4 episodes
Aired between 22nd November 1975 and 13th December 1975
Written by Terry Nation
Produced by Phillip Hinchcliffe
Directed by Barry Letts
Synopsis
The TARDIS finally lands in the English countryside in the 20th century. The Doctor emerges, explaining that whilst he knows they're in the right time, they could be miles and miles from London.
He offers Sarah Jane a bottle of Ginger Pop that he's picked up from inside (presumably the perfect drink to enjoy on a warm summer's day). As it happens, Sarah Jane hates Ginger Pop.
Together, they set off, looking for the nearest sign of civilisation so they can figure out how to get to London. It's not long before they come across four men in white space suits. The Doctor jovially asks them for directions, but the men point their fingers at them and fire bullets out of their fingertips! The Doctor and Sarah are forced to flee as the spacemen chase them off into the woods.
As they evade the spacemen, the Doctor and Sarah find that the woods open up suddenly to a nearby quarry where Sarah nearly has a nasty fall over the edge. The Doctor just manages to help her up in time.
As they recover from the avoided fall, the pair of them see a soldier, twitching and stumbling towards the edge of the quarry. Their shouts go unheard and the soldier throws himself off the side, killing himself into the rocks below. When the Doctor searches the soldier's body, he finds a stack of coins, all freshly minted.
They also find some kind of clam shell pod in the bottom of the quarry that the Doctor finds familiar but cannot place.
Before the pair can investigate further, shots ring out, indicating that the spacemen have found them again. The Doctor and Sarah flee once more until they find the small village of Devesham, a place Sarah's visited two years previously for a story about a nearby Space Defence Station. Now, Devesham seems odd though, as the streets are deserted, along with the local pub - the Fleur De Lys, There's more evidence of freshly minted coins in the till, and lots of half-drunk glasses on the tables.
As the Doctor and Sarah investigate, they see through the window, a flat back van pull up, carrying a load of people all looking like they're under mind control.
They've been brought their by a couple of the spacemen. One of the Spacemen lets them out of the van, and the people begin to go through the town, with a lot of them heading to the pub. The Doctor and Sarah hide just in time. The villagers silently walk to the pub, sit down at the tables (and the landlord moves behind the bar) and they all stand quietly.
One of those people is the soldier that supposedly committed suicide. As the clock in the pub strikes 8, the people suddenly start moving and acting normal.
The Doctor decides to take the back way out of the pub and go investigate the Space Defence Station nearby. He gives Sarah the TARDIS key and tells her to meet him back there. Sarah stays a little longer after the Doctor has left and watches the pub's patrons, but is eventually discovered by the dead soldier. All the villagers turn to look at her as she tries to fast talk her way out of the situation. The Landlord suggests she might be part of "the test". When Sarah enquirers further, the soldier warns her that she should go.
Outside, Sarah manages to run to the flat back van and hide behind it without being seen. She observes one of the spacemen looking around with his visor up and sees that he has only electronic circuits where his face should be. She decides to leg it back to the TARDIS and gets there, only to find one of the strange pods next to it. She leaves the TARDIS key in the lock as she investigates the pod, and is surprised to see that the blue box dematerialises, leaving her stranded. The pod opens up and she's grabbed by a man inside it. Sarah manages to break free and runs away again, into the woods.
Meanwhile, the Doctor gets to the Space Defence Station. He sees a UNIT soldier there and asks him where his commanding officer is, but the soldier just stands motionless and silent. The Doctor wanders into the complex, and the solider turns to wander after him.
Elsewhere in the complex, a one-eyed man called Guy Crayford is working in one of the offices. He is called over an intercom by someone called Styggron. Styggron explains that there's a "random unit" inside the complex somewhere and orders Guy to check it out. Guy obeys and goes off to search, leaving his office open.
The Doctor finds that office, but it's labelled with the Brigadier's name. Guy finds the Doctor and holds him at gunpoint. The Doctor asks for an explanation and identifies himself as UNIT's Scientific Advisor. Guy seems to have heard of him and explains that the Brigadier has gone to Geneva, leaving Colonel Faraday in command.
Guy suggests that the Doctor will have to be detained until someone can verify his identity, but the Doctor has other ideas, he flips over the desk and knocks Guy off guard, allowing him to make a run for it. He is chased over the complex roof, getting shot at by UNIT troops until he's captured once more by the spacemen with pointy fingers and led back to detention.
