The Dæmons (TV story): Difference between revisions

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The Dæmons

Key crew

Writer:

Guy Leopold

Director:

Christopher Barry

Producer:

Barry Letts

Release details

Story number:

59

Number of parts:

5

Premiere broadcast:

22 May - 19 June 1971

Premiere network:

BBC1

Format:

5x25-minute episodes

Production code:

JJJ

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The Dæmons was the fifth and final story of Season 8. It concluded a series-long succession of stories featuring the Master, ending with his incarceration. However, the character would continue to appear on an occasional basis during Season 9 and Season 10.

Synopsis

The Master, posing as a rural vicar, summons a cloven-hoofed demon in a church crypt. Seeking to gain the ancient titan's demonic power, he gathers a cult and then corrupts or controls the residents of Devil's End to bow to his will. Dark elemental forces begin to disturb the village on the eve of May Day: unexplained murders, a stone gargoyle come to life, and a nigh-impenetrable infernal energy dome. With the Master fully prepared to destroy the Earth, the Doctor and UNIT - aided by a benevolent practitioner of witchcraft - battle the wicked rites of a secret science weilded by an alien from another world.

Plot

Episode one

During a storm that whips through the rural English village of Devil's End, a dog gets away from its owner. He pursues it into a graveyard, only to encounter something unseen and die. The local doctor says that it was a heart attack, but Olive Hawthorne, the local witch, insists that the man died of fright. She casts her runes to find that there is evil afoot.

Near the village, an archaeological dig is excavating the infamous Devil's Hump, a Bronze Age burial mound. The dig is being covered by BBC Three. The interviewer, Alistair Fergus, speaks to the cantankerous Professor Horner, who claims that the Hump holds the treasure and tomb of a warrior chieftain, and that he plans to open the tomb at the stroke of midnight on April 30, the pagan festival of Beltane.

The television coverage is being watched by the Third Doctor and Jo at UNIT. While the Doctor scoffs at Jo's notions of the coming of the Age of Aquarius and the supernatural, he feels that something is wrong with the dig. On the television, they see Olive go to the dig to protest, warning of great evil and the coming of the horned one, but she is dismissed as a crank. The Doctor tells Jo that Olive Hawthorne is right — the dig must be stopped. They start off to Devil's End.

Hawthorne calms the weather

Olive returns to the village, and a strong wind whips up out of nowhere. She raises her hands to dismiss it, not knowing that the local constable, PC Groom, has gone into a trance behind her and is about to strike her with a stone. The wind dies down as she chants, and PC Groom regains his senses before he lands the blow. Olive then goes to see the vicar, but he has been mysteriously replaced with a new one, Mr Magister. Magister — actually the Master — tries to assure her that her fears are unfounded, but his hypnosis fails to overcome Olive's will, and she says she will find someone who will believe her.

The Doctor and Jo, driving to Devil's End, get lost when a wind spins a signpost and points them in the wrong direction. Over at the Hump, tempers start to flare for no reason. When the Doctor and Jo stop by the village pub to get directions, one of the villagers goes and informs the Master of the Doctor's presence. The Master tells him to get dressed for the ceremony.

On the way to the Hump, the Doctor's car, Bessie, is blocked by a fallen tree. Unable to budge it, the Doctor and Jo rush to the mound on foot. The Master, dressed in ceremonial robes and with a coven of thirteen acolytes, starts a summoning ritual in the church catacombs. As his chanting grows more frenzied, the Doctor and Jo reach the mound and the Doctor rushes inside to stop Horner, but it is too late. The tomb door opens and icy gusts of wind rush out and the ground begins to shake, toppling the camera crew and even the coven in the catacombs. The Master laughs triumphantly and calls the entity's name, Azal, and the eyes of a gargoyle, Bok, flare with a reddish glow. Jo enters the mound to find Horner and the Doctor motionless, covered with frost...

