TARDIS Log: The Aztecs

Where and when:

The TARDIS materialises in a tomb, and Barbara is the first to emerge, closely followed by Susan. The History teacher immediately recognises the burial goods as Aztec, and belonging to their early period - reckoning around 1430.

So we are in Mexico of the mid-15th Century if Barbara is to be believed - and she does claim that she specialised in this culture and its history.

We'll later learn that this tomb was specifically built for the High Priest Yetaxa, and the designer's son - Ixta - is a young man.

The tomb can therefore be no more than a couple of decades old, depending on what age Ixta was when his father disappeared.

This gives us an approximate dating of 1450 for this story.

Had we information about a total solar eclipse in the region around this time, we could have pinned down the date precisely - but the only one in this timeframe I can find is that of 17th June 1433, and totality would only have been observed in latitudes far to the north of Mexico. (Our main eyewitness source for it was in Scotland).

Other than being in Mexico, we have little information to go on as to where, specifically, The Aztecs is set.

What we can say, however, is that this cannot be their capital of Tenochtitlan as there is no Emperor present, or even mentioned. 

Depending on the exact year, this would be either Itzcoatl (1427 to 1440) or more likely Moctezuma I (1440 to 1469) if Barbara is right.

High Priest of Knowledge Autloc, and High Priest of Sacrifice Tlotoxl, seem to run the city between them, with no political figurehead. 

Yetaxa was apparently senior to both - so it is surprising that he hasn't been replaced, despite having died years ago.

Also odd is that Ixta is the intended leader of the army - so who is leading it now? It's inconceivable that there is an army with no leader in this society which prized warriors so highly, so we can only assume that the previous commander has only just died, but there's no automatic right to succeed in place.

Unseen journeys:

None mentioned this time. The Doctor has picked up some strange knowledge along the way, however, such as knowing the soporific properties of a specific plant, and how to exploit it.

The TARDIS:

As we never get to see inside the TARDIS until the story is technically over, it is simply seen standing in the tomb.

We do get a console room scene at the very end, which is the lead-in to the next story. Some time has passed as the companions have changed their outfits.

The Doctor is puzzled, as one instrument on the console indicates that they have landed - but another states that they are still in motion.

It is suggested by his companions that they have landed on top of something, or perhaps inside something. 

We'll later discover that they have materialised inside an orbiting spaceship - but the Doctor's puzzlement suggests that this hasn't happened before. Considering how often the ship will land within different modes of transport in the future, this might indicate that he is not that widely travelled at this point.

The two instruments are next to each other on the console.

The ship's wardrobe gains some his and hers Aztec gear, including Barbara's fancy High Priestess outfit. The Doctor adds a love token from his fiancée to his collection of souvenirs...

Behind the scenes:

As mentioned, the TARDIS interior only appears at the end of the final episode, so only the console and one section of wall is seen.

What we can point out is the way that David Whitaker and the writers have striven to separate the Doctor from his TARDIS up till now. This story, for instance, is entirely about getting back into the tomb to retrieve it, and everything else comes off the back of these efforts.

This will continue for a while but, starting from the next story, the Doctor will begin involving himself in their adventures by choice - as it's the right thing to do - rather than simply act in a way that will allow them to regain access to the ship and leave again.

John Lucarotti novelised his story - and gave a date of 1507. This would make Barbara's estimate way out, and is probably there simply to make the fall of this culture more imminent. Cortes arrived in 1519 (not 1520 as Barbara states) and the Aztecs were conquered within the space of two years.

With this dating, Tlotoxl may have lived to see the fall of his civilisation.

TARDIS Log: The Keys of Marinus

Where and when:

The TARDIS materialises on a small island, which is dominated by a huge pyramid structure. Exploring, the travellers discover that the sea surrounding the island is highly acidic. They are not the only visitors, as they come upon a number of one-man submersibles capable of moving through acid.

They later meet Arbitan, who resides alone in the pyramid, and from him learn that this is the planet Marinus. 

He is the Keeper of the Conscience machine, which generates a pacifying influence over this world. A figure named Yartek, leader of the Voords, has found a way to protect himself and his followers from the machine, and they now pose a danger to the entire planet. It is they who have come to the island in the submersibles.

Arbitan is now ready to upgrade the Conscience so that it will once again be universal, but to do this he requires all five microcircuit keys which operate it.

He has retained one, but the other four are scattered across Marinus. He then deploys a forcefield around the TARDIS to coerce the Doctor and his companions into fetching these for him. They will journey using special wrist-mounted travel dials, pre-programmed for each of their destinations.

From a map we can see that Marinus seems to comprise one huge elongated continent, with Arbitan's island off its southern coast.

Judging by the defences which the Keeper employs, the acid surrounding this is probably artificially generated and extends only for a certain distance around the island. 

The key locations are as follows:

The city of Morphoton. Here everyone seems content, provided with whatever they wish for. The reality is that they are all mentally enslaved by the Morpho - disembodied brains with eyestalks, which require a special environment in which to live within glass containers. Barbara destroys these, killing the creatures and thus freeing the populace. The travellers collect two new temporary companions here - Sabetha, daughter of Arbitan, and her boyfriend Altos.

