The Seeds of Death

6 episodes
Aired between 25th January 1969 and 1st March 1969

Written by Brian Hayles
Produced by Peter Bryant
Directed by Michael Ferguson

Synopsis

In the last century or so, the human race has developed a groundbreaking technology - matter transmission.  Instantaneous travel is possible across the globe, and even to the moonbase, a station that monitors and facilitates all T-Mat travel.

This system has run well for years, until a strange ship lands on the moonbase, undetected.  The ship is of course, manned by Ice Warriors who enter the control room and demand that the crew help them operate the T-Mat controls to Earth.  Osgood, the commander of the moonbase sabotages the controls and is killed for his troubles, along with half the crew.

Because Osgood sabotaged the T-Mat, the station in London recognises that something's wrong, but cannot T-Mat up to the moon to find out what.  Even the radio link goes unanswered.

Meanwhile, on the moon, Fewsham, one of the three surviving humans is ordered by the Ice Lord Slaar to fix the controls.

The other two humans, Locke and Phipps tell him not to, but he fears for his life, so begins to do as he's asked.

Back on Earth, Commander Radnor orders his second in command (and purveyor of the T-Mat technology) Gia Kelly to fix the fault.  After a quick investigation, Miss Kelly explains that the fault is on the moonbase and it can only be rectified there.  Miss Kelly says the situation is hopeless because T-Mat is the only way of getting to the moon now, but Commander Radnor has an idea of how they might solve it.

Elsewhere in London, the TARDIS lands and the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe soon discover that it's materialised inside a space museum.  The Doctor encourages them to explore, but they get a frosty welcome from the museum's curator, Professor Eldred.

He expects them all to be making fun of him when they say they're really interested in all the rocket models about.  He explains that everyone loves T-Mat, to the point where the human race gave up on the idea of space travel after the technology was discovered.  Now, rockets are nothing but museum pieces.

As they discuss things further, Commander Radnor and Miss Kelly enter the museum.  It turns out Radnor and Eldred have a history of working together, but Radnor stabbed Eldred in the back to go and work on T-Mat.  Radnor reveals that he knows Eldred has been secretly building a rocket in his back garden and says that they need it to get to the moon to fix the T-Mat system.  In return, Radnor will ensure that Eldred gets government funding to build rockets again.

Back on the moonbase, Locke, manages to get a video message to Earth explaining that they've been taken over, much to the fright of Fewsham who reckons he's going to get them all killed.  As Locke is transmitting the message, Slaar enters and smashes the comm. system up and orders Locke killed.

Everyone in the museum is stunned when Eldred refuses to use the rocket.  Radnor points out that whole continents rely on T-Mat to give food and medical supplies and if it's not repaired, millions will die.  Eldred is stubborn though and refuses, partially because it's a neener neener to Radnor, partially because he wants people to see how crap T-Mat is, and partially because the rocket has never been tested and so it's probably a suicide mission to use it.  He only reluctantly agrees when the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe become adamant that they will pilot the rocket.  Miss Kelly wants to go up too, but Radnor won't let her because she know most about T-Mat and if she dies, they're really up the creek.

The rocket is prepared and sent into space with the TARDIS crew on board.

Miss Kelly, Commander Radnor and Professor Eldred return to T-Mat control in London to monitor from there.

With the death of Locke spurring him on, Fewsham finally completes repair of the controls, bringing T-Mat back online.  He's so busy that he doesn't see Phipps sneaking out and escaping into the moonbase corridors.

Down in London, Miss Kelly sees that the T-Mat has come online and goes to meet up with Osgood and the crew on the moon, ignoring Radnors protests.  As she arrives, she sees the panicked Fewsham at the controls.  He tells her a tale about Osgood going mad, killing the crew and then taking a space walk without a pressure suit.  Kelly thinks it's a bit fishy but begins to look over the controls as the Ice Warriors wait in hiding.  Once the T-Mat is fully operational again, the Ice Warriors show up and capture Miss Kelly.

Elsewhere in the complex, Phipps finds an equipment room and patches together a radio to contact Earth and warn them.  He's soon interrupted by an Ice Warrior, but he quickly jury riggs a solar device together that melts the Ice Warrior!

