The Art of... The Enemy of the World

The Enemy of the World was in the process of being novelised by its original writer, David Whitaker, when he sadly passed away in February 1980. Artwork had been prepared by Steve Kyte for this release. The book was then put on hold for a few months before being picked up by Ian Marter, and it finally arrived in April 1981. The Kyte artwork (below, from The Target Book, by David J Howe) was dropped and a new (inferior) cover commissioned by Bill Donohoe.

This features Astrid and Giles Kent, taken from BBC publicity images. Kent is given a militaristic uniform, and Astrid some decolletage. A volcanic landscape forms the background. 

The fact that Salamander doesn't feature - despite the doppelganger aspect of the story being its biggest selling point - is probably down to the policy of the time that only the image of the current Doctor could be used on cover art.

Overall, it doesn't really fit the broadcast episodes at all. A bit too Gerry Anderson.

This was the last time that the Bernard Lodge logo was used on a new Target Doctor Who novelisation.

Kyte also used Astrid - this time with helicopter - and the volcanic backdrop, but there were a couple of rough sketches using a blue logo which he made prior to this, one of which centred purely on the TARDIS.

Whitaker placed the story in 2030, and gave many of the characters first names not used on screen. Salamander was Ramon, Fedorin was Nicholas, and Benik was Theodore. Young Colin, meanwhile, was given the surname Redmayne - but friend Mary was only a Smith.

Most of the scenes with Griffin the chef were omitted. Whitaker also chose to amend the ending to make Salamander's expulsion into the Vortex a deliberate act by the Doctor, whilst it is more accidental on screen - and the would-be dictator is most definitely destroyed by this (whereas the Doctor suggests he might have survived at the opening of the following episode). Another version had the Doctor strand Salamander on Earth to face justice from its people for his crimes.

Marter's adaptation was criticised for the use of the word "bastard", uttered by Benik, as swearing hadn't featured in the range at all before then. The writer was asked to cut his manuscript down to the fixed Target page count and was subsequently unhappy at how disjointed it then became. He cited it as the least favourite of his adaptations.

The novelisation was reissued in 1993, with a new cover by Alister Pearson, this time depicting Salamander backed by a world map. The cover states that the story was first broadcast in 1968, though it began transmission in 1967.

The orphan Episode 3 was released onto VHS on The Troughton Years tape (June 1991), and then on DVD as part of the Lost in Time set (November 2004).

The full story could be enjoyed on audio as part of the BBC Radio Collection, released in August 2002. It manages to cram a number of incidental characters onto its mostly photomontage cover - Denes, Fedorin and Fariah - plus a volcano and helicopter, along with Astrid and Salamander. The map design also features, similar to the one on the reissue of the novelisation (Mercator Projection). I like the little salamander wrapped round the centre of the "O" in "WHO".

Linking narration was by Frazer Hines.

Then, in October 2013, it was announced that the missing five instalments had been rediscovered, along with a new copy of the third episode. A DVD release was swiftly arranged for 25th November, after the episodes had first appeared on iTunes. The cover design - Salamander, Doctor, volcano - was the work of Lee Binding.

A limited edition, utilising the same three visual elements, was also available. The Troughton portrait is clearly one of his earlier ones, from the Power of the Daleks photoshoot.

To mark the return of the episodes, Radio Times commissioned a movie-style poster, designed by Stuart Manning.

The original DVD release had been such a rushed job that there were no extras, so a Special Edition was packaged for release in March 2018. The main making-of documentary was a sort of treasure hunt conducted by Toby Hadoke, and the set also included a touching tribute to Debbie Watling.

The artwork was once again by Lee Binding. As well as the Doctor at the controls of the TARDIS, we see poor Salamander being ejected from the ship in the background. Jamie and Victoria also get to appear this time.

The Target novelisation of the story was released as an audiobook in July 2019, read by David Troughton. He had made his television debut in the story, playing a guard in the penultimate episode whilst on his school holidays. Artwork is as the original novelisation, from Donohoe, but the colours have been dialled down and aren't so garish. A pity they didn't use the reissue cover.

And a Happy Christmas to all of you at home!

 

I'll be back with the art of The Enemy of the World on Friday, but in the meantime let me wish you all a very, very Merry Christmas.

TWBTLATS (5): The End of the War

And so the war comes to an end, though to be honest it has never really felt as if it started. Just threats from both sides. Some actual fighting between Homo Aqua and UNIT or the regular army might have been nice, if you know what I mean.

There have been mentions of "Severance" since episode 3, which we rightly guessed referred to some kind of virus. 

To have had Homo Aqua cohabit the Earth after this was never going to happen, as it would have clashed with everything we've seen of near future Earth since the days of Patrick Troughton's Doctor. At the same time we know that there will be Sea Devils around in 2084, as seen in Warriors of the Deep, and the mentions of Severance can't help but remind us of how crudely Hexachromite gas was set up in that story.

We were also told that this series would be as much a romance as an epic, sci-fi adventure spinning off from Doctor Who. As I said last time, I don't think the relationship between Barclay and Salt was all that convincing (and that between Kate and Ibrahim underdeveloped).

So, going into the finale we can already predict a lot of what's coming. What's left to us is how it happens.

The episode begins with Homo Aqua capturing Britain's dogs and apparently eating them. Kate, speaking to a psychologist, at least admits that we are on the brink of a potential war - and not actually in the middle of one. The world has turned against Barclay, so we can work out that life isn't simply going to back to normal for him.

Then we discover that the talks have been a diversion and Homo Aqua are busy melting the icecaps in Antarctica. If a genocide is being set up, then it will be okay for us to wipe them out first - so the episode is setting up a moral justification for what humanity is sure to do.

Everything is being signposted.

Barclay is managing to sneak out of his confinement every night in search of Salt. His guard is allied with Gunberg, Dussolier and the PM, so they are able to drug and infect him - the plan being that he will find her and so pass on the virus. Sure enough they are reunited, but she sends him back to his friends to arrange an accord - or Capital A "Accord" - with Homo Aqua - and he goes to Kate and UNIT, and they decide to act unilaterally. 

There's no response, however, and we quickly find out why. Homo Aqua begin turning up dead.

Severance.

It's suggested that about 90% have perished - which leaves the door open for Warriors of the Deep of course.

Salt returns, declaring the war ended and revenge is vowed against the three human villains of the piece. We see them perish, but it's unclear if this is just what they fear or if it's a glimpse into the future and actually happens. A more definitive comeuppance would have been more satisfying.

Barclay and Salt get their happy ending. The virus - or Salt, it's very unclear - has made him amphibious and they swim off, not into the sunset but into the deep.

There's an odd little coda, where Kate sees a man drop a bottle on a beach. She asks him to pick it up and when he refuses and gets argumentative she goes ballistic and pulls a gun on him... A bit extreme and totally against what the Doctor advocates. Whatever happened to "science leads"? Trying to reinforce in blunt fashion that everyone has a responsibility to keep the oceans clean, in no matter how small a way - or is Kate being set up as a much darker, more unpredictable, figure for future Doctor Who appearances? When this series was made they had no idea that the parent programme would be shelved for a while.

Overall, this series has been okay - but far from great. Not epic enough, not enough action, and a little derivative and predictable. It was trying so hard to be another Children of Earth but couldn't come close to the event television that became. 

I'm really not sure it's something I would ever feel the need to rewatch - though I'm glad I did see it. A big concern going into it was that it would be overly preachy and, whilst there was an element of that in the second episode, it wasn't too hectoring.

Interestingly, despite the odd mention of the Doctor and the fact that Homo Aqua are supposed to be Sea Devils, it never really felt like it had anything to do with Doctor Who to me - which might stand it in good stead in the long run.

Episode 188: The Enemy of the World (3)

Synopsis:

Alexander Denes, Controller of the Central European Zone, is denounced as a traitor by Salamander - accused of failing to protect his people from a volcanic eruption which the Leader had predicted. He is placed under arrest. He tells Donald Bruce that he looks forward to challenging Salamander in court and has no intentions to flee.