The second key is guarded by an elderly botanist named Darrius in a compound built at the heart of a densely forested region. His experiments with growth accelerator have resulted in the local vegetation growing rampantly and aggressively, and Darrius himself falls victim to it.

The third location is a mountainous area, the key being guarded by Ice Soldiers within a block of ice in a cavern. The Doctor has jumped from Morphoton to the final destination, so it is left to his companions and their new friends to cope with the ruthless fur trapper Vasor, as well as the reanimated Soldiers, to retrieve the key. There are also wolves in this region, which resemble those of Earth. Vasor speaks of a village a few miles from his cabin.

Other than the Morpho, everyone on Marinus appears to be humanoid. We don't know if the Morpho are alien interlopers, or if they evolved naturally here. The origin of the Voords is also unclear. They may simply be men in suits, though Yartek at one point describes them as his "creatures". There is no indication that they are alien to Marinus.

Everyone is reunited at the final key location - the city of Millennius. This is a well ordered society, though one with an unusual legal system. Those accused of crimes are automatically deemed guilty and must prove conclusively their innocence - as Ian discovers when he is accused of murder and the theft of the key from the city museum.

He is defended by the Doctor, and the real criminal is exposed.

The travellers return with the keys to the island - only to find Yartek and the Voord have seized control of the Conscience machine after killing Arbitan. However, Ian gives Yartek a fake key prepared as a decoy by Darrius, and the invaders are destroyed when the machine explodes. Sabetha and Altos elect to settle in Millennius.

It is clear that that no-one in Millennius seems to be aware that another city has been taken over by monsters, or that there is a rapidly growing threat to the continent from Darrius' experiments. These are obviously very insular societies. There does not appear to be any form of conventional transport. (Had there been, the need to protect the travel dials wouldn't have mattered quite so much).

As for when this takes place, the travel dials take people to different locations within the same time period, as everyone is aware of Arbitan. 

With humanoid inhabitants and wolves resembling those of Earth, there is a possibility that this might be an Earth colony. If it is, the fact that the Conscience machine was built a thousand years ago would suggest that this is the far distant future. (There was an unwritten convention in the early days of the series that stories set on alien planets were also set in the future).

Unseen journeys:

The Doctor advises Guardian Tarron to study Pyrrho, which he claims would be of benefit to an investigator like him. Pyrrho founded the philosophical school of Scepticism, in which people were encouraged not to simply accept what they saw or were told, but to challenge and question deeper. He lived in Greece and died c.270 BC, and was a contemporary of Alexander the Great. When told it was lucky he had studied his works, the Doctor retorts that he actually met him. This is another contender for the occasion when the TARDIS took on the form of an ionic column.

As Ian is still wearing his Chinese silk outfit, it appears that the TARDIS has come straight from 13th Century Peking, with no intermediate landings.

The TARDIS:

The console appears to be very close to the external doors. Everyone stands with their backs to these, looking up at the scanner opposite.

We learn that the scanner doesn't show colour images. The Doctor describes this as "temporarily hors de combat" - roughly translating as "out of action". (In a deleted portion of script, the Doctor claimed that this was one of the things he was looking into whilst based in London, 1963 - visiting the BBC where he couldn't get their colour signals to mix).

The radiation meter seems to have been fixed as Ian asks about the reading, and the Doctor replies that it is hardly registering anything. The meter must now be facing the doors, whereas before it was to the right of the console as you came into the ship. This suggests that the console can rotate.

The Doctor makes reference to the "time mechanism" being faulty, and it would take days to repair. He thinks the fully equipped laboratory promised by Altos may help. This may mean that the failure to get Ian and Barbara home might be more to do with the ship itself, and less to do with the Doctor's grasp of the controls.

Arbitan is later able to place an impenetrable forcefield around the ship (which he must take down the instant the travellers depart on their quest - as he is murdered only moments later).

The TARDIS is seen to materialise for the first time, having only been seen to depart up until now.

Sabetha makes a gift of the surviving microcircuit key to the Doctor as a souvenir.

Behind the Scenes:

A single wall - the one with the double doors - and the console were all that were required in studio on 20th March 1964 for The Sea of Death. This was the TARDIS interior's only appearance in the story.

For the materialisation of the TARDIS on the island, a model of the Police Box was used for the first time.

Famously, designer Ray Cusick hated this story as he was called upon to come up with completely different sets each week due to its quest scenario. He simply didn't have the time or budget to do what he wanted to do, and found the director, John Gorrie, somewhat disinterested in his work.

The Velvet Web featured two different versions of the reception area of Morphoton - one looking luxurious and the other decrepit. Cusick was reprimanded by his superiors for using expensive materials for the former. He had wanted to use dead rats for the run-down version.

During rehearsals for The Snows of Terror, the ice-bridge collapsed with Carole Ann Ford on it.

This is a classic example of the "Terry Nation Naming Convention" phenomenon.

Marinus is so called because it has a distinctive ocean.

It doesn't just apply to planets. Arbitan is an arbiter - a judge who, through the Conscience machine, determines right from wrong on this planet.

Morphoton and the Morpho get their name from Morpheus, the Greek god of dreams (son of Hypnos, the god of sleep, and Pasithea, goddess of the night). It is whilst asleep that newcomers to the city are mentally processed and enslaved.

