Countdown to 60: Children of Time

One of the things I really dislike about the Big Finish audios is the frequency of "get-together" stories. Eager for you to part with your cash, they churn these things out all the time, perhaps worried that fans won't buy straight-forward stand-alone stories. Every other release has to be "an event" - to the point that they are no longer any such thing. 

It wouldn't be so bad if there was some logic to the combinations of Doctors / companions, but they give the impression that someone has randomly thrown darts at a list of characters.

On screen, such events happen only on the rarest occasion. The classic era hosted only three stories which featured more than one incarnation of the Doctor. The Three Doctors almost featured Jamie as well, but Frazer Hines couldn't get time off Emmerdale Farm, but did get to have a cameo in The Five Doctors, and then appear properly in The Two Doctors. He's the only companion to feature prominently in a story outwith his regular run in the series.

The Five Doctors was the only story in 26 years to feature both lots of Doctors and lots of companions.

The revived series avoided "get-together" events for a good few years, and its first multi-Doctor story wasn't until 8 years in, when it took the 50th Anniversary to justify it.

Moffat produced only one further multi-Doctor adventure, when David Bradley joined Peter Capaldi for his final story - Twice Upon A Time.

RTD avoided having Doctors meet, other than in the short Time Crash which was produced for Children in Need. A bit of fun for charity, and whilst it fits between Last of the Time Lords and Voyage of the Damned, it doesn't do so seamlessly. We saw the TARDIS leave London, and then the Titanic hits, at the close of Series 4, with no sign of the Fifth Doctor - but Time Crash then gets stuck in this short period when we've already seen that nothing happens... So you can dismiss it from canon if you so desire, or accept as a bit of a temporal hiccup.

Things have been moving up a gear of late, however. Chris Chibnall decided to introduce another Doctor we'd never heard of - one from before the First. Once created, he couldn't get enough of her and went on to use her on three further occasions - The Timeless Children, Flux and Power of the Doctor.

The latter, being another anniversary story (this time for the BBC itself), brought back previous companions Ace and Tegan in significant roles, with cameos from Ian, Jo, Graham and Mel, but also found room to include a number of old Doctors - the First (Bradley again), Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eighth. These were in the current Doctor's head for the most part, though Davison and McCoy got more to do due to their old companions featuring - portraying holographic projections of the Doctor in their forms. 

The episode then concluded with a regeneration with a difference - the new Doctor proving to be identical in appearance (and personality apparently) as a previous incarnation.

This is the incarnation which will lead the next big anniversary - the 60th - which is due in a few week's time. We know of a Fourth Doctor comic strip villain who is to appear, and a Hartnell era TV one, and beyond that we've heard that Mel will be back to accompany the Fifteenth Doctor for a story.

No doubt the Specials will include some other Doctor / companion references or even appearances.

After that, no more anniversaries for a decade, so hopefully the series will settle down and get on with telling good stand-alone stories.

No more gimmicky multi-Doctor, multi-companion episodes for a while, please - we get enough of that nonsense from Big Finish...

Episode 87: Temple of Secrets

NB: This episode no longer exists in the archives, nor is there a full set of telesnaps. Representative images are therefore used to illustrate it.

Synopsis:

On the plains outside the besieged city of Troy, in ancient Asia Minor, two men are fighting to the death. The Greek hero Achilles is seeking revenge on the Trojan prince Hector for the death of his beloved Patroclus. The TARDIS materialises close by, and the Doctor observes the duel. Against the advice of his companions, he decides to go outside and enquire as to their location.

His sudden arrival distracts Hector long enough for Achilles to slay him. The young Greek warrior takes the Doctor to be a visitation by Zeus, in the guise of a beggar. His comrade Odysseus arrives soon after with some soldiers, and Achilles tells him of Zeus' remarkable intervention. The cynical older warrior is not convinced, but insists they escort the Doctor to the Greek camp.

Steven and Vicki, who still sports an injured ankle, see him being led away. Steven decides to disguise himself and follow.

In his tent, Agamemnon - King of Mycenae and overlord of the Greek forces - is arguing with his brother Menelaus, who he thinks isn't taking the decade-long campaign seriously. He spends all his time drinking, and has done little to help win his wife, Helen, back from the Trojan prince Paris. The King orders his brother to challenge Hector to a duel.

Achilles has rushed on ahead and informs them of Zeus' appearance, and of Hector's death.

Odysseus arrives with the Doctor who is going along with the misidentification that he is a god - the alternative being that he will be executed as a Trojan spy.

That night, Steven is scouting out the camp when he is spotted by a mute, one-eyed man. This is the spy known as Cyclops, who is in the pay of Odysseus. He informs his master and Steven is arrested, accused of being a spy. He is brought to Agamemnon's tent to be confronted by the Doctor - his alleged accomplice. 

The Doctor denies knowing him and claims that if Steven is brought to his temple on the plain in the morning for sacrifice, the Greeks will be shown a miracle.

Cyclops then brings further information for Odysseus and "Zeus". His temple has vanished...

Next episode: Small Prophet, Quick Return

Data:

Written by: Donald Cotton

Recorded: Friday 17th September 1965 - Riverside Studio 1

First broadcast: 5:50pm, Saturday 16th October 1965

Ratings: 8.3 million / AI 48

Designer: John Wood

Director: Michael Leeston-Smith

Guest cast: Cavan Kendall (Achilles), Alan Haywood (Hector), Ivor Salter (Odysseus), Francis de Wolff (Agamemnon), Jack Melford (Menelaus), Tutte Lemkow (Cyclops)

Critique:

Despite being the third story of Season Three, and opening six weeks into the third year, it should be remembered that The Myth Makers was the first story to be produced for this season following the summer break - Galaxy 4 and Mission to the Unknown having been held over from the second season production block. 

