changeover sequence on Friday 16th September. It had been decided to record this first on Hartnell's final studio day, due to its technical complexity. The older actor was very upset, and his successor went out of his way to help support him.
The key member of the production team for this was vision mixer Shirley Coward, who came up with the flaring effect that bleached out the scene as the two camera outputs were mixed. This came about by chance as one of the mixing desks at Riverside had a fault and was not actually supposed to be used.
Unlike later changeovers - where the outgoing Doctor was recorded on the floor, and then replaced by the successor stepping in and lying in exactly the same spot - Hartnell and Troughton were recorded simultaneously, lying on different sections of the TARDIS set's floor, each with a different camera pointing at them from an identical angle.
This required a considerable amount of time to line up, and it was rehearsed from 6 - 6:30pm, then recorded over the next half hour. It would then be played into studio at the conclusion of the studio session, which was due to run between 8:30 - 10pm.
Hartnell also had a still image taken of his face - to be used in a superimposed shot on a mirror in the next episode.
The same three actors from Episode 2 - Whitehead, Brooks and Palmer - returned to play different Cybermen. They were joined by a fourth Cyberman, played by Bruce Wells, who had been used on the Ealing filming.
Given names in the scripts, only Krang is actually referred to by name in dialogue. Krang is also given some sort of rank or title - "Regos".
Peter Hawkins joined Roy Skelton to provide additional Cyberman voices. The latter voiced Krang, whilst Hawkins voiced Gern.
Bill King, of the Trading Post effects company, handled the deaths of Cutler and others, with the smoke effect seen in Episode 2. King also arranged the disintegrating Cyberman chest units. All seven Cyberman costumes were provided by Shawcraft, to be arranged empty on the floor to show the destroyed creatures.
Recording breaks through the evening were used mainly to move Cybermen from set to set, and for the use of gas effects. Wells was the Cyberman seen in the spaceship scenes with Polly and the Doctor.
For his final scenes as the Doctor, Hartnell stood on the darkened TARDIS set which had lights pulsing behind the semi-transparent roundels. Close-ups showed the controls operating by themselves, and the materialisation sound was heard throughout, following an assortment of electronic noise.
At no point is the process ever named as a "regeneration". That term was used for the first time only when Jon Pertwee handed over to Tom Baker, and was then applied retroactively to earlier changes.
We'll discuss the first changeover more fully next time.
The Doctor's final lines as scripted were: "No, no, I can't go through with it - I can't. I can't. I will not give in".
As broadcast, his final words are: "Ah yes, thank you. It's good. Keep warm", as Ben hands him his cloak.
The final 15 minutes of studio time did not require Hartnell, so he could go off and get ready for the farewell party that had been organised to take place at the home of Innes Lloyd. He was very emotional, and when Lloyd gave him a lift home around 1am he stressed to him how he could now enjoy a well-deserved rest.
William Hartnell claimed in interviews at the time that the decision to leave Doctor Who had been a mutual one - though he contradicted this in a letter to fan Ian McLachlan in 1968. He also told journalists that he had a number of exciting new projects lined up, including job offers from Australia.
See below for what he actually did next.
His career quickly ground to a halt as his health deteriorated, with only a couple of small screen roles open to him.
By the time Barry Letts contacted him to feature in The Three Doctors, for the programme's 10th Anniversary, he could no longer work at all. His role in the story was quickly reduced and he appeared only in pre-filmed scenes at Ealing, reading his lines from boards.
Intensely proud of his time as the Doctor - the definitive article you might say - towards the end he could not recall ever having been in the show.
He died, aged 67, on 23rd April 1975.
- The ratings remain healthy as far as audience numbers go, but the final instalment sees a further drop in the appreciation figure - though only by a single point.
- Innes Lloyd and Gerry Davis were very happy with the story, and decided that it should be used as a template for future stories.
- The last great dialogue fluff of the Hartnell era features in this episode - but it isn't courtesy of the star. Michael Craze trips over the phrase "grotty planet Mondas" - muddling up all the vowels to talk about the "plonet Mandos".
- The final Cyberman leader to enter Snowcap is named Shav in the scripts.
- The story has been recreated twice in recent years - featuring David Bradley as William Hartnell / the First Doctor on both occasions. The regeneration sequence was included in the 50th Anniversary drama An Adventure in Space and Time, with Reece Shearsmith playing Patrick Troughton:
This also featured recreated scenes from earlier in the story - one of which included the new Mondasian Cyberman costumes from World Enough And Time / The Doctor Falls. However, only one of these scenes, from Episode 2, made it into the finished programme.
- It was always intended that The Tenth Planet was to be retained by the BBC as a complete set of 16mm film recordings. The video tapes were scrubbed in October 1969. In November 1973 the fourth episode was borrowed by Blue Peter in order that a clip of the regeneration could be used in a 10th Anniversary feature. What happened to the episode thereafter remains a mystery, though there are plenty of rumours. Widely regarded as the show's "Holy Grail" missing episode, it was actually beaten by the final instalment of The Daleks' Master Plan in a recent DWM poll.
- The missing episode can be enjoyed in a number of ways, as telesnaps were taken and the soundtrack exists. These were used for the VHS release of the story - despite Michael Craze having filmed links for an earlier abandoned release (see blog post The Art of The Tenth Planet). For the DVD, the episode was animated to a high quality - unlike most of the subsequent animated missing stories:
- William Hartnell's next significant work on leaving Doctor Who was actually in touring pantomime. Interviewed by local TV, as can be seen as a DVD extra, this was not a happy experience for the actor. The show also drew poor reviews (see below). Hartnell had little more than a cameo role, as the cobbler, in Puss In Boots. He first appeared in his TV costume, but then was seen in panto outfit, including a Harpo Marx-style wig. One of the issues with the production was that the venues were not theatres but a cinema chain, which only had shallow stages and were not geared up for this kind of show. Performances were said to feel under-rehearsed and there were sound and other technical issues. That headline says it all...
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