The problem is that to do this, Phipps has to disconnect the homing beacon from the solar power supply.  It's a homing beacon that the rocket the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe are on will need to find its way safely to the moons surface.  Needless to say, when the Doctor and Zoe realise this, they begin panicking as they will likely either crash into the moon or float aimlessly through space forever.

Luckily for them, they manage to pick up Phipps' radio signal and follow it to the base instead.

Once safely down, the Doctor orders Jamie and Zoe to stay put whilst he goes and finds Phipps. Knowing that the Ice Warriors are aiming to invade Earth, he convinces the human that they need to destroy T-Mat.  As they go to do that though, the Ice Warriors chase them, ultimately capturing the Doctor.

As he is captive, he subtly enquires how they are going to invade Earth with such a small force.  Slaar makes it clear that they're not....just yet.  The Ice Warriors begin putting white seed pods into the T-Mat cubicle.  As the Doctor examines one, it expands and explodes, releasing some kind of dust spores into the air.

He collapses in a bout of coughing.

Elsewhere, Jamie and Zoe prepare the rocket but to their dismay find that it's useless now and cannot take off again.  This means that the T-Mat the Doctor went to destroy is the only way back to Earth.  They rush off into the base to find the Doctor and stop him before it's too late.  They eventually meet up with Phipps and a newly escaped Miss Kelly, who fill them in on what's happened.  Together they come up with a plan to turn up the heating in the base to disable the Ice Warriors.  Jamie and Phipps head off to find the thermostat.

Back in the control room, Slaar intimidates Fewsham into sending the seed pods down to all cities connected by T-Mat.  Sure enough, one arrives at the London T-Mat control.  One of the station crew examines the pod and it explodes in his face, killing him. Radnor thinking on his feet orders the extractor fans on, sucking out the harmful spore cloud. He orders the dead crewman taken away and an autopsy performed to find out how he died.

Content with the plan, Slaar turns back to the Doctor's body only to find that he's unconscious, not dead like any other human would be.  He casually orders Fewsham to T-Mat the Doctor into space.  Fewsham is wrestling with his conscience, but obeys orders.  None of them see Phipps sneak into the room and take the Doctor out of the cubicle just before the T-Mat takes place.  Abandoning the thermostat plan, Jamie and Phipps take the Doctor back to the equipment room.

Back in London, Radnor is told that the crewman died from asphyxiation.  The seeds release a fungus that depletes oxygen.

With the Doctor seemingly dealt with, Slaar next orders Fewsham to send one of his Ice Warriors down to T-Mat control in London.  Again, he argues until he's threatened with death and then relents.

As soon as the Ice Warrior reaches Earth, it goes on a rampage, killing crew and guards alike, making its way to the outside world.  Radnor and Professor Eldred barely escape alive.

They get guards to track the monster but it kills them all as they fight with the fungus spores expanding all over the countryside.

Finally alone, the Ice Warrior shambles along to the weather control station where it kills the man controlling the weather in England and sets all controls to "dry".  It then shoots them, locking them in place.

Back on moonbase, Jamie, Zoe, Phipps and Miss Kelly encounter another Ice Warrior and are forced to use the solar energy weapon again, turning the monster into slush.  Phipps places the unconscious Doctor on a table and they try to go for the thermostat again, this time taking Zoe as she's the only one small enough to fit through the vent.  They get to the control room and are soon spied by Fewsham.  He hesitates, but begins destracting the only present Ice Warrior so Zoe can sneak by and turn up the heating.  As they make their way back, the Ice Warrior sees them and kills Phipps, making Zoe freeze with fright as the Ice Warrior prepares to kill her.  She screams and begs for Fewsham to help her.

He grabs the Ice Warrior but is no match for its strength.  Luckily, the heat kicks in and the Ice Warrior collapses.

Similarly, an Ice Warrior enters the equipment store, forcing Jamie and Miss Kelly to hide.  They try to activate the solar energy weapon but it doesn't work.  The monster notices the Doctor as he begins to recover.  It prepares to deal with him, but similarly collapses when the heat level rises.

The Doctor, Jamie and Miss Kelly all go to the control room and meet up with Zoe and Fewsham.  They all T-Mat back to London, with Fewsham tricking them into believing that he'll follow last.