This is the first story to have John Wiles credited as producer.

In its press release, the BBC described the story as "High Comedy" and one of its most sophisticated scripts to date.

Up to this point, Donald Tosh had been working on stories which had already been commissioned by his predecessor, Dennis Spooner. Once he had the opportunity to initiate stories of his own, he decided to seek out writers who were new to the series. He also wanted to make the historical stories more interesting, having seen how they were not proving as popular as the science-fiction ones. To do this, he elected to go for more humour, or more horror.

Tosh knew Donald Cotton from their time together at drama school, and the story editor admired the work Cotton had produced for radio. As well as playwriting, Cotton had been a writer of musical revues, in which he had also performed.

One night Cotton had been at a pub where he bemoaned the fact that his old friends never returned favours. He got home to find a telegram from Tosh asking him to contribute a story idea for Doctor Who.

Reluctant at first, having no experience of science-fiction, Cotton agreed to proceed only if he could pick his own subject and bring in people he knew from his radio productions. This would include actor Max Adrian, and composer Humphrey Searle.

He had previously written dramas based on Greek myths, and so decided on the Trojan Wars as his commission.

John Wiles - who actually quite liked the historicals - was in full agreement, having staged a play on the subject himself with troubled teenagers in the 1950's.

Embarking on his research, Cotton naturally turned to the epic poems of Homer - The Iliad and The Odyssey - and Virgil's The Aeneid.

These told of a decade-long clash between the ancient Greeks (Achaeans) and the Trojans of Asia Minor, and of its aftermath. The conflict was supposedly sparked by the abduction by Trojan prince Paris of Helen - the wife of Menelaus, ruler of Sparta. Menelaus' more powerful brother, Agamemnon of Mycenae, then put together an army composed of many Greek states and embarked on a siege of Troy.

This only ended when the Greeks came up with the ruse of a mock withdrawal, leaving a huge wooden horse behind full of soldiers. Taking this as a gift from their gods, the Trojans took it into the city and the Greeks emerged to open the gates - their army having sneaked back as their enemies celebrated.

The story of the Trojan War came down to us through the classical poems, and were assumed to be pure myth. Some people - like the German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann - thought that there might be some truth behind the myth. He excavated at a site in Asia Minor - in the Dardanelles region of modern Turkey - and located a citadel beneath the Roman settlement of Ilios which matched Homer's descriptions. Other excavations at Mycenae in central Greece seemed to reveal the palace of Agamemnon. 

We now know that there really was a conflict between the Achaeans and the Trojans in the Bronze Age, over Aegean trading routes rather than a woman. The Trojans were a horse-obsessed society. The myths did appear to have historical roots.

Homer came to write his poetry some 150 years after the events were supposed to have taken place, basing his work on oral accounts handed down over generations.

Schliemann actually excavated right through the Bronze Age citadel, trashing much of it - looking for something that matched the poetry. It is also known that he misidentified Agamemnon's palace - again digging too far back - and fabricated excavations by seeding sites with finds from elsewhere, like the famous treasure of Helen of Troy. He ended up banned from Turkey after illegally removing Trojan finds from the country.

(They were supposed to have been destroyed in Berlin at the end of WWII, but it is now known that some were taken by the Red Army back to Russia).

Cotton's Doctor Who story joins the action after ten years of siege. Hector, the heir to the Trojan throne, has killed Patroclus - comrade and lover of Achilles. The Iliad then sees Achilles take his revenge by killing Hector, dragging the corpse around the walls of Troy tied to his chariot - an incident which Cotton elects to omit. 

The Doctor being mistaken for Zeus derives from the many forms which the Greek god assumed - often as a means of satisfying his lust. These included a bull, a swan, a satyr, an eagle, a flame and a shower of gold.

The Doctor emerges from the TARDIS coincident with a flash of lightning and a peel of thunder - both attributes of Zeus.

Whilst keeping up the pretence that he is the god, the Doctor tells Agamemnon that he knows of events back home in Mycenae - namely that his wife (Clytemnestra) is having an affair. The King dismisses this as common knowledge, but legend states that on his return from Troy Agamemnon will be murdered by his wife and her lover.

Tutte Lemkow dons an eyepatch for the second time in the series (having sported one in Marco Polo) to play Cyclops - the mythical giant which had a single eye in the middle of its forehead. Odysseus (aka Ulysses) would encounter the Cyclops Polyphemus during his twenty year voyage back to his home in Ithaca. (The finding of mammoth skulls, with their large central nasal cavity, led people to believe that the Cyclops had been real).

The Myth Makers was originally going to be directed by Derek Martinus, who had handled the preceding five episodes following the illness of Mervyn Pinfield. Instead, the story went to Leeston-Smith - a BBC staff director. This was to be his only Doctor Who story, which those who remember seeing it at the time think a great shame.

The designer most associated with historical stories was Barry Newbery, but it had been decided that he would be alternating with Ray Cusick on the 12-part Dalek epic which was to follow. John Wood, who had previous experience on The Web Planet and parts of The Chase, was given the job of realising ancient Troy. For this episode he created a model of the city which was filmed on location at Frensham Ponds in Surrey, which just happened to be close to where the director lived.

The regular cast returned from their summer break to commence rehearsals on Monday 13th September, and none of them were happy. Maureen O'Brien had embarked on an expensive foreign holiday, and spent money on her London home, on the supposition that she had a regular income due from Doctor Who. Instead, she discovered that Vicki was to be written out at the end of the first new story. As well as the costs of her summer, she argued that she could have better spent the time seeking other work instead of holidaying.

Both Hartnell and Purves were angry at the way she was being treated - and Donald Tosh would later admit that the whole thing had been badly handled by he and Wiles (though the buck has to stop with the producer).

