Episode 10: The Ordeal

Synopsis 

The Thal expedition, which includes Ian and Barbara, hear a scream from Elyon, who has gone to fill their water bags. Ian and Ganatus go to investigate and find no trace of their friend. The bags are strewn around, some floating on the lake...

Back at the campsite, the Doctor and Alydon are formulating their plan, assisted by Susan and Dyoni. Their task is to create a diversion, to help the expedition get into the Dalek city unnoticed.

Ian's party skirt the lake without further incident and soon come to the mountains which back onto the city. Here a pipeline carries water, which they assume must feed the city.

After following a tunnel, Antodus hangs back to speak to his brother in private. He wants them all to turn back. The two argue and suddenly there is a rockfall, which blocks the tunnel. They cannot go back even if they wanted to. Ganatus covers up his brother's cowardice, even claiming that he had saved him from the fall.

When they reach a cavern with multiple galleries running off it, they split up. Barbara and Ganatus find the tunnel which looks the most promising, after the Thal falls down to a lower level.

At the front of the city, the Thals are using large mirrors to reflect light onto the Dalek surveillance systems, blinding them. The Doctor, Susan and Alydon enter the city and come upon a power cable. As Alydon goes to warn his people to move around, to prevent the Daleks locating them with a weapon, the Doctor decides to sabotage the cable. Making use of Susan's TARDIS key on its chain, he links two pieces of equipment which wrecks them both. He is so busy congratulating himself on his brilliance that he fails to notice a Dalek squad approach, and he and Susan are captured.

In the caverns, the expedition members encounter a deep ravine. From about 50 feet below comes the sound of some subterranean river. Ian decides that the distance is crossable if they jump. He goes first and lands on a narrow ledge. He identifies a niche in the rock which should lead to a further tunnel. Each expedition member makes the leap, helped by Ian who has a a rope tied around him. They tie the other end around themselves. 

Everyone gets across except for Antodus, who only half-heartedly makes his jump. He misses the ledge and plummets into the ravine, suspended in mid air by the rope around Ian's waist. The school teacher finds himself being inexorably dragged towards the edge himself...

Next episode: The Rescue.

Data:

Written by: Terry Nation

Recorded: Friday 3rd January, 1964 - Lime Grove Studio D

First broadcast: 5:15pm, Saturday 25th January, 1964

Ratings: 10.4 million / AI 63

Designer: Jeremy Davies

Director: Richard Martin

Critique:

As we have previously mentioned, this story was supposed to be a six-parter until it was decided that the series might only run to 13 episodes. An extra episode was added to Nation's story, and this is where most of the additional material ended up. Much of the episode is taken up with the expedition of Ian, Barbara, and their Thal companions.

It's the first appearance in the series of the "quest" format of storytelling, wherein the Doctor and / or companions must face a series of challenges to reach a destination, or obtain an object of significance.

As well as the hostile jungle, introduced in the previous instalment, the action moved underground into a cave system, adding a different environment. Dangers other than rock falls or sheer drops were planned for these sequences but not used in the end (see below).

One danger the two school teachers don't have to face is the Daleks themselves. They hardly feature in this instalment. Nor do the Doctor and Susan. Hartnell and Ford only have a couple of scenes - though one of them is a highlight of the episode. We see the Doctor doing some very Doctor-ish things when he decides to carry out some sabotage in the Dalek city. He is so pleased with his own cleverness that he gets himself captured. The audience get a little lesson in electrical current as he carries out this sabotage.

Director Martin employs "creeper" cameras, which allow objects to be filmed from a low angle without need to have sets built up on rostra. The Dalek props were smaller than the actors around them, and filming them from such low-angles was an attempt to make them look more menacing. Future directors would do the same.

Audience figures rose by another half million, taking it over 10 million for the first time, and it was at this point that both Sydney Newman and Donald Wilson decided to step back and give Verity Lambert free rein with the show. 

Lambert arranged for two of the four Dalek props to be donated to the Barnardo's children's home at Stepney Causeway, but the other two were to be put into storage at Ealing Film Studios, along with some of their control room props. Thoughts were obviously turning towards a possible return for the creatures.

After Elyon's demise, it appears that Antodus is there purely to get into danger and be killed, in order to reinforce the risks which the expedition is facing. Even before we met him we heard that he was afraid of the dark, so it begs the question of why he volunteered for this mission in the first place - and why his brother accepted him. If so worried about his own survival, why does he not make more of an effort to leap across the chasm?

The caveman Kal had looked at Barbara in a rather lustful way in the previous story, but here we see a potential romance continue to blossom between her and Ganatus. This first showed itself in their night-time chat in the previous instalment. Ian is very much the action hero, but it is nice to see Barbara getting some character development - even if it does mean that, as a woman, she can only be involved in something "domestic". Ian gets fighting, she gets romance.

Trivia:

• Richard Martin returns to helm the final two instalments of the story.
• Nation's initial plans for this episode were for the expedition members to encounter some giant albino spiders in the caverns.
• The rock ledge is a little too obviously made of jablite (expanded polystyrene). We see some of it break away under Barbara's fingers to reveal the white core underneath the painted surface.
• Ray Cusick was unavailable for this episode, which is why Jeremy Davies deputised for him.
• Reporting on the gift of the two Daleks to the Barnardo's Home, the Daily Mirror called them "Darleks".
• The destruction of Susan's TARDIS key will prove significant in a later story, which wouldn't have worked had there simply been a spare key available.
• Schoolboy Steven Qualtrough visited the studio on the day of recording, and publicity images were taken of him meeting with Hartnell.