As they arrive in London, they find that Sir James Gregson from the UN has turned up and is demanding resolution of the T-Mat system as the world is entering crisis due to food shortages etc.

The only one who seems to want to acknowledge that the fungus expanding all over the world is somehow connected is Professor Eldred.  They plan to send up another rocket to take back the moonbase.

Back on moonbase, Fewsham acts unconscious as Slaar stumbles into the control room and manages to turn down the heating again.  He explains that they knocked him out when he refused to help them.   Slaar questions why he wouldn't help, and Fewsham states that he'd face undesirable consequences if he was to be held accountable for his actions on the moonbase.

Slaar is pleased and says that he will be allowed to live if he helps the Ice Warriors guide their fleet to the moon.  As he prepares the homing equipment and Slaar updates the Grand Marshall of the fleet, no one sees Fewsham discreetly activate the video link to London.

In T-Mat control, the Doctor and co. watch as Fewsham points out the frequency of the Ice Warrior homing beacon and the fact that if it was to be switched off or tampered with, the Ice Warrior fleet would head into the Sun.

Slaar realises what's happening a little too late and kills Fewsham for his treachery, as well as destroying the video link.  Armed with this information, the Doctor gets them to cancel the second rocket launch and use it instead to fire a satellite into space with the same frequency and thus lead the fleet into the Sun.

As the T-Mat personnel work on the satellite, the Doctor goes and gets some samples of the foamy spores and does some lab work with Professor Eldred to find out exactly what it is.  It turns out that the spores are reconditioning the Earth to be more like Mars, the Ice Warriors home planet, and moreover, they can be neutralised with simple water.  The Doctor calls Jamie and Zoe and tells them to get Radnor to contact weather control, making it rain and thus disabling the seeds effects.

Jamie and Zoe do as he's asked but find out that Radnor, Miss Kelly and Sir James Gregson are in a meeting, so they decide to head out to the weather control station themselves.  They find that the controls are bust and the crewman is dead, indicating that an Ice Warrior is inside the centre with them.

Later on, the Doctor catches up with Radnor and realises that Jamie and Zoe have gone to the station.  Eldred gasps and says that's the direction the Ice Warrior was headed when they lost it.  The Doctor rushes out into the foamy fungus landscape to get them.  He gets to the weather control station, but bangs on the door as the seeds begin to inflate and explode around him.

Hearing the Doctor's cries, Jamie distracts the Ice Warrior, allowing Zoe to pull him inside just in time.

Jamie locks the Ice Warrior inside the control room, buying the Doctor just enough time to create another solar powered weapon. As the Ice Warrior begins to cut through the door, more human guards turn up to get shot by the green scaly alien.

The Doctor emerges from the store and mushes the Ice Warrior.

Once the threat is gone, the Doctor has enough time to get the wires of the control board and bypass the shot controls, setting them to heavy rain.  Jamie complains when it doesn't cause a downpour immediately.  The Doctor reassures him that it takes time.  Together, they head back to T-Mat control, taking the now portable solar powered gun with them,

When they get back, they discover that the satellite has just been launched.  The Doctor takes the solar gun and goes up to moonbase to destroy the Ice Warrior signal.  He kills the lone warrior guarding the signal, but he's captured by Slaar and his remaining Ice Warrior.

The Ice Lord gets the Doctor to confess his intent to destroy the beacon, and it looks like he's failed, but the Ice Warrior fleet starts to follow the satellite into the Sun.  Slaar is furious when he realises that the Doctor has simply limited the range of their homing signal, making it useless.  In a rage, he orders the Doctor to be killed, but the Doctor grabs hold of the Ice Warriors hand, aiming it instead at Slaar.

The Ice Warrior goes into a rage and intends to kill the Doctor, but Jamie comes through the T-Mat and provides an eleventh hour save, ending the Ice Warrior threat forever.

The Doctor and Jamie return to Earth, finding Radnor and Eldred arguing about the prospects of relocating all T-Mat functions to London, thus putting their eggs once again into one basket.  Eldred asks the Doctor for his opinion but discovers that he, Jamie and Zoe have all sneaked off into the rain.

