403 Terror of the Zygons: Part Two

EPISODE: Terror of the Zygons: Part Two
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 403
STORY NUMBER: 080
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 06 September 1975
WRITER: Robert Banks-Stewart
DIRECTOR: Douglas Camfield
SCRIPT EDITOR: Robert Holmes
PRODUCER: Philip Hinchcliffe
RATINGS: 6.1 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Terror of the Zygons

"Destroy him! Die, Doctor, die!"

Hearing Sarah's screams on the phone, the Doctor, Brigadier & Mister Benton rush to the infirmary where the Nurse, Sister Lamont, doesn't know where Sarah or Harry have gone. The Doctor finds Sarah in the decompression unit, but both are locked in and the pump activated. Harry has been taken to the alien spaceship, where he meets Broton, Warlord of the Zygons. Their craft crashed on Earth centuries ago and they intend to conquer Earth. They show Harry the Skarasen, a massive cyborg reptile brought as an embryo to Earth and grown here. The Doctor hypnotises Sarah and puts himself into a trace to survive the air being pumped out. At the pub, the Brigadier and UNIT troops are gassed into unconsciousness. Benton finds the Doctor & Sarah and releases them. Huckle finds the Brigadier and troops at the pub as a roaring sound is heard. Arriving back at the village the Doctor finds the whole village gassed. Broton is angry at the Doctor's survival. Huckle has found an odd piece of equipment in the wreckage which the Doctor identifies as a signalling device. Harry is taken to the Zygons' cells where his body print is copied allowing a Zygon to assume his form. Also held are Nurse Lamont, The Duke and his Gillie, The Caber. UNIT Troops discover the crushed body of a soldier on the moor. Harry wanders into the pub, takes the alien device and tries to leave but Sarah is suspicious and calls for help. UNIT soldiers & Sarah pursue him to a barn where he falls, impaling himself on a pitchfork and transforms into a Zygon before Broton remotely actives it's dispersal device. Sarah returns the homing device to the Doctor, who tells the Brigadier that he thinks the Pub is bugged. Broton orders the Skarasen to attack and activates the homing device. The Doctor takes the homing device in a jeep to draw it away from the village, but as he gets onto the moor the Jeep brakes down and the homing device attaches itself to him. The Brigadier traces the signal controlling the monster to Lock Ness as Broton commands the massive Skarasen to destroy the Doctor as it bears down on him......

It's time to give a début to the season 13 & 14 game: Guess which film Robert Holmes is paying homage to this story. Nearly every story for the next two years owes a debt to some older film, usually a horror or sci fi movie. Here it's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, aliens taking on human form. Doctor Who has kind of gone here before with the Auton duplicates in Spearhead from Space.

We get to see how the Zygons are doing this when they copy Harry and reveal that they store their copied victims. On the left is a nurses uniform, obviously Sister Lamont who we already sort of knew was a Zygon from the end of the last episode and the start of this one. In the middle is the Duke's Gilly, The Caber, who we sure shoot the only survivor of the Bonnie Prince Charlie rig in the last episode. But on the right is another unnamed human who's also been duplicated by the Zygons. If you're looking for another clue as to who it is then watch the end titles as there's a character credited there who isn't otherwise in this episode!

Writer Robert Banks-Stewart helps the believability of his monsters by giving them names: Their leader is Broton and the Zygon impersonating Harry is Madra. This makes them, and the other Zygons, individuals straight away. Of the non human Doctor Who races to date only the Menoptera & Optera, original Cybermen, Ice Warriors, Inter Minor officials and Sontarans have been blessed with individual names.

In Revenge of the Cybermen I criticised the effect of the planet's surface coming towards the beacon. Two episodes later we get one of the finest effects shots yet seen in the show: The Zygon spaceship sitting under the water. You look at it and it's a perfectly believable shot.

CORPORAL: The signal's coming from inland, sir. Bearing two three zero.
BRIGADIER: Two three zero. And the other bearing was?
CORPORAL: One six five, sir.
BRIGADIER: One six five. That makes it just about here. About six or seven miles from here. Loch Ness.
SARAH: The monster?

To spice up The Invasion of the Body Snatchers we get the legend of the Loch Ness Monster added in. Indeed the book of this story was called Doctor Who & the Loch Ness Monster. We glimpse it briefly in this story, the effect reminding me of the brachiosaur seen in Carnival of Monsters and various dinosaurs in The Invasion of the Dinosaurs. The frill down the neck extending onto the body insinuates that the body of the animal might be shelled like a tortoise Sarah's life gets saved by the Doctor putting her into a trance in the decompression chamber:

DOCTOR: It worked, Mister Benton.
BENTON: What worked?
DOCTOR: Why are you whispering?
BENTON: What worked, Doctor?
DOCTOR: Oh, just a trick I picked up from a Tibetan monk. Don't touch her. It could be fatal to break the spell incorrectly.