Hartnell was just recovering from a bad cold, which did not help his famed irritability. With Verity Lambert now gone, the relationship with Wiles quickly deteriorated. To get his own way, Hartnell started acting older and more infirm than he was, or he would go over Wiles' head to get his own way. This coincided with his actual illness - arteriosclerosis - making it harder for him to learn lines. 

Pre-filming took place on location at Frensham Ponds between 27th August and 2nd September, mostly for fight scenes. There was no pre-filming at Ealing on this occasion. Some model work was undertaken at the unlikely venue of the Ham Polo Club at Ham, Middlesex.

Production moved once again to Riverside Studios in Hammersmith. 

On the day of recording, there were further troubles when Hartnell was hit by a camera in the afternoon, bruising his shoulder. He was not getting on with Francis de Wolff who was mocking his acting. (Hartnell had been on holiday the week when de Wolff had featured in The Keys of Marinus as fur-trapper Vasor). Instead of the scripted line about sitting down and having a ham-bone, in rehearsal de Wolff had said "Sit down, ham, and have a bone". 

Hartnell struggled with pronouncing "Agamemnon".

The opening fight between Achilles and Hector had been pre-filmed at Frensham Ponds. The final shot of the evening was a close up on a plaque depicting a stylised horse, left by the Trojans on the ground where the TARDIS had stood.

In between we have a very witty script, played like it was a modern sit-com. The Doctor bristles as Achilles describes him as looking like a beggar, and the interplay between Agamemnon and his cowardly, drunken brother is very amusing. Hartnell tends to declaim all his lines, but this is in character as he is impersonating a god at the time.

One reason for the poor audience appreciation figure was highlighted in the BBC's viewer report on this instalment. Many respondents were confused by the non-appearance of the Daleks after the previous week's episode, some even believing that a mistake had been made and the wrong programme broadcast.

Trivia

• The ratings remain consistent with the previous instalment, but the appreciation figure drops to below the 50 mark.
• Cotton's initial title for his story was "The Mythmakers". Some BBC paperwork titles it "Doctor Who and the Trojans".
• This episode had the working title of "Deus ex Machina", which would have been a clever play on the Doctor being taken to be Zeus, emerging from a machine - his TARDIS.
• The character of Cyclops was included from the start, though Cotton misremembered this later. He claimed that he had to introduce him when a later episode title was changed, necessitating the inclusion of a spy into the story.
• Ivor Salter had previously featured as the Morok Commander in The Space Museum, and he would later play the police sergeant in Black Orchid.
• Tutte Lemkow had appeared in Marco Polo and The Crusade, and would later choreograph the dancing dolls in The Celestial Toymaker.
• Series regular background artist Pat Gorman doubled for Achilles.
• The day after recording, Saturday 18th September, saw William Hartnell attend a Battle of Britain memorial event at RAF Finningley, near Doncaster.
• Radio Times gave its readers the impression that this story was titled "The Trojan War" in its half page preview. It highlighted two of the story's guest artists - neither of whom actually appeared in this opening instalment.

• The costume Francis de Wolff wears as King Agamemnon just happened to be the same one he had previously worn in Carry On Cleo (1964), in which he played General Agrippa.

• Below, a rare behind the scenes image of the filming at Frensham Ponds. As a flat featureless area close to London it was a popular location for TV and film productions. In Doctor Who, for instance, it later appeared as the battlefield of Culloden in The Highlanders.

DWM Special for 60th

November 2nd sees the release of a new publication from Doctor Who Magazine to celebrate the imminent anniversary. It's the biggest special edition to date, over 200 pages in length, and promises 60 chapters on various aspects of the series.

The editor is Marcus Hearn, who has stepped down from the regular magazine but did say he'd be continuing to work on special releases.

RRP is £19.99. It can be pre-ordered from Amazon (as I can't see it on the Panini site yet).

Inspirations: The Eleventh Hour

Only once before in Doctor Who had we seen what could be termed a reboot of the series, in that a new season commenced with none of the existing characters from the previous year - neither Doctor nor companions. (The move from B&W to colour and the dawn of a new decade help to emphasise that a line has most definitely been drawn under the old set-up). 

The War Games ended with the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe all departing together, so that Spearhead From Space opened with a brand new Doctor, who would then meet a brand new companion. One element did cross over between seasons, but Lethbridge-Stewart was hardly a regular in January 1970. He had only been seen twice, a year apart, and was only the Brigadier, of UNIT fame, in a single story.

The Eleventh Hour would see a new Doctor, new companion(s), new showrunner and new producers, with no reference to the previous episode other than the resolution to the regeneration scene.

Steven Moffat began writing his first story as showrunner as early as January 2008 - an episode which he had provisionally titled "The Doctor's Return".

The companion, Amy Pond, was inspired by the character of Wendy in Peter Pan - a girl whisked away on an adventure still dressed in her nightdress. It was envisioned very early on that this would be on the eve of her wedding.

Amy's meeting with the Doctor first as a child, and then again as an adult, derived from The Girl in the Fireplace. 

An early draft had the Doctor forgetting about meeting Amy as a child due to the trauma of regeneration - so she recalled him, but he did not know her when they met up again later. This was when David Tennant was still contemplating staying on. The reason he did not recognise her was because she had actually first encountered him at the end of his Tenth life, and he would regenerate at the end of the 13th instalment - shades of River Song meeting the Doctor in reverse order.

Moffat plotted out a rough story arc of 13 episodes, which would culminate with the Doctor forced into a trap. If he failed to walk into it, a major conflict would worsen.

Once it was clear that he would be introducing a brand new Doctor, Moffat's idea was for the newly regenerated Time Lord to have a very short time in which to save the Earth - thrown into a situation when he had only just regenerated. This inspired the title - he being the Eleventh Doctor and the phrase "11th hour" referring to something happening at the last minute.