Salamander takes Fedorin away for talks. He is blackmailing the deputy, intent on setting him up to replace Denes whilst having control over him. Fedorin once again denies the accusations against him.

Salamander then hands him a small box - claiming the contents will determine his future. It contains poison...

Bruce is shocked to see Jamie on the palace terrace, now in the uniform of a security guard. He tries to get him to explain what was going on between Salamander and Kent in the latter's office, but Jamie is able to deflect his questions.

Denes is being held in a corridor as there is nowhere else to guard him securely. Bruce insists he be well looked after and a meal is ordered.

Victoria is in the kitchens, which are presided over by the curmudgeonly Chef Griffin. He is not impressed by her cooking skills, and frets that tonight's meal will be a disaster.

Fariah is present, and she tries to warn Victoria into leaving.

Jamie then arrives and reports that Astrid is working on a plan to free Denes. He asks Victoria to get close to Fariah as she may hold valuable information about her employer, who she clearly dislikes.

Victoria agrees that there is something evil about Salamander, just from the reactions of people around him.

At Kanowa, Kent has a mobile home parked just beyond the perimeter of Salamander's research facility. They have watched footage of the Hungarian volcanic eruptions, and Kent tells the Doctor that he believes Salamander to be behind such recent natural disasters - and the answer lies here. He has been suspicious about the facility for some time due to the amount of money and resources that have been diverted into it, despite it only having a small number of staff. It was whilst investigating this that he was removed from office, and all his evidence then disappeared.

They spot Benik and a guard approaching, so the Doctor hides in a box seat.

He has come to warn Kent off, suspicious of his presence so close to the facility. He orders the guard to begin smashing crockery by way of threat then withdraws.

The Doctor has seen first-hand the sort of people Salamander surrounds himself with - but this is not enough to make him accept Kent's suspicions about him. He must have concrete proof.

Astrid arrives at the Palace in the uniform of a messenger. She is stopped by Janos, Denes' guard, who tries to charm her. She brushes him off as the Guard Captain arrives and tells him she has a message for the Leader which must be delivered in person.

The Captain is about to recall seeing her before, but Denes causes a diversion and Astrid hurries away. She makes her way to the kitchen and is able to tell Jamie and Victoria of her plan. He is to create a diversion in the grounds, under cover of which she will spirit Denes away to safety.

Victoria meanwhile tries to learn more about Fariah, and it is clear that Salamander has some hold over her.

Salamander is speaking to Bruce about the arrest and who should replace Denes - making it sound like promoting Fedorin was Bruce's idea.

Victoria is taking a tray of food to Denes when she is intercepted by Fedorin in the corridor. He palms the salt cellar and sends her to fetch another, then opens the box given to him by Salamander.

The Captain informs Salamander of Astrid's presence, having now recalled seeing her with Jamie and Victoria in the park. No message has been delivered to him, so he orders the guards to frighten her away then follow her and see where she goes and who she contacts.

Victoria arranges to sit with Denes as he eats, in readiness for the rescue attempt.

The food has not been poisoned, however. Fedorin could not bring himself to use it. Salamander feigns indifference - then poisons Fedorin's wine, killing him. He claims that the deputy has committed suicide.

In the kitchens, Jamie claims to have seen intruders in the gardens and opens fire. As the guards rush to respond, Astrid overpowers Janos. However, the rescue goes wrong as the Captain shoots and kills Denes. Astrid escapes, but Victoria is captured.

Jamie has also been apprehended and the pair are brought before Salamander, who orders them taken away for questioning.

Bruce finally gets the opportunity to ask Salamander about his recent visit to Kent's office when the young pair were also present. The Leader states he hasn't seen Kent in months. Bruce insists that he saw him there the previous day - or someone very much like him...

Data:

Written by David Whitaker

Recorded: Saturday 16th December 1967 - Lime Grove Studio D

First broadcast: 5.25pm, Saturday 6th January 1968

Ratings: 7.1 million / AI 48

Designer: Christopher Pemsel

Director: Barry Letts

Additional cast: Reg Lye (Griffin), Bill Lyons (Janos)

Critique:

Of all the episodes, Derrick Sherwin claimed that this was the one he did least work on, so it is very much as David Whitaker intended it - or is the one with the greatest contribution from Barry Letts. That Fariah was not originally intended to be a food-taster, and Victoria was to be another security guard and not a kitchen assistant, may suggest the latter.

Patrick Troughton made his appearance on Blue Peter on Thursday 14th December, alongside the winning entrants of their design-a-monster competition, and the next day he, Hines and Watling were taken out of rehearsals to carry out location work on the forthcoming Yeti sequel. This overlapping of productions was becoming a constant irritation for the star, who often had to sacrifice days off for filming.

Designer Pemsel devised a corridor set which could be filmed from different angles to represent different parts of the Palace, using various props to try to disguise this. It is supposed to be the entrance way into the palace, the area where Denes is being held, and the route to and from the kitchens. Unfortunately this does not come across on screen and it looks like all the action is taking place in the same small stretch of corridor.

The episode has Troughton appear both as Salamander and as the Doctor. All of his scenes as the dictator were recorded first, with the scene set in Kent's trailer recorded at the end of the evening. Kitchen scenes were recorded which allowed him time to change costumes and make-up.

Hines and Mary Peach were seen wearing security guard uniforms this week.

Recording breaks were mainly arranged to work around the corridor, with actors walking left to right, then right to left to suggest the different locations - or to place George Pravda in and out of the set.

Bill Kerr had a portrait photo taken at TV Centre on Thursday 14th, to be used as set dressing for Kent's trailer. 

The Doctor and Kent watch more stock footage of volcanic eruptions on a small monitor in the trailer.

Troughton enjoyed working with the Australian actor as he made him laugh a lot.

When hiding in the box seat, Troughton made farting sounds to put Kerr off.

Scripted, but not recorded, was a final scene involving Astrid and Denes. In this she was seen to try to help the dying man towards the exit but he knew he was finished and urged her to leave him and save herself. Its removal does make the scene as broadcast look rushed.

Hines and Watling were now granted a week's holiday as neither Jamie nor Victoria would appear in the fourth episode - but both would still have to join Troughton at Ealing on Monday 18th for filming on The Web of Fear.

This episode was fairly notorious for many years, thanks to it being the sole surviving instalment of the story (until the rest turned up in October 2013). Letts was always annoyed that his earliest contribution to the series was this episode. We now now that it is atypical of the story as a whole and doesn't really represent it well at all. It doesn't have any of the action-orientated location filming seen in the opening episode, or any of the spy-fi trappings of the second half of the story. It looks cheap, and some of the performances are a little broad. However, it did have its fans - even before 2013 and the opportunity to enjoy it in context.

As previously mentioned, it was always thought that the reason for the episode's survival was due to it being the first recorded for broadcast on the new 625 line definition transmission system. This was actually the opening episode, but the paperwork was in error. We would certainly have had a much higher opinion of the story had it been that first instalment which had been the orphan episode - what with helicopters, hovercraft, and the Doctor in his underwear.

What some people seem to like about this episode is the thing that others hate the most - the kitchen sequences. Griffin appears only in this episode, and doesn't have any role to play beyond these comedic scenes - so his presence is entirely superfluous to the plot. He's only there for light relief.

What fans like about these scenes, however, is the very fact that Whitaker takes the time to include them. They're little snapshots into the lives of peripheral characters getting on with life on the edge of the bigger political machinations which are playing out on a global scale.

Contemporaries of the writer, such as Dennis Spooner, claimed that Whitaker over-wrote and a lot of material not necessarily vital to the plot had to be cut - "food machine scenes" - but these little pauses do provide a break from the otherwise breathless pursuit of the main narrative.

However, this episode is rather short on incident, so such scenes might not be of much value here.

One criticism of the episode which really can't be defended from the audience point of view is the apparent cheapness of it. The setting is the Presidential Palace remember, so the idea that there isn't a single room available in the entire building in which to lock up Denes is a preposterous one. A man accused of treason, responsible for the deaths of thousands, is left to sit in a corridor with one guard - who isn't even there all the time... And it's such a boring corridor, with far too much garish wallpaper on show. Having George Pravda seated whilst others stand and talk beside him leads to too may scenes in wide shot, so the background takes up a sizeable proportion of the picture.