Episode two

Yates and Benton fly to Devil's End in the UNIT helicopter

Horner is dead, and the Doctor seems dead as well. The Master uses a knife to indicate a stone covered in ritual markings as the "appointed place", dismissing the coven. Back at UNIT, Captain Mike Yates and Sergeant Benton were watching the end of the broadcast as it went dead. They try to find out what's going on while attempting to contact the Brigadier, who had earlier gone for a night at the opera. Meanwhile, the village doctor discovers that the Doctor may not be entirely dead after all, but is puzzled when he hears the beating of two hearts. Jo telephones Yates, who tells her he will be there by helicopter in the morning, just as the line is cut off from the outside. The Master prays in the church as Jo watches over the still unconscious Doctor in the pub. At the dig, the ground shakes and the constable on duty sees something gigantic with heavy footsteps, and falls.

Hoof prints seen by Yates and Benton from helicopter.

In the morning, Yates and Benton fly by helicopter to Devil's End, and see burn marks on the fields before the village that resemble enormous footprints. Once in Devil's End, Benton decides to look around the village while Yates finally manages to contact the Brigadier, who is not pleased that Yates has commandeered his helicopter, and calls for a car. Benton, looking around in the church, finds Olive trapped in a cupboard, where the Master's verger, Garvin, had locked her. Down in the cellar to hide from Garvin, she tells Benton about Magister. Garvin comes down with a rifle, and Benton tries to disarm him. In the ensuing fight, Benton falls on the marked stone and seizes up. Garvin holds both of them at gunpoint and moves them outside, just as the ground starts to shake. Garvin fires up at something gigantic, but is engulfed in a fireball. The heat wave extends even into the village, knocking Jo and Yates down, just as the Doctor awakens with a start. Olive and Benton make their way back to the pub, and the Doctor discusses the incident with Olive, who says that she saw the devil, 30 feet high and with horns. The Doctor is told of the new vicar, and realises who is behind this, as "Magister" is Latin for "Master".

The Brigadier finds himself unable to enter the village, as there is a barrier surrounding it that causes anything trying to enter to heat up and burst into flame. He contacts Yates and is briefed on the situation while the Doctor and Jo return to the dig, an act the Master seems to be able to sense. They find the constable dead and a small spaceship in the mound the same shape as the Hump. Jo tries to lift it but cannot, as the Doctor explains that it weighs 750 tons. Suddenly, Bok leaps into the tent covering the entrance to the tomb, about to attack...

Episode three

The Doctor wards him off with some words in a strange language and an iron trowel. The Doctor explains to Jo that he actually used the words of a Venusian lullaby — it was the gargoyle's own superstition that drove it back.

The Master sends Bok on a mission of death

The Master, in the meantime, hypnotises the squire, Winstanley, as Olive and the Doctor debate about whether it is magic or science that is at work here. The Brigadier discovers that the heat shield is dome shaped, centred on the church, with a radius of ten miles out and one mile high. The Doctor shows the others pictures of various horned gods and demons from Olive's occult and history book collection, and explains that the creature Olive saw was an extraterrestrial, one of the Dæmons from the planet Dæmos, 60,000 light years away, who came to Earth one hundred thousand years before. The small spaceship's actual size is 200 feet long and 30 feet across, and the heat and cold waves they have been experiencing are the result of the energy displaced when the ship shrinks or grows. The Doctor further explains that the Dæmons have influenced Earth throughout its history, becoming part of human myth, and see the planet as a giant experiment. The Master has called the Dæmon up once, and right now, it is so small as to be invisible. The third summoning, however, could signal the end of the experiment, and the world. The Master uses Bok to scare the church masses into helping him summon Azal.

The Doctor and the Brigadier with the heat barrier between them.

The Brigadier contacts Yates and says he is about to try attacking the heat shield from the air. The Doctor warns him not to, saying that it would only strengthen it, and suggests they use a diathermic energy exchanger. When UNIT technician Osgood fails to understand what the Doctor is getting at, he says he will come out and explain. When he does so, Tom Girton, one the villagers working with the Master, hijacks the UNIT helicopter and uses it to attack the Doctor. The Doctor swerves Bessie out of the way and the helicopter explodes against the heat shield. As the Doctor relates his instructions to Osgood, who protests that it goes against the laws of physics, the Master summons Azal again. A heat wave and an earth tremor once again sweep through the village as Azal curses the Master for daring to summon him again.