He originally set out to have an older Doctor, as Tennant and Eccleston had been relatively young men.

Matt Smith had originally auditioned for Watson in Sherlock, and Moffat had remembered him.

He decided to go with an even younger Doctor in the end - though one who could convey an old man trapped in a young body.

Smith looked at some old episodes and loved Patrick Troughton's Doctor, having seen Tomb of the Cybermen.

The "fish-fingers and custard" food scenes were inspired by AA Milne's The House at Pooh Corner (1928), in which Winnie the Pooh is woken up in the middle of the night by the arrival of Tigger who likes everything, as opposed to the Doctor hating everything until he hits on the fish finger / custard combo.

One of Moffat's sons had a crack in the wall above his bed - which inspired him to include this particular image.

Examining the crack, the Doctor says "You've had some cowboys in here" - the same phrase he had used when mind-reading Reinette in The Girl in the Fireplace.

The extra door / hidden room in Amy's house derived from a childhood dream Moffat had of visits to his grandmother's house.

The setting of events in a village came about as a counterpoint to the inner-city London settings of the previous years. Moffat wanted something out of Trumpton, and in a draft version had the Doctor describe Leadworth as Balamory.

Moffat wanted a big TARDIS interior, and was able to achieve this thanks to the Torchwood Hub having been destroyed in Children of Earth - freeing up studio space. This allowed for different levels and doors going off to other areas, which might be developed later. (RTD's console room was retained, as Neil Gaiman was already planning The Doctor's Wife).

The exterior of the TARDIS was inspired by the Police Box of the Peter Cushing Dalek movies - bigger, darker blue, and with white paintwork around the windows, and the return of the St John Ambulance badge, last seen in Season 3. Mark Gatiss had suggested this. (He was working on his Dalek story, which would see a redesign of the Daleks inspired by the same movies).

The TARDIS swimming pool (described as a bathroom) had been seen in The Invasion of Time, but had been said to have been ejected, due to a leak, in Paradise Towers.

Ten's sonic screwdriver is destroyed on the village green for two reasons - in-story, to make the Doctor's task more difficult, but also to pave the way for a marketable new version.

The Doctor dressing himself from items of clothing found in Leadworth Hospital was a deliberate nod to that other reboot in 1970, when the Third Doctor had collected items from the cloakroom of Ashbridge Cottage Hospital.

As it's a whole new set-up, we have a sequence where the Doctor challenges the Atraxi, which allows for clips from previous stories - classic and more recent - to remind the viewers that this is the same programme. Bizarrely, the clips include Sea Devils, who have never "invaded" the Earth; Hath and Ood - who were quite friendly and have never been near Earth - and Vashta Nerada, who also have never threatened the planet.

The clips of old Doctors come from The Time Meddler, Tomb of the Cybermen, The Sea Devils, The Pirate Planet, Arc of Infinity, Revelation of the Daleks, Time and the Rani, the Paul McGann thing, The Parting of the Ways and The Family of Blood.

Next time: Moffat finally proves that he can write rubbish as well as award-winning gems...

Story 276: Twice Upon A Time

In which the Doctor, refusing to regenerate after being mortally wounded by Cybermen, finds himself at the South Pole. It is December 1986, and out of the icy fog emerges one of his earlier selves - his first incarnation. He has just come from his first encounter with the Cybermen, and is battling against his own impending regeneration.

Whilst the two argue over what they are doing here, time seems to stand still as they see snowflakes suspended in the air. A British Army Captain of the First World War then wanders towards them, unaware of how he came to be here. The last he remembers was being trapped with a German soldier in a foxhole - about to kill each other - when time had stood still for him as well. He had then been approached by a bizarre female figure who appeared to be composed of glass.

The Doctor takes them both into his TARDIS. The First Doctor is not impressed with it, or with the fact that this is his future incarnation.

A gigantic spacecraft appears overhead and it lowers a huge hydraulic claw which seizes the TARDIS and pulls it aboard.

They hear a voice asking them to come outside to the Chamber of the Dead.

The Doctors are offered a gift in return for handing over the Captain - Bill Potts. The Doctor knows that she cannot be real, but she insists that it is the real her.

The Doctors discover time-travel technology of advanced design.

The glass woman appears and explains that the Captain must be returned to the time and place of his death. The First Doctor is given a glimpse of his future selves, learning that he will be known as the "War Doctor", which appals him.

The Doctor manages to open the hatch through which they were brought on board and they use the claw cable to descend to the ice beneath. They take to the First Doctor's TARDIS and dematerialise.

The Doctors wish to know who this glass woman is and what her motives might be. She looked like she was based on a humanoid original so the Doctor decides they must seek out the greatest database in the universe - and he knows where to find it.

The ship arrives on the planet of Villengard, amongst the ruins of its famous weapons factories. A ruined tower is under attack from Daleks, many of which have lost their casings. The Doctor will go there himself as he knows the occupant. In the TARDIS, it is revealed that Bill is really the glass female in disguise.

At the top of the tower the Doctor finds the Dalek which he had previously nicknamed "Rusty".

It has carried on its campaign against its own kind and has amassed a huge databank of knowledge in the meantime. It is able to identify the woman they seek as Professor Helen Clay. She helped found the Testimony Foundation which collects the memories of the dead and allows them to speak again through glass avatars. In this way, everyone has a chance to live on after death.

There is nothing evil behind what she seeks with the Captain.

Time is made to stand still once again, and the two Doctors travel with the Captain to the WWI battlefield. Here the Doctor learns that the man is a member of the Lethbridge-Stewart family - the Brigadier's grandfather.

He has returned to his foxhole, resigned to die, but the Doctor has nudged time on a few minutes. It is Christmas 1914, and the fighting stops for the festive armistice. The Captain is saved.

The First Doctor departs, ready now to face his regeneration after seeing a glimpse of his future.