I say it's indefensible from the audience point of view - but a work of genius if you're a designer with very little money to play with, or a relatively inexperienced director limited for time on the night of recording.

Trivia:

• The ratings see a dip of half a million this week, with the appreciation index remaining below the 50 mark.
• Australian actor Reg Lye (1912 - 1987) came to England in the early 1960's after a successful career back home. He was only in the UK for a short time, but still managed to become the go-to actor if an Australian character was needed. When the Australian film industry picked up in the early 1970's - the New Wave - he returned home to continue his career there, which included a Best Supporting award from the AFI for Sunday Too Far Away.
• Bill Lyons would go on to become a successful writer, particularly for television. He has written a record number of scripts (over 460) for Emmerdale, having started in 1984 when it was still Emmerdale Farm. He has also contributed 60 scripts for EastEnders.
• Gordon Faith, here portraying the Guard Captain, became better known as a speech and voice coach, including work with the BBC radio drama repertory company.
• Radio Times published a small photograph of Frazer Hines as Jamie to accompany the listings this week - one taken during the location filming for The Abominable Snowmen:

What's Wrong With... Paradise Towers

A lot of the blame for problems this story might have can be laid at the door of one man - guest star Richard Briers. We know he was a very good actor, though much of his career was based in situation comedy. In later life he was "adopted" by Kenneth Branagh and appeared in several of his cinematic Shakespeare productions.

In Paradise Towers his performance as the Chief Caretaker is just too broad, as though he is hamming it up for the kids. Things get worse once he is possessed by Kroagnon. He's a caricature, in a story very much built along comic book lines (Andrew Cartmel being a huge fan of 2000 AD etc) where what it really needed was some verisimilitude. We can never believe that the Towers is a real place, inhabited by real people. Being studio-bound, with little or no budget for extras, doesn't help. 

Apparently the producer encouraged the performance by Briers, so he has to take some of the blame.

Most of the background to the story collapses under scrutiny. 

Kroagnon was turned against by the occupants of the Towers and confined as a bodiless entity in the basement. Why not just kill him?

If he's just a brain (or a lifeforce - it's never made clear which) how could he create the technology to hijack the Cleaners? They kill people and bring the bodies to the basement, but for what purpose? He's not using them to build a body for himself as he has the technology to transfer himself into another person and possess them. Again, how can a disembodied being achieve any of this?

Did the residents provide any of this and, if so, why?

Remember that the Time Lords were prepared to resort to assassination to prevent mind transference technology in Mindwarp, so why not intervene here as well?

The Chief Caretaker believes the Doctor to be the Great Architect - yet he's in constant communication with Kroagnon and is actively aiding and abetting his schemes.

The timescale is all wrong. There are young male Caretakers and we have the Kangs, so the war during which all the young men left can't have been all that long ago - unless these are very long-lived humanoid aliens. People ought to remember what happened. 

What sort of conflict was it that every single male failed to return, but no-one seems bothered about why?

If there are teenage female Kangs, then where are all the teenage boys who were too young to go off to war? Where are the men who were too old to fight?

There ought to be a wider age spread for both males and, especially, females here.

The Kangs would have worked far better had they been feral children, but they're obviously in their 20's, and there appears to be a drama school somewhere in the Towers.

Tabby and Tilda resort to eating animals (and people if they get the chance), but how does everyone else survive here?

The Caretakers have a rule book which numbers thousands of rules, most with sub-sections big enough to need paragraphs - yet it's the size of a pocket notebook.

The Towers are clearly dilapidated, yet Tabby and Tilda get a new front door in no time at all.

If they are somehow getting preferential treatment from the Chief Caretaker, why doesn't this include food?

The script had to be changed to avoid showing Mel being threatened by a knife, due to then current rules around violence. But showing her being threatened with a huge toasting fork is more acceptable?

The plan to get rid of Kroagnon is overly complicated. The Kangs have crossbows - so why not simply shoot him? And what sort of "pests" does the Towers have that requires the Caretakers to keep a supply of dynamite?

Mel tells the Kangs that she doesn't have a colour - said whilst wearing a bright blue top...

TWBTLATS (4): The Witch of the Waterfall

This episode I actually enjoyed a lot more. It mainly concerns the emotional aftermath of the previous episode's climactic events, but we also see the conspiracy take an unexpected turn, a potential escalation of the conflict, and there's a dramatic stand-off to round it off.

It's confirmed that Ibrahim did die, and only Barclay has survived the bomb detonation - saved by Salt who enveloped him in an air pocket and rushed him to the surface.

There she is imprisoned by UNIT as a video has been released, purporting to be from her, claiming responsibility for the bomb deaths. Barclay has formed a strange attachment to her, and she to him, and so he goes rogue and breaks her out of containment, and the pair go on the run.

Kate meanwhile struggles to hold it together emotionally following the loss of Ibrahim. 

The twist in the conspiracy is that the events of last week had nothing to do with them at all - or at least not all of them. Some organisation linked to Sir Keith hired both the assassin and the guy with the bomb - and the US General, Gunsberg, has Sir Keith assassinated, with the murder made to look like it was committed by some extreme environmental group. 

Gunsberg and General Dussolier have their own plan - codenamed "Severance" - which the PM is now part of. This appears to be some sort of virus they plan to unleash which will target Homo Aqua - hence the theft by them of some DNA in the second episode.

It needs to be tested first, and Gunsberg wants Salt for this.

Also after her are her own people. A new ambassador arrives at the conference centre - a male named Tide. He explains that because Salt saved Barclay, but not any of her own kind, it means that she's now a wanted criminal - so Kate has a deadline to produce her before he escalates the war. This will involve utilising rust as a weapon.

A large part of the episode is then spent watching the relationship between Salt and Barclay develop into romance and beyond... 

It's another relationship I can't quite believe. We're told constantly of Homo Aqua's disdain for the human race, and Salt is their ambassador who's just implemented the dropping of millions of tons of plastic waste on the world's cities, yet she's quick to get it on with a member of this destructive, inferior species - and he's happy to reciprocate. Doesn't sit right.

Barclay thinks that he might be able to negotiate with Kate but they need to get out of London first, and so he arranges to collect his ex-wife's car. UNIT find out about this, and the suggestion is that his daughter informed on him.

And this is where the stand-off comes in, as UNIT close in from one side of Lambeth Bridge and the British Army from the other, for Gunsberg has talked the PM into giving him control over them. 

Barclay is captured but Salt dives into the Thames after disabling all the pursuers with a shrill cry...

And that's where we are at, with only a single - slightly longer - instalment to go. It's written by RTD, and recent experience shows that he knows how to blow an ending...

Still no explanation for Salt's gender change. There was an image of the male Homo Aqua in the pre-publicity and I thought that this might have been her in male form - but Tide is very much a different character. She and he are the only ones of this sub-species we've seen, but I don't know if that's significant or not.

If you're wondering what any of the above have to do with witches or waterfalls, then the answer is they don't. The title simply comes from a line by Salt.

TWBTLATS (3): The Deep

Before we move on to the third episode of the new spin-off, a couple more things to mention about the opening instalments, now that I've had a chance to think about them.

First of all there's that character from the Albion Party - Doctor Who's version of Reform UK, first introduced in Series 14's 73 Yards. He's just too much of a caricature - a ranting racist. I suspect that this is what the producers intend, rather than just cliched writing - or so I hope.

Then there's UNIT, and this series has very much been spun as a UNIT spin-off. But they've mostly been simply watching events from the background so far. Barclay works for them, granted, and Kate is in overall charge of the conference, but for the most part we see her, Shirley and Colonel Ibrahim simply watching and commenting on what is going on in the hall from a back room somewhere.

Thoughts have also turned to just who or what Salt is. In Plastic Apocalypse we saw her lose her temper briefly and change to masculine appearance. Would this be explained?