Episode four

The Master tries to dismiss Azal with an iron candlestick holder, but it does not seem to work. He demands that Azal give him the power that is his right, but Azal warns him that he is not the Master's servant. Azal also senses the presence of another like the Master, and wants to speak to the Doctor to see if he is worthy to take over the world. Azal says on his third appearance, he will decide if Earth deserves to continue existing (during which, he makes a passing remark about how they destroyed Atlantis). If so, he will give it to the Master. Azal then vanishes in another heat wave.

Azal reveals his horrible countenance to everyone in the church

After explaining the process of creating the exchanger to Osgood, the Doctor returns to the village. However, the Master's agents are at work, and he is soon captured by a mob of villagers and tied up to a maypole, about to be burned alive. Olive goes to the mob and tells them that the Doctor is a mighty wizard, and with some help from Benton's silenced pistol and a remote controlled Bessie, convinces the mob that the Doctor does indeed have magical powers.

Jo has left the bed to investigate and encounters Yates, who tells her about the multiple traps laid throughout the catacombs. He demonstrates with the same force field that seized up Benton. The Master has gathered the people he had scared earlier to bring out as many negative emotions as possible. The Masterbegins to summon Azal. Jo tries to interrupt the ritual, but it is too late. Azal has summoned for his third and final time....

Episode five

With another rush of heat, Azal manifests himself, and Jo and Yates are taken prisoner. Outside, the Doctor explains to the now calmer villagers that his "magic" was due to science, and so is the Master's trickery. The rituals are merely used to focus the psychokinetic energy of humans that the Master needs to summon the Dæmons. As Jo is prepared as a sacrifice to Azal, the exchanger finally works and UNIT forces go through the gap created in the heat shield, but the gap only lasts a few minutes and the exchanger soon overloads. Mike escapes and tells the Doctor about Jo, but Bok is guarding the entrance to the catacombs. The use of the exchanger momentarily weakens Bok and Azal, and the Doctor rushes by the gargoyle. He makes it down to the cellar, where the Master is expecting him.

Azal wracked in agony.

Outside, UNIT troops start firing at Bok, who can disintegrate objects and people with a wave of his hand, but he is also bulletproof. Even a bazooka does not work, as the pieces of the gargoyle reform almost instantly. Inside the church, the Master makes his case to the Dæmon that he will rule the Earth experiment's people for their own good. The Doctor argues that man should be given a chance to grow up. Azal finally decides to give his power to the Master, and fires electricity at the Doctor to kill him. However, Jo, steps in front of the Doctor, asking Azal to kill her instead.

Benton captures the Master

This act of self-sacrifice does not make sense to Azal, and the confusion sends him into an agony. He shouts for all of them to leave as he is dying. Bok reverts to his stone form, and as everyone runs out of the church, it blows up. The Master tries to escape in Bessie, but the Doctor's remote control brings the car back, and the Master is taken into custody, to be put in maximum security.

Olive Hawthorne hears the sound of bird songs and the smell of flowers once again, as the Earth is reborn each May Day. Olive takes Benton to dance around the maypole with the rest of the townsfolk, while Yates and the Brigadier go off to the pub for a drink. The Doctor and Jo join the dance, as the May Day celebrations continue and the Doctor remarks to Jo that perhaps there is magic in the world after all.

Cast

Dr. Who - Jon Pertwee
Jo Grant - Katy Manning
The Master - Roger Delgado
Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart - Nicholas Courtney
Captain Mike Yates - Richard Franklin
Sergeant Benton - John Levene
Olive Hawthorne - Damaris Hayman
Bert the Landlord - Don McKillop
Winstanley - Rollo Gamble
Professor Horner - Robin Wentworth
Alastair Fergus - David Simeon
Harry - James Snell
Garvin - John Joyce
Dr. Reeves - Eric Hillyard
Tom Girton - Jon Croft
PC Groom - Christopher Wray
Baker's Man - Gerald Taylor
Bok - Stanley Mason
Sgt. Osgood - Alec Linstead
Thorpe - John Owens
Azal - Stephen Thorne
Morris Dancers - The Headington Quarry Men
Jones - Matthew Corbett

Crew

References

The Doctor's items

The Doctor has fitted his car, Bessie, with radio remote control.

