Story 310: Rogue

In which the Doctor and Ruby attend a lavish Regency ball at the home of the Duchess of Pemberton, located in the countryside near Bath. The year is 1813.

Alien technology has been detected here, and as the Doctor looks around he spots a man watching the proceedings from the balcony.

Outside, two of the male guests are arguing. Lord Galpin is accusing Lord Barton of damaging his sister's reputation. Galpin suddenly realises that he envies Barton's reputation as an adventurer and womaniser and tells him that he wishes to be him. He seizes his rival and there is a fierce electrical discharge. Barton lies dead, his body charred beyond recognition - but Galpin now looks exactly like him.

The Doctor and the handsome stranger flirt with each other, by way of trying to work out what each is doing here.

The false Lord Barton returns to the dance and attempts to seduce Ruby but she instantly dislikes him. She spots a portrait of an elderly lady and recognises it as the woman whom she and the Doctor have been seeing a lot of lately - most recently the mother of Lindy Pepper-Bean. The Duchess explains that it is an image of the mother of the Duke who once owned this property.

Barton moves his attentions to another female guest - Lady Emily Beckett - and they withdraw to the library. Wishing to protect her, Ruby decides to follow.

The Doctor has discovered that the man on the balcony is named Rogue, and who invites him outside.

The Duchess is elsewhere in the grounds and comes upon one of her servants. She is annoyed by her presence so close to the house during a function, but the servant tells her that she wants to be her. She seizes hold of the Duchess and soon looks exactly like her - the real Duchess now a charred corpse.

Ruby prevents Barton from seducing Lady Emily when she knocks over a book - alerting him to her presence.

The Doctor finds the body of the Duchess and, noting that this is the work of extra-terrestrial technology, is surprised to see that Rogue agrees. Both reveal to each other that they do not come from Earth - and both try to convince the other that they are not responsible for the death. Rogue explains that this is the work of the Chuldur, who are able to shape-shift - and he believes the Doctor to be one of their number. He has been paid to come here and kill the creature, so draws a gun on the Doctor and marches him to his spaceship, which is cloaked and lies only a short distance from the TARDIS.

Rogue is on the point of incinerating the Doctor using a Triform device when he is able to convince him that he is not a Chuldur but a Time Lord of Gallifrey. Impressed, Rogue releases him.

The copies of the Duchess and Barton meet and discuss their scheme. They had hoped that members of the royal family might have attended the function, but the Duchess says she will make do with Ruby, who intrigues her.

The Doctor takes Rogue to see the TARDIS. They plan to adapt Rogue's Triform to imprison the Chuldur in a pocket dimension, rather than kill them.

Ruby and Lady Emily discover one of the corpses and go in search of the Doctor.

They are reunited in the ballroom where the Doctor has worked out that the Chuldur are social parasites. They take on other forms purely for the thrill of it, likening them to cosplayers. They home in on individuals whom they find exciting and different, and so he and Rogue decide to dance together - such a scandalous act surely tempting them to reveal themselves.

They then deliberately manufacture a scene together and storm off, causing four of the guests to reveal their true Chuldur form and follow them. They appear to be bird-like humanoids. Rogue had thought that there might only be a single specimen present, and so the Triform must be reconfigured to capture a larger number. He and the Doctor realise that, unchecked, they will work their way through society until they achieve their goal of taking over the throne.

Ruby is comforting Lady Emily, only to discover that she too is a Chuldur.

The Doctor and Rogue then witness the Duchess announcing a wedding - between Lord Barton and Ruby. The Doctor fears that his companion has been killed and copied.

The wedding party at least concentrates all the Chuldur in one place, to be captured by the Triform. Ruby reveals that she hasn't been copied as Lady Emily appears in Chuldur form.

Rogue seizes her and pulls her into the Triform field, which now holds the five Chuldur and he captive - its maximum capacity. He activates the device - even though it will mean his own imprisonment with the creatures. He asks the Doctor to come and find him.

The following morning the Doctor has Rogue's ship placed in a hidden orbit around the Moon. He is heartbroken at having lost Rogue as the pair had fallen in love, and tells Ruby that with multiple dimensions he may never find him again...

Rogue was written by Kate Herron and Briony Redman, and was first broadcast on Saturday 8th June 2024. 

Herron was best known for directing episodes of Sex Education, which co-starred Ncuti Gatwa, and Marvel / Disney's Loki, though she also wrote. Redman had mainly written shortform films before this, prior to collaborating with Herron on Sex Education.

If there is one obvious inspiration for their story, it is the popular historical drama Bridgerton. This Netflix series, which began at Christmas 2020, is set in the Regency period and follows the romantic adventures of the wealthy Bridgerton siblings. Not only does Ruby specifically state that the ball reminds her of the TV series, but the choreography was arranged by Jack Murphy, who also choreographs Bridgerton, and the music comprises string quartet versions of contemporary pop tunes in both cases.

The other inspiration is cosplay. This phenomena originated with fans of manga, anime and gaming and quickly extended into the realms of general science-fiction and fantasy - beginning with the Star Trek franchise. Once conventions took off, some fans would turn up dressed as their favourite characters.

Cosplayers not only wish to look like their favourites, down to highly detailed costumes, accessories and make-ups, but will often play out their mannerisms and characteristics as well.

The Chuldur like to look like people they are fascinated by and want to become, but in an extreme form as they actually kill the subject of their interest and physically transform into their likeness so that they can enjoy their lifestyle.

They are possibly the most shallow villains the Doctor has ever encountered, so particularly apt for this particular incarnation in my view.

Rogue is also, at heart, a gay romance - but one in which the two protagonists fall in love over surface charm alone. Events take place over the course of a single evening, and the Doctor and Rogue suspect each other of being alien killers for much of the time they are together. Despite this, they flirt, and once they have worked out who each really is they seemingly fall madly in love. Since they can't possibly know each other, it can only be about surface infatuation.

And the romance appears to consist of a single dance, which is actually designed to get the Chuldur to expose themselves. It's a shallow relationship, which is impossible to invest in emotionally.

Rogue is played by musical theatre star Jonathon Groff, who first came to my notice in the TV series Glee and has since gone on to feature in musicals such as Hamilton (playing King George III - whose illness was the very reason for the Regency). He had never seen Doctor Who before, so RTD2 lent him some DVD's, resulting in him becoming a big fan.

A big problem with the character is that he comes across as a surrogate Captain Jack Harkness, and you have to wonder if this wasn't originally intended as a story in which the Fifteenth Doctor and Jack met up. The fact that it is 1813 and Rogue's favourite song is one of Kylie's means that he has to be a time-traveller - and Jack was a Time Agent. Compare also the scene between the Doctor and Rogue in the latter's spaceship with the one between Rose and Jack in The Empty Child.

We have reason to believe that Vinder in Flux was created to fill Captain Jack's role in events, and that's the same feeling here. Even if not intended, this is what it looks like.

The other main guest artist this week is Indira Varma, playing the Duchess and her Chuldur duplicate. Varma had previously played Suzie Costello in two episodes of the first series of Torchwood. Other roles of note include appearances in Rome, Game of Thrones, Obi-Wan Kenobi and The Night Manager. She also featured in the BBC4 live remake of The Quatermass Experiment as astronaut Victor Carroon's wife Judith.

She's really rather wasted here.

The rakish Lord Barton is Anglo-French actor Paul Forman, sometimes better known for his modelling career, but who recently came to prominence in Emily in Paris. He's very good looking, probably, so why hardly use him and stick him in a mask when you do? Ditto Indira Varma.

