463 Image of the Fendahl: Part Two

EPISODE: Image of the Fendahl: Part Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 463
STORY NUMBER: 094
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 05 November 1977
WRITER: Chris Boucher
DIRECTOR: George Spenton-Foster
SCRIPT EDITOR: Robert Holmes
PRODUCER: Graham Williams
RATINGS: 7.5 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Image of the Fendahl

"There are four thousand million people here on your planet, and if I'm right, within a year there'll be just one left alive. Just one."

The Doctor escapes the power holding him. Leela was shot at by Ted Moss, she wrestles the gun from him but both are caught by Jack Tyler wanting to know what they are doing in Gran's cottage on the estate. Colby find Ransome in an entranced state and entering the kitchen they find security team leader Mitchell dead, also with a blister on his neck. The Doctor enters as Thea collapses to the floor glowing with snake like creatures materialising near her before vanishing. The Doctor identifies them as embryo Fendahleen from the destroyed fifth planet in the solar system. Doctor Fendelman has the Doctor locked up. Leela tells her story to Jack Tyler who sends Ted Moss, who'd come for something from Mrs Tyler, on his way. Colby decides to call the police but finds the phone line cut. Fendelman tells them he believe the skull is extra terrestrial in origin. The Doctor escapes and overheard Stael & Moss talking: they are both members of a local coven. Ted Moss' Gran returns, scared out of her wits. Fendelman has found a pentagram in the structure of the skull by X-raying it. Thea finds herself drawn towards the X-Ray image, but is found by Stael who chloroforms her saying she is the chosen one. The Doctor finds the skull which starts to glow in his presence and draws his hand towards it....

In an odd way this episode is feeling a little "bitty" and didn't flowing that well for me so far. Sorry. It's not got a lot of The Doctor in it and not a lot of Leela in the episode, and they spend no time together.

COLBY: It's Mitchell. That expression, it's the same as the other one.
THEA: There's a blister on the back of the neck. Could be a birth mark, I suppose.
COLBY: How can you be so dispassionate? The man's dead, Thea.
THEA: Adam. Adam.
COLBY: Thea?
DOCTOR: Don't touch her. I said don't touch her! How many deaths have there been?
COLBY: Deaths?
DOCTOR: Like this.
COLBY: Two. Now, look
DOCTOR: No, no, no, no, no, you look

COLBY: What was it?
DOCTOR: They look like embryo Fendahleen to me.
DOCTOR: Come and sit down. You'll be all right.
COLBY: Embryo what?
DOCTOR: Embryo Fendahleen. A creature from my own mythology. Supposed to have perished when the fifth planet broke up. At least, so they said.
COLBY: A creature from mythology? Do you know what you're talking about?
DOCTOR: Well, you saw it. If it survived twelve million years, it's energy reserves must be enormous.
COLBY: Twelve million? Why did you say twelve million?
DOCTOR: What? Well, about twelve million. That's when the fifth planet broke up. There are four thousand million people here on your planet, and if I'm right, within a year there'll be just one left alive. Just one.
COLBY: What are you, exactly? Some sort of wandering Armageddon peddler, hmm?

This is the point it goes wrong for The Doctor:

DOCTOR: Who's in charge round here?
FENDELMAN: I am.
DOCTOR: Ah, Doctor Fendelman, I presume. Is that really your name, Fendelman? Now listen, Fendelman, I want you to do two things. Dismantle the scanner and run some tests on Miss Thea. Start with an x-ray of her skull. Now
FENDELMAN: I will give the orders around here. Take him away. Lock him up somewhere.
DOCTOR: Is this the way you treat all your house guests?
FENDELMAN: Only the uninvited ones whom I suspect of murder.
DOCTOR: But she needs help!
FENDELMAN: Take him away!
STAEL: It is just the same as before.
FENDELMAN: This is a terrible thing. Terrible.
COLBY: This time I will call the police. Come along, Thea.
FENDELMAN: As you wish, Adam. But how will you explain to them that you did not call them before?

We've not had the Doctor locked up for a bit have we? Robots of Death?

Leela meanwhile has met local Jack Tyler, who has seen off Ted Moss, the man from the council in the first episode who shot at Leela at the end of episode 1.

TYLER: Nasty piece of work. Him and some others from the village, they er. Well, I'm not sure exactly, but the thing is that I think my Gran's involved in whatever it is. Now, she's a good old girl but, well, she was brought up in the old ways, you see.
LEELA: The old ways?
TYLER: Yeah, the old superstitions and that. See, he called her Mother Tyler. Now that ain't 'cos he likes her. That's, that's the old religion. Look, there's something nasty going on. Do you know what it is? Have you been sent with this Doctor bloke to sort it out?
LEELA: Well, the Doctor came to stop the sonic time scan.
TYLER: Oh. What's one of them?
LEELA: He said it would cause a, a direct continuum ex, implosion.
TYLER: Damn, girl, you don't half tell some whoppers, don't you.
LEELA: Whoppers?
TYLER: Aye. Don't matter.
LEELA: Listen. I'm sure the Doctor can help you. Oh, he's very difficult sometimes, but he has great knowledge and gentleness.