Nation has a thing about the name Darren, hence Darrius. In The Dalek Book the home continent of the Thals on Skaro is Darren.

As for Tarron, Nation will come up with all manner of permutations of names based on "Terry N" in both Doctor Who and Blake's 7.

Millennius derived its name from the idea that the next millennium, only a few decades away in 1964, might prove to be one of technological advances and fewer social ills.

For his next Doctor Who script, Nation was actually working on a historical adventure set around the Indian Mutiny, provisionally titled "The Red Fort". With issues continuing with Malcolm Hulke's "The Hidden Planet", he was instead asked to write another sci-fi story and came up with this series of mini-adventures after discussions with David Whitaker.

TARDIS Log: Marco Polo

Where and when:

The TARDIS has materialised on the Plain of Pamir in the snowy foothills of the Himalayas. As the Doctor informs his companions of the predicament they are in - the complete failure of the ship's electrical systems - they decide to look for fuel for a fire. They encounter instead a Tartar warlord named Tegana and his men. Fearing they are evil spirits, Tegana is on the point of having them killed when they are saved by the intervention of a European man - whom Barbara recognises as the Venetian explorer Marco Polo.

The year is 1289, and Polo is returning to Cathay from a diplomatic mission. He is bringing Tegana to meet with his employer - the mighty Kublai Khan - so that a peace agreement can be reached between him and Tegana's liege Noghai. Polo is also escorting a young girl from Samarkand - Ping-Cho - for an arranged marriage to one of the Khan's elderly councillors.

Polo wishes to leave the Khan's service and return home to Venice, but isn't having much luck persuading him to let him go. He has become too valuable a servant. On learning of the "flying caravan" of the strangers, he hits upon the idea of presenting it to the Khan as a gift - one which will finally secure his release from duty.

The TARDIS is loaded onto a cart which then proceeds on a lengthy journey across the Plain, the Gobi Desert and on into Cathay, stopping off at various way stations on the route.

Initially they are making for Shang-Tu, where the Khan has his summer palace (an inspiration for poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Xanadu). However, a despatch rider intercepts the caravan and informs Polo that the venue for the meeting with Kublai Khan is now his capital at Peking.

The entire journey overland from the Plain of Pamir to Peking takes around three months.

At Peking it is revealed that Tegana actually intends to assassinate the Khan, with Noghai's army massing on the border ready to invade. Marco defeats him in a duel, but Tegana kills himself rather than face capture.

That Marco Polo and Kublai Khan existed as historical figures is beyond doubt. The latter was the grandson of Genghis Khan, and became the first ruler of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. Born in 1215, he ruled from 1271 until his death in 1294.

Marco Polo was born in Venice c.1254. In 1271 he accompanied his father and uncle on a journey to Cathay, following the Silk Road, for the purposes of trade.

He quickly became a favourite of Kublai Khan due to his organisational skills, and was sent on various missions of a diplomatic or military nature.

In 1291 he escorted a princess named Kokochin to Persia - the inspiration for Ping-Cho's role in this story - and after safely delivering her he then travelled on to Venice, via Constantinople. By the time he got home, he had been away for 24 years.

His homecoming coincided with war between Venice and Genoa. Polo fought for his city state but was taken prisoner. It was whilst in captivity that he narrated his story to his cellmate Rustichello da Pisa - and this is where some doubt creeps in...

His cellmate was the one who actually wrote the book The Travels of Marco Polo (also known as The Book of Marvels of the World) - and it is widely believed that he used a certain amount of poetic licence in the narrative - wishing, naturally, to present a best-seller. The overall history is generally accepted, but some of the specific incidents may have been fabricated to liven up the narrative.

There is certainly no mention of a strange Doctor or his magical blue flying caravan. Perhaps Rustichello thought this was pushing the fantasy too far to include, or Marco simply decided to keep this part of his adventures to himself.

After his release from prison, Marco Polo went on to enjoy a successful mercantile career in his home city, dying in January 1324. He is buried in the Church of San Lorenzo.

Unseen journeys:

Susan has seen the metal seas of Venus - but has never seen a moonlit night. She must mean "like this one" surely. She lived in London for five months and has been to other times in Earth's history and to other planets. One explanation might be that her over-protective grandfather only ever allowed her to go to the school and confined her to the safety of the TARDIS at all other times - which might go some way to explaining her lack of knowledge about British currency in 1963.

The TARDIS:

Despite the interior of the TARDIS only featuring in three short scenes, the ship does have a significant role to play in Marco Polo. It is, after all, purloined by the Venetian adventurer so that he can give it to Kublai Khan as a present. The Doctor and his companions are denied access to it, other than when he and Susan are permitted to sleep in it for one night during their trek across the Gobi Desert.

The TARDIS had materialised in a snowy landscape at the end of the previous story, and some time seemed to have passed before the travellers go outside to explore - after Susan and Barbara find what appears to be the footprint of a giant.

The Doctor goes back inside the ship, then emerges moments later to announce that there has been a failure in one of the key components. This is the 2LO circuit, which has burnt itself out. 

It is a vital part of the ship's electrical systems, and without it they have no heating or light. The Doctor also states that they won't have any water either, so presumably its loss means that the Food Machine has no independent power source. (It also implies that the TARDIS has no kitchen or bathrooms, unless they too are electrically powered).