The Doctor's had several Tibetan monk friends: he met Padmasambhava in Tibet in the 18th century before making a return visit in the 1930s. But it almost certainly refers to his old Time Lord teacher K'anpo who we met in Planet of the Spiders.

Playing Sister Lamont is actress Lillias Walker. I recently spotted her in Douglas Camfield's Out of the Unknown The Last Lonely Man as Mary. If you don't own this series then buy the dvd because it's superb. She also works for Camfield on the Paul Temple episode The Man Who Wasn't There playing Eleanor Capell and in Van der Valk: Elected Silence as Beryl Harkemer

Robert Russell, The Caber, had previously appeared in Doctor Who as a Guard in The Power of the Daleks episodes 3, 5 & 6. He'd also been in Out of the Unknown, appearing in Thirteen to Centaurus as Sgt. Burke. His previous Camfield association comes from the Public Eye episode Nobody Wants to Know where he plays Dave Tarrant. Other genre appearance include Space: 1999: Mission of the Darians as Hadin and Blake's 7: Cygnus Alpha as Laran

This episode has another bit of Camfield repeat casting: Bernard G. High plays the UNIT Corporal and he was previously a soldier in The Web of Fear, directed by Camfield. But that wasn't the first time they'd worked together: he plays Detective Constable John in 3 of Camfield's Z-Cars episode in 1967's season 6: The Great Fur Robbery: Part 2, Who Said Anything About the Law?: Part 2 and Finch and Sons: Part 2. These are his only appearances in the series so I suspect Camfield was using him for a generic Detective Constable role. They next work together on the first Paul Temple episode Who Dies Next, which was broadcast on Doctor Who's 6th anniversary. He plays a character called Williams in that episode before returning as Detective Constable Watson in 1971's Death Sentence, also helmed by Camfield. As best as I can see this is his last TV work.

Barry Summerford plays Private Thurston, the Unit soldier in the mist. He'd already been a Golden Age Man in Invasion of the Dinosaurs part six, an Elite Guard in Genesis of the Daleks, and a Vogan in Revenge of the Cybermen part one. Camfield has him back as a UNIT Communications Soldier in The Seeds of Doom part six and he then appears as a Security guard in The Hand of Fear part two, a Steaming Audience Member in The Sun Makers part four, a Shrieve in The Ribos Operation part four, a Guard in The Armageddon Factor part one, a Guard in The Creature from the Pit part one and a Foster in The Keeper of Traken part one. He'd previously been in Barry Letts & Terrance Dicks' Moonbase 3 as a technician in both Castor and Pollux and View of a Dead Planet as well as appearing in the Doomwatch episode Tomorrow, the Rat as a Man. Over the next few years he'll rack up a fair few Blake's 7 appearances starting with a Federation Trooper in The Way Back, a Rebel in Pressure Point, another Rebel in Voice from the Past, a Customer / Gambler in Gambit, a Federation Commando in Volcano, a Monster in Dawn of the Gods and finally the bounty hunter Tando in Blake, one of his rare onscreen credits, making him one of just three people to appear in the first and last episodes of the series. He reunites with Camfield for Beau Geste in 1982 where he plays a Legionnaire in four episodes.

This story is set in Scotland, around Loch Ness. However the BBC, in their wisdom, decided to film the locations for this story in Sussex instead!

The Doctor's visited Scotland five times on the television screen: The Highlanders, Terror of the Zygons, The Hand of Fear (School Reunion says the closing scenes are in Aberdeen), Timelash and Tooth & Claw (plus The Moonbase refers to previous visit to train under Lister in Edinburgh). Yet not once does the production venture north of the border to film! We've been to Wales to film The Abominable Snowmen, The Green Death, The Masque of Mandragora, The Pirate Planet, The Five Doctors and Delta and the Bannermen yet only two of those are set there! Then add in all the Welsh filming for the new series! Come on Doctor Who, address the balance and organise some Scottish location filming soon!

This episode of Doctor Who shed 2.3 million viewers from the previous week (down to 6.1 million from 8.4 million) which is believed due to the arrival of ITV's new science fiction series Space 1999. However the impact was short lived with the next episode returning to 8.2 million and by the end of the season Doctor Who was being watched by more than 11 million people. We'll look at Space 1999 during the next story when one of it's stars shows up in a guest role in Doctor Who.