Not yet, though The Deep does let us see a lot more of UNIT. For the most part, however, the episode is simply set up for the dramatic closing moments. In some ways you could simply start watching the last five minutes and you wouldn't have missed a lot. It's mainly Barclay and his team preparing for their descent in a bathysphere to a mid Atlantic trench to begin round two of the talks - and the long journey they then undertake. There is a scene set in a COBRA meeting, in which Kate suspects that UNIT are being side-lined, and we have the unholy trio of conspirators bending the will of the weak British PM.

One of Barclay's party is carrying a gift which conceals a bomb, and just as he produces it we see Colonel Ibrahim, back in London at Kate's flat, get shot by a sniper - taking a bullet meant for her. As he lies dying on the floor, the sniper sets their laser sight on Kate.

We naturally assume this is all part of Sir Keith's conspiracy...

I must confess I was more upset at the loss of General Pearce than I was at that of Ibrahim, as he had come across as a much more sympathetic character after his initial appearance on Torchwood.

We got a couple of scenes between Kate and Ibrahim earlier in the episode, but frankly their relationship has never been set up well. It was hinted at only in Doctor Who, but he just hasn't been around long enough to establish himself - and I'm not at all convinced by them entering into a romantic relationship in the first place. She certainly comes across as far too professional and committed to her father's legacy to endanger it with a workplace romance.

They are obviously trying to replicate the structure of TW: Children of Earth, with a shock death in the middle episode - but Ibrahim is no Ianto Jones.

The descent in the bathysphere reminds us of the Third Doctor's descent in a diving bell to establish contact with the Sea Devils - and we do finally get to see some of the classic design in the scene where Barclay and his group emerge into a vast chamber in which thousands of Homo Aqua are gathered for the talks.

Episode 187: The Enemy of the World (2)

Synopsis:

Donald Bruce is in the office of Giles Kent, demanding to know the identity of the man seen earlier with Astrid Ferrier. An inner door suddenly opens and his boss, Salamander, enters...

Kent has deliberately brought Bruce here in order that the Doctor should be forced to impersonate the would-be dictator. The deception is working as Bruce is shocked to see Salamander here, as he and Kent are the bitterest of enemies. He was also under the impression that Salamander was currently in Hungary.

The Doctor bluffs his way through the encounter, explaining that Bruce will find out why he is here when he wants him to know. After he has gone the Doctor accuses Kent of bringing him here deliberately to force him into impersonating Salamander - but Kent is pleased with his experiment. The Doctor can successfully pass for his enemy, and can get him the evidence he needs to destroy him.

The Doctor will remain in Australia with Kent to work on his impersonation and to check out Salamander's research facility at Kanowa, whilst Jamie and Victoria will travel to Hungary with Astrid to make contact with Alexander Denes, Controller of the Central European Zone and an ally of Kent.

At Kanowa, Bruce consults with his underling Benik, who confirms that Salamander got on a rocket transport to the Zone controlled by Denes, to attend a conference. Bruce tells him that he has just left their leader with Kent. Benik thinks him mistaken and explains that they will not be able to contact Salamander until after the conference is over. Bruce is concerned that Kent may have some hold over his boss.

At the Presidential Palace where he is staying, Salamander is warning Denes that the entire region is at imminent risk of volcanic disturbance. Denes insists that the Eperjes-Tokaj range has been dormant since the 16th Century. Their argument is being observed by Fedorin, Denes' deputy. Also present is a young woman named Fariah, and Fedorin is appalled to learn that she acts as Salamander's food-taster - especially after he has consumed some wine which she hadn't yet tested.

Denes leaves, but Salamander wants Fedorin to remain.

Astrid has a rendezvous with Jamie and Victoria at a park near the Palace. There is a plan to get Jamie onto Salamander's staff.

Astrid then contacts Kent and the Doctor to update them on progress, and to inform them that she has arranged a covert meeting with Denes.

Salamander has rejoined Fedorin and they are talking when Jamie suddenly appears on the terrace, armed with a pistol. He urges Salamander not to touch the radio-telephone sitting on the table. He picks it up and throws it into the bushes where it apparently explodes - really a small blast set off remotely by Astrid. Jamie then surrenders his weapon and explains that he only acted as he did to save Salamander. Impressed with his actions, the would-be dictator offers Jamie a role with his security team. The young man asks if there might be a job for his girlfriend Victoria as well.

Jamie returns to the park to update Victoria and Astrid, who slips away when they see Fariah and the Guard Captain approach. They have come to take them to the Palace to commence their new roles. Victoria will assist in the kitchens.

Astrid goes to a disused jetty to meet with Denes and tell him about the scheme to infiltrate Salamander's retinue. Astrid questions Fedorin's loyalty towards Denes. He hopes he can trust him.

At the Palace, Fedorin has been told of a number of secrets about himself which Salamander has obtained - instances of financial embezzlement. He protests his innocence, but Salamander tells him that he is going to replace Denes as Controller of this Zone. He again claims that a disaster is about to befall the region, and then states that Denes will be killed by an unknown assassin soon after.

Bruce arrives from Australia in response to the earlier assassination attempt, but his efforts to speak to Salamander are interrupted by earth tremors and the sight of volcanic eruptions on the horizon. Nearby communities are being destroyed, with many dead.

Denes rushes in, demanding to know how Salamander could have known this was going to happen with such accuracy.

As the volcanic eruptions continue, Salamander angrily accuses Denes of being a traitor and of failing in his duty to protect his region...

Data:

Written by David Whitaker

Recorded: Saturday 9th December 1967 - Lime Grove Studio D

First broadcast: 5.25pm, Saturday 30th December 1967

Ratings: 7.6 million / AI 49

Designer: Christopher Pemsel

Director: Barry Letts

Additional cast: George Pravda (Denes), David Nettheim (Fedorin), Milton Johns (Benik), Carmen Munroe (Fariah), Gordon Faith (Guard Captain)

Critique:

Fedorin was originally going to be the Chief of Police for the Central European Zone, rather than Denes' deputy. Fariah was a female security guard, and it was in a similar role that Victoria was to be recruited, suggesting that the whole kitchen sequence in the following episode, and Fariah's position as Salamander's personal food-taster, came later as the story developed. As mentioned last time, everything after the opening instalment existed only in draft form when Barry Letts joined the production, and he had to work closely with Derrick Sherwin on all subsequent episodes.

Filming for this instalment was confined purely to back projection sequences. These included the park near the Palace, the backdrop to the disused jetty, and the bomb explosion. Letts was inspired to make full use of back projection after seeing Shaun Sutton employ the technique on Z-Cars.

The park location was Walpole Park in Ealing, close to the BBC's Villiers House, which would later feature as the exterior of Kent's office building. The filming took place on Thursday 9th November. Jamie was seen to approach in long shot as his double, Richard Halifax was once again used.

Life was made easier for Patrick Troughton in studio as he only had to dress as Salamander for this episode - first as the Doctor impersonating him, and then as the real character for the rest of the running time. 

However, there is one scene in which we see him as the Doctor - when Astrid radios Giles Kent to provide an update, and the Doctor humorously mishears "disused jetty" as "disused Yeti".

This scene was simply filmed during a later recording session - presumably Episode 4 as Kent's office set is used in this, and Troughton would be dividing his time more evenly between the Doctor and Salamander - and edited into this episode.

Joining the cast this week, playing one of the guards in the Presidential Palace, was Ian Hines - Frazer's cousin. 

As with most of these episodes, Letts decided against lengthy reprises - or cut them altogether. Here only Troughton's closing line from Episode One is repeated.

Some scenes were recorded out of order this week.

One of the recording breaks was followed by the scene in which Bruce confers with Benik at Kanowa - allowing Troughton to change into the full Salamander costume and make-up.

The establishing shot of the research centre was a photo-caption of Dungeness Power Station, with a sign superimposed in front.

Most of the terrace scenes were recorded before another break, and then the scenes at the jetty were recorded - a split-level set allowing for guards to stand above the heads of Astrid and Denes. 

The remaining terrace scenes were then recorded following another break.