The Doctor has Susan go into the TARDIS to fetch the circuit out to him, and he thinks it unlikely that he will be able to repair it before nightfall. It appears to be a chunky black box, full of wiring.

After examining it, the Doctor announces that he will have to make a new one, and this could take days.

It's another vital component, like the Fluid Link, for which the Doctor has no spares.

The TARDIS appears to have some form of altimeter, as the Doctor is able to state that they are several thousand feet above sea level (though this may simply be the result of his visual observation of the terrain and an assessment of the oxygen levels).

Marco Polo takes the Doctor's key - and he hasn't gotten round to making a new one for Susan yet (lost when used to sabotage the Dalek city's surveillance systems). He will make a new key, in a single night, whilst they are stopped at an oasis. He uses it to sneak into the TARDIS to repair the 2LO circuit, until Marco finds out and the ship becomes too well guarded.

In reference to the 21-barrel lock mentioned in The Daleks, the Doctor does warn Polo not to use the key himself. (The odd thing is that Polo never once shows any interest in seeing the inside of the "flying caravan" which he sees as key - no pun intended - to his release from service. Not once does he insist on being shown the interior).

The TARDIS can be lifted onto, and carried by, a wooden cart, drawn by a single horse. Its weight must therefore equate to that of whatever it currently resembles.

As mentioned, the Doctor and Susan are permitted to spend a night in the TARDIS when they are in the middle of the desert. The caravan's water supply has been sabotaged by Tegana, and the nearest oasis is a day's ride away.

Unfortunately, we don't get to see the Doctor's sleeping place. The episodes are lost, and the only telesnaps of this brief scene are two close-ups of the Doctor's face as water drips on it. There's simply a black background. All we do know is that Susan is sleeping next to him, as he tells her to wake up and fetch some means to capture the water. The suggestion is that he is in her room, sleeping on the bed that Barbara was using.

The Doctor does sleep - so must have his own bedroom. That he is sharing here might simply be down to the fact that he has a touch of heatstroke and Susan wants to keep an eye on him.

The reason that water is forming inside the TARDIS is condensation. The ship's interior is being heated by the sun during the day, then cooling at night - meaning that the ship is susceptible to atmospheric conditions outside its shell, despite it supposedly existing in a separate dimension. (The loss of power may be the reason for this, with some protective shielding also disabled).

The Doctor attempts to get the TARDIS back by playing backgammon with Kublai Khan. He starts off well, winning 35 elephants with ceremonial bridles, trappings, brocades and pavilions; 4000 white stallions; 25 tigers; the Sacred Tooth of Buddha; and all the commerce of Burma for one year. He then hits a losing streak and is left with only a piece of the Khan's new paper currency.

That Ulster coat which used to belong to Gilbert & Sullivan is left behind somewhere, but Ian, Barbara and Susan all depart with 13th Century Chinese silk outfits to add to the TARDIS wardrobe. 

Ian will like his so much he wears it for the next story...

Behind the Scenes:

The obvious starting point for this story would have been in the TARDIS console room, when it suffers its electrical breakdown. However, director Waris Hussein and designer Barry Newbery decided to use the limited space of Lime Grove Studio D to concentrate on the story-specific sets required for the opening episode.

The console room set is used only once throughout this entire seven episode story. This is for the sequence at the end of Rider From Shang-Tu, the fifth episode, when the travellers have gained access to the ship but are waiting for Susan to join them. We only have a couple of telesnaps from this scene also, and it looks like only one corner of the set was used, comprising a couple of walls. One has the roundels, whilst the other has a series of vertical lights and is actually a large rectangular pillar-like block which was used in several of the early stories.

Assassin at Peking closes with a shot of the Doctor and his companions standing around the console - but this is clearly set up in front of black drapes in a corner of the studio. Again, this would be due to the size and number of sets needed for the final episode. A star-scape is superimposed over this scene.

We can detect the hand of Story Editor David Whitaker throughout these early stories. There was no real need for the Doctor to take his hand-held radiation meter outside the TARDIS on arriving on prehistoric Earth - there's a built-in meter on the console after all - but it had to be disposed of before the travellers reached Skaro, otherwise The Daleks would have been a very short story indeed. Likewise, Susan had to lose her key in the Dalek city for this story to work. We know she had one as she let herself into the TARDIS on coming home from school before the Doctor got back. The plot relies on there being only a single key to the ship.

2.L.O. was the old BBC radio transmitter for London, based in Marconi House on the Strand. It got its name from being the second London radio licence issued by the Post Office. It began broadcasting in May 1922 under the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company, before being operated by the BBC from November that year.

TARDIS Log: The Edge of Destruction

Where and When:

On leaving Skaro, the TARDIS has suffered a major malfunction. The travellers have been knocked unconscious, and wake to find themselves completely disoriented. The ship is apparently stationary - and it has definitely left Skaro as we, and the Thals, saw it dematerialise - and they have to work out what has happened, and where they now are.

There are clues. ("We've been given nothing else but clues", says Barbara at one point).

When the doors open they see only a brilliant white void. It's so bright the companions have to shield their eyes when they look outside.