402 Terror of the Zygons: Part One

EPISODE: Terror of the Zygons: Part One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 402
STORY NUMBER: 080
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 30 August 1975
WRITER: Robert Banks-Stewart
DIRECTOR: Douglas Camfield
SCRIPT EDITOR: Robert Holmes
PRODUCER: Philip Hinchcliffe
RATINGS: 8.4 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Terror of the Zygons

"This one they call the Doctor is a threat to us. Already he has found out too much. He must be destroyed!"

At sea an oil rig is destroyed. The Doctor and his companions have arrived in Scotland and hitch a lift on the road, being picked up by His Grace, The Duke of Forghill, who takes them to the Village of Tulloch where UNIT are operating out of the local pub. The Brigadier has been talking with Mr Huckle from the oil firm. On a local beach a survivor from the oil rig is washed up. The Brigadier explains to the Doctor about three oil rigs being destroyed. Radio blackouts occur just before the rigs are destroyed. Sarah speaks to the local pub landlord but their conversation is observed on a monitor screen by alien eyes. Harry finds the survivor on the beach, but both are shot by the Duke's gillie. The Doctor & Sarah are summoned the local infirmary where Harry has been taken as the aliens direct something under the water which attacks another rig. The Doctor examines some of the wreckage and deduces that it has been bitten into by making a plaster cast of from the damage. The aliens observing them decide the Doctor must be destroyed. Harry starts to come round, leading Sarah to summon the Doctor. But as she speaks on the phone one of the aliens appears in the corridor behind her....

Ah that's decent stuff. I criticised Revenge of the Cybermen for bungling their monster reveal but it's done a lot better here with little hints - eyes and hands - before the reveal at the end of the episode as the monster ambushes Sarah.

Destroyed oil rigs might make long term fans of the show automatically think Sea Devils, but as we can see it's not them. But given that this story is set in Scotland are we being drawn towards thinking another rather more famous aquatic monster is responsible?

DOCTOR: You say these radio blackouts have happened before?
HUCKLE: Each time a rig has disappeared.
DOCTOR: And no strange craft in the area? Nothing suspicious?
HUCKLE: Difficult to be sure. It was at night. The radio picked up some strange sound, but as far as we know, the sea was calm and empty.
DOCTOR: It may be calm, but it's never empty.

McRANALD: Take my word for it, my dear. There are ancient mysteries here. Evil spirits haunt Tulloch Moor.
SARAH: Maybe, but I'm certain of one thing, Mister McRanald. Evil spirits don't destroy oil rigs.

HUCKLE: Doctor, do you mind telling us exactly what you're doing?
DOCTOR: A little experiment in orthodontology, Mister Huckle.
HUCKLE: Orthodontology?
DOCTOR: Teeth. Teeth. The scientific study of teeth.

DOCTOR: It's the cast of a tooth, wouldn't you say?
HUCKLE: Teeth? Doctor, you can't be serious.
DOCTOR: Teeth are very serious things, Mister Huckle.
HUCKLE: Look. Lets get this straight. Are you trying to tell me that the rigs were chewed up by a set of giant molars?
DOCTOR: Yes. A set of giant molars that can chew through solid steel as easily as paper.
BRIGADIER: Are you suggesting that we're dealing with some kind of sea monster?
DOCTOR: Yes. A monster of frightening size and power.

The Oil Rig Names, Ben Nevis and Bonnie Prince Charlie, have obvious Scottish connotations, but how about the oil field itself? It's named Waverley, which automatically puts me in the mind of Edinburgh Waverley station, which in turn gets it's name from The Waverley Novels by Scottish author Sir Walter Scott.

Meanwhile there's a hint that the oil rigs disappearing isn't the only thing that isn't right....

SARAH: He's a strange man, this Duke, isn't he?
McRANALD: Would you think so, Miss? You know, I would give it a favour to remember he is the McRanald, my clan chief.
SARAH: Oh, of course. No, no, it was just that, well, after he picked us up in his car, he never spoke a word all the way to the village.
McRANALD: Ah well, it's true he's no the Duke I remember. He's been a different man since the oil companies came.

Back to the show comes our old friend Douglas Camfield following his heart problems and disagreements with Jon Pertwee on the set of Inferno. And if Camfield is back then that means the music isn't by Dudley Simpson, due to their long running feud. Instead Geoffrey Burgon provides the incidental music and a large portion of it can be found on Doctor Who - The 50th Anniversary Collection (CD).

For years this episodes had a legendary missing scene of an invisible Tardis materialising in the woods at the start, similar to one in a previous Camfield story, The Invasion. . It's in the novel but was never seen on screen. When it was filmed a problem was discovered with the film, so it was cut and long thought lost until a black & white copy was uncovered during preparation work for the DVD. Stuart Humphryes, aka Babelcolour, hand recoloured the scene in a similar manner to Mind of Evil episode 1 and it was included as an optional extra on the DVD and for the first time could be viewed in it's intended place in the story.