Sound effects of birdsong were used to help establish the park setting, as the location film was silent, and the lapping of water for the jetty scene.

Stock footage of the Vesuvius eruption of 1944 was used for the climactic scene.

It was during the camera rehearsals for this episode that all of the photographs of Troughton as Salamander were taken, as well as portraits of Nettheim and Pravda. (I'm assuming the one below was colourised by Clayton Hickman).

Having only appeared on a screen giving a speech last week, this is our first proper look at Salamander - and we get to see the nature of his villainy. He blackmails Fedorin and plots the assassination of Denes, and seems to be very well informed about the imminence of a volcanic eruption - claiming that his scientists are more competent than those Denes employs. He clearly gets rid of people who might challenge him and replaces them with weaker figures over whom he has some hold. The fact that he employs someone to taste his food and drink for poison shows that he knows his own popularity is on shaky ground, but he is arrogant enough to believe he will come to dominate this world.

Tellingly, he finds the sight of the volcanic eruption "beautiful", even though he's just been told there are many fatalities.

Apart from the staged bomb attack, this is obviously more of a character-driven episode after the action-orientated opener. We do get some globe-trotting, with another foreign locale - but unfortunately this isn't set up very well. We get some Mittel European accents, but some establishing shots of the Presidential Palace or its environs might have helped.

Trivia:

• The ratings see a sizeable upswing, no doubt due to it being that quiet period between Christmas and New Year, before the January sales commence. The appreciation figure drops below 50, however.
• ITV opposition remained repeats of Sir Francis Drake in most regions, though Southern began showing Gerry Anderson's latest series Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons.
• The Hungarian mountains mentioned in this episode are a chain of hills which run between the cities of Eperjes in the south, and Tokaj in the north. They form the inner volcanic part of the Carpathians and are a popular hiking trail, as well as a noted wine growing region.
• George Pravda would return to the series on two further occasions - as corrupt scientist Jaeger in The Mutants, and as Castellan Spandrell in The Deadly Assassin.
• Milton Johns would also return to the series - also playing a Castellan (Kelner in The Invasion of Time). His next role after Benik would be playing Guy Crayford in The Android Invasion. He is one of a small number of Doctor Who regular guest artists who have played Imperial officers in the original Star Wars trilogy, appearing with Michael Sheard and Julian Glover in The Empire Strikes Back.
• The Daily Mail Boys & Girls Exhibition opened at Olympia on 27th December, and featured a number of Doctor Who costumes as well as the winning entrants in the recent Blue Peter competition. Monsters on view from the series included a Dalek, Cybermen, a Yeti, an Ice Warrior, Fungoids and the Mire Beast from The Chase, a Varga Plant (Mission to the Unknown) and a Rill (Galaxy 4). The exhibition ran to January 7th. A short Movietone film titled The Young Idea was produced, which features the Cybermen and Yeti at 0:57, which you can view on YouTube here - THE YOUNG IDEA Hopefully this will feature on a Troughton Blu-ray box set when they finally get round to giving us one.

Inspirations: The Girl Who Died...

But not The Woman Who Lived...

Steven Moffat said that he was going to change the way viewers thought about two-parters this series, and here we have an example of what he was talking about. Many see this and the following episode as two halves of a single storyline - how Ashildr becomes immortal and what happens when the Doctor has to then confront the consequences of his actions in making her so. 

However, the actual narratives within each episode - the background / plot - have absolutely nothing to do with each other, and the Doctor could have had his follow-up meeting with her - now known as Lady Me - at any point later in the series. Indeed, I said in my review at the time that this might have been preferable. There's no reason whatsoever to follow up on her in the very next episode.

There is also the obvious fact that both of these episodes are written by different people.

This is why I'm going to look at the two separately.

Jamie Mathieson had come up with a number of story ideas - but unfortunately every one of them was already an idea being developed by someone else this year. He was therefore given the starting point of "the Doctor meets Vikings" by Moffat.

His first idea began with the Doctor and Clara already captured by Vikings after a school trip to the island of Lindisfarne, off the Northumbrian coast. With them would be a number of other woman taken from the island. The Valkyrie would descend - female warriors on winged horses - and take all the women on Odin's orders. At the floating city of Valhalla, the female captives - who included Ashildr - would be forced to fight gladiatorial combats. In this version it was women whom the aliens wanted, as part of a breeding experiment to create a hybrid species.

The Doctor captured one of the Valkyrie and discovered that they used alien tech. Odin retaliated by sending the Leviathan to attack the Viking village. Part of the Doctor's plan to defeat the aliens was to tamper with one of the Valkyrie helmets.

Only one or two of these ideas / images would make it through to the episode as broadcast.

Leviathan became the wooden dragon used to frighten the Mire, and the tampering with the helmet is what helps feed the Doctor's imagery through the aliens' psychic link and is manipulated by Ashildr - leading to her death.

Moffat liked the notion that the Doctor had to train a second-class band of Vikings to become an effective defensive force. In this he was inspired by Dad's Army - the much-loved BBC sit-com about the Walmington-on-Sea Home Guard, broadcast between 1968 - 1977. This even led to a working title of "The All Father's Army" - 'All-father' deriving from Norse mythology, another name for their supreme god.

The Doctor would also have to furnish his Viking band with weapons derived from the only available resources and technology - an idea exemplified by US action series such as The A-Team and MacGyver.

Another very obvious inspiration is The Magnificent Seven (1960), which was a Western version of 1954's Seven Samurai. In these a small group of ill-prepared locals have to defend their community against a larger, more organised force, making use of the advice and support of outsiders.

Moffat was quick to point out that he knew that Vikings did not go around in horned helmets all the time. Horned, or winged, helmets were worn only on ceremonial occasions - but were popularised in the 19th Century through productions of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen. 

However, he thought that the general viewing public would expect to see them and they were a good visual shorthand for "Viking".

The Mire were originally intended to be humanoid in appearance, wearing helmets akin to the famous Sutton Hoo one. At one point Vikings were to have been inspired to add horns to their helmets because the Mire wore them on theirs.

Vikings had appeared in the series once before - in The Time Meddler - and John Lucarotti had attempted to contribute another story involving Eric the Red's discovery of the Americas. The Vanir in Terminus are based around Norse mythology, which also feeds into The Curse of Fenric and The Greatest Show in the Galaxy. A later working title for this episode would be "Ragnarok".

Odin was the All-father, or king of the Norse pantheon. He is generally depicted as an older, bearded man with only one eye - having sacrificed the other in order to drink from the Well of Mimir, which gave him great wisdom.

The role, here played by David Schofield, was originally intended for Brian Blessed, who had played the blustering King Yrcanos in Mindwarp, but he had to drop out after taking ill.

This episode takes the time to explain why the Doctor looks exactly like someone he met in a previous incarnation - namely the Pompeiian marble merchant Caecilius. In The Fires of Pompeii, the Doctor had been convinced by Donna Noble to save Caecilius and his family, and here he realises having his features is a sign that he is expected to save others. The Doctor had questioned the familiarity of his new appearance in Deep Breath.

The Doctor demonstrates his skill in communicating with babies once again, having been seen in A Good Man Goes To War and Closing Time.

He is also seen playing with a yo-yo, a toy he has used since The Ark in Space, often for the serious purpose of judging local gravity.

In one of the drafts of this episode, the Doctor was to have taken Ashildr's body to the Sisterhood of Karn to be saved using the Elixir of Life - first introduced in The Brain of Morbius.

At one point the Doctor talks of how he could "reverse the polarity of the neutron flow" - the classic Third Doctor line only ever spoken in full in The Sea Devils, with a later cameo by Pertwee in The Five Doctors. However here the Doctor claims not to know what it actually means.

The Doctor also refers to his 2000 Year Diary. He was earlier seen to have a 500 Year version from The Power of the Daleks onwards.

Next time: a quick jaunt through European medieval and early-modern history, and the Doctor is forced to stand and deliver...

TWBTLATS (2): Plastic Apocalypse

This episode is mostly set in the conference hall, as Barclay begins his task of acting as intermediary for the human race in their negotiations with Homo Aqua. As such it is a bit more talky - though there's a big VFX set-piece before the end. We also get to see some shady politicking developing, as a British businessman / MP enters into a conspiracy with military personnel representing the USA and France.