Back at the museum, Jamie complains that the Doctor set the rain to come down too heavy.  The Doctor grumbles that some people are never satisfied and all three enter the TARDIS, off on their next adventure.

Trivia

• Brian Hayles' original script called for the TARDIS to go to Mars itself, where they would find significantly more backstory on the Ice Warriors, including offshoot races.  Unfortunately, the story included mind control beams which were too similar to the modus operandi of the Cybermen in the Invasion being written at the time, so the script was bought, but never used.  Hayles was however asked to come up with a different story, which ended up as the Seeds of Death.

• Watch carefully at the scene where the Doctor is trapped outside the weather station and you might just see the subtle differences in his appearence between when the outdoor locations were shot and the studio shots.

• Also notice when Zoe lets the Doctor in, Wendy Padbury couldn't stop herself from laughing when the Doctor slips on the floor.  It made the cut and thus her beaming grin is on the finished article.

• This story gained a bit of a bit of an urban legend.  For the location shots, the production crew used Hampstead Heath.  Between filming, the actor playing the Ice Warrior lit up a cigarrette and stood by a tree minding his own business.  It just so happened (as the story goes) that a lady was driving past and was so shocked by the sight of the "alien" that she crashed her car into the curb / a tree / a police car depending on which version you believe.  

What worked

• Fewsham's cowardly reasons work really well and the acting is superb

• The Ice Lord costume sort of worked, although the helmet looks very suggestive.

• One final outing of the foam machine and in an outdoor setting provided much fun, mainly because of Patrick Troughton's facial expressions.

• The solar gun effect is awesome

What didn't work

• The monotonous voice of the computer that can't seem to understand the meaning of full stops.  I mean, imagine if your smartphone talked to you like that alllllll day long.  No wonder Radnor keeps telling it to stop the reports!

• What madman builds a thermostat that can go up to 100 degrees C?!

• I guess it's the same madman that builds and extractor fan that can suck the air out of a control room in double quick time!

• Ok, so following the Ice Warriors plan, they might get London, but how do they think they'll control the other cities without controlling the weather?

• Is everyone so inept that they can't manually steer a spacecraft to a planet they can see without a radio beacon?

Overall feelings

Ask anyone born up to 1985 if they liked Superman III as a kid and you'll be hard pressed to find anyone who didn't, myself included.  However, I watched it the other day with my friend and you would not believe how surreal and illogical it all is.  Sure, everyone's acting is superbly corny and funny, especially Richard Pryor, but I couldn't help shake my head at all the random and frankly bonkers stuff that happens in it.

What has this got to do with Doctor Who?

Well, if you ask anyone who likes the classic series of Doctor Who if they like the Seeds of Death and I'll wager that the majority of people will say it's a great episode without strictly noting why.

The background for the story is initially elaborate and the premise of poisonous pods being used to suffucate everyone on earth is refreshingly good.  Likewise is the moral quandary of Fewsham.  The actor really pulls this off and gives us a sense of urgency about his plight.  On the surface, this story IS great, and it's the last Troughton example of a base under siege which adds extra nostalgia.  However, look under the thin veneer and it just doesn't stand up well at all.

To really enjoy some of the classic series, it's a prerequisite to be able to look beyond the shoddy rubber costumes and rickety sets.  This story made it impossible, not because of the sets or the costumes (although the crew shell suits are a bit much).  The biggest problem is just the rationalisation of everything.  The fact that people stopped wanting to go into space because they found T-Mat; the fact that there's absolutely no failsafe for T-Mat crashing; the speed in which nations go into crisis; the lack of foresight for the Ice Warriors to realise that if it rains on Earth their plans will fail or the scope of troops they would need to capture all weather control bases on Earth in an impossibly short amount of time, and lets not forget the fact that like the Wheel in Space and the Invasion, nobody can pilot a ship without a homing beacon and if it goes wrong, you automatically get sent to the Sun.

A lot of these faults could perhaps be forgiven if the story was shorter, because they wouldn't have needed half of the excuses, but there we go.

Rating

6 out of 10

A half decent attempt at a base under siege, but spoiled by rubbish logic

Rewatchability Factor

6 out of 10

Quite boring to watch through in its entirety, but it still has some good bits.

Watch this if you liked...

