TARDIS Log: An Unearthly Child

Where and When:

The story begins with the TARDIS in London - standing in a junkyard at 76 Totter's Lane, which is close to Coal Hill School. We know it is London as Ian says so in The Cave of Skulls.

But where is the Coal Hill district?

We will find out later, but for now the exact part of the city is unclear. All we have to go on is when the local area appears on the scanner as the ship takes off. Large buildings, in crescents and terraces can be seen. As the programme is made in West London, we could be forgiven for thinking that's where Totter's Lane is situated. (Things aren't helped by the fact that the BBC's most famous junkyard at the time - at 26a Oil Drum Lane and home to Steptoe and Son - is located in Shepherd's Bush). However, these buildings look more like office blocks than the residential terraces and crescents of areas like Notting Hill or Ladbroke Grove.

For now, all we can say is that it is probably in the inner suburbs of the city.

As for the 'When', Ian also states that the year is 1963 in the second episode. We can work out from the homework on Ian's blackboard that it is a Thursday when he and Barbara first enter the TARDIS. The Science homework is for Tuesday and Thursday in that order - so those are the days on which Susan attends this class. It can't be a Friday anyway as Susan says she'll return the borrowed book the next day.

If this was a Tuesday, then the homework would have been for Thursday first, and then for the following Tuesday - so this must be Thursday. Barbara's classroom also has History homework set for a Tuesday.

The month is harder to pin down. We know it is winter as it is dark so soon after school finishes (4pm in those days). We're looking at October to February as most likely, and it tends to be accepted that it is November as that is when the series started.

A potential issue with that is Susan's mention of the last five months being the happiest of her life, straight after stating that she loves the school. Is she talking about staying in London in general, or is she specifically referring to that time spent at the school?

As the new school year would have begun in September, she can't be saying that she's been at the school for five months if it's only November - unless she joined around Easter and spent the school summer holiday in London before rejoining Coal Hill for the Autumn term.

One other option is that this isn't the end of the year at all, but the beginning of 1963 (February perhaps) - which would allow her to have attended the school for the whole five months.

The problem with this is Ian and Barbara. Surely they would have questioned Susan's odd behaviour before now, if they've been teaching her for five months?

One explanation could be that they are the newcomers - just joined the school in a recent intake of new staff. That might explain the way they seem to have bonded, and don't involve any other teachers or the headmaster in their concerns about Susan.

A problem of this being the start of the year is the Big Freeze of 1963 - which lasted through January and February and saw many school closures.

(One other issue about Susan's mention of a five month residency in London, whether in general or at the school, is how could she not have known that the UK used pounds, shillings and pence before now?).

At the end of the opening episode, the TARDIS makes its first televised journey. It is no longer in the junkyard, but sitting on a scrubby plain. It is observed by a man dressed in animal skins. Ian and Barbara discover that the sand is near freezing.

The TARDIS has a "year-o-meter", but this isn't working - it registers "Zero". Writer Anthony Coburn stated in a draft script that the ship had travelled in time only - some 195,000 years. David Whitaker also used this date in paperwork. But Coburn and the production team gave the story an overall title of "100,000 BC". The Doctor also states that they have gone back in time, and he'll know when once he's collected a few samples - so as far as he is concerned this is prehistoric Earth.

As the instruments aren't working properly, and he will be shown to be an unreliable navigator, we have to take his word that this is not actually some alien planet where a similar humanoid race has evolved (Mondas, anyone?).

Assuming it is Earth, as the tribespeople are clearly Homo Sapiens then it can't be more than 40,000 years ago. If it is an Ice Age which is approaching, then the last was around 10,000 years ago. It's unlikely that the tribe would have survived very long without fire, so it is more likely that Za's father died only recently and it is winter which is approaching. But then Horg goes and talks about fire and meat joining together as though it was some distant memory...

One other theory to consider is that this is not the past at all, but the far future, when humans have degenerated following some great cataclysm that has thrown civilisation back to a new Stone Age.

The TARDIS must have moved geographically as well as through time, as the London area was mostly marshland in prehistoric times, and there's no evidence of this sort of terrain. Indeed, there is much talk of a mountain near the cave of the tribe, if the cave itself isn't part of the mountain instead of some rocky outcrop. (It's odd that the tribe don't use the Cave of Skulls as a living space, as it ought to be warmer and provide better protection - but then palaeontologists and archaeologists have argued for years about 'Ritual' in prehistoric societies, and it is simply the place of their ancestors).

We learn quite quickly that the Doctor and Susan haven't come to London straight from their home planet. Susan mentions that the ship has disguised itself as a sedan chair and an ionic column in the past. This suggests two potential trips into Earth history - though they would have had such columns in the days of sedan chairs, what with the neo-classical architectural movement. 

Then there's her reaction to the book on the French Revolution which she is borrowing - implying she has first hand knowledge of the event. Not necessarily a third previous trip, as they would have had both sedan chairs and ionic columns in late 18th Century French cities.

The TARDIS makes its second televised journey at the end of the story - but we'll talk about that next time.