The scanner shows a series of images, three of which comprise a sequence - a moon-like planet, a view of a solar system, then a blinding light.

The Doctor eventually works out that this represents their journey.

He has used the Fast Return switch on the console, to presumably retrace their most recent journeys. We can assume that he planned to go back to Totter's Lane, London, in 1963, to rid himself of his unwanted passengers. But is that how the switch works? We'll come back to this shortly.

Anyway, the switch has jammed and they have travelled back much further than the Doctor intended.

Early fandom believed that they had gone right back to the Big Bang at the start of the universe, but the Doctor clearly states - in his famous soliloquy - that it is the birth of a solar system.

But which one?

He was aiming to get back to Earth, so does that mean that it is our own Solar System?

The scanner sequence is the clue, for the planet which begins it is clearly not Earth. Much later, in the closing moments of The Space Museum, we will discover that it is Skaro.

They have travelled back to the creation of that planet's system.

When that was, it's obviously impossible to know, but if it's anything like our Solar System then we're talking billions of years in the past.

Other Journeys:

I meant to include this subsection from the start, as we heard that the TARDIS had assumed the form of a sedan chair and an ionic column at some point before it became stuck as a Police Box - and then there's Susan's reaction to the book about the French Revolution, which suggested personal experience of the event.

Here the scanner shows an image of the planet Quinnis. This is said to lie in the "Fourth Universe", and it's where the Doctor and Susan nearly lost the TARDIS. She describes this as "four or five journeys back", so not that long before London 1963.

The landscape resembles a primordial swamp, and we can hear the roars of strange animals.

Much later, the Doctor will claim that travel between universes was relatively easy when the Time Lords were around, so it may be the case that this actually is another universe.

However, David Whitaker was a writer, not a scientist, and he'll provide some very dodgy astrophysics over the next few years. Let's just say that he probably meant a galaxy, and leave it at that for now...

The Doctor and Susan have visited late Victorian England at some point, as they have met dramatist WS Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan, famous for the Savoy Operas. They were active between 1871 - 1896. The Doctor "acquired" an Ulster coat from them.

The TARDIS:

The TARDIS has been programmed to do something which will mean its destruction and those of its occupants.

It "refuses" to do this, and sets about warning everyone. However, rather than stick a message up on the scanner or use any of the standard warning systems which the ship must possess, it provides a number of clues - which are cryptic to say the least.

Unless everyone is concussed, it appears to initially affect the minds of Ian, Barbara and Susan - causing them to suffer a temporary amnesia and confusion.

It then employs the scanner. We have the sequence mentioned above, which illustrates a journey back through time from a planet to the creation of its solar system, but before that we get a still image of a pleasant country landscape, and the hostile environment of Quinnis. The Doctor points out that these are only photographs, but they have sound. These landscape images coincide with the opening and closing of the main doors, operating on their own.

The sequence is repeated.

A time element is then added, when the TARDIS somehow manages to melt clock and watch faces. How it achieves this we cannot tell. Does it do it physically, or is it actually only in the minds of the travellers, like a shared hallucination? 

Time is "given back" to the travellers by the sounding of an alarm from the Fault Locator. This device is still in the same place - but it no longer reads like a seismograph or lie detector, with inked needles on paper. Instead it runs through an alphanumerical code sequence - A1, A2 etc. A light indicates the status of the individual components. 

The Doctor has difficulty reading this as it blurs before his eyes. 

A short time later the entire machine lights up - suggesting that everything is failing. 

Eventually the Doctor starts to accept Barbara's contention that the TARDIS is causing all these strange incidents itself, as a means of warning them. He accepts that the ship can think - but only as a machine and "not as you or I do". For him it is simply a machine intelligence, devoid of any kind of consciousness.

The interesting thing about all this odd behaviour from the TARDIS is that the Doctor's logic and scientific reasoning is blind to what it is trying to do.

It is Barbara's human instinct and intuition which solve the mystery. The TARDIS appears to be more in tune with the new passengers than with its own operator and his granddaughter. 

We have to go back to why it chose these particular methods of warning, rather than the more straightforward mechanical ones. It must have some sort of consciousness, which operates above the purely machine level.

It's fair to say that this is yet another reason for doubting that the Doctor built the TARDIS, as he simply doesn't understand it beyond its role as a space / time machine.

We learn more about the console itself - especially the central glass cylinder and its internal mechanism. (This will later become known as the Time Rotor). According to the Doctor, the rise and fall of this indicates the extent of the power thrust. The power source of the TARDIS lies beneath the console, and were the cylinder to be pushed up too far and come free, this power would escape and effectively destroy the ship.

Near the beginning of the story, the Doctor speculates on the cause of the breakdown, and worries that it might even be the "main unit", but doesn't elaborate on what this is.

In An Unearthly Child we saw how the Doctor could electrify part of the console, and here the TARDIS does this itself. It generates an electrical charge, targeting the back of the neck, which can knock out anyone even approaching any part of the console other than the section it wishes to draw their attention to. This includes the scanner control - and the Fast Return Switch. 

This is actually marked on the console in felt-tip pen, and seems to be a removable component which plugs into the console. There are two theories as to how this functions.