Before "Bill" departs, she gives the Doctor a final gift. He sees Nardole - and Clara, memories of whom are returned to him.

He, too, is now ready to face his regeneration. With the TARDIS in flight he regenerates into a female form. The ship goes out of control and the new Doctor falls out of the open doors...

Twice Upon A Time was written by Steven Moffat - his final contribution to the series at time of writing - and was first broadcast on Monday 25th December 2017.

Moffat had thought that his final story, and that of Peter Capaldi's Twelfth Doctor, was to be The Doctor Falls. This was the second half of an epic series finale featuring the return of the Mondasian Cybermen and of the Harold Saxon incarnation of the Master, with the Doctor repeatedly blasted by Cybermen, Bill Potts transformation and departure, and the two incarnations of the Master killing one another. Ordinarily, this would have been an ending, but it would prove to be just a step towards the final end for actor and writer, which would be prolonged until Christmas.

Moffat had expected his successor, Chris Chibnall, to launch his iteration of the series, with the new female Doctor, at Christmas 2017. Christmas night was the prime time of prime time, a slot which the series had won back in 2005 and held onto ever since - even when there hadn't even been a normal series that year.

However, Chibnall simply wasn't ready to produce a Christmas Special, and was contemplating doing away with them altogether anyway. Ratings for Christmas night were falling across the board, not just for Doctor Who. The soaps and the sitcom Mrs Brown's Boys were also seeing lower viewing figures, despite still maintaining good percentage scores.

In order to keep the slot, Moffat agreed to write one more story, and since the Doctor was already dying, he would prolong the regeneration for one more adventure and build an episode around this.

Moffat had earlier been asked about returning characters during a Comic-Con panel, when he stated that a meeting between the first and last Doctors - both famed for their grumpiness - would be a great idea.

Peter Capaldi then said that he knew who they could get to play him... This was David Bradley, who in 2013 had portrayed William Hartnell / the First Doctor in An Adventure in Space and Time.

The First Doctor had already been played by another actor, when Richard Hurndall had taken on the role for The Five Doctors. With the theme of regeneration already in place, the obvious storyline of two Doctors each facing their impending regenerations, but refusing to accept them, presented itself. This in turn led to the setting of the South Pole (scene of the Doctor's first regeneration at the conclusion of The Tenth Planet, which coincidentally featured the Cybermen). The meeting of the two Doctors would make for a special end of series cliff-hanger, and material was prepared to top and tail the Series 10 finale. The moment chosen was the sequence at the end of the fourth episode when the Doctor wanders off alone to the TARDIS before companions Ben and Polly can catch up with him, once he's already in the ship. Having just brought back the Mondasian Cybermen, the costumes existed to allow a recreation of scenes from the 1966 story, similar to those staged for the 50th Anniversary drama.

Several scenes were filmed, but few made it to the final episode. These were the introductory sequence where Hartnell's features blend into Bradley's, following the "Have you no emotions?" speech; and the regeneration itself, which existed as some 8mm off-air material and a clip preserved through inclusion in Blue Peter's coverage of Doctor Who's 10th Anniversary in 1973.

As a swansong for writer and actor, the episode was to include references to earlier stories. 

The episode opens with the caption "Previously on Doctor Who... 709 episodes ago", and we see footage from The Tenth Planet.

Other than those relating to the First Doctor, the biggest nod to the more recent past was the inclusion of "Rusty" - the Good Dalek - which had featured right at the start of Capaldi's tenure in the TARDIS, Inside the Dalek being only his second story. The location of Villengard went back to Moffat's very first story for the series in 2005. 

In The Doctor Dances the Doctor and Captain Jack discuss its weapon factories and their destruction.

Thanks to cuts we hardly see Ben (Jared Garfield) or Polly (Lily Travers).

On a personal note, two of Moffat's friends and fellow writers - the most prolific - just happened to also act. Mark Gatiss featured as the Captain, who we would subsequently learn is an ancestor of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart; and Toby Whithouse played his German army opponent.

Captain Lethbridge-Stewart lives in Cromer, the Norfolk town which his grandson will think UNIT HQ has been transported to in The Three Doctors.

The idea of the glass avatar (Testimony / Helen Clay being played by Nikki Amuka-Bird, who had featured in the Torchwood episode Sleeper) allowed for a reappearance of Pearl Mackie as Bill, and we also saw an image of Clara, with the Doctor regaining his memories of her. To round off the season, Nardole also appears to say goodbye to the Doctor, bringing all of their stories to a conclusion. It should be remembered that the Doctor was unconscious when taken into the TARDIS at the end of The Doctor Falls, so won't have been aware of the fates of Bill and Nardole. 

The Testimony Foundation is said to have been formed on New Earth. The Chamber of the Dead is able to show the First Doctor his future selves, allowing for clips of other Doctors.

One criticism of the story was the realisation of the First Doctor in terms of his old-fashioned attitudes. Bradley is given words which the First Doctor would never have uttered - but which the actor who played him might have done (e.g. the sexist remarks). It does seem as though Moffat has confused actor with character.

The series had been struggling to include festive components in its Christmas Specials, but the 1914 WWI armistice at Ypres, when troops from both sides ceased hostilities to party together and play football, hadn't been used so far. 

Overall, a nostalgic end to the Moffat / Capaldi eras. The actual story is quite weak, but that doesn't really matter. It's a farewell story in more ways than one, the end of an era. There are many who dislike (indeed, hated) what happened next, and this episode is now seen by some as the last of its particular line.

