The Mark of the Rani

Two Episodes (45 mins each)
Aired between 2nd February 1985 and 9th February 1985

Written by Pip and Jane Baker
Produced by John Nathan-Turner
Directed by Sarah Hellings

Synopsis

In a little village in the north of England called Killingworth, an old woman who runs a bathhouse
has a sinister practice of gassing miners and somehow turning them into violent vandals and thugs. 

They're seen as belonging to the Luddites, a group of people that are against the oncoming use of technology in the industrial revolution that is stealing away jobs from hard working men.

Perri and the Doctor arrive in Killingworth after noticing some form of time distortion. 

They investigate the town and he soon sniffs out the fact that the bathhouse is connected to the distortion. He also discovers that a series of top names in the scientific world are about to come and meet in the village at the invitation of notable scientist George Stephenson. He is however, unaware that he's being watched from afar by his old enemy the Master, who has somehow escaped the flames and is alive and well.

The Master goes into the bathhouse and finds that another renegade Time Lord known as The Rani is orchestrating things here.

The Rani was exiled from Gallifrey and set up her own empire on a planet known as Miasmia Goria. She is extracting chemicals from the miners that controls sleep (serotonin).

The Master works out that it's because she has been messing around with her citizens to create super species, but has made them all violent. She now needs the chemical to calm them down and stop the riots.  The Master takes her batch of the chemical, as well as some small maggots that have mind control powers when placed in people's mouths, and blackmails the Rani to help him kill the Doctor.

Although the Doctor disguises himself and infiltrates the bath house to find the Rani's operation and confronts her about the immorality of it, he is ultimately captured.

The Master enlists the help of the "Luddite" miners to attack the Doctor.

They throw the TARDIS down a mine shaft and strap him onto a mine cart and are planning to send him down after it.  Perri helps rescue the Doctor, but she accidentally sets the cart going towards the mine shaft.  Lucky for the Doctor, George Stephenson himself manages to stop the cart and rescue him. 

Together, they all go to see Lord Ravensworth, the owner of the pit to plan their next move.  The Doctor tries to convince Stephenson to call off his meeting with the other scientists, but the Master overhears and ends up using one of the Rani's maggots on Stephenson's aide - Luke Ward. 

He tells Ward to kill anyone who tries to stop the meeting.  The Master then returns to the Rani and suggests she helps him make sure the meeting happens, with the intent of speeding up humanities technological development and therefore transforming it into a power base for him to rule over. In return, the Rani can come and extract as much seratonin as she wants.  The Rani gathers some landmines and takes the Master with her to set a trap.

The Doctor decides it's time for action and goes off back to the bathhouse. He steals his way into her TARDIS and begins exploring, when it is summoned to some old mine workings by remote control, with him still inside. The Doctor hides as the Master and the Rani return and awaits his chance.

Meanwhile, Perri talks with Lord Ravensworth and says she is a botany student.  She goes with Luke Ward to Redfern Dell to look for certain herbs to use to create something to calm down the "Luddite" miners. Unfortunately, Luke Ward has been commanded by the Master to take her there, as that's where the trap is for the Doctor.  They walk around and unfortunately, it's Luke himself who steps on one of the Rani's landmines and gets turned into a tree.  It comes alive as Perri walks past it and grabs her. 

The Doctor has seen it all from afar and seizes his moment, capturing the Master's Tissue Compression Eliminator and using it to force them to help Perri escape.

The Doctor takes the Rani's chemical and goes to make everything right, but the Master and the Rani manage to escape, fleeing in her TARDIS.  Unfortunately for them, the Doctor sabotaged the navigation systems whilst he was in there and some of her specimens (one being a T-Rex) begin to grow and come to life due to the effect of time spillage. 

The Doctor and Perri return to Lord Ravensworth and George Stephenson, trading the serum for the Doctor's TARDIS that has been recovered from the bottom of the pit shaft.  They instruct Stephenson on how to give the chemical to the Luddites and then make their departure.

Trivia

• The Master turning back up was an instruction from JNT. There was no explanation as to how, and Eric Saward was not happy with the idea, but had no option but to let it in

• The name Rani means queen. Pip and Jane Baker based her character on their conversations with neuro biologists at dinner parties. They wanted her as an immoral biochemist rather than a typical hand-wringing villain

• The story might have had a load of studio work take place, but an extra film crew was offered by the BBC due to a mistake in another programme, so JNT took full advantage of them and sent them to Ironbridge museum to do location work instead 

• The scene where the Doctor marks his face with coal dust was made more funny by a dog taking a S**t in the pile. When Colin first did the action, he rubbed it all over his face and the crew stalled to clear it off so they could have a good laugh.