The first is that it simply takes the TARDIS rapidly back in time, and that's what it seems to do here if the solar system being created is indeed Skaro's.

The Doctor actually says: "I had hoped to reach your planet Earth. Skaro was in the future and I used the Fast Return switch". Ian then replies: "You've sent us back too far...".

Setting aside the fact that events on Skaro may well have actually occurred in Earth's past, theory number two is that the switch causes the TARDIS to retrace its own journey - traveling in reverse gear as it were - so that he can get back to Totter's Lane in 1963.

The problem with this second theory is that a stuck switch shouldn't take the TARDIS back to the birth of a solar system, but to its own creation on the Doctor's home planet.

However it works, the problem is traced to a spring inside the mechanism. This has stuck so, as far as the TARDIS is concerned, the Doctor was holding it down the whole time. It therefore didn't register as a fault.

As well as the Fault Locator, another change is to the Food Machine. It certainly wasn't there in The Daleks, but there is now a separate button for water. It's in the middle of the other controls, and there's an indicator light above left, which let's you know when it's empty. Quite when the Doctor found time to add this is anyone's guess. Or was it the TARDIS itself? Do the Doctor's people not need this as much as human beings, so he - or it - decided it was necessary to accommodate passengers from Earth? I say the TARDIS might be responsible as the layout of the console room changes considerably from story to story, even when there is no time for the Doctor to have made adjustments himself. 

Whoever installed it, it provides the water in little plastic bags. 

You now have to go through an internal double door to reach the Food Machine, whereas in The Daleks it was simply behind a partition wall, off the console room. 

The Edge of Destruction introduces us to the travellers' bedrooms. We see Susan's room, which contains an angled bed, with a table and metal chair. She has a plant on the table. The bed folds up into the wall when not in use. There must be a wardrobe off screen, as we have already seen her change outfit more than once, and here she dons her sleeping apparel - a black smock-like garment. We'll see Barbara wear the same night gear, though Ian manages to find an ordinary dressing gown (but no pyjamas). There doesn't appear to be any need for sheets or blankets. 

There isn't a separate room for everyone, as Barbara has to share Susan's bedspace on a second fold-down bed. Presumably Ian has his own room - unless he's in with the Doctor.

A new addition to the TARDIS medical supplies is a bandage which is impregnated with medicated bands. This ointment seeps into the wound and when the colour fades it has done its work. It comes in a long roll, and you simply cut off the length required with scissors.

(Susan has a pair of scissors which look like they are used for dressmaking, so she may make some of her own clothes - when she's not threatening schoolteachers with them or attacking her mattress...).

Once the problem has been resolved, the TARDIS continues its journey. After landing, the Doctor and Barbara have a conversation in the rest area where the Food Machine is located. This now features a long, low couch. There's a small round table as well, but no obvious chairs.

The Doctor says that the TARDIS has "an extensive wardrobe", and we see Ian wearing that Ulster coat mentioned above, whilst Susan has picked out cold weather garments for Barbara.

The TARDIS appears to have been sitting at its new destination for some time before anyone has ventured outside, as no-one has noticed the giant footprint in the snow just outside the doors...

Behind the Scenes:

A popular alternative title for this story is "Inside the Spaceship". Early fandom also used "Beyond the Sun", but we know that this was an episode title for Malcolm Hulke's abandoned "The Hidden Planet" story, as well as the overall title of Brian Hodgson's suite of sound effects for the series.

For many years, the background to this story was that it was written to plug a two week gap in the schedule as the sets for Marco Polo weren't ready yet. This is what the cast certainly believed, as they mention it in interviews. The truth of the matter is that the series was threatened with cancellation due to budgets - and it was the TARDIS set which was mainly to blame.

The series was to be terminated after 13 episodes on the grounds of cost, on the instructions of Donald Baverstock, BBC Controller. Story Editor David Whitaker was therefore asked to come up with two episodes which would complete the run.

Verity Lambert saved the day by pointing out that the cost of the TARDIS had been worked out over 52 weeks, so she was within budget. £500 over 13 weeks would work out at nearly £40pw, whereas the same amount spread over a whole year would come to less than a tenner.

Whitaker then used his two-parter to concentrate on the relationships between the Doctor and his companions, properly introduce the TARDIS, and at the same time save money by only featuring the regulars and an existing set. Designer Ray Cusick only had to add the sleeping area and make some amendments to existing props and set elements.

The large hexagonal metal floor plate which surrounds the console makes a return.

The story relies heavily on lighting effects to conjure mood and menace, and the console room is plunged into darkness, other than a single overhead light, for Hartnell's soliloquy about the birth of a solar system.

When asked about "Fast Return" being written on the console above the switch, in felt-tip pen, Cusick suggested that it was probably put there simply for the benefit of William Hartnell and / or the camera operator to find. The scene is recorded in low lighting after all. Either no-one had thought that it was to get a big close-up, or it had been intended to remove it before recording and someone forgot. 

TARDIS Log: The Daleks

Where and When:

Our first alien planet - Skaro. 

Even Ian and Barbara know that they are no longer on Earth after coming across the Magnedon - a creature the size of a Labrador dog, but with a shell comprising of metal plates and resembling a crocodilian. 