The only other actor of note here is Camilla Aiko, who plays Lady Emily. She featured in 2024's Kraven the Hunter.

Susan Twist's appearance this week is confined to the portrait seen by Ruby.

Overall, how much you like this episode depends entirely on how much you buy into the Doctor's romance with Rogue. Personally, I don't at all, so really can't be bothered with this. The idea that the Doctor can fall hopelessly in love with someone he's spent only an hour or two with - half of that thinking he's an alien killer - is unrealistic. Had the relationship been developed properly, over a longer period of time, then we might have invested in it emotionally, but it's all too brief and only roughly sketched in.

Beyond the romance, what does the Doctor actually do in this episode? Nothing at all.

And you can't help but feel that Rogue is simply a Captain Jack clone.

Things you might like to know:

• The UK broadcast had a dedication to William Russell who had died earlier that week.
• RTD had previously complained about Herron's Loki episode as a "feeble gesture" towards queer representation.
• The Doctor works out that "Rogue" is an alias as he spots some dice on his spaceship - deducing that he took his name from the role-playing Dungeons & Dragons game.
• The Regency period describes the years 1811 - 1820. It came about through an act of parliament when King George III was deemed too ill to rule. His eldest son - George, Prince of Wales - acted as Regent in his place. The King had suffered periodic bouts of ill health - the "Madness of King George" - since the late 1780's but the Regency was only formalised with the Act of 1811. The period ended in 1820 with the death of George III and Prince George assuming the throne as King George IV.
• Jonathan Groff filmed his cameo for Wish World during the making of this episode.
• Had Gatwa not jumped ship early, would Rogue have figured more prominently in a later series? Would anyone have actually cared?
• One of the incarnations of the Doctor produced in hologram form by Rogue's computer is the "Shalka Doctor", played by Richard E Grant. This animated on-line series was produced as a means of bringing back the series - only to be scuppered by the 2003 announcement that it was returning to television under RTD. Few regard it as canon, but RTD2 now claims his inclusion here makes it so. Few still regard it as canon...

What's Wrong With... Dragonfire

Widely regarded as the best story of Season 24, Dragonfire still has its problems - the first of these being the whole background to Kane's imprisonment.

Why would you imprison someone on a spaceship - a means of escape - even if you had removed its power source? There was always the chance, surely, that he - or someone visiting - could have provided an alternative to the "Dragonfire". 

Not only have they left him with a functioning spaceship, but they've left that power source on his jail with him. Why has he taken this long to get someone to go look for it, considering he's been here for thousands of years? The Dragon has built-in weaponry, but it is easily destroyed by a couple of his guards.

And why leave him unguarded? He could simply have taken over a visiting spaceship, after first disabling the thermostat, and fled.

Kane is building an army, but seems to have only recently started on this as it comprises only a handful of people bought from Glitz.

(Are there lots more in cold storage? What's Glitz going to do with them all now that he's the new owner of Iceworld?).

Iceworld must generate enough wealth for him to have funded a ready-made mercenary force ages ago.

He kills by touching people but they have a certain amount of body heat - so it would feel like grabbing a hot coal to him. Why not simply shoot folk he doesn't like?

Did Kane wake up one day and think "How should I go about building an invincible army to wreak revenge on my home planet?... How do I start?... I know - open a frozen food shop!".

He commits suicide the minute he hears that Proamon has been destroyed. Might it not have been a good idea to confirm this first? How does he know the Doctor hasn't simply tricked him?

And surely, during all this time, he would have checked on his homeworld every so often. There must have been visitors to Iceworld who could have told him that the planet had been destroyed.

He's planning on attacking it first chance he gets, so you'd think he would be keeping an eye on it.

Ace is a very popular companion, but personally I've never liked the character - mainly because the idea that she acts like a genuine teenager and was the programme's first real working class companion, is a nonsense. She's what the BBC of 1987 liked to think a teenager acted and sounded like, sanitized and watered down. If you can't have a character swear then don't even go there.

She tells Mel that she has never told anyone her real name - yet she's only known her five minutes.

The "ANT" hunt is just embarrassing. They are trying to do Alien / Aliens but in a harshly lit studio. The Dragon looks not too bad confined to the shadows, even if an obvious rip-off of the Xenomorph, but should never have been shown fully.

Does the little girl serve any function whatsoever in the story? She just wanders about the place - including into Kane's high security living area where even a slight temperature rise could kill him...

I'm no astrophysicist but surely something as massive as Iceworld would affect the orbit of Svartos?

Sylvester McCoy is the only person acting like the floors are slippery. A bit of consistency from the director might have helped here.

Mel's departure is terrible. She decides on a whim to go off with a man she hardly knows, other than that he once happily allied himself with the Master against the Doctor, lies, cheats, steals, cons and is not averse to selling his own crew.

Not even a note of caution from the Doctor about her irrational decision.

When Barry Letts decided to incorporate an audition piece into the series, we got The Daemons. When Cartmel does it, we get this...

And then there's that Part One cliffhanger... Trying to make out afterwards that it was really some post-modern comment on the nature of episodic television just doesn't wash. What everyone saw, on the night, was the Doctor climb over a railing and dangle above a precipice for no reason whatsoever. 

Episode 192: The Web of Fear (1)

Synopsis:

Salamander has been sucked out of the TARDIS doors into the Vortex, and the Doctor and his companions are threatened with the same fate as the doors remain open. Jamie is able to manoeuvre himself to the console and the doors are closed.

In London, a now elderly Edward Travers is visiting the private museum of Julius Silverstein after it has closed for the evening. Travers had sold him a defunct Yeti, brought back from Tibet decades ago, and now he is desperate to get it back. He tells Silverstein that it is dangerous but is not believed, the old curator thinking he only wants it back as it is now valuable. Travers' daughter Ann arrives to fetch him home, and he reveals to her that he has inadvertently succeeded in reactivating one of the Yeti control spheres which he also brought back. It has gone missing, and he fears it will try to reunite with the robot.

Sure enough, after they have gone, Silverstein hears a window smash. Thinking it the work of Travers he is looking around when the Yeti comes to life, altering its appearance before his terrified eyes. It strikes him dead, then vanishes into the night.

Travers is initially suspected of the crime, but soon afterwards a strange mist starts to spread across central London. Anyone venturing into it is soon found dead, and more Yeti begin roaming the streets. A dense web-like substance begins to infiltrate the Underground network.

The TARDIS materialises, and the Doctor is surprised to find that they are suspended in space. A web-like substance begins to envelop it and the Doctor is forced to boost the power to break free to land.

The ship has arrived on a darkened London Underground station platform - that of Covent Garden. The Doctor explains that the force which held them in space had attempted to capture them, but in breaking free they have arrived some distance from where the force intended to take them.

There is no power and they find the station locked, assuming it to be early morning. Jamie sees the figure of a newspaper vendor sitting outside the station entrance. He is dead, however - his corpse smothered in web.

Situated at Goodge Street on the Northern Line is a deep bunker built originally for the army to act as a transit camp in the heart of the capital. This has now become the base of operations for a military-scientific team set up to counter the threat of the Yeti and the lethal mist. Travers and his daughter provide the scientific talent, whilst Captain Knight leads the military response whilst he awaits the arrival of a new commanding officer. Under Knight is Staff Sergeant Arnold.

Also present is a representative of the British press - the unctuous Harold Chorley.

The Doctor and his companions are exploring the tunnels when they come across Arnold and two of his men - Corporal Blake and Craftsman Weams. They are laying a thick electrical cable. The Doctor asks Jamie and Victoria to follow the soldiers, whilst he traces the cable to see where they have come from, arranging to meet again shortly.