The Master

The Master has taken over as vicar in the village of Devil's End.
The Doctor says the Master reminds him of either Adolf Hitler or Genghis Khan.

Species

Azal is a member of the race of Dæmons, from the planet Dæmos on the other side of the galaxy.
It is implied that Azal (or his race) destroyed Atlantis.
Bok is a stone gargoyle from the Church crypt, animated by Azal and under the mental control of the Master. It has a fear of iron (an ancient magical defence), and is repelled by the Doctor's use of a Venusian lullaby, which Bok believes is a psionic incantation.
When coming to grips with the idea that the Dæmons might be aliens, Sergeant Benton compares them to other alien species he's met, namely the Axons (TV: The Claws of Axos) and the Cybermen. (TV: The Invasion).

Technology

When instructing Sgt. Osgood on how to build the energy exchanger, the Doctor tells him to reverse the polarity. This is one of several occasions on which the Third Doctor comes quite close to using his putative catchphrase, 'reverse the polarity of the neutron flow', without actually using it.

Language

The Master uses the alias "Mr Magister". The Doctor explains that magister means "master" in Latin.
Untranslated, though, is the name the Doctor chooses for himself — calling himself "the Great Wizard Qui Quae Quod". This is three conjugates (the masculine, feminine and neuter forms) of the Latin word "who", continuing the "Doctor who?" running joke.

Story notes

This story had the working title The Demons.
"Guy Leopold" (the writer) is a pen name for Robert Sloman and Barry Letts.
The Radio Times programme listing for episode one was accompanied by a black and white illustration by Frank Bellamy depicting Miss Hawthorne, along with the Doctor and Jo driving towards Devil's End in Bessie, with the accompanying caption "Dr. Who drives into a new adventure: 6.15". That for the omnibus rerun of the story on 28 December 1971 was accompanied by another black and white illustration by Bellamy depicting the Doctor with the Master in the background, with the accompanying caption "Dr. Who meets The Master in the Daemons: 6.20".
Although the filming location, the village of Aldbourne, is in the county of Wiltshire, there is no indication in the on-screen dialogue as to which county Devil's End is situated in.
The shot of the exploding helicopter is actually an unused out-take from a James Bond film, possibly From Russia With Love. The sequence looked so convincing on-screen that a popular myth persists to this day that a helicopter was actually destroyed during the filming.
The area under the church is always referred to as "the cavern", never "the crypt". This was a BBC requirement to avoid the risk of causing offence to viewers with religious sensibilities. Similarly, much to director Christopher Barry's amazement, no mention of God was permitted to be made in the story's dialogue, in case this was considered to be blasphemous – although references to the Devil were acceptable.
The incantation used by the Master to summon the Daemon is the nursery rhyme "Mary had a little lamb" backwards. This was to have been the Lord's Prayer spoken backwards, but BBC executives objected.
In the DVD featurette Terrance Dicks: Fact & Fiction (included on the DVD of Horror of Fang Rock), Dicks confesses that in the script he originally cut out the famous "Chap with wings, five rounds rapid" line, but it was reinstated at Barry Letts' request.
It was believed by many viewers that the model of the church blown up in the final episode (a replica of the actual church in Aldbourne) was real, because the sequence looked so convincing on-screen. Complaints were received by the BBC deploring its destruction.
When the signpost pointing to Devil's End is shown in episode two, another sign on it can be seen to read "Satanhall".
This is the only story to end an episode on a cliffhanger of the Master in peril.
The dig is broadcast on BBC3. This revelation will be taken differently by different audiences. At the time The Dæmons was broadcast, there was no such thing as BBC3. Consequently, to the contemporaneous audience, this was an indication that the story was not set in the present day, but a few years in the future. The writer and producers perhaps felt that BBC3 was no more than a few years off, therefore allowing them to sneakily set the story in the late 1970s. It made sense, at the time, to include these little nods to the future, as it was the general intent of Sherwin/Letts/Hinchcliffe-era UNIT stories that they be set in the slight future. However, in this case, the trick falls flat on a modern audience. In real life, BBC3 wasn't launched until 2003, which only adds to the broader UNIT dating controversy, since the story is otherwise quite evidently not set in the same time period as, say, Rose. Very young audience members won't be troubled by the remark at all, since, for them, BBC3 has always been around. Likewise, non-Britons will likely not understand the gag at all, regardless of their age.