• The Moonbase

• The Ice Warriors

• The Wheel in Space

• Fury From the Deep

Consulting the Matrix

What was the most bonkers part of this story for you?

The Krotons

4 episodes
Aired between 28th December 1968 and 18th January 1969

Written by Robert Holmes
Produced by Peter Bryant
Directed by David Maloney

Synopsis

On a faraway planet, a primitive society called the Gonds undertake a ceremony to celebrate and acknowledge their two brightest students.  Abu-Gond (male) and Vana-Gond (female).  As the smartest of their student body, they have been selected to go and assist the other race of beings on this world, a mysterious race known as the Kroton's.

Everyone is really happy about all this, except Vana's lover Thara-Gond (yes, everyone is a Gond).  The reason why he's upset is because those who are chosen as assistants enter through a metal doorway into a complex, never to return.  Despite Thara's insistence that he doesn't want Vana to go, his father Selris (who is also leader of the Gond's) says it is the only way, as the centuries old law states that this is what must happen, and he dare not risk incurring the wrath of the secretive Krotons.

Elsewhere on the planet, the TARDIS materialises in a desolate landscape.

When they emerge, Jamie immediately notices that the place stinks of rotten eggs.  The Doctor smiles and says that it's a mixture of Sulphur and ozone.  Zoe wants to leave for somewhere more pleasant, but the Doctor wanders off, carrying an umbrella with him to protect his delicate skin from the rays of the twin suns beaming down on them.

Soon the group crest a ridge that leads down to a strange looking city.  The Doctor remarks that the people who built it must be used to low gravity environments.  The TARDIS crew go down and explore, finding a strange metal building half buried in the ground, and containing a strange metal door.  The Doctor identifies it as part of a machine rather than a building, just as the door begins to open.

They all hide, watching from cover as a dazed and confused Abu-Gond emerges from the door.  From the sides of the doorway, tubes emerge and spray a cloud like acid at him, evaporating him in seconds.

The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe are naturally horrified and begin working their way around the machine to discover where the woozy man had come from.

They eventually stumble into the Gond celebration ceremony as Thara and Selris argue over whether or not Vana is going to be sent inside the machine to work for the Krotons.  The Gond's are astounded at the sight of the Doctor and co, as they believe the outside world to be an uninhabitable death zone.  They initially point their spears at the Doctor, but Jamie gets himself into a brawl with one of the Gonds.  As this commotion is going off, Vana ends up being taken inside the machine as the doors open.

The Doctor shouts out to stop her but it's too late.  He explains to the primitive Gonds that the world outside is in fact totally okay to walk in (even if it is a sulphuric wasteland), and explains about Abu-Gond's untimely death by the acid jets.  The Gonds are shocked and few can believe that they've been sending students into the machine for hundreds of years, just for them to die at the other end.  The Doctor, Jamie, and Zoe waste no time waiting for the Gonds to come around to the revelation.  They rush back out onto the surface to reach the other end of the machine before Vana gets an acid bath.  Thara goes with them,  They get there just in time and manage to block the holes where the jets emerge from, dragging her dazed form to safety as she emerges from the machine.  As they examine her, it turns out she's virtually in a coma.

The group carry her back to the city where she can be tended to.  Inside, Selris tries to make sense of everything that the Doctor has told him.  He explains that for centuries, the Krotons have remained hidden within the machine, but have provided the Gonds with education via the use of computer terminals.  This was a sort of brokered peace treaty after the Krotons arrived from outer space and waged war upon the Gonds, devastating the planets environment in the process.  The Doctor isn't impressed with the set up, decrying it as self-perpetuating slavery.

Thana is also dissatisfied with the society too.  Now he knows of the true fate of the students, he leads a party of student boys into the learning room (where they keep the computer terminals) and gets them to smash them up, in the hopes that it will force the Krotons out of the machine.  From the machine, a loud booming voice calls out for the students to leave the area at once.  The Doctor and Selris turn up to try and stop the students destruction, but it's too late.  A large metallic hose / snake emerges from the wall, moving menacingly towards the Doctor.

He raises his hands in front of him (seemingly in fear) and discovers that the snake-like device goes dormant when it cannot see his features.

