Synopsis:
Jamie has been abducted, but the Daleks insist that their experiment begin immediately. Failure to do so will mean death...
An unconscious Mollie has been left in Jamie's place. The Doctor looks around and spots some straw on the floor.
Jamie wakes to find himself held captive by Toby in the stables. Another man arrives soon after - Arthur Terrall. It appears that it was Terrall who had ordered his abduction - yet he then denies this, which angers Toby. Terrall sends him away then demands of Jamie the whereabouts of Victoria Waterfield. The man appears to be in some discomfort, and then contradicts himself once more - claiming to know that Miss Waterfield is in Paris.
The Doctor arrives, and Terral withdraws as though nothing has happened.
Jamie is informed that Victoria is a prisoner of the Daleks.
Within the house, she is being forced to move rooms by the creatures.
Waterfield is unhappy that the Doctor has told Jamie about the Daleks, as they had instructed that he not know anything about their planned experiment. The Doctor insists that Jamie will do whatever is asked of him, no matter what he is told. He is unaware that his young friend is listening to this conversation...
In his laboratory, Maxtible is discussing the arrangements for the experiment with a Dalek. He informs it that Victoria has now been moved, and the testing equipment prepared.
He then calls in his manservant Kemel, who works at his London home. He is a huge, musclebound figure, though mute. The Dalek has withdrawn to observe him being tested. Maxtible instructs Kemel to demonstrate a number of feats of strength, and then tells him that he has an assignment for him. He is to intercept the villainous Jamie and prevent him murdering them all, by any means necessary.
Maxtible shows his servant that a number of lethal booby traps have been set up around the south wing of the house, and this is where he will find and stop Jamie.
The Doctor goes to the laboratory and confronts the Dalek, which explains further the reason for the test. They wish to identify the "Human Factor" which has led to their defeat, so that they can implant it into their own race. They cannot use the Doctor as he is regarded as being "more than human", due to his many travels through time and space.
There are three large packing cases, with a dormant Dalek in each. They have been sent from Skaro, and are the subjects into which the Factor is to be implanted.
Waterfield and Maxtible arrive, and explain that the experiment is for Jamie to be monitored whilst he rescues Victoria from elsewhere in the house.
Jamie, meanwhile, is meeting with Ruth Maxtible and Terrall, who continues to act strangely. He runs out of the room after arguing with Jamie, and Ruth goes after him. Mollie tries to explain his odd behaviour by telling Jamie that Terrall had been in the Crimea. She also mentions that the rest of the servants have left as the house is supposed to be haunted.
The Doctor arrives soon after, and he is confronted by an angry Jamie. He accuses him of allying himself with Kennedy's murderer - a man who has stolen the TARDIS.
Waterfield arrives and confirms that the Daleks were responsible for the death, and he is being forced to help them as they hold his daughter. An angry Jamie is unaware that the Doctor is manipulating him into rescuing the girl. Jamie storms out.
Out in the stables, Terrall and Toby argue - the latter demanding payment or he will threaten blackmail. After Terrall has gone, Toby decides to rob the house before leaving.
Intrigued by the ghost story she had mentioned, Jamie begins questioning Mollie about the layout of the house.
Knowing that his rescue mission has begun, the Doctor and Maxtible begin the Dalek experiment.
Toby breaks into the laboratory, but is confronted by a Dalek. It exterminates him.
Mollie shows Jamie the way into the closed-off south wing. He narrowly misses being impaled by a spiked gate which drops from the ceiling.
He passes along darkened passageways, and suddenly sees a huge shape moving through the shadows towards him.
It is Kemel...
Written by David Whitaker
Recorded: Saturday 27th May 1967 - Lime Grove Studio D
First broadcast: 5.45pm, Saturday 3rd June 1967
Ratings: 6.1 million / AI 52
VFX: Michealjohn Harris & Peter Day
Designer: Chris Thompson
Director: Derek Martinus
Additional cast: Gary Watson (Arthur Terrall), Sonny Caldinez (Kemel), Gerald Taylor (Dalek)
Episode Three of The Evil of the Daleks is the final instalment to be script edited by Gerry Davis. Having turned down the chance to produce Doctor Who, he was now moving on to story edit another series - The First Lady, which starred Thora Hird as the lady mayor of a fictitious Northern town. (Only a single episode survives in the archives).
As I've previously mentioned, Whitaker's original idea was for the Daleks to force the Doctor into going back to 20,000 BC to abduct a "caveman" (named Og) to be their test subject.
Jamie and Victoria were to have been transferred to Skaro whilst the experiment took place - so Og would not have been on a mission to rescue her.
The Dalek scheme was to destroy the "Human Factor", before it could really develop, back in prehistory.
I'll be criticising their inclusion later, but Whitaker originally intended there to be a romantic sub-plot between Ruth and Terrall - something which clearly never developed into the finished story.
He gave this episode the title of "A Trial of Strength".