Cue shot of the Doctor being anything but gentle and kicking the **** out of some boxes in frustration at not being able to escape!

This actually helps highlight something that happens a little later: The Doctor does escape, following a click at the door. Someone has let him out! But who?

Meanwhile things have gone from bad to worse for the sensible pair of scientists

THEA: Adam, can't you be serious just for a minute?
COLBY: I am serious. The place is surrounded by guards, we're beset by a wandering lunatic and we have a pair of corpses on our hands. And on top of all that, the telephone seems to be very dead. Thea, we're trapped.
THEA: It was planned.
COLBY: By Fendelman.
THEA: No. No, not by Fendelman. He's just part of it, doing what was planned for him. Don't you see? For him. That would fit. That would explain it.
COLBY: Explain what?
THEA: Adam, you haven't asked me whose plan it is. Why don't you ask me? Go on, ask me who planned it.
COLBY: Stop it. Stop it!
THEA: I did. Do you understand? I did.
COLBY: Now be reasonable, Thea. How could you have? You're as sane as anyone here. Except. Come on. Come on.

Fortunately their employer seems in the mood for explanations, albeit seemingly unlikely ones:

FENDELMAN: This skull that you found is, I believe, extraterrestrial in origin.
COLBY: An alien space traveller? Hence the guards. Next of kin come for the remains? You're expecting an attack by little green men from, er, Venus?
FENDELMAN: Don't talk like a fool, Colby! You're not a fool!
COLBY: No, I'm not. That skull is human. It's a skull like yours and mine. Modern man. Homo sapiens!
FENDELMAN: Exactly. It is also twelve million years old. Millions of years older than the earliest of man's known ancestors.
COLBY: You think we're all aliens?

COLBY: Circumstantial. It's all circumstantial.
FENDELMAN: It is the only logical explanation, Adam. Man did not evolve on Earth, of this I am sure. There is something else that I have not told you. With the scanner, I have traced what I now believe to be the moment of death of this alien traveller. At that moment, there is an enormous surge of power the like of which I have not seen before. It was this that first attracted my attention. It is an inpouring of energy. A concentration of power as though to store. Now I ask myself, where would this power be stored? And why? These questions I could not answer until I had x-rayed the skull.
COLBY: You x-rayed the skull? When?
FENDELMAN: Stael and I have been doing experiments in secret for some time.
COLBY: Thank you.
FENDELMAN: No, no, no, you are right. But from the beginning I had the feeling that this was so important that it must be kept secret. And now we have these murders and this mysterious intruder.
COLBY: He said something about x-rays.
THEA: Will you excuse me?
COLBY: Oh, I'm sorry, Thea. Are you still feeling ill?
THEA: No, it's all right. I'm just a little tired. I think I'll go and lie down.
FENDELMAN: You are looking very pale, my dear. Perhaps you have been working too hard. I will ask Stael to look in on you later...... There is no doubt that this intruder has been spying on us.
COLBY: Yes. Well, after the x-rays, what did you find?
FENDELMAN: I will show you. Come.

FENDELMAN: There. Do you see it?
COLBY: It looks like a pentagram. It's the way the fragments have been assembled.
FENDELMAN: No. It is part of the bone structure itself. I believe it to be a form of neural relay, and this is where the energy is stored. It is interesting, is it not, that for as long as man can remember, the pentagram has been a symbol for mystical energy and power.
COLBY: All right, let's assume that's the how. You're still left with why.
FENDELMAN: A beacon.
COLBY: What?
FENDELMAN: Suppose the energy is still within this neural circuit and can only be released by the intelligent application of applied advanced technology.
COLBY: You mean the release of that energy would act as a signal that there was intelligent life on this planet?
FENDELMAN: And at last, mankind would meet its
COLBY: Next of kin?
FENDELMAN: Destiny, Adam. Its destiny.

Now I always get slightly uneasy when I see things like pentagrams and other occult symbology, but Doctor Who has been there before in The Dæmons where it exposed the mystical being there as being an alien and it looks like they're taking a similar angle here too. In that story the Master was working with a local cult group and sure enough there's one here too:

STAEL: You should not have come here.
MOSS: Well, I had to warn you.
STAEL: There are security guards now.
MOSS: City boys. I know how to get past them.
STAEL: It was a stupid risk. Fendelman is already suspicious and uneasy. Why do you think he sent for the guards?
MOSS: I had to warn you about the Doctor.
STAEL: What doctor?
MOSS: Well, there's this bloke calls himself a doctor. Tall, curly hair. He's got a girl working with him. And I told him where to find this place. Well, I didn't realise. I tried to stop him after. They know all about us. 'Tis true. They're investigators. They come to investigate.
STAEL: I will deal with them. Now go, quickly. STAEL: Are all our friends prepared?
MOSS: They're waiting for the word.
STAEL: When the time comes, we must be twelve.
MOSS: We know you lead the coven now, but we know the old ways. Thirteen be the number.
STAEL: A place must be left for the one who kills.