However, Victoria screams when she brushes against a spider's web and the pair are captured by Arnold.

The Doctor traces the cable back to a pile of boxes labelled "Explosives", standing on the platform at Charing Cross. He suddenly hears a familiar bleeping sound and hides under the platform as a pair of Yeti appear.

Jamie and Victoria are taken to the Goodge Street fortress where they are questioned by the Staff Sergeant. Captain Knight is too busy overseeing with Ann Travers the planned detonation of the explosives found by the Doctor at Charing Cross. It is hoped that by destroying sections of tunnel, the spread of the web-like substance will be halted. Jamie and Victoria claim to have been on their own - but quickly change their story when they learn of the planned explosion.

The Yeti are armed with guns which produce large quantities of web and use these to entirely smother the boxes before departing.

The Doctor emerges from hiding to examine their work.

Before Arnold can warn Knight and Ann of the Doctor's presence in the vicinity, the detonation signal is sent. 

The boxes at Charing Cross glow fiercely and the Doctor is thrown to the ground...

Data:

Written by Mervyn Haisman & Henry Lincoln

Recorded: Saturday 13th January 1968 - Lime Grove Studio D

First broadcast: 5.10pm, Saturday 3rd February 1968

Ratings: 7.2 million / AI 54

VFX: Ron Oates

Designer: David Myerscough-Jones

Director: Douglas Camfield

Guest cast: Jack Watling (Professor Edward Travers), Tina Packer (Ann Travers), Ralph Watson (Captain Knight), Jack Woolgar (Staff Sergeant Arnold), Frederick Schrecker (Julius Silverstein), Jon Rollason (Harold Chorley), Richardson Morgan (Corporal Blake), Stephen Whittaker (Craftsman Weams), Rod Beacham (Corporal Lane), John Levene & Gordon Stothard (Yeti)

Critique:

The Doctor is running along a darkened tunnel and pauses, facing the camera:

"Thank goodness... Oh, it's you... I thought for one moment it was... oh... sit down for a minute... oh. 

I'm glad I met you as a matter of fact, there's something I want to tell you. When we - uh - when we start out on our next adventure - Jamie, Victoria and I - we meet some old friends. Yes, and we meet some old enemies. Very old enemies. Yes - uh - the Yeti as a matter of fact. Only, um, this time they're... they're just a little more frightening than last time, hmm? 

So I'd better warn you that if your mummy or daddy are scared, just you get them to hold your hand".

(Sounds of gunfire are heard).

"Here we go again. I've got to go. See you soon - I hope!".

This specially recorded trailer was shown immediately after the final episode of The Enemy of the World, and was recorded during the making of this opening instalment of The Web of Fear - a sequel to The Abominable Snowmen which had only finished broadcasting some twelve weeks before.

A montage of action sequences followed the Doctor's dialogue to camera.

Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln had been approached by Peter Bryant during the location filming of the first Yeti story for a follow-up featuring the monsters - so confident was he that it would prove successful. Preparing to take over as producer on Doctor Who, he knew that aliens, robots and monsters were the key to the series' popularity. He was also conscious of the success of Hammer's horror films and wished to have something of their feel. The director chosen for the new story was someone who had been trying to get work with Hammer for some time, with no success...

Victor Pemberton's "Colony of Devils" would be pushed back to allow the second Yeti story to take its place, as it was in better shape. Pemberton was having issues with new Story Editor Derrick Sherwin over his scripts, which would soon see production as Fury From The Deep.

Haisman and Lincoln decided to remain Earthbound for their follow-up and wished to bring back the character of Edward Travers. Luckily Jack Watling was able to confirm he could appear a few weeks later. Time would have moved on to the present day (more on this next time...) so Travers would now be an elderly scientist rather than a young explorer.

The writers also elected to bring the threat closer to home and set the story in London. Thinking of how the Great Intelligence could spread across the city without recourse to a lot of impractical location filming, the dark and claustrophobic tunnels of the Underground made for an ideal setting. 

Douglas Camfield had not worked on the series since the epic The Daleks' Master Plan. With a strong military presence in the new Yeti story, he was the obvious choice as director.

As mentioned, he had been keen to find work with Hammer as a means of moving away from television onto cinema work. (One of the company's more recent features had been Quatermass and the Pit (released November 1967), which had relocated Nigel Kneale's main setting from a Knightsbridge building site down into the London Underground).

Haisman and Lincoln were unhappy that Camfield found the Yeti not frightening enough. He wanted them to be sleeker, and with glowing eyes which would show up on the darkened tunnel sets. He also decided to give them a roar. Terrance Dicks, who joined the production team around this time as Sherwin's assistant and intended successor, often stated in later interviews that his first experience on the show was seeing how they tried to make the Yeti roar not sound like a flushing toilet.

The original costumes had been in a poor state anyway, with their bamboo frames broken, so four new ones were made by father and son team Jack and John Lovell. These were made from yak hair and, as well as the sleeker outline, they had larger claws and a belt of ribbed skin around the middle. The fur pattern was slightly different for each.

The writers didn't like these physical changes as their apparent cuddliness was intentional on their part. They looked cute yet could suddenly kill and destroy, and it was this contradiction between appearance and behaviour which they wanted.

The draft script for Episode 1 did not feature the opening TARDIS scenes resolving the cliff-hanger, and began instead with Jamie noticing the flashing light on the console.

The museum was to have been the Natural History Museum, and neither Julius Silverstein nor Harold Chorley featured.

Permission was sought from the London Transport Board to film in the Underground network. Aldwych Station had been hoped for, as well as the entrance to Covent Garden station.

However, only very limited overnight hours - 2am to 5am - could be offered, and they would charge £200 per hour. Night filming would already be overly expensive for the BBC crew, so it was decided that most of the Underground scenes should be filmed at Ealing.

David Myerscough-Jones designed a quarter-length station platform which could be redressed with signage to represent a number of different stations, as well as sections of tunnel which could be reconfigured and filmed from different angles to give Camfield the maximum coverage.

As well as a curving section and a long straight one, there was also a Y-junction.

Filming commenced on the afternoon of Friday 15th December 1967 over two Ealing stages and required the presence of Patrick Troughton, Frazer Hines and Debbie Watling, who were taken out of rehearsals for the third episode of The Enemy of the World. The scenes set at Covent Garden station were filmed first, with the newly arrived TARDIS crew exploring before setting off down the tunnels.

The platform was redressed to represent Charing Cross for the sequences of the Yeti smothering the explosives and the Doctor's investigation of the boxes and their subsequent "explosion".

A line about the TARDIS always seeming to land on Earth these days was added when Sherwin noted how many consecutive stories this season were indeed Earthbound (there would be 30 episodes in total, bookended by the two Cyberman stories).

Filming continued on Monday 18th, for the scenes in which the Doctor's party spotted Arnold and his men, with the regulars missing more rehearsals.

Model filming was due to take place on Tuesday 19th December, but this was postponed. 

Also deferred was planned location filming at the Natural History Museum, South Kensington, for the opening sequence involving Silverstein, Edward and Ann Travers and the Yeti coming to life. This had been planned for Thursday 21st - the museum closing for Christmas from Monday 18th - but this was moved to Wednesday 3rd January to be staged at Ealing instead.

An original Yeti costume and one of the control spheres from The Abominable Snowmen were reused, the sphere attached to a black rod to hover outside the window before being pushed through the glass.

The model work was finally completed on Monday 8th January, comprising the shots of the TARDIS suspended in space and being covered in web. This was achieved using a stop-motion effect, with a latex gun being used to add layers of fake cobweb.