To confuse matters still further, the most recent broadcast of this story on the BBC was on 21 and 22 October 2007 - not on BBC 3, but on BBC FOUR. (The broadcast compiled episodes one, two and three in one broadcast on October 21 2007, and episodes 4 and 5 the following evening.)

The symbols on the collar of the Master's ceremonial robe are from the sixteenth century occult alphabet known as Theban, and from left to right they translate to "Master".
This is the only televised story of Doctor Who to contain a typographic ligature in its title: æ.
Along with Mission to the Unknown, Doctor Who and the Silurians, The Mind of Evil, The Sea Devils, The Sontaran Experiment, Genesis of the Daleks and Midnight, this is one of only eight televised stories in the history of Doctor Who not to feature the TARDIS (The Ambassadors of Death, Inferno and Day of the Daleks feature the central console, but not the TARDIS itself).
Part two of the story is the 300th episode of Doctor Who.
The 625 line PAL colour videotapes of episodes one, two, three and five were either erased for reuse, junked or lost — despite a request made by Barry Letts during his time as producer for the story to be retained complete as an example of 1970s Doctor Who. For some unknown reason, only episode 4 was kept in this format. 16mm black & white film telerecordings, made for overseas sale, were retained for the other episodes.

Ratings

Episode one - 9.2 million viewers
Episode two - 8.0 million viewers
Episode three - 8.1 million viewers
Episode four - 8.1 million viewers
Episode five - 8.3 million viewers

Myths

There was a sixth episode planned, where the Master escaped UNIT. (This was an April Fools' joke in the fanzine DWB.)

Influences

Much is often made of the strong influence of the old Professor Quatermass serials on season 7 of Doctor Who, but here is an even more direct connection in season 8. This story makes more than a few nods towards Quatermass and the Pit, and not just for the idea that stories of devils and demons may be a race memory of horned aliens who conducted a eugenics experiment on early humans. Devil's End is essentially the same placename as Hobb's Lane, the fictitious London setting of the earlier story, Hobb being an old name for the Devil. The use of iron to hold both Azal and Bok at bay is an old folk superstition that is also referred to in the Quatermass story (see also TV: Image of the Fendahl). And to further strengthen the connection, Roger Delgado - here playing The Master - had himself appeared in the Quatermass serials in the 1950s.
The large hoof prints left by Azal as he walks from the barrow to the village of Devil's End echos a famous and well-documented case. On the morning of 9 February 1855, the inhabitants of several villages and towns in Devon awoke to find what appeared to be the tracks of a hooved, two-legged creature in the snow, traversing a total distance of one hundred miles, going over rooftops, a 14-foot wall, and even apparently leaping across a two mile wide estuary. Many believed that the Devil himself had walked through Devon the previous night.

Filming locations

Aldbourne, Wiltshire
Ramsbury Airfield, Ramsbury, Wiltshire
BBC Television Centre (Studio 4), Shepherd's Bush, London

Production errors

If you'd like to talk about narrative problems with this story — like plot holes and things that seem to contradict other stories — please go to this episode's discontinuity discussion.

Various pronunciations of 'Dæmons', 'Dæmos' (and all other permutations) are used throughout the story.

BBC holiday repeat

On 28 December 1971, The Daemons became the very first serial to be rebroadcast by the BBC in omnibus form; and on this occasion the chosen serial was shown complete. Billed as Dr Who and the Daemons in Radio Times, this was the first time a "complete adventure in one programme" — to quote the programme listing — had been shown. (In the 1960s, when Doctor Who was being broadcast 48 weeks a year, there was normally no opportunity, or imperative, to show any repeats between one season and the next.)