Things you might like to know:

• Peter Capaldi was invited to stay on when he learned that Moffat was leaving. It was only coincidence that the two left together. Capaldi decided that his three series were enough, and wanted to move on to other projects.
• This episode was so unplanned that both Pearl Mackie and Matt Lucas believed they had finished on the series and were pleasantly surprised to be invited back. Mackie was on holiday in the US when asked to return, and Lucas in Rome writing his autobiography.
• Rachel Talalay had already directed the Series 10 finale and was keen to get home, but Moffat and Capaldi together talked her into remaining in the UK to direct this story.
• Sadly, this was the final Doctor Who story to be designed by Michael Pickwoad. He passed away in August 2018.
• We see a ring drop from the new Doctor's hand just after she has regenerated - a nod to the same thing happening in Power of the Daleks.
• Unlike when Ten became Eleven, it isn't the regeneration which wrecks the TARDIS. It's only afterwards when the Doctor presses a button that the console explodes and it goes out of control - Chibnall intending, like Moffat before him, to have his own new console room.
• In the first draft there's a funny reference to Episode 3 of The Tenth Planet when the First Doctor seems to brag about his actions at Snowcap Base, to which the current Doctor remarks that all he did was have a big nap - Hartnell having fallen ill and the Doctor been written out of that episode, stuck unconscious in bed.
• As the Doctor sends a message to his future self, he quotes Terrance Dicks' famous words about the Doctor never being cruel or cowardly. He also advises never eating pears, which was on Ten's recorded to-do list in Human Nature.
• The Testimony Foundation was formed in the year 5 Billion and 12, which is before the events seen in either of the televised stories set on New Earth - so before the population was decimated by the mood virus.
• The difference in facial features of the First Doctor is put down to the early effects of the regeneration process. Their timelines being "out of synch" is the excuse why the Second Doctor will not remember any of these events.
• Testimony gives some of the titles which have been given to the Doctor, most of which we know of ("Destroyer of Worlds" was given him by Davros, for instance). However, two titles refer to stories we have never seen - "The Last Tree of Garsenon" and "The Butcher of Skull Moon".
• BBC VFX pioneer Bernard Wilkie's name appears on a label on the TARDIS console.
• Some of the set elements, like the brass columns, seen in the First Doctor's TARDIS are the original ones from 1963.
• Jon Pertwee's purple jacket from Planet of the Spiders is seen in the TARDIS. Capaldi was photographed by Mark Gatiss (who now owns it) wearing it in his trailer:

Episodes - Afterlife: Beaus' Helmet

The character in the helmet with the breathing tube attachment, right of centre, is Beaus, played by Sam Mansary.

That helmet would return to the series in a variety of guises over the years - but before it featured in Doctor Who it could be seen in one of the Pathfinders serials.

The series began life as Target Luna, which co-starred Michael Craze (companion Ben Jackson) and was broadcast on ITV in April 1960. Other Doctor Who connections were Sydney Newman, who produced it, and Malcolm Hulke, who co-wrote it and the subsequent serials with Eric Paice.

It led to a trilogy comprising Pathfinders in Space (September 1960), Pathfinders to Mars (Dec 1960 - January 1961), and Pathfinders to Venus (March 1961).

The star was Gerald Flood, who voiced Kamelion (and appeared as 'King John' in The King's Demons), and George Coulouris (Arbitan in The Keys of Marinus) featured in the Mars and Venus serials as Harcourt Brown.

Newman's involvement leads us to view this series as very much a direct ancestor to Doctor Who. The stories feature characters similar to the first TARDIS team, with Harcourt Brown as the crotchety and at times untrustworthy older figure, with clean cut adult hero figures and younger characters as you "need a kid - to get into trouble".

Our distinctive helmet first appeared in Pathfinders to Mars (above).

When Beaus was next seen, his helmet had been given a makeover. It had lost its aerial-like attachment and been painted black, though the breathing attachment was still present. He first appears in this guise in The Day of Armageddon and, presumably, in later episodes for which we sadly have no visual record.

The helmet reappeared in Doctor Who, still with the aperture for the breathing tube, in two consecutive stories in 1973 - Frontier in Space and Planet of the Daleks. In the first of these we saw it being worn by the Third Doctor on the two occasions when he embarked on hazardous space walks - firstly to escape captivity on the Master's stolen prison ship, and later to repair General Williams' craft as it approached the Ogron planet.

Having featured in the sixth and final instalment of Frontier in Space, it was seen again just one week later in the opening episode of Planet of the Daleks. With a quick paint job from silver to white, our helmet was being worn by the deceased Thal commander in his crashed spaceship on Spiridon.

Our last sighting in Doctor Who was in 1975, when four of the helmets featured in The Android Invasion, worn by the white-suited Mechanics. On this occasion, they were fitted with new darkened visors, to conceal their true robotic nature.

Episode 86: Mission to the Unknown

NB: This episode no longer exists in the archives, nor is there a full set of telesnaps. Representative images are therefore used to illustrate it.

Synopsis:

On the remote planet Kembel, a man staggers blindly through a dense jungle, obsessively muttering to himself that he must kill...

In a clearing nearby two astronauts are working to repair their spacecraft, freighter XM2, which has crash-landed here. The pilot is Gordon Lowery but he is under instruction to obey the orders of his colleague Marc Cory at all times. The man in the jungle is their navigator, Jeff Garvey.

Garvey arrives at the clearing and begins to sneak up on Lowery, determined to kill him, but he is spotted by Cory who shoots him dead. The pilot is appalled, but Cory pulls back the dead man's sleeve to reveal a thick black spine embedded in the flesh. They go inside the ship to talk, but after they have gone Garvey begins to twitch back to life. More spines sprout from his skin, along with dense white filaments.