Gung-ho US military are a bit of a cliché in these sort of things, and I'm assuming the fact that one of the co-conspirators is French is a nod to their sinking of Greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior in Auckland in 1985 - for this episode sets out the anti-pollution of the seas message in stark terms.

The French officer leaks Barclay's identity to the press (for no discernible reason) whilst the MP (Sir Keith Spears, played by Patrick Baladi) obtains some Homo Aqua DNA by devious means (acquired through a lab assistant examining one of their still-born eggs).

Kate Stewart still doesn't trust Barclay to just be himself and, as expected, he decides to go off-script and speak to Salt from the heart - just as we could see coming. She responds well to this but the agreement to hold these talks was never to be a sharing of ideas and meeting of minds. Homo Aqua have come with a list of grievances which they want resolved right now, rather than a promised 50% reduction in pollutants in 40 years time as Barclay is compelled to propose. 

Salt lets it be known that what belongs to the human race in the oceans will be returned to it - and so we get our big VFX set-piece. Except it's not all that impressive.

Basically lots of plastic bags and bottles fall out of the sky over London, along with a big anchor. One person is seen to be killed, and St Paul's Cathedral gets a hole in its dome. The Titanic finally arriving in New York is at least funny. Visually, I found this all a bit of a let-down.

The question also has to be asked: if Homo Aqua had the technology do this, why not do it a lot sooner?

They could have done it without even showing their faces, and if they didn't want humans to notice them then they could simply have dumped it all in the middle of the Sahara or somewhere similarly remote, to remain a bizarre unsolved mystery.

Salt then states that the waters of the world belong to them and they want complete control over them. The human race are landlubbers, and that's where they will have to stay. They can't go into the oceans, lakes and rivers, and can no longer cross them - even by air.

Naturally this provokes outrage amongst the delegates from across the world who are in attendance, especially as it will affect trade and local / global economies. Sir Keith and his co-conspirators have already let it be known to the viewers that trade is all that matters to them.

Barclay is able to east tensions.

Salt's final demand is that next time they meet it must be in their domain, so there will be a resumption of talks at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean - to which Barclay agrees.

So the scene is set, with Salt's demands never going to be agreed to as many nations rely on intercontinental trade, and we've already seen some shady individuals working against Homo Aqua before any of this episode's events have even taken place.

Doctor Who has already addressed plastics pollution of the oceans, as Pete McTighe very well knows since he wrote Praxeus for Series 12. Then, the Doctor gave humanity a right good talking to about it - and nothing has been done about it at all, so obviously this sort of drama is not necessarily the best way to address these issues. Lecturing / hectoring fans of Doctor Who, or its spin-offs, about environmental issues really is preaching to the converted, in my opinion. (We all knew pollution was bad from watching The Green Death in 1973, so no need to tell us again).

No doubt Western nations will be presented as the chief culprits, but a quick search on-line reveals that Asian and South American nations are far and away the biggest polluters of the seas. Will this be addressed in the series? I'd like to think that some basic research has gone into this if messages are going to be pushed.

I've read that some 2.82 million viewers watched Homo Aqua, dropping to 2.05 for this instalment. Might look bad but Sunday night also saw the finale of I'm A Has-Been, Get Me Out Of Here on ITV, so audience share will be more important.

TWBTLATS (1): Homo Aqua

The war starts off in a relatively low key fashion. A Sea Devil, as was, is accidentally caught in the nets of a Spanish fishing boat and the crew shoot it dead when it bursts out. UNIT find out about the corpse from social media, and so a team are flown in to the small island where it is being held. In command is General Austin Pierce (Colin McFarlane) who we first met in Torchwood: Children of Earth, and seconded to the mission is Barclay (Russell Tovey). He's there by mistake, having once covered for the person who should be there, for Barclay is just a lowly logistics assistant who books transport for UNIT.

The Sea Devils - now dubbed Homo Aqua, though it's acknowledged that this is itself a misnomer and they should really have a much more complex taxonomy - then show up in force. Pierce starts peace negotiations - but it turns out that they want this anyway.

Cue setting up a big glass tank at a Thames-side building in London to host the talks - shades of that Torchwood series again - and Barclay is invited, having been part of the initial contact team.

The talks will be supervised by Kate Stewart (Jemma Redgrave) but conducted by a seasoned diplomat.

Having been seen to pay respect towards the dead Homo Aqua, the chief negotiator on their side, who goes by the name of Salt (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), insists that Barclay be the one they go through.

And that's the opening instalment in a nutshell. It's very much setting things up by introducing the key players and giving viewers some idea of just who these Homo Aqua are, for those that might be unaware of the Silurians and Sea Devils of Doctor Who.

The Doctor does get a mention - Barclay telling a colleague that he once saw them at "the Tower". (Whether this is the new Tony Stark-style tower or the older base under the Tower of London isn't specified).

We're introduced to Barclay's family, which comprises a teenage daughter and an ex-wife, neither of whom had any idea of what he really did for a living. It's therefore a big shock to them when they get  removed from their home at gunpoint as Kate initially believes that there may have been some prior collusion between Barclay and the amphibians. This isn't the cosy UNIT set-up we've been used to through the parent programme. They act like ICE agents and don't trust anyone. There's a harder edge to the characters, which include recent regulars Colonel Ibrahim (Alexander Devrient) and Shirley Bingham (Ruth Madeley).

The new Sea Devils are mostly of the turtle-beaked variety, who do not communicate in English. When their delegation arrives at the conference venue - swimming up a giant pipe from the river - we see that there is a second species, which is much more piscine. Salt seems to be one of a kind, having a more human-like form and features. It's said that they all have a pearl imbedded in their throat and this seems to act as a piece of technology - allowing them to have witnessed and recorded Barclay's private act of respect for instance. There is a lot of talk of their advanced technology, and we saw that they were able to transmit their demand for talks globally, but so far we have seen little of it. They live in, and / or travel in, large coral formations which are able to rise up from the sea in major world cities. We see one rise near the Statue of Liberty, and another in the Thames by Big Ben.

These, the first appearance of the creatures en masse off the Spanish island, and their arrival in the conference venue are the big spectacles of this opening instalment.

UNIT remain peripheral for now, so it's very much Tovey's episode and he comes across as a likeable everyman figure. Kate - under pressure from the PM and other political figures - doesn't trust him to be himself, however. When Salt insists they will only talk through him, UNIT insists that he still follow their script. As a viewer, we know that's not how it is going to go. Homo Aqua want to talk to, and through, an ordinary person - and that's the set up for the next episode...

There's an apparent nod to Chibnall's The Hungry Earth (which, of course, brought back the Silurians) when two members of the initial mission are killed - the ground liquifying and them being pulled under. This looks a little odd as we've clearly seen that the outbuilding in which the Homo Aqua corpse was being kept was well up from the beach on a rocky ledge. If they were able to get water to rise this far up, I'd love to know how they did it.

One other thing which wasn't terribly well set up was Barclay's response to these deaths. He mentions it only once as a reason for not trusting Homo Aqua, yet these feelings simply never re-materialise. I think more could have been made of his conflicting opinion of them. He is suddenly being asked to negotiate with beings who killed his friends.

It would have been nice to have included at least one representative of the classic Sea Devil design amongst their delegation as well.

As an introduction, it does everything it needs to do. A little spectacle, the beginnings of some political manoeuvrings, and a personable leading man. You'd certainly want to carry on watching...

The Sea Devils (2025)

Before watching the opening episodes of The War Between The Land And The Sea (reviewed tomorrow) I decided to watch the new re-edited omnibus of The Sea Devils. I must admit I almost didn't bother as the complete story is already available on Blu-ray, and the Season 9 box set includes an existing omnibus put together by the original production team.

There was also the issue of the two previous re-edits from the current team which certainly had their faults.

The Daleks and The War Games had as their main selling point the fact that these were 1960's monochrome stories which were going to be colourised. That process, for me, was successful.