On debut here is writer Robert Banks-Stewart, who'd been writing for television since 1959 with Danger Man, The Avengers and Jason King on his CV. He'd go on to create detective dramas Shoestring and Bergerac. Banks-Stewart is the first debut author on Doctor Who since Robert Sloman and Barry Letts wrote the Daemons in 1971. Four seasons of Doctor Who have elapsed since then with the just older authors contributing to the show. It's no surprise that Robert Banks-Stewart should show up: he was an old friend of Script Editor Robert Holmes as you can read in Robert Holmes: a Life in Words. Banks-Stewart is due to have his memoirs published shortly by those nice people at Miwk Publishing.

Also returning are Nicholas Courtney, as Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart, and John Levene, as Mister Benton, as part of UNIT's traditional start of the season appearance. The last time we saw them was in Robot when The Doctor left with UNIT's Medical Officer Harry Sullivan.

Angus, the pub landlord, is played by Angus Lennie who was Storr in The Ice Warriors and found fame as Shughie McFee in Crossroads. He's got a role in the The Great Escape as Flight Officer Archibald Ives 'The Mole'. Doctor Who companion William Russell, who played Ian Chesterton, also features in the same film!

The man from the oil company, Huckle, is played by Tony Sibbald. He's got no other Doctor Who connections but had appeared in The Plastic Eaters, the first episode of science fiction drama Doomwatch by Doctor Who alumni Kit Pedler & Gerry Davis. The same episode also features Camfield regulars Kevin Stoney and Richardson Morgan as Professor Hal Symonds and the Engineer - First Airline Crew respectively. Camfield would later reuse Tony Sibbald as Dr. Symonds when he directed Robert Holmes adaptation of The Nightmare Man

Appearing in this episode only are Hugh Martin, as Munro, who'll be back as a Priest in Vengeance on Varos. Camfield had used him earlier that year in one of his episodes of Public Eye: The Fall Guy as The Barman. This isn't the last time that Public Eye will feature in the cast lists for this story!

Bruce Wightman , the Radio Operator on the Ben Nevis oil rig, was used by Camfield for a couple of Hartnell stories as William de Tornebu in The Crusade and Scott, the Australian Cricket Commentator, in The Daleks' Master Plan.

Credited as a soldier in this episode is James Muir - which one I can't tell. He's a somewhat regular extra for the series having appeared as, all uncredited, a Soldier in The Time Monster episode one, a UNIT Soldier in Invasion of the Dinosaurs part one and a Muto in Genesis of the Daleks parts two & three. He'll be back as a Brother in The Masque of Mandragora part three, a Worker in The Sun Makers part one and a Technician in The Sun Makers part two, a Technician in The Pirate Planet parts one & two, a Druid in The Stones of Blood part one, a Louvre Detective in City of Death part one, a Mandrel in Nightmare of Eden part one, a Foamasi in The Leisure Hive part one, a Gaztak in Meglos part one, a Tharil in Warriors' Gate part one and the Police Driver in Black Orchid part two. He's got Blake's 7 on his CV appearing as a Federation Trooper in Seek-Locate-Destroy, a Phibian (for which he gets a credit!) in Orac, a Rebel in Pressure Point, a Monster in Dawn of the Gods, a Link in Rescue, a Helot in Traitor, a Pirate Guard in Assassin and a Federation Trooper in Blake. He'd been in Moonbase 3 as a Technician in Castor and Pollux and he's also the Vl'Hurg Leader in Episode 4 of the TV version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy!

This episode aired the last Saturday in August 1975. The previous Monday, a bank holiday, Tom Baker presented the BBC's Disney Time as The Doctor which included the Doctor being given a message by the Brigadier summoning his assistance.... which he'd already done in the previous story Revenge of the Cybermen.

401 Revenge of the Cybermen: Part Four

EPISODE: Revenge of the Cybermen: Part Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 401
STORY NUMBER: 079
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 10 May 1975
WRITER: Gerry Davis
DIRECTOR: Michael Briant
SCRIPT EDITOR: Robert Holmes
PRODUCER: Philip Hinchcliffe
RATINGS: 9.4 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Cybermen Box Set

"It means we're heading for the biggest bang in history!"