In the ship, Cory reveals that he is a member of the Space Security Service, licenced to commandeer anything, or anyone, at any time. He tells Lowery that a freighter captain recently spotted a strange vessel in this region of space, which is believed to be a Dalek ship. The Daleks have been building a power base far from Earth's galaxy, but it is feared that they may have turned their attention towards it once again. On a hunch, Cory has come to Kembel as he suspects it would make an ideal base of operations. His superiors are unaware that he is here. Garvey had become infected by a Varga Plant, which confirms the Daleks' presence as these creatures are unique to Skaro where they are created in Dalek laboratories. An emergency beacon will be set up, in case they cannot repair the ship. This will be launched into space to alert a passing ship.

On leaving the freighter, they are attacked by Garvey, now almost completely transformed into a cactus-like Varga Plant. They destroy him, but other Vargas are closing in, pulling themselves along by their roots.

Nearby lies a huge complex with a landing area. A massive spaceship flies overhead, which the Earthmen recognise as hailing from the Outer Galaxies. It lands at the complex, which is the Dalek base. The Black Dalek Supreme is aware of the crashed freighter and has sent patrols out to find it.

One of these locates the camp and Lowery and Cory hurry into the jungle as the Daleks completely destroy their ship. Luckily Cory has brought the beacon and its launcher.

They set off to find some shelter. Pushing his way through the vegetation, Lowery feels a sharp sting and is horrified to see a familiar black spine sticking out of his hand. He declines to tell Cory, who has gone on ahead and found the base, where he overhears the Dalek plan.

The Daleks have built an alliance of members of the Outer Galaxies. The last to arrive is Malpha, who joins Trantis, Celation, Beaus, Sentreal and Gearon.

Together they intend to launch an all-out attack on the planets of the Solar System - beginning with Earth.

Cory returns to find Lowery transforming into a Varga Plant and is forced to kill him.

He records a warning but before he can launch it into space he is discovered by a Dalek patrol. He is exterminated, the recording left unnoticed beside his corpse.

In the base, the Daleks and their alien allies continue their preparations for the destruction of the Earth...

Next episode: The Temple of Secrets

Data:

Written by: Terry Nation

Recorded: Friday 6th August 1965 - Television Centre Studio TC4

First broadcast: 5:50pm, Saturday 9th October 1965

Ratings: 8.3 million / AI 54

Designer: Richard Hunt / Raymond P Cusick

Director: Derek Martinus

Guest cast: Edward de Souza (Marc Cory), Jeremy Young (Gordon Lowery), Barry Jackson (Jeff Garvey), Robert Cartland (Malpha), Peter Hawkins & David Graham (Dalek voices), Robert Jewell, Kevin Manser, John Scott Martin, Gerald Taylor (Dalek operators), Ronald Rich, Pat Gorman, Sam Mansary, Johnny Clayton, Len Russell (Planetarians)

Critique:

Mission to the Unknown is the only Doctor Who story in which neither the Doctor nor his companions appear in any way. William Hartnell did receive an on-screen credit as the Doctor, but this was simply a convention of the time. (And O'Brien and Purves got a credit in Radio Times for the same reason - see below).

It marks the final production by Verity Lambert, and she concentrated all her efforts into it whilst her successor John Wiles took charge of Galaxy 4. After producing the pilot episode of new soap The Newcomers, she would go on to produce Adam Adamant Lives!, after the BBC failed to secure the rights to Sexton Blake.

The story owes its existence to the decision to reduce Planet of Giants from four episodes down to three. 

By 1965 the pattern of the series had been established as four-part stories in general with a six-part Dalek story every six months, so two per season. The on-going success of the Daleks had been noted by the upper echelons of the BBC, and Huw Weldon, controller of television programmes, was keen to see more of them. He had noted how big a fan his mother-in-law was, whom he regarded as a typical viewer. For its third season, Lambert and Dennis Spooner were encouraged to combine the two planned six-part Dalek stories to form one massive 12 week adventure.

With the production team owed an episode due to the re-editing of Planet of Giants, it was decided to use this as a stand-alone prequel to this Dalek epic, to be recorded as part of the Galaxy 4 production block at the conclusion of the second season, under the same director. It would be made after the regular cast had departed on their summer break, so would not feature the Doctor, TARDIS or companions.

Terry Nation had hoped to develop his creations further with a TV series of their own, divorced from Doctor Who. This would feature new characters to fight them - futuristic secret agents, belonging to an organisation which would be featuring in the 12-part story. "Spy-Fi" was a big thing at this time, thanks to the James Bond movies, which had reached Goldfinger at this stage, and TV series such as The Man From Uncle which debuted in September 1964. It's no coincidence that Marc Cory introduces himself to Lowery as having a "licence to kill".

It says a lot about Doctor Who fans that a story which actually has its title on screen should still have arguments about what it is called. On paper the episode was often referred to as serial D/C - standing for "Dalek Cutaway". This was a production term, however, as in the action cutting away from the main narrative of the Doctor and his companions for a week. It was never intended for a story title.

Rather than give it the production code "U", it was allocated "T/A" since it was produced as though it were the fifth instalment of serial "T".

The alien assembly goes under different names. Officially they were known as the Planetarians, but fans often refer to them simply as the Dalek Alliance. The first issue of the magazine World of Horror featured a photograph of Malpha, claiming he was a member of UGH (United Galactic Headquarters). I always assumed this was a bit of nonsense by the magazine editors, but it transpires that some BBC paperwork - a press release - did actually use this term for them. This also claimed that each delegate would be seen behind a lectern displaying their name - but photographs show this was never the case.

Theoretically, we can work out which delegate is which by a process of elimination, knowing the identity of some of the actors. Malpha is the only speaking alien, which is why Robert Cartland gets a proper credit. He's the bald, white suited one with the mottled skin, fourth from left in the second image above.

Apart from the face tendrils, Trantis is similar in both stories, so we can work out that he is the short alien second from left, played by Johnny Clayton.

Richard Rich we know from other roles to be very tall, so he's the alien with the thick balaclava-like headgear third from left. This is Celation.