Sarah meanwhile has found the Doctor and watches them lead him to prison from her hiding place. She sneaks in after them and starts to unlock the Doctor's cell door, unaware that an alien figure is watching her from secret.
Sarah frees the Doctor, and they escape. They hide in a cupboard as the alarm sounds.
Whilst hiding, the Doctor tells Sarah about meeting Crayford but she insists it's impossible as he was the reason she was investigating Devesham. It turns out he was an astronaut that went missing whilst on a mission to test a new ship called the XK-5.
They eventually decide to sneak out of the building but end up meeting Sgt Benton who points a pistol at them. He gets a message from Crayford however saying that Styggron has ordered them taken alive. The momentary confusion allows the Doctor and Sarah to run off, throwing the UNIT pursuers off their scent long enough to run to the nearby woods.
The pair are pursued by UNIT soldiers with tracker dogs. Sarah twists her ankle in the escape and is forced to hide up a tree, whilst the Doctor takes her scarf to lead the dogs away from her and ends up planting it in a bush and diving in a nearby reservoir.
The soldiers find the scarf and look around, ultimately capturing Sarah as she hops down from the tree and tries to sneak away.
Back at the space centre, Styggron issues new orders to Crayford to locate but not detain the Doctor as Styggron has other plans for him.
Sarah Jane awakens to find herself in an alien control room strapped to a table. Harry Sullivan is there, once again being on the side of the bad guys. He tells her it's no point in struggling as he turns on a mind probe under the orders of Styggron.
The Doctor meanwhile makes it back to the village. He goes to the pub that is now deserted, except for the landlord. He tries the phone but it is dead.
The landlord said the line has been brought down by a gale. As he's drinking more Ginger Pop, the Doctor finds more unusual things such as a dart board with no holes from darts in it, plastic horse brasses and a calendar with only one day, repeated.
Back in the alien control room, Styggron is met by another alien of his kind - Marshal Chedaki who argues that they don't need to do anymore experiments. Styggron disagrees, but orders the final test to commence.
In the Fleur De-Lys, the phone miraculously rings. It's Sarah who says she's escaped from the soldiers and is hiding in the corner shop. The Doctor agrees to meet her and hangs up, but immediately tests the line again, finding that it is once more completely dead. He goes and meets her, narrowly avoiding being seen by more of the spacemen robots hanging around the village.
He comments on the phone as he hands Sarah a bottle of Ginger Pop, saying he thinks they're being tested to see how smart they are. Sarah takes a long drink and thanks him.
They decide to try and get to the TARDIS and radio for help from there, but once they get to the spot where it was, they find that it's gone.
The Doctor is confused as to why, but asks suspiciously for the TARDIS key from Sarah. She claims she's lost it, but the Doctor says matter of factly that she's never had it because she's not the real Sarah, and they're not really on Earth.
Sarah pulls a gun on the Doctor and the Doctor explains that he knew she was a fake as the real Sarah had lost her scarf and hates Ginger Pop, whereas this Sarah both had a scarf, and took a drink. He uses his explanation as a distraction to knock the gun out of the fake Sarah's hand and grabs her, throwing her to the ground and demanding to know where the real Sarah Jane is. As the Sarah Jane falls to the floor, her face comes off to reveal a bunch of electronic circuits - she is an android!
Back in the Kraal base, Chedaki berrates Styggron for his failed experiment with Sarah Jane. Styggron is not phased by this. He tells Chedaki that he's going to blow up the village anyway with a Matter-Dissolving bomb, so it really doesn't matter that the Doctor's realised Sarah is fake and has escaped. Chedaki questions why they're keeping the real Sarah Jane alive, and Styggron tells him he wants to test out the virus he's going to use to wipe out all the humans on Earth with it. The Kraals wander off, quarreling with each other, and Sarah Jane gets up from playing possum and sneaks off.
The Doctor goes back to the village just in time to see it being evacuated, and gets caught by Styggron himself.
He's tied up to a stone cross at the head of the village and left with the Matter-Dissolving Bomb ticking away. Lucky for him, the real Sarah Jane turns up after Styggron has left him to die.
Sarah uses the sonic screwdriver to cut through his ropes and they manage to run into the Kraal spaceship just as the bomb goes off, revealing a desolate and rocky alien landscape - in other words, that of Oseidon, the Kraal home planet.