Studio recording began on Saturday 13th January, with episodes being recorded three weeks before broadcast.

All the Yeti material had been captured on film at Ealing so none of the monsters were present on the first day's work.

TARDIS scenes were completed first, with action following on directly from the climactic events of The Enemy of the World. A periscope attachment was used on a camera to record the shots of the Doctor and companions struggling on the console room floor. The regulars retained their outfits from that story, including a sticking plaster on Troughton's left cheek. Lighting effects and camera movement suggested the TARDIS being out of control with its doors open.

The first recording break followed shots of spreading web, then a clear star-scape, and then a tunnel ceiling, shown on the TARDIS monitor.

The Doctor was to have explained what happened to Salamander as being the result of "air pressure caused by air speed velocity", but thankfully this was dropped. What we are left with is a suggestion that the would-be dictator might actually still be alive in the Vortex, as the Doctor claims he doesn't envy his predicament.

Extra Bert Smith was recorded seated on the small station entrance set, covered in latex webbing.

Action then moved to the platform set. The Underground sets had been designed to be remounted in the more limited spaces of Lime Grove.

Troughton ad-libbed the word "braunched" to describe what would have happened had the rails been live. This is an obsolete version of "branched" but can be used as a sexual metaphor.

The Goodge Street fortress was a series of linked sets - corridors, ready room, bunk room and workshop - and contained a large illuminated map of the Underground network that would be used to indicate the progress of the web.

The closing credits played over microscope film of cells multiplying.

With recording completed, Troughton embarked on a week's holiday, spending most of it fishing at Elstree Reservoir with his sons.

As is well known, following broadcast the production team was contacted by an irate London Transport Board, threatening legal action for filming on their  property without permission, such was the quality of the set design and construction. In March 1968 they would praise these sets in their in-house staff magazine, with comments from Myerscough-Jones.

Victoria: "But will it be safe?"

Doctor, gleefully: "Oh, I shouldn't think so for a moment...".

For more than four decades this was our only glimpse of a story which was regarded as a classic, thanks to fan memory and an excellent Target novelisation by Terrance Dicks.

We got an often humorous TARDIS sequence (with the resolution to the cliff-hanger of a lost story) - the Doctor thinking that Jamie and Victoria are playing a trick on him. Note the physical business between Troughton and Hines with the power booster, which we'll see again...

We also got the atmospheric museum sequence, enhanced by the classical music (Bela Bartok once again) and it being on film. Then we saw the superb Underground sets - again helped immeasurably by being on film. There was horror in the discovery of the old newspaper seller, his corpse covered in cobweb. The cast of guest characters are introduced, and we end on a proper appearance by the new Yeti. As openers go, it cannot be faulted.

On paper, the idea of transplanting Abominable Snowmen to the London Underground simply should not work - but it does.

Setting the story decades after The Abominable Snowmen, newer viewers could easily get into this without having seen the previous story - though fans would have enjoyed being reunited with Travers and the Yeti.

Trivia:

• The ratings get off to a so-so start, despite the return of the Yeti - dropping just over a million viewers from the previous episode - though the Appreciation Index is an improvement.
• The first two episodes of the new story began slightly earlier than usual due to coverage of the Winter Olympics.
• The trailer was to have ended with the Doctor saying "... see you next week!", but it was realised that the series might not be shown on a weekly basis overseas. It is now lost, but this change suggests that it was sold abroad along with the episodes themselves, and so the possibility of its survival somewhere exists.
• Television Today published a very positive review of the opening episode on  February 8th, in a piece titled "Guaranteed to Chill the Blood". As well as welcoming the Yeti back, it singled out Troughton's performance as the Doctor, stating that he had "broadened, mellowed and enriched" the series.
• John Levene - who will go on to find fame as UNIT's Sergeant Benton - makes his second appearance in the series as one of the Yeti at Charing Cross. He had previously been a Cyberman in The Moonbase. Accompanying him as the other monster is Gordon Stothard who, as Gordon St Clair, will play King's Champion Grun in The Curse of Peladon.
• First appearance in the series for Ralph Watson. He will be back as the rebellious Ettis in The Monster of Peladon, and as lighthouse keeper Ben in Horror of Fang Rock.
• Richardson Morgan will return as technician Rogin in The Ark in Space.
• Jon Rollason was one of the original Avengers - that being the ITV series which starred Patrick Macnee. Rollason played Dr Martin King who briefly replaced Ian Hendry's Dr Keel, prior to the introduction of Honor Blackman's Cathy Gale.
• Chorley seems to be based on Alan Whicker or perhaps David Frost, but in appearance he's more like the BBC's political commentator Robin Day, who was noted for his spectacles and bow ties.
• We're Haisman and Lincoln possibly Pink Floyd fans, using names like Arnold and Lane?
• The deceased commander of the fortress is a Colonel Pemberton - named for writer and temporary story editor Victor.
• The new production partnership of Bryant and Sherwin would come to be nicknamed "Bryant and May" - after the popular brand of safety matches.
• The Doctor is mistaken when he tells Victoria that the Underground is a little after her time. She left home in 1866, and the first public underground railway - between Paddington and Farringdon - opened in 1863. Even if she had never travelled on it, it was obviously big news at the time.
• Radio Times caught up with the times and provided some rather groovy stylised illustrations, by Richard Jackson, to accompany its usual piece on the new story:

In Memoriam

Sadly, we lost three actors with classic era Doctor Who connections in as many days recently.

Tina Packer, who played Ann Travers in The Web of Fear (which I'm about to start covering in my weekly "Episodes" posts), died on 9th January, aged 87, at her home in Massachusetts. She had lived in the US for many years, establishing a noted Shakespeare company there.

The following day saw news that Derek Martin had passed away at the age of 92. He first appeared as an extra in The Highlanders before going on to become part of the HAVOC stunt team. He features in the battle of Covent Garden in The Web of Fear, chases Liz Shaw across a weir in The Ambassadors of Death, and gets zapped by an Axon outside Dungeness power station, amongst his many appearances.

He would later get the speaking role of Mitchell, the security guard, in Image of the Fendahl.

He is best known to the general public for the role of taxi driver Charlie Slater in EastEnders. 

I had the pleasure of meeting him at Riverside Studios last year when he attended the Recall UNIT event.

11th January then saw the news that Battlefield's Marcus Gilbert had died, aged only 67. He played the knight Ancelyn in the 1989 story - a role he only recently returned to on audio.

RIP

P is for... Poul

Poul acted as Mover on a Sandminer craft. These vast mobile refineries scoured desolate landscapes in search of valuable minerals. The small human crew, supplemented with a workforce of robots, could be away from home for up to two years at a time. Poul had been assigned to Storm Mine 4, captained by Commander Uvanov. 

There was a hidden agenda behind his presence on this particular mission, however. He was really an agent working for the company which ran the mining operations, placed here incognito with a robot colleague. Their role was to identify a man named Taren Capel, who was fomenting a robot revolution and who had issued warnings to the company. The robot colleague was disguised as a black Dum-Class machine - D84.

Leela was able to spot that Poul was not all he appeared through his body language. Crew members began to die one by one and, when told by the Doctor that a robot might be responsible, Poul was sceptical. However, when he discovered a damaged, deactivated robot with blood on its hand, he realised that the Doctor had been right. Unfortunately Poul suffered from an extreme form of Robophobia known as Grimwade's Syndrome. The idea that robots could be killers broke his mind. He had to be left cowering on the command deck whilst the Doctor, Leela and two of his colleagues - Uvanov and second-in-command Toos - worked together with D84 to defeat Capel, who had been masquerading as crewman Dask. Poul survived until a rescue ship could be sent, and was taken home for treatment.