Sam Mansary is black, so he's the one in the helmet with the breathing tube - Beaus - far left.

The alien with the egg-shaped helmet and cloth-face is Len Russell, playing Gearon, second from right.

This leaves the ubiquitous Pat Gorman as Sentreal, who is the tall black Christmas tree shaped being far right.

Oddly, the final spaceship to arrive on Kembel is said to belong to Gearon, yet it is Malpha who is the last delegate to turn up in the Dalek council chamber. It may be that he travelled as a passenger in the Gearon spaceship, as we'll later learn that the delegates are trying to keep their movements secret from others.

Whilst Malpha appears to the character's name, it may well be that the titles derive from their planet or galaxy of origin, as we will see that few of them are identical in the subsequent story. Even Malpha, who has changed the least, will be played by another actor.

Three Varga Plants were constructed - armless costumes covered in cotton wool and with black spines. They were operated by Tony Starn, Roy Reeves and Leslie Weeks.

This is the second story in a row from Nation to feature mobile hostile plant forms, after the Fungoids seen in The Chase. This was something he would return to later in his "greatest hits" story Planet of the Daleks.

In the draft script "Varga" was the name of the jungle planet. It then became "Kemble" - a name previously used by Spooner in an episode of Fireball XL5 ("Space Vacation").

Seven aliens were to have been represented - the last being Zephon, whose name appears in the rehearsal script but was then omitted. The aliens were all supposed to be humanoid, but with different uniforms. Nation didn't want them to look "silly", so not sure what he might have thought of the Christmas tree-shaped Sentreal.

Because he would be involved with the subsequent 12-parter, and due to his obvious Dalek experience, designer Ray Cusick joined Richard Hunt as co-designer. Hunt designed the jungle, whilst Cusick concentrated on the freighter and beacon launcher, as well as the Dalek base interiors as some elements of these sets were to be reused.

Some jungle scenes featuring Garvey's mutation were filmed at Ealing on 25th June. 

Rehearsals commenced on Monday 2nd August. 

Jeremy Young was concurrently rehearsing a production of Macbeth to be staged at the Edinburgh Festival. He was looking forward to working with Hartnell again (see Trivia), and so was disappointed to learn he would not be appearing.

In studio, four Daleks featured - one painted black to portray the Supreme.

Recording began with the scenes of Garvey that would be edited into the close of The Exploding Planet.

With the benefit of hindsight, we can see this episode for what it was - a lead-in / prequel to The Daleks' Master Plan, produced outwith the contracts for the regular cast thanks to a decision taken a whole year previously to re-edit another story.

Viewers at the time, however, would have been very surprised to see the end credits roll without the TARDIS having arrived - especially when they tuned in the following week to find an entirely unrelated story commencing. 

It would have been very confusing, with the audience having no idea when, or even if, the Dalek plotline would be picked up again. They have been left with a dark and doom-laden story in which the heroes have been killed, the Daleks and their allies victorious. The usual emotional relief valve of the Doctor arriving to save the day hasn't materialised.

Sadly, it is highly unlikely that we will ever get to see any of this, as the episode was never sold abroad. ABC in Australia did consider taking it, but rejected it as too horrific for its audience.

An order to wipe Mission to the Unknown came in 1969, though it is believed that the BBC still retained a film copy as late as 1974, after which it was destroyed - with no hope of a copy turning up anywhere else.

Trivia

• Despite the presence of the Daleks for the first time this season, and the recent Peter Cushing movie, the ratings fall by almost 1.5 million on last week's episode, though the appreciation figure remains in the mid 50's. One of the factors behind the lower than expected ratings was the arrival of Irwin Allen's Lost in Space in various ITV regions.
• This is one of only two episodes of the classic era which act as complete stories in their own right, the other being The Five Doctors.
• Edward de Souza starred in a couple of Hammer Horror films - Phantom of the Opera (with Michael Gough and Patrick Troughton) and Kiss of the Vampire. He also featured in the final episodes of Sapphire and Steel, and appeared with Roger Moore in The Spy Who Loved Me.
• Jeremy Young is another returnee to the programme, having played the villainous Kal in An Unearthly Child.
• Already booked for this episode, Robert Cartland had replaced Anthony Paul to voice the Rills in Galaxy 4.
• Ronald Rich had played Gunnar the Giant in The Time Meddler.
• Johnny Clayton would return to the programme as one of the elderly Thinktank scientists in Shada, and later as one of the Lazars in Terminus. His biggest claim to fame was playing the deceased neighbour (Reg Cox) in the opening scene of EastEnders' first ever episode.
• Mission to the Unknown has never been released on any media on its own (apart from as a giveaway CD with a UK newspaper). The novelisation and soundtrack of The Daleks' Master Plan simply use it as their opening section. Because of this, there won't be an "Art of..." post on this occasion.
• Radio Times, as usual, covered the new story with a feature article, which included two photographs highlighting the Planetarians:

• In 2019 media students of the University of Central Lancashire recreated Mission to the Unknown using 1960's television production techniques. It attracted the attention of BBC Studios. Edward de Souza and Peter Purves paid the set a visit, and Nick Briggs agreed to voice the Daleks. It was released onto YouTube at 5:50pm on 9th October 2019, the 54th anniversary of its original TV broadcast. Depending on your location, it can be viewed here: Mission to the Unknown Recreation | FULL EPISODE | Doctor Who - YouTube with a making-of feature here: The Making-Of Mission to the Unknown | Doctor Who - YouTube

• The wonderful Oliver Arkinstall-Jones has produced three retro cinema-style posters for this episode, two for the original BBC version and one for the UCLan reconstruction. He has a range of products (posters, T-shirts, fridge magnets etc.) based on his images available for sale on Redbubble: Oliver Arkinstall-Jones Shop | Redbubble