The Hartnell story had its padding, an extra episode having been requested after Terry Nation came up with a 6-parter, so there were obvious edits that could be made. 

The Troughton story was a lengthy 10 episodes in duration, and the editing was much more of a hack job in the middle instalments. The cuts and jumps really jarred.

A problem across both stories was the soundtrack. There was some wholly inappropriate and intrusive music slapped over sections of The Daleks - the escape sequence stands out - whilst bits of Nu-Who music were used on The War Games, where more era specific music would have fitted much better. Using the Saxon Master theme for the War Chief also went against what the co-creator of both characters intended.

The Sea Devils obviously doesn't need to be colourised, so this was all going about the edit and the soundtrack.

I'm pleased to say that this was a much more successful project. 

The cuts made were the right ones in my view, so that all the main narrative beats were present and the story flowed. There were only a couple of new bits of filming edited in - a drone shot of the sea fort and a new initial view of the Master's prison at the start. The opening titles were omitted, to closer match those of the new spin-off. When the Doctor tells Jo about his encounter with the Silurians we get some flashback clips from the Season 7 story.

Some of the cuts are achieved by having dialogue continue over the next scene. The stuff in the prison is where most of the cuts seem to have been made. What we still get are all of Pertwee's more humorous moments, and anyone coming new to this would be encouraged to check out more of the Third Doctor's adventures. The main action sequences and iconic imagery, such as the Sea Devils rising from the waves, were there. Also nice to see the Clangers sequence retained. Unnecessary to the plot but a lovely character moment for the Master and illustrative of Trenchard's unimaginative nature.

There is new music, but fortunately Mark Ayres has been confined to general remastering and kept well away from this aspect of the new edit. Apparently some original unused cues from Malcolm Clarke were employed, along with new themes from another composer which were more mood pieces, and so nowhere near as intrusive and jarring.

If you want to revisit The Sea Devils but don't have the time or inclination to watch the complete six episodes, then this is a perfectly fine alternative.

I'm going to assume it won't warrant a release on its own, but may be an extra on the spin-off Blu-ray when it arrives in the New Year.

Episode 186: The Enemy of the World (1)

Synopsis:

The TARDIS materialises on an Australian beach, and the Doctor immediately strips to his long-johns and takes to the water as a bemused Jamie and Victoria look on. After his brief dip, the Doctor notices a small hovercraft standing on the shoreline nearby. The three men operating it, Anton, Rod and Curly, are observing him closely, for they are sure they know exactly who he is...

Concerned by their attention, the Doctor returns to his companions. The hovercraft speeds towards them and so they take to the sand dunes. Anton has contacted a woman named Astrid Ferrier to report their sightings. She is stationed in a nearby office and urges them to stand down until she has consulted with their boss, Giles Kent - but Anton refuses to heed her advice. They plan on killing their target.

Astrid takes to a helicopter and rushes to the area. 

Jamie is able to knock out Curly with a punch as they are hunted through the dunes.

Astrid arrives in time to rescue the Doctor and his companions, but the helicopter fuel tank has been hit by bullets and she fears it may explode any moment. She has a cottage along the coast and takes them there, but Anton and his men follow close behind. The Doctor notes that it is the year 2018 from documentation in the craft.

At the cottage, the Doctor notices that Astrid has been wounded and so gives medical aid. He learns from her that he closely resembles a man who is regarded as a saviour by many, but who is feared by others to be a would-be dictator. She wishes him to meet Kent who can explain more, in the hope he can help them - even though it will be of great risk to himself.

They are interrupted by the arrival of the hovercraft. Rod is accidentally killed by his own friends in the confusion whilst Astrid leads the others out the back door of the cottage. 

Anton decides to take the helicopter to hunt them. Shortly after he and Curly have taken off, the craft explodes in mid-air.

Astrid takes the Doctor and his companions back to the office, which is Kent's base. He is astounded by the similarity of the Doctor to Ramon Salamander, the alleged would-be tyrant. He plays them a recording of a speech by Salamander at the UN General Assembly. He talks of his Sun-Catcher device, which focuses the sun's rays on parts of the Earth's surface and so allows crops to grow in otherwise inhospitable regions. As far as the Doctor can see, there is nothing sinister about him. Indeed, he appears to be a benefactor of the human race. Kent still claims he is a danger - and the Doctor is the person he needs to get the proof that will expose and discredit him.

Kent explains that he was once a senior member of the World Zones Authority, but Salamander had him replaced by a man named Donald Bruce when he started investigating his actions. Bruce is now his Head of Security. Since then a number of Salamander's political opponents have met with fatal accidents. Now only a man named Alexander Denes, of the Central European Zone, is brave enough to openly defy him.

Kent wants to know if the Doctor could impersonate Salamander and so infiltrate his organisation and find the evidence against him. The Doctor recognises his accent, from the Yucatan region of Mexico, and explains that with enough time he could no doubt copy him.

Word then comes through that Bruce has arrived at the building. The Doctor will be forced to carry out his impersonation immediately, and he realises that Kent has deliberately brought Bruce here to force his hand. He slips into another room as Bruce enters with security guards. He has come to investigate the deaths of the men at Astrid's cottage. He recognises Jamie and Victoria as having been seen with Astrid, and knows that there was another man with them. He demands to know who this was and where they now are.

The door to the adjoining room suddenly opens and Bruce is shocked to see his leader standing there, asking why he has come...

Data:

Written by David Whitaker

Recorded: Saturday 2nd December 1967 - Lime Grove Studio D

First broadcast: 5.25pm, Saturday 23rd December 1967

Ratings: 6.8 million / AI 50

Designer: Christopher Pemsel

Director: Barry Letts

Guest cast: Bill Kerr (Giles Kent), Mary Peach (Astrid Ferrier), Colin Douglas (Donald Bruce), Henry Stamper (Anton), Rhys McConnochie (Rod), Simon Cain (Curly)

Critique:

David Whitaker had last contributed to the series with a pair of Dalek stories, but those creations of Terry Nation's were now absent from the programme. Peter Bryant was in the process of taking over from Innes Lloyd as producer on Doctor Who, and the pair had decided to concentrate on science-fiction / monster stories this year now that the historical adventures had been dropped.

Whitaker was asked to provide a new six-episode storyline, but it was agreed that his would be the exception to the monster rule. What he came up with was a political thriller, but one set in the near future so that there could still be science-fiction trappings. These would prove to be mostly references to things off-screen. We hear of rocket planes getting people from one continent to another in a couple of hours but never see any, and the talk of Salamander's Mark VII Sun-Catcher remains just that.

With no monster or alien, the big draw for viewers this time would be the fact that the villain would be the Doctor's double.

We had seen two earlier "evil" versions of the Doctor in the series - the android copy created by the Daleks in The Chase, and the Abbot of Amboise in The Massacre - both during William Hartnell's tenure. In the latter case the Doctor and the cleric never encountered each other, and in the former Hartnell swapped the android role with Edmund Warwick from scene to scene. Here, Troughton would play both the Doctor and Salamander - named for the reptile which thrives in hot climates - and the actor was naturally concerned about this, already complaining about his workload on the series. Each episode was therefore carefully planned to facilitate his dual role, in terms of costume and make-up changes, so that they would be kept to the absolute minimum.

An obvious inspiration for the story was the popularity at the time of what we now call the "spy-fi" genre, exemplified by the James Bond movies. Bond-mania had built steadily with the first two films but had really taken off with the third in the franchise - 1964's Goldfinger. This had led to a number of copycat films and TV series, such as The Man From UNCLE and the Flint and Matt Helm films.

The Enemy of the World is the closest that classic era Doctor Who will come to the world of James Bond. The ingredients are all there: a super-villain, a strong female companion figure, an underground lair, high-tech gadgets, world domination and international jet-setting.

It was originally intended that the opening episode would be set not in Australia but in Central Europe, where the story will move to in the next couple of instalments. The character Curly was originally going to be called Otto whilst Rod was to be named Tibor, until incoming director Barry Letts decided on a change.