Played by David Collings. Appearances: The Robots of Death (1977)

• Second of three appearances in the series for Collings, the first being as Vorus in Revenge of the Cybermen. Later he played the title role in Mawdryn Undead.
• For fantasy genre fans he is also known for his portrayal of Silver in Sapphire and Steel, and he voiced Legolas in the BBC's radio adaptation of Lord of the Rings.
• He also guested in the final episode of Blake's 7.
• Poul was named after noted science fiction writer Poul Anderson (1926 - 2001). He was given the first name Ander in spin-off fiction written by his creator, Chris Boucher.
• Poul and D84 were based on Isaac Asimov's Elijah Bailey and R Daneel Olivaw, another human / robot detective pairing.
• The character reappears in the Missing Adventures novel Corpse Marker, as well as in the Kaldor City audio range.

P is for... Posicarians

Diminutive purple-skinned bipeds, reptilian in nature, who sought to enter into trade negotiations with the Mentors of Thoros Beta. The meeting coincided with a slave revolt engineered by the Doctor.

They may well have been related to the Terileptils.

Played by Deep Roy. Appearances: Trial of a Time Lord (5-8) aka Mindwarp (1985).

• The Posicarian mask was a repurposed Terileptil one, from The Visitation.
• Deep Roy is best known to Doctor Who fans for playing Mr Sin in The Talons of Weng-Chiang.
• He has also appeared in Blake's 7 and The X-Files, plus the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises.

P is for... Porridge

Encountered by the Doctor when he and Clara took her young charges Artie and Angie Maitland to Hedgewick's World of Wonders, a now derelict amusement park spanning an entire planet. In Mr Webley's waxworks Artie was challenged to play a game of chess against a purely robotic Cyberman, but it turned out that this was a trick. Porridge was hidden underneath the table operating the inanimate suit.

The reason for the Cyberman being here was because a great battle had been fought nearby in the Cyber-wars. They had only been defeated when an entire star system had been blown up.

Elsewhere on the planet was a punishment platoon - conscripts who had been deemed failures but still had to serve their time. The Doctor used his psychic paper to claim to be an Imperial representative, and was able to place Clara in command of the platoon. 

The planet housed a Cyber-factory where a whole new army of Cybermen were being created or repaired. Porridge joined Clara and the platoon to defend against them. The platoon held a powerful bomb - capable of destroying the entire planet.

When it became clear that the Cyber-army could not be stopped, Porridge took charge of the weapon and detonated it - as he was really the Emperor Ludens Nimrod Kendrick Cord Longstaff XLI. The Doctor had recognised him earlier from his waxwork effigy. Tired of court life, and feeling lonely, he had run away for some adventure.

He alerted his people so that they rescued him and the others just before the planet was destroyed.

Safely on his flagship, Porridge proposed marriage to Clara, but she politely declined.

Played by: Warwick Davis. Appearances: Nightmare in Silver (2013).

• Davis is best known for his fantasy cinema work, which began with a role as the Ewok Wicket in Return of the Jedi. He has since gone on to work on all of the subsequent Star Wars movies, sometimes in multiple roles. With George Lucas he also starred in Willow and its later TV series (produced by the director of his Doctor Who appearance).
• Multiple roles have also been his in the Harry Potter franchise.
• In the UK he is well known for presenting the popular quiz show Tenable, as well as appearing in comedic collaborations with Ricky Gervais.
• Davis' costume as Porridge was based on a Warhammer 40k miniature figure known as Rogue Trader.

P is for... Poppy

When the Fifteenth Doctor and Ruby Sunday arrived on a space station in orbit near Pacifico Del Rio in the year 21506, they were surprised to find that it was inhabited by a group of hyper-intelligent toddlers. Their captain was a child named Poppy. The children ran the station but lived in fear of a creature known as the Bogeyman who lurked in the lower levels. It transpired that these babies had been bred for inhabitants of the planet below, but economic disaster had rendered the station unviable and they had been abandoned here. One adult remained - an accountant named Jocelyn Sancerre, who couldn't bring herself to abandon the children. Poppy helped save fellow crewmember Eric when he rashly decided to attack the Bogeyman single-handedly.

The Doctor was then able to direct the station towards the planet Mondo Caroon where Poppy and the others could find a new home.

Some time later, the Doctor's next companion Belinda Chandra was looking for the Doctor through the backstreets of Lagos, Nigeria, when she spotted a child watching her, who promptly vanished. Though she did not know it, this was Poppy.

When Belinda and the Doctor were later trapped in an alternate reality known as Wish World, they were a married couple with a daughter - Poppy. This was the work of the Rani who sought to resurrect Omega and through him re-establish the Time Lords. Once reality had reasserted itself the Doctor tried to preserve Poppy by having her placed in a Zero Room with Belinda. This failed to work and Poppy vanished, memories of her leaving the Doctor and Belinda - yet she could still be remembered by Ruby.

The Doctor sacrificed his regeneration to alter reality slightly so that Poppy became Belinda's child.

Played by: Sienna-Robyn Mavanga-Phipps. Voiced by: Shola Olaitan-Ajiboye. 

Appearances: Space Babies (2024), The Story and the Engine, Wish World, The Reality War (2025).

• Had Ncuti Gatwa not left the series necessitating major rewrites, it was to have been revealed that Poppy was Susan's mother - i.e. the Doctor's daughter.
• As it is, the Poppy from Series 15 has nothing to do with the one from Space Babies, other than as a construct from the Doctor's memory of the latter. I think.

Inspirations: The Zygon Invasion / The Zygon Inversion

Another proper two-part story for Series 9, this acts as a direct sequel to the 50th Anniversary story The Day of the Doctor. Indeed, the first episode begins with a recap of events in that story, in which Zygon refugees are forced into an uneasy truce with UNIT thanks to the combined efforts of three incarnations of the Doctor.

As the whole 'Zygons seeking a new home' plot had first been mentioned in Terror of the Zygons, it can be argued that it is a sequel to that 1975 story also.

The 50th Anniversary story had told how the Zygons had arrived in Tudor times (even though Broton had stated that it would take time for their fleet to reach Earth, and he was saying this in the late 20th Century). The Zygons had used stasis cubes to hide themselves in a number of artworks which ended up in the National Gallery. On emerging in 2013 they attempted to take over but the Doctors forced them to negotiate a truce with Kate Stewart of UNIT, whereby they could live in peace on Earth in human form, they being shape-shifters of course.

This new story picks up some time later, when a radical faction of young Zygons are rebelling against the current arrangement. They wish to live as Zygons and not hide, even though both species have co-existed happily for a couple of years.

This radicalisation points to one of the main inspirations for the story. Issues of immigration, integration and the status of refugees also background the episodes.

Interestingly, Steven Moffat always intended to revisit these themes with a global political thriller following The Day of the Doctor - so the Zygon element was always intended as a sort of prequel to a story which would come later, with the Twelfth Doctor following up on something initiated by his predecessor.

The title of the first episode might feature the word "Invasion", but Moffat and writer Peter Harness sought to look at how conflicts started, growing out of dissent from within a community - be it the power vacuum resulting from regime change in countries such as Iraq, or popular revolutions such as the Arab Spring movement.

In recent years we had seen the rise of Islamic State, which had already had an impact on Doctor Who when changes were made to the ending of Robot of Sherwood. Hundreds of young Westerners had flocked to the Middle East to join the movement, and the UK and other European countries had seen a rise in domestic terrorism.