Filming for this episode included shots of Victoria being moved to the room from which Jamie was to rescue her. These scenes were shot on the afternoon of Thursday 20th April at Grim's Dyke. The house lies near Harrow Weald to the west of London. At the time it was being used as a rehabilitation centre for young people, but had once been the home to Sir William Gilbert, of Gilbert & Sullivan fame.
A new Dalek prop had been ordered from Shawcraft Models, one with a much slimmer base. This was commissioned due to the narrowness of some of the door frames at the location. You can recognise this Dalek as it has a single column of spheres running down the rear, rather than the usual two.
Small ramps were also required to allow the Daleks to get over the door sills.
The start of Jamie's rescue mission was filmed on Monday 24th April. It was on this day that Frazer Hines first worked with Debbie Watling on the programme, and they were both joined by Trinidadian wrestler and actor Sonny Caldinez, playing Kemel. Scenes between Jamie and Kemel continued on Tuesday 25th, which involved night shooting between 5pm - 2am.
Monday 22nd May saw Peter Hawkins record the Dalek Emperor dialogue at a studio in Soho.
Watling enjoyed working with Caldinez as she found him very friendly and protective.
Into the studio and the final Dalek scene of the previous episode was remounted, this time with Gerald Taylor inside the second Dalek prop.
The night-time photograph of Grim's Dyke was used as an establishing shot just before Mollie showed Jamie the plans of the building. This was used to bridge the only recording break of the evening's recording session.
Maxtible's stables were devoid of horses - their presence suggested only by sound effects. A number of special props were constructed for Kemel to demonstrate his strength - bendable metal bars and planks of wood that could be karate-chopped.
Neither Patrick Troughton nor Debbie Watling would be required for the following week's studio, since all their scenes were pre-filmed.
What was the point of Toby? (As the story develops, I'll be asking the same question of Ruth and Terrall. They are utterly pointless characters, clearly added to the episodes for padding purposes only as far as I'm concerned).
Toby abducts Jamie seemingly just so that we have a cliffhanger for the second episode. The resolution is that he did this on Terrall's orders, only for him to contradict this in the first few minutes of this episode. If it confuses Toby, then it confuses the viewer as well. After being kidnapped, Jamie is quickly freed - so you have to ask what the point of it all was. The Doctor's detective work with the piece of straw wasn't even necessary.
Toby features in only one further scene with Terrall where they have an argument in the stable block, before he breaks into the laboratory to do some thieving - only to be killed by a Dalek. It's simply a repetition of Kennedy from the first instalment - dodgy criminal hireling who plans to steal from the person employing him, only to be exterminated by a Dalek.
What is interesting this week is the Doctor's relationship with Jamie. Ian Chesterton took a long time to accept the Doctor as a friend, whilst we had previously seen Steven Taylor fall out with the Doctor quite dramatically following the events of the St Bartholomew's Day massacre. He stormed out of the TARDIS, planning never to return (somewhat undermined by his rapid return for no real reason).
Here Jamie learns that his friend can be on friendly terms with someone whom he believes to be a murderer and a thief, and we get to see the Doctor's manipulative side. He orders Jamie not to attempt to rescue Victoria, knowing full well that the young man will do the opposite, and he seems almost gleeful about his deception to Waterfield. The dark, manipulative Doctor was invented long before Andrew Cartmel came on the scene.
The Daleks do not identify the Doctor as an alien / non-human here. He is simply "more than human" to them. This is due to his vast experience of space-time travel, seemingly - rather than any innate abilities or extra-terrestrial nature.
- The ratings have dropped by 2 million since the opening instalment, though the appreciation figure remains stable. Either the Daleks simply don't have the drawing power they once had, or viewers have noticed that they've hardly been in this story so far. We have now moved into June and the better weather, so TV audiences as a whole may have been down.
- The episode was repeated on Saturday 22nd June 1968, when it was watched by 6.3 million viewers - slightly more than watched the original broadcast.
- There was a technical fault during the repeat screening, during the scenes with Mollie telling Jamie about the closed-off south wing. Music by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass was played whilst this was fixed.
- Viewers in 1968 also had to contend with a three week break between this episode and the next, thanks to Wimbledon coverage.
- Sonny Caldinez will go on to feature four more times in the series - always playing Ice Warriors.
- Kemel was named after the Turkish statesman Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
- John Maxim was another contender for the role of Kemel. He had played the Frankenstein Monster in The Chase and, under the name John Wills, a Cyberman in The Moonbase.
- Barrie Ingham was one of those considered for the role of Arthur Terrall. He had previously played Paris in The Myth Makers, and Alydon in the first Peter Cushing Dalek movie.
- References are made to the Crimean War (1853 - 56). Terrall is said to have taken part in the Battle of Inkerman (5th November 1854), whilst the Doctor states that he was present at the Battle of Balaclava (25th October 1854) and witnessed the ill-fated Charge of the Light Brigade.
- Grim's Dyke is now a hotel - so you can stay at a Doctor Who location if you have the money. WS Gilbert died in the grounds, suffering a heart attack after saving a young female guest from drowning in the pond, the area around which is now reputed to be haunted.
No comments:
Post a Comment