Meanwhile Thea has gone looking for the Doctor and finds only an empty room where he was locked up:

THEA: Hello? Are you there? Please, I need help.

This bit of the story has always bothered me: could what happens to Thea after this have been avoided if the Doctor had still been there? We still don't know how he escaped but when Thea runs into Stael he drops a hint that he might have been responsible.

STAEL: Thea.
THEA: Max! You frightened me. Do you have to creep about like that?
STAEL: I apologise. What are you doing here, Thea?
THEA: I was, I was looking for the stranger. Do you know where he is?
STAEL: It is not important.
THEA: Well it is to me. I must find him. I think he can help me.
STAEL: Why should you need help, Thea? Anyway, the stranger has escaped. He can do nothing.

Stael's not searched the room that we've seen so how does he know the Doctor has escaped? If he has, why hasn't he raised the alarm? These questions suggest that Stael is the on who let the Doctor out. We already know he's up to something behind Fendelman's back with Moss and the cultists.

It's at this point things go really wrong for Thea as he cloroforms her!

STAEL: It is too late. Too late for all the meddling fools.
THEA: What are you talking about, Max? Get out of my way.
STAEL: There's no need to be afraid of me, Thea.
THEA: Please, Max!
STAEL: It is fitting that you should be the key to my power.
THEA: Max, don't be such a fool.
STAEL: The chosen one.

Meanwhile the Doctor's found the skull:

DOCTOR: Oh. Oh. Would you like a jelly baby? No, I don't suppose you would. Alas, poor skull.

The "Jelly baby" is obviously a liquorice allsort!!

The Skull's obviously somewhat offended at this judging by what it does to him!

Dr. Fendelman is played by Denis Lill who'll return as Sir George Hutchinson in The Awakening. He's probably most famous for his role as Charles Vaughan in Survivors. He's one of the few people to have appeared in The Professionals, playing Josef Merhart in Hijack, and it's sequel CI5: The New Professionals, where he played Eliz Risha in Hostage. He's done comedy too appearing as Sir Talbot Buxomly, a member of Parliament, in Dish and Dishonesty, the opening episode of Blackadder the Third, which my history teacher wanted to show us as a text on electoral reform, and as Beadle in Blackadder's Christmas Carol. He's been in Red Dwarf playing the Simulant Captain / Death in Gunmen of the Apocalypse and has a recurring role in later series of Only Fools and Horses where he plays Alan Parry, Rodney's Father In Law. He used to live in my former home town of Kingston and one of my brothers went to school with his daughter!

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Wanda Ventham plays Thea Ransome. She'd previously appeared in The Faceless Ones as Jean Rock and returns to Doctor Who as Faroon in Time and the Rani. She'll be familiar to science fiction fans as Col. Virginia Lake in the first episode of UFO, a role which becomes a regular in the second half of the series but also appears in the mising second season Out of the Unknown episode The Eye as Josephine. She's the mother of Benedict Cumberbatch, TV's Sherlock and has, along with her husband Timothy Carlton appeared as their son's character's parents in The Empty Hearse and His Last Vow. She too has had a recurring role in Only Fools and Horses where she plays Pamela Parry, Dennis Lill's character's wife!

Probably the most famous face in this, to the general public at least, is Geoffrey Hinsliff, playing Jack Tyler. He'll be back as Fisk in Nightmare of Eden but most people will know him for the several years he spent playing Don Brennan in Coronation Street. Before his soap fame he appeared in UFO as the Hotel Clerk in Confetti Check A-OK, I, Claudius as Rufrius in Fool's Luck and The Professionals as the Sergeant in When the Heat Cools Off.

Jack Tyler's Gran, Martha Tyler, is played by Daphne Heard who's well known for her role as Mrs. Polouvicka, Richard DeVere's mother in To the Manor Born

Council Worker and Coven Member Ted Moss is played by Edward Evans. He's got an Out of the Unknown to his name appearing as Tom Palfrey in the missing fourth season episode The Sons and Daughters of Tomorrow. He was in Doomwatch twice and both his appearances exist and can be found on The Doomwatch DVD: he was in The Battery People as Dai and The Inquest as the Coroner.

There's two uncredited security guards in this episode. Geoffrey Witherick has previous Doctor Who form to his name appearing as a Cricketer / Reveller in Dalek Masterplan episode 8: Volcano, a Guard in The Massacre 4: Bell of Doom, a Man in Market in The War Machines episode 3, a Villager/ Coven Member in The Dæmons, a guard in Frontier in Space and a Security guard in Image of the Fendahl part two. He's been in Doomwatch as well, as a Man in Burial at Sea, but his episode is missing. The other security guard, John Emms, had also been in Doomwatch appearing as a man in Re-Entry Forbidden, and his episode survives on the above DVD.