As mentioned, Zygons are shape-shifters, and so Harness was also inspired by that 1950's classic piece of anti-communism paranoia Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Anyone could be a Zygon duplicate.

Kate visits the town of Truth or Consequences in New Mexico. This used to be called Hot Springs but changed its name in 1950 to that of a popular radio game show. The presenter, Ralph Edwards, had announced that the forthcoming 10th anniversary show would be broadcast from the first town to change its name. Once renamed, it never changed back.

Harness originally set part of the story in Azerbaijan, but this became the fictional Turmezistan.

In draft scripts UNIT had characters named Bell and Bambera, but there was no indication that they would have anything to do with previously established UNIT staff Corporal Bell and Brigadier Bambera, so may simply have been placeholder names.

Complaining of shortages, Kate mentioned Sergeant Benton as one of "only about 6 men" her father had to command in his day. (Many of us much preferred the "Brig's Army" to the version of UNIT seen these days).

Once again the Doctor finds himself acting President of Earth, with a special aircraft at his disposal (as in Death in Heaven. Once again it contains a portrait of the Brigadier - based on a publicity photo from Battlefield. And once again, the 'plane is brought down.

The Union Jack parachute is clearly inspired by Bond's in the precredit sequence of The Spy Who Loved Me (1977).

The Doctor mentions having once snogged a Zygon - referring to the one which copied Queen Elizabeth in The Day of the Doctor.

The two boxes in the Black Archive are said to be work of Harry Sullivan. His last story as a regular companion was Terror of the Zygons, and he was said to be working at Porton Down (the UK Government's biological research establishment) in Mawdryn Undead.

One of this series' story arcs has revolved around the notion of a hybrid. The Doctor describes Osgood as a hybrid, in that no-one knows if she was human or Zygon.

Kate orders "five rounds rapid" against a Zygon - part of the famous quote from her father in The Daemons.

Next time: Deadly slumbers. Doctor Who finally does "Found Footage", only 16 years after it became popular, and it is the audience who were mostly asleep during this one...

Episode 191: The Enemy of the World (6)

Synopsis:

Astrid is approaching the research facility when she hears faint cries for help coming from the undergrowth. She finds Swann, who has been brutally attacked. She drags him into a nearby cave where he reveals he was attacked by Salamander, and tells her that there are people underground who must be warned.

The Doctor and Jamie are trying to convince Donald Bruce of Salamander's guilt, and tell him that the evidence they need will lie in the records room. However, that is locked with the would-be dictator inside. Benik enters the interrogation room, having just come from the records room where the guard has stated that Salamander could not have left it.

He attempts to trick the Doctor into revealing who he really is but fails. After he leaves, the Doctor is able to show Bruce that supply records indicate that far more people based here than are known about.

Astrid is able to tell Swann that there has been no nuclear war just before he dies of his wounds. She sets off down the tunnel to find the people he told her about.

The Doctor has Bruce arrange safe passage for Jamie and Victoria away from Kanowa, instructing them to go to the TARDIS and wait for him there.

In the underground shelter, an alarm sounds to indicate that someone is descending, and Colin assumes that it is the return of Salamander and Swann. He decides to confront them.

It is Astrid, however. Not recognising her, the others attack. Colin and Mary intervene so that she can explain her presence here.

She tells them of meeting Swann and of his death at the hands of Salamander. She informs them that there has been no war and to prove this she shows that the Geiger counter has been rigged to give false readings.

Concerned about Bruce allowing Jamie and Victoria to leave, the Guard Captain goes to find Benik.

Astrid intends to use the travel capsule to get back to the surface. It will only take a maximum of three people, and so Colin and Mary will accompany her.

Giles Kent is now in the research station, and has accessed a monitor which shows Salamander in the records room.

He has his own means of entering the room and inside he confronts Salamander. He pulls a gun on him and assures him that he has not come here alone.

Bruce and Benik observe the confrontation on the monitor. Kent has locked the door from the inside and it will not be easy to cut through as it is heavily reinforced.

Kent reveals that he knows of the secret exit from the room, which leads to the tunnel system and out to the waste ground beyond the facility. There are explosives set up in a chamber here which will bring down the tunnel and prevent anyone following.

Astrid suddenly appears from the shaft entrance with Colin and Mary, who recognise Kent as the person who had them enter the underground shelter in the first place. He and Salamander had planned all this together, until the falling-out between them. Now Kent intends to take over himself.

However, it is not Salamander whom he has confronted here but the Doctor - who now knows the truth about him. Bruce has also heard everything.

The real Salamander is in the tunnels, watching events unfold on a monitor.

Astrid has learned that Kent lured the shelter people down there as part of a survival experiment in living after a nuclear war. Salamander then turned up to claim that this had actually happened, and they then set about getting revenge on their attackers using manufactured natural disasters.

Kent flees and descends to the tunnels. The Doctor and Astrid find they are now trapped in the records room, knowing that Kent can detonate the explosives and destroy the facility above.

They are able to adjust the monitor to show the tunnel chamber where Salamander has been hiding.

Benik attempts to overpower Bruce but the Security Chief's deputy, Forester, arrives in time with a party of men. Benik is arrested, as are all the facility personnel.

Kent arrives at the chamber and is confronted by Salamander. He tries to strike a deal with him, but Salamander shoots him. As he dies, he detonates the explosives.

This is witnessed by the Doctor and his friends in the records room, just as Bruce's men finally get the door open. They escape into the corridor just in time, suffering only minor injuries.

Astrid tells Bruce about the people still trapped in the shelter, and a monitor shows they are still alive. He will help her free them. 

The Doctor offers to assist but Astrid points out that the people will think he is Salamander and try to kill him. Instead he has Bruce arrange passage for him away from the facility.

Night has fallen, and Jamie and Victoria are waiting for the Doctor by the TARDIS when they see him approach through the dunes. Still wearing his disguise, he appears to be somewhat dazed and says nothing as he stands scanning the console. He then indicates that Jamie should take over, but his companion points out that he is never allowed to touch the controls. A voice from the doorway congratulates him on remembering this rule and they turn to see the real Doctor standing there, back in his usual outfit. 

Salamander reveals that Kent died in the blast, and he decided to imitate the Doctor to escape. The Doctor tells him that he will leave him here to face justice for his crimes.

Salamander reaches for the controls and the two struggle before Jamie pushes him away. However, the dematerialisation control has been activated with the doors still open.

As the TARDIS dematerialises, Salamander is sucked out into the Vortex - and the Doctor and his companions face the same fate...

Next time: The Web of Fear

Data:

Written by David Whitaker

Recorded: Saturday 6th January 1968 - Lime Grove Studio D

First broadcast: 5.25pm, Saturday 27th January 1968

Ratings: 8.3 million / AI 52

Designer: Christopher Pemsel

Director: Barry Letts

Critique:

The filming for this episode mainly covered two sequences from the climax to the story - one on location and one at Ealing.

At the beach at Littlehampton the scene where Jamie and Victoria stand by the TARDIS, waiting for the Doctor, was filmed on the evening of Sunday 5th November - the only day when the regulars were free to do location filming. In order to capture the sound, it was realised that the film recordist, John Hills-Harrop, would have to be so close to the TARDIS prop that he would be in shot. Knowing the level of broadcast definition, he dressed all in black and, with careful backlighting, was able to record the dialogue whilst remaining invisible to the camera.

The Ealing filming covered the key scene in which the Doctor and Salamander finally come face to face. This took place on Friday 10th and Monday 13th November, and did not go exactly to plan. 

