140 [1] –The Two Doctors | |||
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Doctor Who serial | |||
Cast | |||
Guest
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Production | |||
Directed by | Peter Moffatt | ||
Written by | Robert Holmes | ||
Script editor | Eric Saward | ||
Produced by | John Nathan-Turner | ||
Music by | Peter Howell | ||
Production code | 6W | ||
Series | Season 22 | ||
Running time | 3 episodes, 45 minutes each | ||
First broadcast | 16 February 1985 | ||
Last broadcast | 2 March 1985 | ||
Chronology | |||
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The Two Doctors is the fourth serial of the 22nd season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who , which was first broadcast in three weekly parts on BBC1 from 16 February to 2 March 1985.
The serial is set on an alien space station and in and around Seville. In the serial, the alien time traveller the Sixth Doctor (Colin Baker), his former travelling companion Jamie McCrimmon (Frazer Hines) and his current companion Peri Brown (Nicola Bryant) work to save the younger Second Doctor (Patrick Troughton) from the biogeneticist Dastari (Laurence Payne), who intends to steal the knowledge of how to travel in time from the Second Doctor's genetic make-up.
This serial marks Troughton's final appearance as the Second Doctor before his death in 1987.
The Second Doctor and Jamie McCrimmon land the TARDIS on board Space Station Camera, where they talk to Dastari, the Head of Projects. The Doctor tells Dastari that the Time Lords want the time experiments stopped, but Dastari refuses. Also on board are the Androgums, a gluttonous alien species who are conspiring with the Sontarans to take over the station. The ship's Androgum cook, Shockeye, drugs the crew's dinner to give the Sontarans an opportunity to invade.
In the TARDIS, the Sixth Doctor has a vision of his second incarnation being put to death. He decides to consult his old friend Dastari to see if he can help. The Doctor and Peri arrive on the station and are taken prisoner by the Sontarans. The ship lands in Seville, Spain, where the Androgums and Sontarans take over a local hacienda to use as a base of operations.
Dastari reveals his plan to dissect the Second Doctor's cell structure to isolate his symbiotic nuclei and give them to Chessene, an Androgum technologically augmented to genius levels. Upon discovering there are two Time Lords on the ship, Chessene asks Dastari to turn the Second Doctor into an Androgum instead. They also intend to eliminate the Sontarans.
Dastari implants the Second Doctor with a 50 per cent Androgum inheritance. The Second Doctor and Shockeye go to a restaurant and order gargantuan amounts of food. When the restaurant's owner demands that they pay, Shockeye fatally stabs him, just as the Sixth Doctor and the others arrive. Shockeye leaves the Second Doctor, who slowly reverts to normal. Chessene and Dastari take them back to the hacienda at gunpoint.
The Sixth Doctor frees himself and kills Shockeye. Chessene sees the Doctor's blood and starts licking it. Dastari realises that no matter how augmented she may be, Chessene is still an Androgum, and decides to free the Second Doctor, Peri, and Jamie. When Chessene sees this, she shoots and kills Dastari. She tries to shoot the Second Doctor and Peri, but Jamie throws a knife at her wrist, making her drop the gun. Chessene goes into the module, hoping to escape, but the sabotaged module explodes, killing her.
Robert Holmes, a vegetarian, wrote the serial as an allegory about meat-eating, hunting and butchering. "Androgum" is an anagram of "gourmand". [2]
Holmes's original brief from producer John Nathan-Turner was to write a serial taking place in New Orleans, involving the Sontarans, the First Doctor portrayed by Richard Hurndall and the Doctor's granddaughter Susan Foreman, played by Carole Ann Ford, reprising their roles from "The Five Doctors". [3] Hurndall's death in April 1984 saw the brief revised to feature the Second Doctor and Jamie, [4] but the setting had to be changed to Spain instead when the expected funding for location filming in the United States fell through.
In his 1986 interview for Starburst , script editor Eric Saward said he thought this story was "poorly directed". [5]
This story marked the final appearance of Patrick Troughton as the Second Doctor and the final on-screen appearance of Frazer Hines as Jamie.
Episode | Title | Run time | Original air date | UK viewers (millions) [6] |
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1 | "Part One" | 44:22 | 16 February 1985 | 6.6 |
2 | "Part Two" | 44:49 | 23 February 1985 | 6.0 |
3 | "Part Three" | 44:45 | 2 March 1985 | 6.9 |
The Two Doctors was one of several stories from this era to provoke controversy over its depiction of violence. In 1985, Australasian Doctor Who Fan Club president Tony Howe criticised the murder of Oscar with a kitchen knife as being an instance of "sick, shock violence" that was present for "cheap shock value only". [7]
Patrick Mulkern of Radio Times awarded the serial two stars out of five, stating: "The Two Doctors wasn't dire, but the actors and audience deserved better." [8] In Doctor Who: The Complete Guide, Mark Campbell awarded The Two Doctors seven out of ten, describing it as "a Doctor Who version of Last of the Summer Wine as sponsored by the Vegetarian Society." [9]
Author | Robert Holmes |
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Cover artist | Andrew Skilleter |
Series | Doctor Who book: Target novelisations |
Release number | 100 |
Publisher | Target Books |
Publication date | 5 December 1985 |
ISBN | 0-426-20201-5 |
The novelisation of this serial, by Robert Holmes, was published in hardback and paperback in August 1985 as the 100th Doctor Who release by Target Books. This was Holmes's only complete novelisation and seeks to clear up some of the continuity errors in the original broadcast. With a gold foil-embossed cover, it was billed on release as the 100th novelisation and featured an introduction by John Nathan-Turner.