Lester stops Harry from removing the bomb harness. Harry explains what has happened. Stevens continues on the planned course while The Doctor, Harry & Lester attack the Cybermen in the caves with gold. Vorus & Tyrum argue over Vorus' actions. The Doctor's attack goes wrong and Lester is killed destroying the Cybermen with his bomb. The Doctor turns off the Cybermen's monitoring device. They attempt to set off the bombs remotely but Sarah interrupts them, getting herself captured. However the detonation is prevented by the Doctor's sabotage. The Doctor confers with the Vogan leaders and decides to transmat back to the station to deal with the Cybermen and rescue Sarah. The Cybermen set the Beacon on a course to collide with Voga, loading it with bombs and preparing to leave on their spaceship. The Doctor uses the Cybermat to attack the Cybermen with gold. Vorus, worried by the station's movement, launches the rocket early and is gunned down by the other Vogans. The Doctor & Sarah are captured by the Cybermen and tied up in the Beacon's control room powerless to do anything. The Cybermen leave as the Beacon moves towards Voga. The Doctor & Sarah escape their bonds and get the Vogans to divert the rocket towards the Cybership which is destroyed. The Doctor wrestles with the Ark's controls preventing it from hitting Voga. The Tardis arrives at the Ark as Harry returns by Transmat, but they all leave quickly as The Doctor finds a message from the Brigadier summoning him back to Earth ....

The episode closes with the travellers finally being re-united with The Tardis, after a 3 story and 11 episode absence (Ark in Space 4 is the last time it appeared).

But the episode opens by returning to a very familiar theme this season....

LESTER: Harry, don't touch it. Open that buckle and you'll be blown to kingdom come.
HARRY: You mean it's booby trapped?
LESTER: These buckles can't be opened until the Cybermen beam the release signal.
DOCTOR: Harry, were you trying to undo this?
HARRY: Well, naturally.
DOCTOR: Did you make the rocks fall, Harry?
HARRY: Er, well, I suppose I must have done, yes.
DOCTOR: Harry Sullivan is an imbecile!

Harry later demonstrates that maybe his memory isn't that great either:

DOCTOR: So where is Sarah?
HARRY: I'm not sure, Doctor. When I last saw her, she was trying to get back to the Beacon.
DOCTOR: What?
HARRY: Yes. You see, we thought you were still up there, and she naturally wanted to warn you about the rocket. Sorry, I can see you're not with me.
DOCTOR: Harry, I'm not with you.
HARRY: No, you see, it seems that Kellman, er, he's dead, by the way. Kellman was really working for the Vogan people, and he got the other half, the, what do you call them?
STEVENSON: Cybermen.
HARRY: Cybermen, that's right. Terribly bad on names. Got the Cybermen up on the Beacon so that they'd be sitting ducks for the Vogan's rocket. Only the Vogans haven't finished the rocket yet, so things have gone a bit wrong.

Just a bit. we'll come back to Vorus' plan with the rocket in a moment.....

But just like last episode he displays his ambitions:

TYRUM: As the human said, recrimination is pointless now. But I promise you, Vorus, if by some miracle our planet should survive, you will face trial for treason.
VORUS: It's you who should be tried, Tyram. You and your creeping sycophantinous city.
TYRUM: As leader of the Guardians, you abused your trust. You opened the route to the surface. You made clandestine contact with aliens, and you beamed radio transmissions out into space. There are no greater crimes in our calendar.
VORUS: In your calendar, Tyram! Your cowering, furtive, underworld life. If we survive, I will face trial gladly. I will give the people my reasons. I wanted to free them from this tyranny of dark, living rock.
TYRUM: Living the way we had for generations, at least we were safe, Vorus. Safe from the genocidal threat of the Cybermen.
VORUS: I had a dream.
TYRUM: A folly, conceived out of arrogance through overweening ambition.
VORUS: We could have traded with other worlds, exchanged our gold for armaments. We could have been strong enough to defend ourselves against Cybermen or any other attackers.

As I said last episode this is what the story is about: two groups of people wanting more than what they've got and each planning to achieve it by getting rid of the other!

As "bonkers Cyberman plans" go, Revenge is nearly sensible: Capture the beacon, Transmat the humans to Voga carrying the bombs and blow them up. You're guessing they use the humans to avoid getting killed by the gold. Except they then send two Cybermen down anyway who the Doctor promptly attacks with the gold. No matter, we'll load the beacon with explosives and crash it into Voga. Well if you've that much explosive why not just transmat it down and blow the planet up from there?

Except, as Lester's sacrifice shows, the Cyberbombs may not be all they're cracked up to be. The supposed all powerful Cyberbombs have enough force to kill a human and 2 Cyberman but there's enough of Lester left for Harry to be checking his body to make sure he's dead. They're going to destroy a planet with just two of those?

You have to assume Kellman, an exographer, had found some weak spot in Voga the Cybermen where the planets weak..... and now we're peering at the details the cracks are beginning to show.

Still it's a bit more solid than Vorus' plan to blow the Cybermen up with a rocket that he's only finishing as they show up!

They've cheated again by using NASA footage for the rocket launch but there's some nice modelwork elsewhere in the episode.