The technique Letts chose to employ involved masking one half of the lens to capture Troughton as the Doctor on the right side of the film. After careful rewinding, the same film would be exposed this time with the other half of the lens masked and with Troughton now portraying Salamander on the left hand side. Unfortunately the film jammed badly and could not be fully rewound, and so only a limited amount of footage could be used.

Only later did Letts discover that he had been badly advised and that he could have simply filmed the two performances separately, with a fixed camera, and had the images overlapped using optical printing.

When Salamander is sucked out of the TARDIS doors, Troughton was being doubled by fight arranger Peter Diamond, pulled on a Kirby wire.

This was the first time Frazer Hines and Debbie Watling had seen Troughton in character as Salamander, and found the accent hilarious. He was asked if Salamander was Welsh...

One other brief piece of filming is more of the model work as the shelter dwellers watch the capsule ascending on a monitor.

In studio, Letts was granted extra time due the technical complexities of this final instalment. Recording commenced at 8pm, running to 9.45pm.

A few seconds of the previous episode's ending, on 35mm film, acted as a reprise. To save recreating the small woodland set, Astrid is instead seen to tend to Swann in the rocky tunnel set as it would be used for much of the episode.

Troughton was able to wear his Salamander costume and make-up throughout the evening as the only scenes of him as the Doctor this week were those already filmed at Ealing for the final confrontation.

Dialogue concerning the release of Jamie and Victoria was simplified just before recording, and a scene between the Guard Captain and guard discussing the jammed records room door was dropped altogether.

Scenes set in the corridor and the records room were recorded first, mainly in story sequence, with the scenes set in the tunnels recorded towards the end of the evening. Recording breaks were mainly to allow actors to move from set to set. 

The corridor had a television monitor added, so that Bruce and others could observe what was going on in the records room.

After the main sequences were recorded, a number of brief cutaway shots were completed. These were mainly shots which were to be seen on the monitors in the corridor and records room - thus allowing Troughton as the Doctor to watch himself as Salamander - or vice versa - without the need to a recording break.

The detonation of the explosives was a piece of stock footage and smoke was superimposed over the picture. 

An electronic interference pattern effect was superimposed over the filmed shot of Salamander in the Vortex.

That day Letts and Troughton had once again discussed the problems which the star was facing with the production schedule on Doctor Who, and the director suggested that the series should run for only 26 weeks of the year, which was the norm for most on-going drama series. Filming for an episode could be done a whole week before studio recording, doing away with the current overlapping of productions and loss of days off. This was fed back to new producer Peter Bryant, who was positive about the suggestions and promised to make changes for the 1968/69 season.

As we've previously mentioned, it was long thought that Episode 3 was retained in the archives as it was the first to be made for broadcast on the 625-line system - but the paperwork has been incorrect on this. The episode was kept, along with the sixth and final instalment of The Wheel in Space, purely as examples of the 1967/68 season.

After film copies were sold to countries including Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Gibraltar, Zambia and Nigeria, the video recordings of Episodes 2 - 5 were cleared for wiping in July 1969, with the first instalment following that September. 

The film copies were all thought destroyed by 1974 but, in 2013, the Nigerian copies were rediscovered by Philip Morris at a TV relay station and returned to the BBC archives. (We'll mention Morris again when we get to the next story).

The reaction from fans was to form a positive re-evaluation of the story and it is now well-regarded. Even the much derided Episode 3 holds up better once viewed in context.

This final episode does have its problems however. David Whitaker has striven for an epic, Bond-like feel, but the climax is somewhat disappointing. Bond always had a big climactic event which had to be averted, generally involving a countdown to disaster, but we have nothing like that here. 

There's the reveal that Kent was just as big a villain all along, and was out to usurp Salamander, but it's all far too rushed. 

We're told that Salamander has locked himself in the records room and no-one can enter. Presumably there's no way of seeing inside by monitor either, otherwise Salamander's absence would be found out, and his secret capsule spotted, every time he descended to the shelter. 

And yet here everyone can easily tune into the records room - and how did the Doctor get in there in the first place, when Salamander had locked himself in?

Benik is set up as a particularly nasty villain, but is dispensed with really easily, and heads off into arrest meekly asking for a fair trial. He deserved a more satisfying comeuppance. Bond villains have their henchmen (or women) and it is often their demise which pleases the audience more than the main villain's. Apart from his confrontation with Kent, and the final TARDIS scene, even Salamander hasn't much to do this week.

Jamie and Victoria have so little to do they are sent home early. And what happened to Colin and Mary?

They simply vanish after the explosion. We don't see them in the corridor, and they are the obvious ones to help Astrid rescue their colleagues - but where are they? If they got buried by rubble in the records room you'd expect this to be mentioned. There's a feeling Letts was rushing to fit in the key sequences on the night before the plug was pulled, so corners were cut.

Then we have the big face-to-face showdown, which everyone would have been waiting to see. From reading above, you'll note that it was hardly Letts' fault that this isn't as memorable as it should have been, but at the end of the day we are left with a key scene which is all too brief.

Ultimately, the conclusion to the story is too rushed and not terribly satisfying.

Was The Enemy of the World really a Doctor Who story at all, or simply a genre piece into which Whitaker shoehorned the TARDIS and its crew? The companions play very little role after the first couple of episodes, and the Doctor is quite out of character in sitting on the side-lines for so long.

You can't fault the ambition, but trying to do Bond in Lime Grove Studio D on a shoestring budget might not have been the wisest decision Lloyd and Bryant ever made.

Trivia:

• The ratings for this story have varied greatly, but they end on the highest viewing figure for the season so far. We also get the best appreciation figure for the serial here, in the 50's for the first time since the opening instalment.
• The Enemy of the World was David Whitaker's favourite of all his Doctor Who scripts.
• Innes Lloyd, who died in August 1991, would go on to produce some of the BBC's most highly regarded television dramas, including a number of collaborations with playwrights Alan Bennett (Talking Heads, An Englishman Abroad and A Question of Attribution) and Stephen Frears (Going Gently, A Day Out). East of Ipswich was a semi-autobiographical piece by Michael Palin about his childhood days. Biographical dramas about Arthur "Bomber" Harris, the speed-loving Campbells - Donald and Malcolm - and the BBC's Lord Reith followed. He was also responsible for Nigel Kneale's The Stone Tape being produced. An excellent documentary on Lloyd is to be found on the DVD / Blu-ray of The Savages, and was also recently broadcast on BBC 4, along with an episode of The Ice Warriors.
• The latest edition of Whicker's World was broadcast a few hours after Doctor Who this evening. This was titled "I Don't Like My Monsters To Have Oedipus Complexes", and dealt primarily with the Horror genre. Christopher Lee was interviewed as were members of the HAVOC stunt team. A Yeti pursued the celebrity interviewer through Highgate Cemetery, and he also had a chat with Terry Nation at his home in Kent, which housed a number of his own Dalek props...

• To mark the return of the missing episodes in October 2013, along with those from The Web of Fear, DWM offered a choice of two themed covers:

Story 309: Dot and Bubble

In which the Doctor and Ruby attempt to save a society which is obsessed with social media... 

The population of a colony known as Finetime has a unique demographic, comprising only young adults. They have been sent here from Homeworld to work in a variety of mundane administrative tasks but spend their entire lives, from waking to sleeping, engaging with their social network Bubbles. These are literal bubbles of audio-video links with their particular circle of friends and favourites whom they follow. They are constantly enveloped by small screens, generated by tiny machines known as Dots.

Finetime is surrounded by a densely forested region known as the Wild Woods, in which there are many dangers, but the colonists have no reason to ever venture from their regulated domain.

One morning a young woman named Lindy Pepper-Bean notices that some of her friends are missing from her Bubble, and others report experiencing the same thing. 