One of the students attacks the snake, but is killed by its acid spray.  Inexplicably, the snake then returns into the wall of the machine.  The Doctor theorises that it's got limited logic and that it was told to kill one person - him.  Now that it's killed someone, it believes it's accomplished its mission.

The voice of the Krotons booms out again, ordering them to leave the area.  Seeing no advantage in pushing things further, they all obey.

As the Doctor and Zoe discuss things with Selris, it becomes apparent that the Gonds have only limited technical knowledge, and a lot of their understanding has gaps in it.  Selris explains that the Krotons tell them what to learn and all the knowledge, everything they know is given to them by the Krotons.  The Doctor and Zoe decide to re-enter the teaching room to investigate the computer consoles further.  On the way, Selris leads the Doctor on a little detour to show him underneath the teaching chamber, revealing that the learning modules have root like structures running under the floor.

When the Doctor and Selris catch up to Zoe, the Doctor is shocked to see that she has taken it upon herself to complete one of the tests the console gives the students.

It turns out that she scored twice as high as any Gond has ever done, a fact that she is overjoyed at, even if its part of the machine's brainwashing process.  The Doctor chastises her for the foolish move, and is horrified when she's summoned to join the Krotons almost immediately.

The Doctor has little choice but to take the test himself so that he can travel with her into the machine.  At first he does terribly. but soon gets the hang of it, and scores pretty high too.

The Krotons indeed summon him as well.

The door to the machine opens, and the Doctor and Zoe enter.  They soon find a pair of chairs and sit in them.  A device lowers from the ceiling and begins to convert their mental prowess into energy.

 The energy travels from the device to a couple of glass tanks nearby, both of which contain a bubbling crystalline solution that is forming together into matter.  The Doctor and Zoe realise that their combined mass intellect has been enough to start the process, whereas the Gond's limited knowledge has not.  The Doctor gathers a small bottle of the solution and they both run off to the other end of the machine.

They escape through the outer doors with a bit of mica that the Doctor found earlier, and evading the acid jets just in time.

The Krotons, now fully formed rise up to take control of their machine once more.  They recognise that the Doctor and Zoe aren't Gonds and decide that they need to capture them again.

Back in the Gond city, Selris tells Jamie that the Doctor and Zoe have gone inside the machine.  He is distraught and tries everything he can to get inside to rescue them.  He eventually gains entry by using an iron rod as a crowbar.  He's soon captured by the Krotons who know he's not a Gond either.  They put him under the same mental probe as the Doctor and Zoe underwent, but they soon recognise that because he's not a "high brain" like the Doctor or Zoe, it's likely that the mental probe will destroy him.

The Krotons turn off the machine, deciding that Jamie can actually prove himself useful by giving them more information about their race and how they came to the planet.  As they show him images of the Doctor and Zoe escaping to the TARDIS, they discover from Jamie that they are time travellers.

Back in the Gond city, Security Chief Eelek-Gond approaches Scientist Beta-Gond and starts asking him how they can fight the Krotons.

Beta shares Eeleks willingness to act against the Krotons but he's smart enough to realise that everything they've been taught has come from the Krotons themselves, therefore their weapons and scientific knowledge is inadequate.  They need time to research alternative weapons and science.  But Eelek is impatient as he wants a quick way to rise to power and overtake Selris.  He says that if the scientist won't help them, they will simply opt for an all out frontal assault on the machine with slings and fireballs.

With the information at hand, the Krotons decide that they need to go and capture the Doctor.  One of them leaves, whilst the other uses a comm. link to relate directions to it (they are effectively blind outside the machine they call the dynatrope).  As it leaves, the Kroton takes a large canister shaped weapon with it.

The remaining Gonds go to a council meeting to decide their next course of action.  Selris turns up, only to find that they've chosen Eelek to replace him.  He tries to reason with the warmonger, but his pleas fall on deaf ears.

Despite Jamie's fears that the Doctor and Zoe may have retreated to the TARDIS to fly off and leave him, they re-emerge from the TARDIS, having analysed the bottle of solution using the TARDIS' lab equipment.  They gather sulphurous rocks from the landscape for a plan that the Doctor is keeping close to his chest for now.