• They also left him hanging on a pole between two trees and even though some dog walkers stopped and talked to him, they never offered to untie him! 

• This was the first time Pip and Jane Baker worked on the show, but they soon became favourites of John Nathan-Turner's. He would use them throughout the seasons until the end of the series

• Colin Baker and Kate O'Mara had worked together before a couple of times and so knew each other quite well.  This was before she went on to appear in Dynasty though.

• The original music score was different as it was commissioned to a man called John Lewis, who unfortunately contracted a terminal illness and died before he got a chance to finish it.  Johnathan Gibbs was asked to do the score instead and he had a much more orchestral take on it.

The Review

The Mark of the Rani has a strange yin-yang of regard to it.  What do I mean by that?  I'll try to explain.  In fandom, it's generally regarded as a terrible story, with awful attempts at Geordie accents, stupid plots and ret-conning the Master's final death with no explanation whatsoever. BUT, this is juxtaposed by an almost cult following of the Rani (not quite to the level of Sil from the previous story, but still formidable). 

Equally, not since the shambles of Black Orchid has the Doctor Who production team even attempted to do a historical. This has all the bells and whistles of it, even including historical figures in the script, something which hasn't been seen since the sixties.  This SHOULD be a welcome return and the fact that they went to the effort to find an authentic location in a museum and get the costumes right, well, we should be applauding it. The problem is the execution is poor at best.

The character of the Rani is interesting enough, with her detached scientific approach to things making many of us intrigued. She demonstrates quite clearly, she is not cut from the Master's cloth. She has reasons and motivations and that is good. But what she's doing, the reasons why is pretty much stupid. Many of the scenes are supposed to be sinister (I think) but they come across as hokey. But as mentioned, the crux of her character is quite intriguing, which is why to this day, every new season of Doctor Who that comes out, the fans are looking with eager eyes as soon as there's a whiff of a female villain to see if the Rani is going to return (see the whole Missy debacle for more).

Sadly, the only other time she appears on screen is a laughable attempt to disguise herself as Bonnie Langford.

The Mark of the Rani should be good, on paper it probably is, on screen it most certainly is not.

Rating

4 out of 10

Re-Watchability Factor

4 out of 10

Watch this if you liked...

• The Time Meddler

• The Green Death

• The Time Warrior

Vengeance on Varos

Two Episodes (45mins each)
Aired between 19th January 1985 and 26th January 1985

Written by: Phillip Martin
Produced by: John Nathan-Turner
Directed by: Ron Jones

Synopsis

On a planet called Varos in the constellation of Cetus, a pair of citizens called Etta and Arrak watch the condemnation and execution of a rebel leader called Jondar live on TV. 

It's a form of reality television that the citizens are obviously used to the brutality as Arrak complains at the lack of anything new to watch.  Just like reality TV, there are also live public votes, but these are mandatory.

Meanwhile, on the TARDIS, the Doctor is still tinkering and maybe as a direct result, the ship stops in deep space and shuts down, refusing to move due to a lack of a vital element, a quantity of ore known as Zeiton-7. The ore only comes from one place - Varos. 

Back on Varos, prices on the ore are being negotiated with Sil, a reptillian representative of the Galtron Mining Corporation. 

The governor of Varos is playing hard ball, even though he has no appreciation of the fact that the corporation are already getting the ore woefully cheap. The difficulty is that because of this, his planet has little money and people are having to ration food.  As part of the ruling process, the Governor is forced to submit to a public vote for the will of the people.  He asks them if he should hold out for a better price on Zeiton ore, but the vote goes against him and he is hit by a human cell disintegration beam. 

The beam severely weakens him and gives him one last chance to turn things around.  The Governor's guard, Bax, recommends that he kill Jondar to gain popularity with the citizens.

The Doctor, after a lot of sulking and proclaiming they're doomed to die in deep space alone, manages to repair the TARDIS just long enough to get it to Varos. 

He arrives in the area of Jondar's execution.  The guard stationed there thinks they're hallucinations when they turn up as there's an odd technology that causes them in the area.  The Doctor deals with the guard and frees Jondar. They're forced to run away as more guards show up and are ultimately rescued by a defecting guard and Areta, Jondar's partner.  They go through the punishment dome, being televised all the way to Sil's pleasure.  They pass through hallucinations, but are ultimately captured again and the Doctor is caught in a deadly vision of a desert which makes his body believe he's dying of thirst and heat exhaustion.