She then sees a stranger, who tries to warn her of danger. This is the Doctor. He claims that Finetime has become infested with monsters. Not knowing him at all and annoyed at his intrusion, she ignores the warning.

As the day progresses she finds more friends going off-line. Another stranger appears whilst she is at work, this time a young woman - Ruby. She claims to work for the company she is employed by and wishes her to confirm that all of her colleagues are at work today. She advises her to deactivate her Bubble, at least momentarily, so she can check this. Loathe to do so, she looks through a gap in her screens - and witnesses one of her colleagues being consumed by a huge slug-like creature.

The Doctor joins Ruby on screen to reiterate his warning about the monsters. Lindy must turn off her Bubble and leave her office. She assumes that the creatures must have invaded from the Wild Woods. At one point the Doctor and Ruby see her review a message from her mother, Penny, and both recognise the woman - but not from the same place. The Doctor knows her as the face of the Ambulances on Kastarion 3, whilst Ruby is reminded of a hiker encountered in Wales.

Unfortunately, the inhabitants of Finetime have become so addicted to their Bubbles that they can hardly function without them - reliant on the Dots telling them what to do. Lindy can't walk in a straight line without them.

The Doctor is puzzled when Lindy comes face to face with one of the creatures - a Mantrap - but it ignores her.

Once outside in the street, Lindy witnesses other people being devoured. She tries contacting the authorities, but no-one answers. Looking to her friends for help, she sees one of them attacked by a Mantrap.

Someone then calls out to her, and she recognises him as Ricky September - a popular influencer whom she follows. He reveals that, despite being a huge social media star, he hardly ever uses it himself. He is therefore not reliant on the Dots and knows of a way out of the colony, via the underground infrastructure. He leads her to a conduit where he tries to contact Homeworld. He learns that it too has fallen victim to the Mantraps, but decides not to tell Lindy of this - trying to reassure her that help will soon come from there. There is a series of locked doors to get through before they can reach safety through a water course out of the colony.

The Doctor gets back in contact and reveals that he worked out why the Mantrap earlier failed to attack Lindy. They are killing people in alphabetical order - and have now reached the letter "P". 

As there is some intelligence behind their actions, the Doctor realises that they have not come from the Wild Woods at all. They have actually been created by the Dots, which have come to detest the society which they are forced to serve. Next in line to die, Lindy's Dot attacks her but she is defended by Ricky. 

She suddenly announces that she knows that "September" is not his real name. It is really Coombs, and he only changed it as part of his plan to become famous.

The Dot therefore kills him. Lindy has intentionally sacrificed him to give her enough time to escape into a tunnel beyond the conduit.

At the end of this she finds a small group of fellow survivors, who are preparing to leave by boat for the Wild Woods. The Doctor and Ruby are here with the TARDIS.

He offers to take them all to safety, arguing that they will never be able to survive on their own.

However, Lindy and the others reject his help outright as he is not like them. His skin is the wrong colour.

The Doctor is shocked and frustrated but can do nothing to help the group as they sail away...

Dot and Bubble was written by Russell T Davies and was first broadcast on Saturday 1st June 2024.

It's the second episode in a row to feature only minimal involvement from the Doctor. Apart from the final sequence, Gatwa only ever appears in brief messages within Lindy's Bubble. The same applies to Ruby this time. Like Blink in 2007, this episode elects to concentrate on the guest character of Lindy.

Initially she comes across as a shallow, social media-obsessed individual - though no different from anyone else in this society. We then see that she isn't simply naïve to the point of uselessness, but has a really nasty streak. First she deliberately causes the death of the person who has tried to save her - someone she has been a great admirer of - but then we see that she, like everyone in Finetime, is an out and out racist. The signs were there to see if you had paid attention from the start, as there hadn't been a single non-white face in her Bubble. It's only the second time we've seen the Doctor actively discriminated against - the first being in The Witchfinders, when it was on the grounds of gender.

He's obviously horrified and saddened when his help is rejected - knowing full well that the survivors don't stand a chance outside their ordered colony - but the bottom line is that this lot don't deserve to survive. Perhaps the ending might have had more impact had they been worth saving - but still refused his help.

Mentioned in reviews at the time was the fact that this story was akin to an episode of Black Mirror. As the name suggests, it's a series which holds a mirror up to current society and, like all good sci-fi, extrapolates some aspect of it - taking it to the extreme. In this instance it is the increasing obsession with social media. The inhabitants of Finetime are so reliant on their Bubbles that they can't function on even the most basic level without their Dots. We see that Lindy relies on them even to walk in a straight line without knocking into the furniture. I'm sure I'm not the only person who has seen someone almost knocked over by a car when they've stepped out onto a road whilst staring at their mobile phone, or witnessed a similar near miss. You hardly ever see anyone these days with a good old-fashioned book on public transport, and even toddlers are given screens to watch to keep them quiet.

Then we have Ricky the influencer, who doesn't actually use social media all that much but exploits it for fame. I doubt very much that any real influencers are so disciplined as to pay little attention to their "likes". The way in which Lindy sacrifices him so easily isn't just there to show us what a horrible person she is, but to also show that such people are not real friends at all when it comes down to it.

Lindy is played by Callie Cooke, best known for series such as Cheaters, Henpocalyse! and Rules of the Game. Ricky is Tom Rhys Harries. He featured in the second Inbetweeners movie as well as Britannia and Love Actually, and has recently been cast as comic book character Clayface, part of the DC Universe.

Playing Lindy's mother Penny, seen only in a video message, is Susan Twist. This marks the first time in the season that the Doctor and Ruby notice that they have seen this woman's face before somewhere else.

Overall, it is one of the better episodes of this first Gatwa / RTD2 season, with a fairly traditional monster of the week feel whilst the ending does pack an emotional punch. Gatwa's unavailability in such a short season is beginning to tell, however, as there's only three more episodes to go and we've hardly had time to get to know this incarnation of the Doctor.

Things you might like to know:

• There is a specific Black Mirror episode which RTD2 has said acted as an inspiration for this, both in terms of plot and overall look. This is "Nosedive", first shown on Netflix in October 2016. This is set in a society where people have implants which monitor how everyone interacts with each other, giving them ratings out of five. A woman notices that her ratings are falling and becomes obsessed by this, as low ratings can lead to becoming a social outcast. The colour palette for the episode was mostly bright pastel shades, whereas most episodes of the series went for darker tones. 
• Another inspiration for this episode might possibly be The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, as there is a definite sense of the Golgafrinchan B-Ark about the society of Finetime. Have the adults of Homeworld simply gotten rid of their social media-obsessed youths to this colony to carry out meaningless jobs because they served no other purpose?
• Davies had briefly pitched the idea for this story to Steven Moffat as an Eleventh Doctor story for Series 5. At the time it was felt impossible to make.
• With Gatwa's casting it had been suggested that the Doctor could experience racism when he visited Earth history, but Davies realised that racism might not just be confined to the past - and so had him confront it here in the far future. The character of Krasko in Rosa had already shown that racism still persisted in the 52nd Century.
• Homeworld appears to be an Earth colony as Ricky is seen performing a cover of Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini, made famous by Brian Hyland in 1960. It was repopularised, if such a thing is possible, in 1990 when covered by novelty act Bombalurina (aka supremely annoying TV "personality" Timmy Mallett).
• The inhabitants of Finetime are said to all be aged between 17 - 27. Callie Cooke was 29 at the time, whilst Tom Rhys Harries was 32.
• When location photographs first appeared online, many fans thought that the monsters were Tractators, as seen in Frontios.