The TARDIS has landed in the middle of a forest, and when the Doctor and his companions emerge they are initially surrounded by a mist, which quickly clears. The trees and plants are unfamiliar, and it is Ian who spots that, despite a breeze, the branches do not stir. It transpires that they have been petrified - and the Doctor thinks not by heat. The soil is ashen.

Susan finds a brittle tulip-like flower, which has retained some colour. She wants to keep a specimen, but Barbara's discovery of the Magnedon causes Ian to crush it in his haste to come to her aid.

The creature is quite dead, however. The Doctor suspects that it had an inner magnetic field and may have used this to draw its prey towards it, if they were also metallic.

Beyond the forest lies a desolate plain, on which sits a large city composed of futuristic buildings.

And beyond that is a mountain.

This city is home to the Daleks - once humanoid but now mutated into small brain-like creatures with vestigial limbs. They inhabit metal casings, created as protective shells which enable them to move around. They can only do so on metal flooring - drawing power through this via static electricity.

They do not inhabit the surface buildings, confining themselves to subterranean levels.

It will be revealed that Skaro was the scene of a devastating nuclear war, involving neutron bombs. The atmosphere is heavily irradiated.

There is another race on Skaro - the Thals. Whilst the Daleks interfered with the evolutionary process by taking to their protective shells, the radiation has allowed the mutation of the Thals to come full circle, and they are now humanoid again - tall, blond and physically perfect. They have developed a drug to counter the radiation.

The war was fought between Thal and Dal - the original name of the Daleks, who were philosophers and teachers.

The Thals were a warrior people, but now live a simple agrarian lifestyle on a plateau many miles from the Dalek city.

They rely on a great rainfall for their crops, and this has failed. (When this disaster befell them is unclear, as the dialogue is contradictory).

They have embarked on an arduous trek under their leader Temmosus to seek help from their old enemies - even though they don't actually know if any have survived. (It is only through Susan that they learn that they have. Despite their life far from here, they must have known about the city and where it was to be located, so may have mounted the odd exploratory expedition to this region).

We only see adult Thals, but dialogue states that there are children present.

The Thals possess history records, which tell of the planet as well as its people. They know that Skaro is the seventh planet of its solar system.

Behind the mountain lies a great lake, which is home to a variety of mutated animals. One looks like an octopus whilst another generates a whirlpool effect before ensnaring its prey.

Surrounding the lake is more forest - though this doesn't appear to have been petrified (shielded by the mountain perhaps).

One of the creatures which inhabits this region resembles a giant caterpillar.

A cave system runs through the mountain from the lake, and the Daleks have used the tunnels to pipe water into the city to generate hydro-electric power.

The Doctor takes some soil samples and tells the Thals that it is not as barren as he first thought, and that life might return within a few generations.

The dating for this story is impossible when you consider only the seven broadcast episodes on their own. 

We can only attempt to work out when The Daleks might be set by looking at the evidence of later Dalek stories.

12 months from now, we'll learn that they are a space-going race by 2164. They are more advanced than the city-bound ones we see here - though they are still reliant on power being beamed to a collection dish on the back of their casings.

The Doctor states in The Dalek Invasion of Earth that these events on Skaro took place in the far distant future - suggesting that they will degenerate and retreat into their old city. This doesn't really fit with the Thal history or what we see here, however.

Everything seems to point to this being the early emergence of the Daleks following the war, encountering the Thals for the first time since that catastrophe.

The big problem is the fact that the Daleks appear to be killed off at the end of the story.

There are two ways around this.

The first is that there is at least one other Dalek colony elsewhere on the planet.

The second - made possible by The Power of the Daleks - is that they have simply been rendered dormant without power. The Daleks in the capsule found on the planet Vulcan are said to have been buried in a mercury swamp for several hundred years - and yet are resurrected when fed power.

For them to be invading Earth in the mid 22nd Century, and if it's the same Daleks, then this story is most likely set in Earth's past, perhaps the 18th or 19th Century.

The TARDIS:

The journey from prehistoric Earth to Skaro lasts only moments. The Doctor asks Susan to check the radiation meter, which is a fixture on the console. It shows normal but, seconds after everyone goes off to freshen up, it climbs quickly into the danger zone. A light flashes, but there is no audible alarm.

The travellers spend the night in the TARDIS before going off to explore the city in the morning - yet no-one spots this flashing light. They even stand around the console when the Doctor operates it, during his act of sabotage - but no-one notices anything.

The alarm must have switched itself off. If so, coupled with the delay in indicating danger, this suggests that the meter is faulty.

Unfortunately, the Doctor broke his handheld meter when he was abducted by Kal in the last story.

Ian suspects that the Doctor doesn't know how to pilot the TARDIS. When asked directly, he claims that if the correct data is known at the start of a journey then the course can be set - but they took off too quickly from the last location to gather this information.

Susan states further that there is a meter fixed to a big bank of computers which can guide the TARDIS, but only if that data is fed in - suggesting some form of 'auto-pilot' function, and the Doctor doesn't have to be at the controls the whole time.

But then she says that the Doctor's inability to navigate the ship is simply down to him being "forgetful".

The Doctor will later think that he might be able to work out their position from the Thal history records, which include a map of local space.