Perri is taken to the Governor and questioned.  Elsewhere, the Doctor is believed dead and taken to an acid pool where bodies are dumped. He recovers (being a time lord and not a mere human) and accidentally startles the guards who fall into the acid. 

He takes his leave and goes to find Perri.  It's not long before he's captured again and taken to the Governor.

Once together, it's decided that Jondar and the Doctor will be hung, and Perri and Areta will be mutated by a machine that takes your thoughts and turns them into horrifying twisted reality.  These fates are carried out, but just before the hangman releases the trapdoor, the Doctor figures out that Sil is manipulating and undercutting the price of Zeiton and explains to the Governor. 

The trapdoor opens and they fall through, the ends of the ropes not being attached.  Perri and Areta however are not so lucky and are changed into a bird and a reptile respectively. 

As it happens though, the Doctor steals a gun from a guard and shoots the control panel, reversing their effects in the nick of time.

Once more, Perri is captured but the Governor takes pity on her.  Unfortunately, he is out of time and hasn't managed to get a good deal from Sil and the underhanded Chief.  He submits to the public vote and Etta and Arrak watch as he is bombarded by the disintegrator again, likely for the last time. 

The guard with them defects however and stops the machine, allowing the Governor to live.  Together, they all escape and meet up with the Doctor again. 

They find some sentient, poisonous plant life in the end of the punishment dome and hide in it. The Chief officer and other corrupt members of the regime head into the tendrils to capture and kill the Doctor and co and are killed by the poisonous plant.

Sil's plan is thwarted, as there is suddenly another source of Zeiton 7 ore found and the Galtron Mining Corporation orders him to make a deal at any price.  The Governor is in a position to re-negotiate for the better and promises to end the brutality of the Reality TV Governorship.

The Doctor is gifted some Zeiton 7 ore and he and Perri go off into the sunset.

Trivia

• As you'll know if you've watched this story, there's nothing in it about vengeance. The title was chosen for the alliteration that matched the double V logo of the regime

• The original concept of Sil was for him to be in the fish tank, but it was too complicated and difficult to achieve at the time.

• Actor Nabil Shaban who played Sil came up with his trademark laugh after handling his friends pet snake (easy, I mean a real snake).  He watched its tongue flicking in and out and incorporated it into his persona, and voila.

• The "Marsh Minnows" he eats are peaches dyed green.  He ate so many of them that they made him ill in a way that he needed the toilet, unfortunately, the costume he was in was very difficult for him to actually use one!

• There was complaints received on this story about how violent it was. In fact, one Radio Times reader wrote in that it "exceeded the horrors of the holocaust!"  The writer took pride in the bad review and had it blown up and placed on his toilet wall

The Reveiw

Over the course of twenty two seasons, we've become accustomed to a few Doctor Who stories that are essentially good, but either make no sense, or have humongous plot holes in them.  Vengeance on Varos is one of these stories.

What makes it good is more about the ambience and tone of the story than anything that happens.  It is shot darker than much of the classic stories, the regime is as brutal and ruthless as the Kaleds and it does a very good job of showing the price of rebelling against a dictatorship and the consequence of corruption in the higher ranks. 

It cannot also be ignored that Sil is the last, truly good villain of original origin.  His look is perfect, his mannerisms and quirks are great and Nabil is just a good actor so sells it very well. 

Conversely, the things that let this story down are more about the plot itself and the logic of it. For example, if Varos was the only place to get Zeiton 7, how come they're selling it so low price to Galtron?  It cannot possibly be the case that they're the only company that has come to use it.  Also, why is the Chief backstabbing the Governor by driving down the price of the ore, when he has to live on that planet too?  Wouldn't he starve with the rest?  Well, it's implied that Sil will see him alright, but it would be a very obvious move and one that would get the Chief killed when others see how much he has.

Finally, the two and fro of the Doctor and Perri getting captured and escaping grows a little tiresome by the end, it was obviously filler to draw out the episode times to 45 mins.

The story is on point or perhaps even ahead of its time, like 1984, predicting the harshness of the government and the problems of reality TV, but to really enjoy it, there is some suspension of disbelief needed.

Rating

7 out of 10

Re-Watchability Factor

7 out of 10

Watch this if you liked...

• 1984

• The Enemy of the World

• Genesis of the Daleks

• The Sun Makers

• Mindwarp (Trial of a Timelord Episodes 5-8)

• The Happiness Patrol

• Bad Wolf (Doctor Who, Series 1)