The first Kroton turns up and holds them prisoner, but Jamie seizes the opportunity whilst the second Kroton is distracted, to grab one of the canister weapons and use it.

The second Kroton is temporarily stunned and cannot relay directions to the first Kroton, thus allowing the Doctor and Zoe to run off.  Jamie is knocked unconscious, and the second Kroton returns, giving orders to destroy the TARDIS.  The first Kroton fires the canister weapon at the ship, and it disappears within the cloud of acid.

Zoe believes that the TARDIS is destroyed, but the Doctor assures her its fine.  Seconds later, as the Kroton wanders off, it reappears higher up the quarry side.  The Doctor explains that it was all part of the Hostile Action Displacement (HADS) system that he'd set on board the ship before they left.  Whenever it's attacked, the TARDIS relocates itself.

Back in the Gond city, Selris and Beta decide to take their own course of action, correctly assuming that the frontal attack will be suicide.  They attempt to draw the Krotons out of the Dynatrope by attacking the computer consoles, just as Thara did, but this time they do it by attacking the root structure underneath.

As the attack gets underway, and the rest of the Gond city is evacuated, the Doctor and Zoe return, finding Thara leaving with the recently recovered Vana.  Thara tells them what his father, Selris, is attempting to do, but the Doctor thinks its a foolish idea.  He rushes off with Zoe to stop them before its too late.  On his way, he still has time to drop the rocks of sulphur in with Beta with instructions on how to turn them into a weapon.  Beta tells him that Jamie is inside the Dynatrope, which spurs the Doctor on all the more.

Zoe, Thara and the Doctor reach the under hall as Selris' attack is complete.  The Doctor tells them to get out quickly as the ceiling begins to give way, but he's buried under rubble in the process along with Thara. The cave in is extensive, but luckily, the Doctor emerges from it fine.  Thara on the other hand, is hurt.  The Doctor chastises Selris for the plan, but soon sees that it had limited success, somehow damaging the Dynatrope.

Inside the machine, Jamie recovers and sneaks off to escape whilst the two Krotons try to stabilise the place.  He uses a piece of mica on the floor to break the door lock and get out, avoiding the acid jets once more.  He goes back into the city and meets up with the Doctor and Zoe.

They're all happy he's okay, and Jamie is soon set to work helping Beta make sulphuric acid from the rocks they brought back.

As Selris and Eelek argue in front of the machine as to the effectiveness of Selris' plan, it turns out that it did have the desired effect.The first Kroton emerges from the Dynatrope and demands that they return the two high brains (the Doctor and Zoe) to them.  Eelek gets cunning and extracts a promise from the Kroton that if the Doctor and Zoe are handed over, and they help the Krotons to repair the Dynatrope and power it with enough energy to leave the planet (because the Dynatrope is really a spaceship stranded on the planet for centuries), then they will leave the Gonds in peace.  Under that premise, Eelek sets about kidnapping the Doctor and Zoe and force them into the Dynatrope.  Selris again tries to make Eelek see the truth that the Krotons will not honour their words and will simply kill the Gonds as they leave.  His words once again fall on deaf ears.

As the Doctor and Zoe are shoved inside the Dynatrope, Selris realises that the strange visitors plan is the only way they can truly defeat the Krotons, and so he grabs a newly made bottle of Sulphuric acid and dives into the Dynatrope after them, getting disintigrated as he passes the bottle to the Doctor.

The Krotons complain that the mental energy that was drained from the Doctor and Zoe is running low.  They have little time to lift off before they return to a soup like crystalline solution, and it requires four high brains to pilot the craft.  The Doctor realises that and with the help of Zoe, he stalls for time.  He palms the sulphuric acid off to Zoe who discreetly pours the contents into the glass vats, where it travels up life support tubes into the Krotons themselves, dissolving them into a puddle of mush.

Jamie and Beta finally complete cooking up a vat of acid and pour it onto the Dynatrope, disolving the ship as the Doctor and Zoe escape, thus ending the rule of the Krotons.

All the Gonds are happy, and as the TARDIS crew leave, Thara states that he will take up his father's mantle of ruler and depose Eelek.

Beta shares his excitement of learning lots of cool new science tricks from the Doctor, but is gutted to find that when he turns round, the strange visitor has returned to his ship, leaving the planet of the Gonds forever.