One truly dodgy special effects sequence in this episode involved Voga's planet surface on a roller being spun round in front of the camera. Unfortunately the roller is a bit small making the effect look very poor!

Other than that it's not a bad episode with a nice bit of action and tension and far more Cybermen than I remember there being.....

.... which is a good thing really as we now bid farewell to the Cybermen, who we'd not seen for six and a bit year, for nearly another SEVEN. This episode was shown on 10 May 1975 and, barring an aborted cameo in Shada and a flashback in Logopolis, they wouldn't be seen till 09 March 1982 when they made their surprise comeback. In fact during the entire rest of Tom Baker's reign there's only two returning monster stories: The Sontarans in the Time Warrior and the Daleks in Destiny of the Daleks. Include the Master's appearances and this number rises, but he's more of a villain than a monster and two of those are right at the end of the fourth Doctor's reign. The majority of this period is done without any resort to the show's back catalogue of monsters, though we do get to see the Time Lords on a more regular basis.

We also good bye now, this time permanently, to Gerry Davis, co-creator of the Cybermen and former Doctor who script editor for the last year of the first Doctor and first year of the second. In the 1980s he worked in America, including collaborating on an attempt with Terry Nation on a bid to take over production of Doctor Who. He died on 31 August 1991.

Revenge of the Cybermen also marks the end of the shortest season (so far) in Doctor Who's history at 20 episodes, beating the 25 episodes for Seasons 7 & 8. Even if Terror of the Zygons, recorded at the end of season 12 but eventually shown at the start of season 13, had been shown with season 12 it would have only been 24 episodes long. As it was the practice of holding a story over to the start of the next season was commonplace in the early seventies. The short season here enabled filming to resume earlier than usual in the summer of 1975 and for the show to return not in January 1976 but in September 1975, giving that year 35 episodes of Doctor Who, the most since 1968.

YEAR # EPISODES 1963 6 1964 45 1965 46 1966 46 1967 44 1968 41 1969 25 1970 25 1971 25

YEAR # EPISODES 1972 27 1973 28 1974 24 1975 35 1976 22 1977 30 1978 28 1979 26 1980 18

YEAR # EPISODES 1981 12 1982 26 1983 23 1984 24 1985 13 1986 14 1987 14 1988 13 1989 15

Revenge of the Cybermen was novelised by Terrance Dicks, the only one of Gerry Davis' four Cybermen scripts not be adapted by Davis himself. My local library had it and it was a very early Doctor Who read, before Earthshock happened. In fact my library had all the stories this season, bar Ark in Space, and generally a very strong representation of the last two Pertwee and first two Baker series.

Revenge of the Cybermen was the very first Doctor Who story to be released on video cassette as a compilation version on both VHS & Beta Max formats in October 1983. The story has it that fans at the BBC's Celebration event at Longleat were polled on what story they'd like to see released. They chose Tomb of the Cybermen, which at the time was missing from the archives but it's absence wasn't generally known. So BBC Video chose the first complete story they could find with the Cybermen in it. Following the grand tradition set by Target books the cover to the first release of the video featured the wrong type of Cyberman. We'll forgive the neon logo on the box because it was the current Doctor Who logo at the time.... It was quickly reissued in the packaging standard that would become the template for the Doctor Who videos with only the font used for the story title being carried over. This design would be kept for the majority of the videos up until 1996 when the covers were redesigned. In 1999 Revenge of the Cybermen was reissued on video in episodic format.

Revenge of the Cybermen was one of two Doctor Who stories to be issued on Laserdisc in the UK by the BBC - the other being Brain of Morbius.

Revenge of the Cybermen was issued on DVD as part of Doctor Who - The Cybermen Box Set with Silver Nemesis on 9 August 2010 setting a record of the longest gap between initial release on video and release on DVD.

400 Revenge of the Cybermen: Part Three

EPISODE: Revenge of the Cybermen: Part Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 400
STORY NUMBER: 079
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 03 May 1975
WRITER: Gerry Davis
DIRECTOR: Michael Briant
SCRIPT EDITOR: Robert Holmes
PRODUCER: Philip Hinchcliffe
RATINGS: 8.9 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - The Cybermen Box Set

"You've no home planet, no influence, nothing. You're just a pathetic bunch of tin soldiers skulking about the galaxy in an ancient spaceship."

Episode 400? Wow.