Letts was an old friend of Troughton, the two having worked together as actors, and the star was pleased to have an actors' director onboard (as opposed to a more technical one). Letts had also worked with Frazer Hines before.

Letts had attempted to write for Doctor Who in the past, but his story ideas had been rejected by Gerry Davis. One of these, about humanoid alien beings which would metamorphose into another form, would form the basis of 1972's The Mutants.

The director was horrified to find only the script for the first episode in anything like a completed form when he joined the production, and had to work closely with Derrick Sherwin to pull this into shape. The other five episodes existed only in draft form. Sherwin had joined the series as assistant story editor to Bryant, and had trailed him on The Ice Warriors. He would then take over Bryant's role once he became producer after this story. Sherwin in turn had approached a colleague from his Crossroads days to become his assistant - Terrance Dicks. Dicks would agree to a three month contract early in 1968.

In Whitaker's original opening script, the setting was a large holiday camp, but Letts realised this would be impractical to mount and so changed it to a deserted beach.

Filming got underway on Sunday 5th November, lasting until Wednesday 8th. The location chosen was Climping Beach at Littlehampton, West Sussex.

Their first time working together as actor and director, Troughton was initially somewhat wary of Letts now that he was no longer an equal, but quickly settled once he saw him in action.

The regulars had recorded the third episode of The Ice Warriors the day before and so were working on what should have been their day off. Troughton and Letts would discuss the production schedule on the show over the next few weeks and the director would come up with some ideas which he thought would help - little knowing that he would one day be able to actually introduce them, though by then it would be too late to help Troughton.

Also present on location were Mary Peach, already an established film star, and the three actors who would play the hovercraft crew. Peach had already threatened to pull out of the production as the character of Astrid disappeared after the fourth episode, and so Letts ensured that she was given a role to play in the last third of the story to retain her.

The idea that the Doctor should strip down to his long-johns came from Troughton himself. The script simply had him paddling in the sea.

A Hillier UH-12 helicopter was hired for filming, given a fake registration of AST-018. Also hired was a prototype four seater hovercraft, after Letts approached its maker KR Morgan, an ex-Royal Navy man who had developed it.

The Sunday was the only day on which the regulars would be available so all their scenes were filmed, including the arrival of the TARDIS, the Doctor's impromptu swim, and the pursuit into the sand dunes. Also filmed was the arrival of the Doctor and companions at Astrid's cottage - really just two scenery flats erected on location next to the local golf course.

The helicopter was of course standing on the ground when the regulars and Peach were filmed sitting inside it.

The rest of the hovercraft and helicopter scenes were filmed over the next three days. For Jamie's attack on Curly, Hines was no longer present so only an extra's arm was seen in shot.

At one point Morgan injured his leg when the hovercraft jammed heavily into the sand.

As well as appearing on screen, the helicopter was used for capturing aerial shots and there was almost a serious incident when the weight distribution inside the cockpit threatened to roll it over. After this, Letts travelled in the craft as well to balance the weight.

Some shots of the TARDIS crew running in the distance were achieved using doubles. Regular fight arranger Peter Diamond doubled for Troughton, whilst Sarah Lisemore - daughter of production assistant Martin Lisemore - doubled for Victoria. Jamie's double was Richard Halifax. 

Photos of Peach posing with the helicopter were taken on Wednesday 8th November.

Filming continued at Ealing on Friday 10th and Monday 13th November, when the shots of Salamander's speech to the UN were recorded. Troughton had hoped to make Salamander look very different from the Doctor but, as the whole point of the story would be his impersonation of him, this could not be achieved. He based the look of Salamander on old photographs of his theatrical performances, selecting images from a 1950's production of Hamlet he had performed in the US.

The costume designer was Martin Baugh once again. He elected to base Astrid's outfit on a mix of Regency / Napoleonic design, with a hint of Highwayman. Debbie Watling was given an ensemble mirroring Jamie's - with a short kilt and round-necked sweater, topped off with a tartan beret.

There is no individual VFX designer credited on this story.

Rehearsals began with a small amount of friction between star and director, as Letts attempted to restrict the amount of extra-curricular activities which Troughton enjoyed during these sessions - namely card games with Hines and the guest artists.

Joining the cast was Colin Douglas, playing Donald Bruce, and Bill Kerr, playing Giles Kent. Kerr was best known for his work with Tony Hancock in radio's Hancock's Half Hour.

Whilst Troughton enjoyed working with the Australian, it was a less than happy time for Douglas, who regarded Doctor Who as a children's programme which was beneath his talents. He actually stated this to Watling, adding that he would never come back - "and don't want to be asked" (but see below...).

Mary Peach brought her children to the studio to meet Troughton as they were often frightened by the programme.

Two recording breaks were planned, the second to allow Troughton to change into his Salamander disguise. This involved donning a neutral black outfit and darker make-up, with his hair parted and eyebrows slightly fluffed up.

The set for Kent's office had a back projection screen on which Salamander's speech could be shown, as well as maps of the Cape Arid region of Australia for Astrid to view near the start of the episode. Also shown were a number of images of the people whom the would-be dictator had allegedly had killed. There had been more dialogue about these victims but this had been cut before recording.

The desk also had a small monitor on which Astrid could see her boss when he ordered her to stop Anton and his crew from attacking what they thought to be Salamander.

The only other set used this week was Astrid's cottage, which would only feature in this episode.

Stock footage included shots of the UN building in New York and scenes of the main assembly chamber, cut into Salamander's speech. The helicopter's destruction was going to be achieved on location by hanging a small explosive charge from the craft, but this proved unsatisfactory. Instead, some 35mm footage from Pinewood Studios was used  - appropriately enough a visual effects off-cut from the making of the second James Bond film, From Russia With Love.

Letts opted to save some money by dispensing with a new musical score, choosing instead to use classical pieces by the Hungarian composer Bela Bartok (appropriate to the original setting for the first half of the story).

Despite the speech appearance, Troughton was only credited as "Dr Who" for this episode.

Letts experienced problems during the editing of the episode, losing valuable time as the tape had been reversed. There would be a knock-on effect to later episodes, leading to the director having to give up his New Year's Day to complete the work.

Thanks to the 2013 return of this episode, we can now appreciate it a great deal better. Previously we were denied the comic sight of Troughton stripping down to his underwear and diving into the sea, followed by extended action scenes which audio and telesnaps failed to really capture the excitement of. Other little things were missed, such as the setting for the story. It had usually been set much further into the future by fans, thanks to some of that technology we hear about, but clearly on screen we got to see that the helicopter's registration expires in December 2018, so a late 2017 or early 2018 setting.

Nearly all of the location filming went into this episode, Letts and Sherwin clearly wishing to get the story off to a flying start. Indeed, some of the changes they made to this instalment were to add more action as Whitaker's scripts were deemed too dialogue-heavy.

Despite all the rushing around, there is still an opportunity for a quiet character moment as the Doctor and Astrid chat in the cottage as he tends to her wound. She tries to find out a little more about him, based on Jamie calling him "Doctor" - trying to discover just what discipline he is a doctor of.

The Second Doctor will often seem at ease with more mature women, as we'll later see with Anne Travers and Gemma Corwin.

Trivia:

• The ratings see a drop of more than half a million on the previous story. However, this can be explained by festive events once again - this being the last Saturday before Christmas.
• As mentioned last time, there was a short trailer for the new story broadcast immediately after the final episode of The Ice Warriors, comprising part of the scene of the Doctor and his companions watching the speech.
• This episode was the first to be recorded for transmission on the 625-line broadcasting system being adopted by the BBC. Paperwork erroneously states that this began with the third episode, and is the reason why that instalment was retained in the archives. Up to this point the series had been recorded for broadcast on 405 lines.
• Despite describing this as the worst job he had ever done, Colin Douglas would return to the series, as lighthouse keeper Reuben in Horror of Fang Rock.
• Radio Times covered the opening instalment with a brief synopsis of the story set-up, and an image of guest star Mary Peach:

• In some regions Radio Times also had a feature about the costuming for the story. This gave a date of 2017 for the setting.