They're both immediately captured and placed in a cell. Whilst there, the Doctor theorises that the radiation levels of the planet must be slowly rising and the landscape will soon be uninhabitable, that's why the Kraals are planning their invasion of Earth by using a fake Devesham as a training ground. Crayford visits them, and it soon becomes apparent that Crayford has been brainwashed from the start into believing that Styggron helped him when he was lost in space.
He's even convinced Crayford that humanity will be spared. In a bid to make the Doctor come round to his way of thinking, Crayford explains the plan of sending down androids in the space pods that Earth will somehow mistake for meteorites and then they will take over the space station and thereafter key positions of power.
Meanwhile, Styggron goes through with his test and orders the android Harry Sullivan to place a drop of the virus in a water jug and sends it to the cell for the Doctor and Sarah.
As the water is sent to the cell, the Doctor and Sarah are trying to pull up the wiring from a conduit in the floor so they can electrocute their android guard. When the water comes, they leave it in the cell and take the Doctor forcefully to Styggron. As Sarah is about to drink it, the Doctor shouts out not to waste a drop as it's a good conductor. Sarah decides to do as the Doctor suggests and therefore doesn't drink the poisoned water.
When the Doctor reaches Styggron, he's strapped into an analysis machine that will painfully extract all his memories and experiences into a databank so they can create an android of him.
Given that the Doctor will die from the process, he sees no reason to hide the truth from the Doctor that he will indeed destroy humanity because it would be inefficient to leave such an inferior species alive. Styggron sets the machine off and leaves it to run.
Sarah meanwhile manages to get the wire and place it in a pool of the water. She gets the guard to come in, and his chest explodes with the sudden voltage from the shock. She races through the ship just in time to save the Doctor by switching off the machine.
Together, they race through the ship to Crayford's rocket ship. Inside, they find a host of the space pods. The Doctor warns Sarah that they've got to get inside them asap or they'll be crushed by the G-Force of take off. The intent is for the pods to be released just before Crayford gets on the Earth scanner, and there's no guarantee that they will withstand heat of re-entry, or if they will have enough oxygen to survive. They're too slow getting into the pods and the G-Forces cause them to black out.
As the Doctor and Sarah eventually recover in the hold of Crayford's ship, they fail to notice one of the pods that bears a replica of the Doctor himself.
Back on Earth, UNIT is working from the Space Defense Station in Devesham, just like Crayford would have guessed. They've found the TARDIS that mysteriously turned up in the woods nearby with the key in the lock, and Harry and Sgt Benton have been searching for the Doctor ever since.
In the station itself, two of the staff: Grierson and Matthews pick up Crayfords rocket back on the scanners, as well as the mysterious meteorites. They inform Colonel Faraday who is covering for the Brigadier whilst he's out at Geneva.
The pods meanwhile have all been ejected and land in the near vicinity of the station. The Doctor's doesn't land near Sarah's, so he goes off looking for her.
Sarah lands near the woods and it isn't long before she locates the TARDIS. The Doctor taps her on her shoulder but it becomes clear very quickly that he's the android Doctor, and he's backed up by another Sarah Jane android.
Sarah is forced to leg it into the woods.
At the station, Crayford makes radio contact and begins preparation to land. Noone knows Styggron is inside the ship with the virus.
Once it's landed, Harry and Colonel Faraday head off to the rocket to greet Crayford.
The real Doctor turns up at the station too late. He uses his UNIT pass to get past the UNIT soldier who "killed himself" on Oseidon. Once inside, he finds Benton who explains where Harry and Colonel Faraday are. The Doctor orders Benton to go and stop them entering the ship and then gives instructions to Grierson to amend the radar dish electronics. Grierson is a bit confused as if he points the radar dish down at Earth as the Doctor then suggests, he will scramble all the electronics for miles. That is precisely what the Doctor wants to happen though.
Benton does as he's told, but he's knocked out on the way by his own android replica! They return to the scanner room and Faraday demands an explanation. They go to Faraday's office and the Doctor informs them all of the Kraal invasion, but it's too late. Faraday, Harry and Benton are all androids now. The android Doctor shows up and points a gun at the real Doctor, who quickly closes the door and dives through Faraday's office window to escape.
Outside, the Doctor runs into Sarah and together they sneak back into scanner room, bluffing their way past the android Benton as they do so.
Once in the scanner room, Sarah heads off to the rocket to find the real Harry and Faraday.