Sarah & Harry are taken to Tyrum. Kellman briefs the Cybermen on Voga. He goes to Voga, ostensibly to check the Transmat is working. The Cybermen intend to destroy Voga so Stevens, Lester & The Doctor are sent to Voga by Transmat with powerful Cyberbombs strapped to them. Kellman attempts to find Vorus but is captured by Tyrum's men. The Cybermen escorting the Doctor & the humans are attacked by Vogans. Kellman tells Tyrum of Vorus' plan to launch a rocket at the beacon destroying the remaining Cybermen. The Cybermen move through the caves killing any Vogan they find as the Doctor & the humans move towards their target. Sarah goes transmats back to the beacon to warn the Doctor. Vorus prepares to launch his Skystriker rocket at the beacon but fears he has run out of time now the Cybermen have arrived with their bombs. Harry & Kellman attempt to find the Doctor & his party but cause a cave in killing Kellman and knocking the bomb carriers out. Harry attempts to free The Doctor from his bomb harness little knowing that the harness is booby trapped......

There aren't that many Cybermen in this episode but you get an idea of how powerful they're meant to be as the two on Voga move through the caves seemingly impervious to everything the Vogans throw at them. Where's the so called Glitter Guns that we hear about during this episode? Given that the Cybermen have showed up you'd expect them to be armed with an appropriate weapon quick enough!

Got a little first from the Cyberleader here:

LEADER: This is the main shaft?
KELLMAN: Yes, this is a shaft I explored for you. It runs right to the core of Voga.
LEADER: How far from the shaft entrance is the transmat receptor area?
KELLMAN: Just a matter of yards. I set the receptors as close as possible.
LEADER: Excellent, Kellman. You have done well. The humans will carry the explosives into the shaft.

Yes it's out first Excellent! He likes it so much he gives it two more airings:

CYBERMAN: Our warriors report all initial opposition has been crushed.
LEADER: Excellent. They are now one hundred metres below the surface.

And then:

CYBERMAN: Average progress rate is fifty metres per minute.
LEADER: Excellent. They will be in the central chamber of Voga.

Meanwhile the Cybermen coerce someone into doing their dirty work for them:

LEADER: And you, Doctor, and your two friends will help us in this task. That is why your lives have been spared.
STEVENSON: I was wondering why you hadn't killed us.
LESTER: We don't have to help them. They can't force us.
LEADER: Oh, you are mistaken.
LESTER: You'll discover who's mistaken, chum.
LEADER: The heart of Voga is almost pure gold. Gold is hostile to our function, therefore Kellman was asked to preserve three animal organisms for this purpose.
DOCTOR: Isn't it wonderful to feel needed, Commander?

LEADER: Cyberbombs, the most compact and powerful explosive devices ever invented.
DOCTOR: Yes, and their use was banned by the Armageddon Convention.
LEADER: Cybermen do not subscribe to any theory of morality in war, Doctor. Our calculations indicate that two bombs placed in the central fissure of Voga will fragmatise the planet.
DOCTOR: Fragmatise? Oh well, I suppose we can't expect decent English from a machine.
LEADER: Prime the buckles. Two bombs should be sufficient. Three will make certain.
STEVENSON: Now what have they done?
LEADER: The buckles are now primed. Any attempt to remove the harness before the countdown reaches the red zone will cause a secondary explosion. Do you understand?
LESTER: You mean, if we attempt to release the harness before then, we'll get blown up.
LEADER: Correct. It is as well to keep that thought in your minds.
DOCTOR: And when we reach the centre of Voga, we'll be fragmatised, as you put it.
LEADER: Incorrect. You will have fourteen minutes, the time period of the red zone, to reach your surface and save yourselves by the transmat beam.
STEVENSON: That is not long enough.
LEADER: Fourteen minutes is considered adequate.
DOCTOR: Anything else before we go?
LEADER: Yes, Doctor. Your progress will be followed by radar. Any attempt to deviate from the planned course will be immediately detected and the bombs exploded by means of these manual controls.
DOCTOR: Thank you.
LEADER: Countdown has commenced. You, Doctor, will leave first.
DOCTOR: Careful, careful. I might explode.

That's not going to end well, is it?

The idea that the Cybermen have been lured here by the ability to destroy a threat to them but it actually being a trap to destroy the Cybermen appeals to me. Both sides here, the Cybermen and the Vogans, have been greatly reduced by their conflict and wish to re-obtain their former greatness:

TYRUM: You're insane, Vorus. You've brought about the destruction of our race.
VORUS: I wanted to bring them freedom, Tyrum. Freedom from fear, freedom to live as Vogans should, on the surface, not cowering like worms in the earth.