The TARDIS:

In outward appearance, the TARDIS resembles a Police Public Call Box, blue in colour and with white window surrounds and emergency instruction panel. When Ian touches it, he feels a strange vibration, as though it's alive. (He may mean live, as in having electrical power, as he walks all round it and states that it doesn't appear to be connected to anything - unless it's through the floor).

Susan seems unaware that her teachers are prowling around outside, but then she's wearing different clothes and is probably off changing - so there has to be a living space with a wardrobe somewhere.

The Doctor opens the door with an ordinary Yale-style key.

It can also be opened from within as Susan opens it - allowing Barbara to push her way in.

Within, the dimensions are far greater than the exterior box would suggest. 

Susan is standing in the middle of a brightly lit, futuristic space, next to a six-sided control console topped by a glass or clear plastic cylinder. The panels are covered in buttons and switches.

Various bits of furniture, some practical, some purely decorative, are dotted about.

(The Doctor places his coat and scarf on a chair, and the scarf falls on the floor. Perhaps he should get a nice hatstand one of these days...).

Most of the walls, as well as the doors, are covered in large inset roundels.

The ship has a faulty filament, but the Doctor has found what he thinks to be a suitable replacement - though it is amateurish by his standards.

He instructs Susan to close the wide double doors using one of the controls on the console.

(Presumably bewildered by all this, Ian claims to have seen the Doctor do this).

The Doctor then explains that this is a time machine, and Susan claims to have made up the name 'TARDIS' from the initials of "Time And Relative Dimension In Space". (Note the singular of Dimension).

As far as we know this craft is unique, but the Doctor didn't necessarily build it himself - otherwise why not replace the filament with one of his own manufacture?

The Doctor and Susan state that they come from another world, so the TARDIS is not of human construction.

One of the controls allows at least one part of the console, or a specific switch, to become electrified - presumably some sort of defence mechanism to prevent unauthorised use.

The Doctor pilots the TARDIS from the console, a process involving operating several controls.

He and Susan then look up at a scanner, resembling a TV screen, which is suspended about 8 feet above floor level against the wall opposite the doors. This wall is fronted by glass panels, behind which are instruments.

This shows a cityscape receding, as though the ship is flying up into the sky. 

This first ever take-off will be like no other, as it renders the teachers unconscious - and even the Doctor and Susan appear physically discomfited by the process. The take-off is accompanied by a loud mechanical wheezing-groaning sound, as well as various electronic beeps and bleeps.

The lights dim, and a mechanism within the glass cylinder glows as it begins to rise and fall.

Could this debilitating take-off be the result of that make-do replacement filament?

The effect on Ian and Barbara appears to be only momentary - for the TARDIS reaches it's destination very quickly.

The light level returns to normal.

The Doctor has Susan take some environmental readings from the console, but he decides to bring a handheld radiation meter with him when he goes out to explore.

The open double doors lead directly to the new landscape outside. What then does Barbara see when she steps outside and looks back inside the ship? (Note the exterior of the doors are patterned like the interior of the ship, and not like a Police Box).

From the outside there are only the narrow Police Box doors, and people are only seen to emerge through one of these (the one without the instruction panel and telephone cabinet).

Susan is surprised to see that the TARDIS still looks like a Police Box - something which irritates the Doctor as it suggests something else to be repaired.

The implication is that it is only from this point on that the TARDIS will be stuck in this shape, and it has always camouflaged itself on landing before this (see above).

The portable radiation meter gets damaged when Kal abducts the Doctor, and Susan finds his notebook which she claims contains vital information about the ship's operations - codes for different machines.

This suggests that the Doctor is not entirely familiar with the ship - or, as Susan states, he's simply becoming forgetful. It's another hint that he did not build the TARDIS.

At the end of the story we see how the TARDIS travels, when it dematerialises - fading away before the startled eyes of Za and his men.

It again arrives swiftly at its next destination - and we'll talk about its dodgy built-in radiation meter next time...

What is most significant is the Doctor's statement that the TARDIS "...isn't operating properly. Or rather, the code is still a secret" - which pretty much confirms that he cannot have built it.

He goes on to say that if you feed in precise data at the beginning of a journey, then you can set your destination - but in this instance he did not have the information he needed.

When Ian asks him outright if he can fly the TARDIS, the Doctor says "Well of course I can't. I'm not a miracle worker".

Behind The Scenes:

We discussed the creation of the set in the Origins post. The main thing to note here is that Peter Brachacki was hospitalised not long after the pilot episode was made, and designer Barry Newbery took over - though he stuck faithfully to Brachacki's designs for the opening episode.

Most changes between the pilot and broadcast versions of An Unearthly Child were to do with character and dialogue, though there were slight changes made to the TARDIS. One of the photographic blow-up walls was replaced, and the furniture rearranged, but the biggest difference was in the soundscape.

There is a loud, intrusive hum in the TARDIS throughout the pilot, which they got rid of for the second version. It would have been very annoying to have retained this throughout.

The dematerialisation sound is also simplified, with a lot less beeps and bleeps.