The real Grierson gets the electronic work completed but is shot in the shoulder by the android Doctor before he can switch it on. The android Doctor has the upper hand and is about to kill the real Doctor when Crayford enters with Styggron. Crayford is appalled at the android Doctor and rages at Styggron for almost killing the Doctor when he promised there'd be no casualties. Styggron is contemptible to Crayford and tells him they're all going to die by the virus anyway. The real Doctor opens Crayford's eyes literally by explaining that Crayford's been brainwashed, even to the point of Styggron convincing him that he saved his life and took his eye out in the operation.
Crayford goes to a nearby mirror and whips off his eye patch, realising the real Doctor's right. He rushes out of the control room and gives the real Doctor time enough to act. He rushes the android Doctor and in the struggle, the radar is activated, scrambling all the Kraal signals to the androids and freezing them all.
On Crayford's ship, Sarah Jane finally finds the real Harry and Faraday and unties them. Styggron enters and threatens them. Crayford enters and attacks Styggron, angry that he's been duped. Crayford gets the full blast of Styggron's gun and dies but the Doctor turns up and finishes the job, punching Styggron and causing him to fall onto his on bottle of the virus, killing the Kraal in a rather unpleasant manner but not before he gets to shoot the Doctor in revenge.
Sarah is heartbroken until she discovers that the Doctor was really the android Doctor that had been re-programmed.
A short time later, the real Doctor and the real Sarah Jane head back out to the woods where they find the TARDIS waiting. Sarah says she's going to get a taxi home rather than mess around getting lost all the time in the TARDIS. The Doctor however makes an offer to take her straight home and she smiles saying "how can I resist?" Together, they both enter the ship and it dematerialises on the way to yet another adventure.
Trivia
- This was only the second time Terry Nation wrote anything other than a Dalek story for Dr Who. The other was The Keys of Marinus
- This was the penultimate story that Terry Nation would write for this series
- This was however the last time that Barry Letts would direct for this series
- This is the last appearance on screen (excluding video images) of Sgt Benton and Harry Sullivan. Both actors said they didn't enjoy making this one.
- It's worth mentioning Ian Marter who played Harry. His connection with Doctor Who didn't quite end there. He went on to write a significant portion of the Doctor Who target novels. He unfortunately died in 1986 from a heart attack at just 42.
- Nicholas Courtney was approached to play the Brigadier in this story, but he'd already committed to a theatre tour and so couldn't make it.
- One person who was in it though, was our old pal Roy Skelton, playing Chedaki. His voice is the closest to Zippy we've come yet.
- Continuing the theme of re-told horror movies, this is based upon Invasion of the Body Snatchers
- The chemistry between Tom Baker and Lis Sladen is really working well here
- The mystery of the deserted village and the freshly minted coins is great
- The faceless androids are creepy too
- The dead telephone ringing adds a nice touch of horror to the story too
What didn't work
- A lot of the Kraal plan doesn't make sense. Like, why blow up the village when it's on your home planet, and why leave the Doctor in easily escapable death traps
- The fact that Crayford is baying for the Doctor's blood one minute, then wanting him alive the next. It's even mentioned in the story.
- So...Crayford's not bothered to lift his eye patch in two years?
- Why are UNIT milling around the Space Defence Station anyway?
- How come nobody thinks the meteorite shower is strange, until they start slowing down and even then, not doing anything about it?
- How can Crayford know that UNIT would be at the Space Defence Station, to the point of even knowing that the Brigadier would be away?
This story is a mixed bag. Distant memory of previous views of it seemed to recall that it was ultimately boring and a farce. Upon watching it, before reading any other reviews, it came out a lot more favorably as being "better than I remembered". I must have watched it from that mystical place of a seven year old's point of view, because as soon as you step back and review it intellectually, there's a lot to scoff at.
Ultimately, I side with the views of Phillip Hinchcliffe on this. The beginning of the story - the empty village, the apparent suicide of a man for no reason, the freshly minted coins - it's all brilliant. in fact, for the best part of two episodes, I was well and truly hooked as even the space suited androids were quite ruthless and menacing and there was little in the way of the baddies spilling out their grand plan. The stakes were high, the setting familiar, and the threats were ominous.
All that changes from Episode 3 as we go on to learn more about Styggron's absurd plan. From then it does turn to a farce with unrealistic and unbelievable links that just turn it into a poor imitation of Spearhead from Space crossed with the Terror of the Zygons.
I would definitely recommend watching it, but only once in a blue moon.
Rating
7 out of 10
Rewatchability Factor
3 out of 10
Consulting the Matrix
This was the last time we see UNIT until the end of the 1980's. What other story would you have liked to see them in?
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