The Two Doctors was released on VHS in November 1993. It was released on DVD in the UK in September 2003 in a two-disc set as part of the Doctor Who 40th Anniversary Celebration releases, representing the Colin Baker years, with many extra features, including the Jim'll Fix It sketch A Fix with Sontarans . The DVD contains a full-length commentary provided by director Peter Moffatt and actors Colin Baker, Nicola Bryant, Frazer Hines, and Jacqueline Pearce. The DVD was subsequently incorporated into the box set Bred for War, along with The Time Warrior , The Sontaran Experiment and The Invasion of Time . Following the sexual abuse accusations regarding Jimmy Savile, the DVD was withdrawn from sale but has since been rereleased with the offending sketch removed. [10] The BBC has made the serial available for download on Apple iTunes. It was released in issue 45 of Doctor Who DVD Files.
It was released as part of the ‘Doctor Who The Collection: Season 22’ blu-ray box set on 20 June 2022. An extended cut of Part One was included as an extra on the set with a runtime of 47:33, running 3 minutes and 11 seconds longer than the original broadcast episode.
The Seeds of Death is the fifth serial of the sixth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Written by Brian Hayles and an uncredited Terrance Dicks and directed by Michael Ferguson, it originally aired in six weekly parts on BBC1 from 25 January to 1 March 1969. It sees the return of the Ice Warriors, previously introduced by Hayles in the 1967 serial The Ice Warriors.
Mindwarp is the second serial of the larger narrative known as The Trial of a Time Lord which encompasses the whole of the 23rd season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was first broadcast in four weekly parts on BBC1 from 4 to 25 October 1986. The title Mindwarp is not used on screen and appears only on the serial's scripts with the four episodes that comprise the story being transmitted as The Trial of a Time Lord Parts Five to Eight. This story marks the final appearance of Nicola Bryant as Peri Brown.
The War Games is the seventh and final serial of the sixth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which originally aired in ten weekly parts from 19 April to 21 June 1969.
"The Five Doctors" is a special feature-length episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, produced in celebration of the programme's 20th anniversary. It had its world premiere in the United States, on the Chicago PBS station WTTW and various other PBS member stations on 23 November 1983, the anniversary date. It was transmitted on BBC1 in the United Kingdom two days later.
The Time Warrior is the first serial of the 11th season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts on BBC1 from 15 December 1973 to 5 January 1974. The serial introduced Elisabeth Sladen as new companion Sarah Jane Smith. It also marked the debut of the Sontaran race. The serial also introduces the name of the Doctor's home planet, Gallifrey.
The Ark in Space is the second serial of the 12th season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts on BBC1 from 25 January to 15 February 1975.
The Dominators is the first serial of the sixth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which originally aired in five weekly parts from 10 August to 7 September 1968. The Second Doctor and his travelling companions Jamie McCrimmon and Zoe Heriot work with the Dulcians of the planet Dulkis to prevent the alien Dominators from blowing up Dulkis and using its irradiated remains as spaceship fuel.
The Mind Robber is the second serial of the sixth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in five weekly parts from 14 September to 12 October 1968.
Frazer Simpson Frederick Hines is an English actor. He began his career as a child actor and appeared in A King in New York (1957) with Charlie Chaplin. He later played Jamie McCrimmon in Doctor Who, appearing in more episodes than any other companion. He was a regular in the series alongside Patrick Troughton as the Second Doctor between 1966 and 1969, and made guest appearances in the 1980s stories "The Five Doctors" and The Two Doctors. He also had a long-running role as Joe Sugden in Emmerdale Farm between 1972 and 1994.
Vengeance on Varos is the second serial of the 22nd season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in two weekly parts on 19 and 26 January 1985.
The Abominable Snowmen is the mostly missing second serial of the fifth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which originally aired in six weekly parts from 30 September to 4 November 1967.
The Moonbase is the half-missing sixth serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 11 February to 4 March 1967.
The Second Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by actor Patrick Troughton. Out of his 119 episodes, 53 are missing.
The Krotons is the fourth serial of the sixth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 28 December 1968 to 18 January 1969.
The Ice Warriors is the partly missing third serial of the fifth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 11 November to 16 December 1967.
The Underwater Menace is the half-missing fifth serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 14 January to 4 February 1967.
The Faceless Ones is the mostly missing eighth serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 8 April to 13 May 1967.
The Enemy of the World is the fourth serial of the fifth season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which originally aired in six weekly parts from 23 December 1967 to 27 January 1968.
The Highlanders is the completely missing fourth serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 17 December 1966 to 7 January 1967.
The twenty-second season of British science fiction television series Doctor Who began on 5 January 1985 and ended on 30 March 1985. It opened with the serial Attack of the Cybermen and ended with the serial Revelation of the Daleks. The season returned to the traditional Saturday transmission for the first time since Season 18, but for the first and only time in the series' first run it featured 45-minute episodes in its entirety. During transmission, BBC1 controller Michael Grade announced an 18-month hiatus for the series, partly citing the violence depicted in the stories of the season. John Nathan-Turner produced the series with Eric Saward as script editor.