There is an area at the rear of the console room, partitioned off from the rest of the room, which contains a table and chair at which Susan sits to sketch the flower she had found. We see a double inner door leading off this area.

It is in this area that we find the Food Machine.

It is a tall box-like affair with a sloping control panel with buttons and lights at chest level.

The foodstuff requested is created by inputting a code, using clock-like dials, operated as you would the combination lock of a safe. The Doctor gets these codes from a notebook. You then press a central button, lights flash and it emits a noise to let you know when your item is ready. He explains that flavours are made up of component parts, likening it to composing colours from a combination of other ones.

Ian and Barbara select bacon and eggs, and a small item resembling a white Mars Bar - other chocolate bars are available - emerges on a little tray from a slot on the front of the machine, just beneath the control panel.

With one bite you taste the bacon, and another the eggs. Ian jokes his bacon is a little salty, and the Doctor counters that it shouldn't be as it is English.

Presumably he acquired the taste during his five months in London.

The Doctor is determined to explore the city, but Ian and Barbara refuse to let him do this - even alone, as only he knows how to operate the TARDIS (so they assume that Susan can't on her own).

When Susan agrees with the teachers that they leave the planet, the Doctor sabotages the ship.

He ducks down behind the console whilst the others are distracted looking up at the scanner and tampers with a component inside its base.

The power builds up as normal, but the ship fails to dematerialise. 

Susan suggests checking the Fault Locator. This is built into the wall behind a glass frontage, and has a small rectangular viewing port at eye level.

When Susan looks through this we see a device resembling a seismograph, with a rolling strip of paper and a number of inked needles.

From this she identifies the problem as component K7 - which the Doctor knows, without looking it up, to be the fluid link (because he just tampered with it).

This small object comprises four circular discs with a metal rod running through the centre.

It should be filled with mercury, but one end of the rod has come loose and the mercury has run out. 

The Doctor reveals that he doesn't have a supply of this substance on board. This particular fault has never happened before - or so he claims. He will later confirm that there is no mercury on board, having searched through all his spares. Nor does he carry any other fluid links, as the one taken by the Daleks has to be retrieved from the city.

Prisoners in the Dalek city, someone has to return to the TARDIS to fetch the anti-radiation drugs left by the Thal Alydon. Only Susan is fit enough to do this but Ian insists on going, using her key. She explains that the lock has a defence mechanism. Inside are a number of barrels, 21 of them. If the key isn't inserted properly, the entire lock melts.

Ian can't simply keep trying. (Now that he is travelling with people other than just his granddaughter, and they may be with him for some time, the Doctor obviously replaces this set-up at the first opportunity).

The Doctor later uses Susan's key to sabotage the Dalek surveillance system, stating that he can make her a new one easily enough.

(Whilst he can make another key, he can't make a new fluid link it seems. This might be because he lacks the tools or materials, or maybe it's the skill - another possible pointer to the TARDIS not being of his own invention).

The TARDIS has some medical supplies, such as a remedy for headaches, but the Doctor states that there is nothing which might counter radiation sickness. They would need to travel to another planet and hope that a cure might be available there.

The Doctor takes some soil samples away with him, whilst Barbara gains a roll of Thal cloth and Susan one of their cloaks, of the style worn by their females.

The story ends with the Doctor at the console, with the TARDIS power levels building steadily after it has dematerialised from Skaro. The lights suddenly flare, and the room is plunged into darkness as everyone is thrown to the floor.

A word about the console: it has six control panels, but you can't operate it from any one of these on its own. You have to move around the console to operate it effectively, which suggests that it wasn't designed for a single pilot. This does not mean that it requires a crew of six, however - you wouldn't need someone just to operate a single panel - but it may have required at least one other person (a pilot and a navigator or co-pilot perhaps?).

Behind The Scenes:

It was originally intended that Ridley Scott - yes, that one - would design this story. However, when it became known he could only do the pre-filming at Ealing but be unavailable for the studio recordings, Verity Lambert asked that another designer be used for the sake of consistency.

This was Raymond P Cusick. In the end, the sixth episode would be designed by Jeremy Davies.

As the series progresses, designers will pick and choose which parts of the TARDIS set they will use depending on the needs of the director, and what is in the script.

A considerable part of the opening episode takes place inside the TARDIS, so the full size console room set is employed, including the partitioned off area which is to the right of the Fault Locator wall. This is where the food machine prop is also to be found.

The hexagonal floor plate which surrounded the console in the last story is no longer present.

The scene bridging the second and third episodes sees Susan return to the ship to collect the Thal drugs. Here we only see the console and a couple of walls, one of which contains the main doors. Beyond these is part of the forest set.

(It will become a convention of the series that the TARDIS doors will be to the left of the screen, but in the early days it can be seen to the rear of the console or, very occasionally, screen right).

The drugs are resting on a chair with a tasselled covering, just inside the doors. 

At the end of the story we see a shot of the console room from a high vantage point, and it can be seen that only one corner of the set has been used, along with the console itself. The scanner now appears to be positioned above the main doors, judging by where the Doctor and Ian are looking. The console is much closer to the doors.

If you look closely, you can actually see the rear of one of these walls at the back of the Dalek control room set.

A simple lighting effect was used to simulate an explosion, and the overhead lights were then dimmed.

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.