Trivia

• This story was originally submitted by Holmes during season 2, but it was turned down because the Krotons were felt to be too similar to the Mechanioids (see the Chase).  He resubmitted the proposal on a whim when he found the manuscript lying about as he moved house.  To his surprise, it was accepted.

• As you will have seen by now, the scripts at the BBC production office were in utter chaos.  Terrence Dicks got hold of Holme's script and liked it.  When he approached Derrick Sherwin and Peter Bryant with it, they turned it down as they already had something in mind for the slot called Prison in Space. They did allow him to keep it on the backburner though.

• The Prison in Space was to be a story about a matriarchal society that brainwashes Zoe to join their ranks and, as the name implies, imprisons the Doctor and Jamie.  It was to include such controversial things such as Jamie in drag, and the Doctor breaking Zoe's conditioning by slapping her on the bum.  It also included an exit for Frazers character.  

• As it turned out, the Prison in Space's author, Dick Sharples, became frustrated with the sheer amount of re-writes Sherwin and Bryant were asking him to do.  He was eventually paid off and the script became unusable.  Luckily, Dicks stepped up at the eleventh hour with Holme's story that was slotted in.   

• As a point of interest, the Prison in Space was eventually used by the Two Ronnies as a basis for their comedy serial - the worm that turned (apparently).

What worked

• The use of other senses to describe the world adds another dimension to the world

• The progression of a changing belief within the Gond's thanks to the Doctor and co's arrival

• The fact that Zoe can spend some time with the Doctor, it gives us a lot more of a sense of how they interact

• The interaction between Zoe and the Doctor is really funny and a welcome change to Jamie hogging all the companion spotlight

• The use of acid is something we've not seen too much of before, and an organic spaceship seems quite cool.  It's a concept explored much better in the Third Doctor's reign, but it started here

What didn't work

• The fact that the Krotons turn the mind probe on, just to serve as a cliff hanger and then turn it off again at the start of episode three.  That's lazy writing from someone who I'd never suspect it to come from

• I can't get away from it.  The Kroton costumes are just horrendous.  I bet the crew fell about laughing

• There's a bit in the end of the story where the Doctor realises that there might be a tremendous explosion, and then it's never mentioned again as the ship just quietly dissolves instead

• The Kroton weapons

• The fact that the Gonds just carry on arguing about sending Vana into the Dynatrope, even though a strange alien enters the city from a place previously thought uninhabitable.

Overall Feelings

Just in case you didn't know. Robert Holmes would go on to be THE best Doctor Who writer that the show has ever had (yes, even better than Steven Moffatt in my humble opinion).  With that kind of lofty position, many fans would paradoxically expect me to be saying things like "this story was awful beyond belief and deserves never to be watched again".  Many fans think this,  I don't...quite.

There's a lot to like about the Krotons and even if they're not immediately obvious, there's some hallmarks here of good writing.  For a start, the initial scenes give us a rich history of this alien world, and thanks to the doctors intervention, he sets off a cultural change, where people begin to question the authority of their masters and take an interest in their society once more.  This is brilliant because its far richer than 90% of Troughton's stories.  The Krotons culture is equally interesting, with their use of unusual terms such as high brains, Dynatropes and dispersed.

The problem with the Krotons is that the only thing of interest is the quirkiness.  The monsters cannot be taken seriously for their looks and the fact that they need high brains to grow new bodies, but yet restrict the level of knowledge they receive.  Similarly, they need high brains to pilot their way off the planet but yet choose the most intelligent Gonds and kill them.

The whole sub plot with Eelek is pointless, even if Phil Maddock plays the part well.  He wants a frontal attack and in the end does nothing.  He declares himself leader but does nothing to stop the Doctor and co. ruining his day.

The story has lots of interesting ideas and nice subtle touches to how the cultures and characters have developed, but it's otherwise quite a static story with lots of false starts in the tension department.

Rating

6 out of 10

Rewatchability Factor

4 out of 10

Watch this if you liked...

• The Savages

• The Macra Terror

• The Claws of Axos

• The Face of Evil

• The Trial of a Time Lord (episodes 1-4)

Consulting the Matrix

Do you think that the Krotons should return?