Compare that to this exchange between the Doctor & Cyberleader:

DOCTOR: You've no home planet, no influence, nothing. You're just a pathetic bunch of tin soldiers skulking about the galaxy in an ancient spaceship.
LEADER: You speak unwisely. We are destined to be rulers of all the cosmos.
DOCTOR: No, I don't think so, somehow. You tried that once and you were nearly wiped out.
LEADER: Because of Voga and its gold. If humans had not had the resources of Voga, the Cyber War would have ended in glorious triumph.
DOCTOR: It was a glorious triumph, for human ingenuity. They discovered your weakness and invented the glitter gun, and that was the end of Cybermen except as gold-plated souvenirs that people use as hat stands.
LESTER: Watch it, Doctor. I think you've riled him.
LEADER: That is why Voga must be destroyed before we begin our second campaign.
DOCTOR: Oh, there's to be a second campaign, is there?
LEADER: We have enough parts in our ship to build an entirely new Cyber Army, and this time, Doctor, it will be invincible. Cybermen function more efficiently than animal organisms. That is why we will rule the galaxy.
DOCTOR: Loose thinking. The trouble with Cybermen is they've got hydraulic muscles, and of course hydraulic brains to go with them.

A clip showing the Doctor's first line from this exchange was reused in Earthshock episode 2 in 1982.

There's a couple of lovely touches with the transmat in this episode as the Doctor beams down playing with a yoyo and Sarah's crossing her fingers, actions that are continued from departure to destination giving a continuity even though one point was shot in studio and the other on location some weeks apart.

And if you think the transmat terminal in the caves looks familiar, then you're right: it's exactly the same sphere arrangement seen a few episodes earlier in the Sontaran Experiment, except there they were assembled out in the open.

Location filming for this story was conducted at Wookey Hole in Somerset (itself an actual location in the Doctor Who New Adventure novel Blood Heat) between the 18th-21st November 1974. The filming there was plagued by accidents: an electrician broke his leg, Elisabeth Sladen's motorboat went out of control throwing her into the water where she nearly drowned and the stuntmen who rescued her was injured getting her out of the water. Some members of the cast & crew attributed the incidents to a local curse but in reality most of the incidents can be ascribed to the small amount of air in the caves being consumed by a larger than usual number of people.

The location filming for this story has been homaged by The League of Gentlemen in the fifth episode of their first television series. Mark Gatiss, a future Doctor Who writer and actor, plays a cave guide in the fictional Stump Hole Cavern and at one point says

This particular cavern might be familiar from it’s countless appearances on the small screen. In 1974 you couldn’t move down here for Cyber Men. In fact, in an amusing incident, Tom Baker sprained his ankle on that rock there…

A live version of this sketch can be found on YouTube but I'd suggest you don't watch it at work!

Lovely bit of almost Douglas Adamsesque comedy from the Doctor as they troop round the caves with the bombs strapped to them:

LESTER: Why don't we just wait here?
DOCTOR: I think my idea's better.
LESTER: What is your idea?
DOCTOR: I don't know yet. That's the trouble with ideas. They only come a bit at a time.

The story is nicely bound together with some great music from composer Carey Blyton, doing the music for his third and final Doctor who story having previously worked on The Silurians and then the previous season's Death to the Daleks, also directed by Michael Briant who's in charge here too. The sort of heavy ponderous metallic theme for the Cybermen is fabulous. There's over 5 minutes worth of it on the 4 disc Doctor Who - The 50th Anniversary Collection CD, which is well worth owning, and more on the now our of print limited edition 11 disc set.

Like Magrik actor Michael Wisher several of the supporting artists playing Vogans were also in Genesis of the Daleks, so we've seen them already even though there appearance in this was filmed first: Barry Summerford & Roy Caeser were both Kaled Elite Guards,
David Billa was various Thals and Cy Town, as per usual, was inside a Dalek. Leslie Weekes had been in Mission to the Unknown as a Varga Plant and The Mind of Evil episode Three as a UNIT Soldier. He'll be back in The Masque of Mandragora as a Peasant villager in part one and a brother in part 3. Finally a big welcome back to Harry Fielder, appearing for the first time since 1968's Wheel in Space where he was a wheel Crewmember in episode 1 & 2. He'd made his debut earlier that year as a Central European Guard in The Enemy of the World episodes 2 & 3 and will return as a guard in The Seeds of Doom parts three and four, he's actually credited in 4, the Second Assassin in The Face of Evil part one, which gets him an appearance on the commentary, a Titan Base Crewman in The Invisible Enemy part one, a Levithian Guard in The Ribos Operation part three, a Guard in The Armageddon Factor part two, another credited role, a Tigellan in Meglos part one and a security guard in Castrovalva part one. He's got a fair few episodes of Blake's 7 to his name: an Armed Crewman in Space Fall & Cygnus Alpha, a Scavenger in Deliverance and a Federation Trooper in Weapon, Trial, Voice from the Past, Children of Auron, Games, Warlord & Blake. During his career Aitch has been in everything and his website & book are well worth a look. He's not been too well of late so hope you're feeling better soon!.