The repeat broadcast attracted 10.5 million viewers, the show's highest rating since 1965. This was such a huge audience that the experiment was adjudged a great success, and this led to a policy of showing at least one omnibus repeat from every subsequent season for many years afterwards, until well into the Tom Baker era.

Continuity

The Second Doctor had previously visited submerged modern day Atlantis in the company of Ben Jackson, Polly Wright and Jamie McCrimmon. (TV: The Underwater Menace)
In episode 2 of 'The Daemons' the Doctor recites a few lines from a Venusian lullaby, which is heard in full the following season during The Curse of Peladon.
Although Sergeant Benton had previously worn civilian business suits for surveillance in The Invasion and The Mind of Evil, this is the first story in which he is on-duty in casual civilian attire or engages in armed combat out of uniform. This is also the first time that Captain Yates is on-duty in civilian clothes. At the opposite end of the spectrum, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart's mess dress is shown for the first time.
After being featured in every story of Season 8, the Master is captured by UNIT forces at the conclusion of this story and is next seen in prison in TV: The Sea Devils.
Winstanley tells Jo, "While there's life there's hope, right?", when the faintly alive Doctor is being thawed out in episode 2. These would turn out to be the Third Doctor's last words to Sarah Jane Smith- "A tear, Sarah Jane? No, don't cry. While there's life, there's... (hope)" (TV: Planet of the Spiders).
The investigative journalist James Stevens and his girlfriend Dodo Chaplet, one of the First Doctor's former companions, watch the opening of the Devil's Hump live on tv in the broadcast of The Passing Parade. (PROSE: Who Killed Kennedy)
A Liverpudlian UNIT soldier named Francis Cleary was driven mad after seeing Satan himself in Devil's End. (PROSE: Who Killed Kennedy)
Under the pseudonym "Victor Magister," the Master was charged with having caused the attack on Black Thursday (TV: Spearhead from Space), the Silurian plague outbreak (TV: Doctor Who and the Silurians) and the failure of the World Peace Conference (TV: The Mind of Evil), among other incidents, after being captured in Devil's End. Stevens notes that his terrorist activities were little remembered by most British people in 1996. (PROSE: Who Killed Kennedy)
The Master's TARDIS is not seen in this story. He is said to send it to the Devil's End crypt at the close of PROSE: The Face of the Enemy.
The Master retrieves his TARDIS from the debris of the church in PROSE: The Eight Doctors.
A Daemon carcass is used by the Faction Paradox as a spaceship in PROSE: Interference - Book Two.
The planet Dæmos is mentioned in TV: The Satan Pit.
Some events of this episode are referred to in TV: Last of the Time Lords.

Home video and audio releases

VHS releases

Episode five was included in black and white on the Pertwee Years video in 1992.

The Dæmons was released on VHS in the UK and Australia in 1993. This was an electronically restored colour version of the story completed by the Doctor Who Restoration Team.

AUS VHS cover
US VHS cover
UK VHS cover

DVD Releases

The story was released on DVD on 26 March 2012.

Script book

The Dæmons was released by Titan Books as a script book in November 1992.

Script book cover

Other publications

Countdown Annual 1972 contains an article (with photographs in colour) about the location filming for this story. The article is listed in the contents page as "Filming Dr. Who", but is actually titled "A Day with Dr. Who". The author is Countdown editor Dennis Hooper (who misspells "Bessie" as "Betsy").
In March 1971 The Daily Express newspaper featured the location filming for this story as part of an article on Jon Pertwee, one of a series of features about well known tv personalities.

External links

The Dæmons at the BBC's official site
The Dæmons at BroaDWcast
The Dæmons at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
The Dæmons at Shannon Sullivan's A Brief History of Time (Travel)
The Dæmons at The Locations Guide

Footnotes

@@ Line 12: / Line 12: @@
 |featuring = [[Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart|The Brig]], [[Mike Yates]], [[John Benton|Benton]]
 |enemy= {{Delgado|c}} <br /> [[Azal]] <br /> [[Bok]]
-|setting= [[Devil's End]], the [[1980s]]
+|setting= [[Devil's End]], the [[1970s]]
 |writer= [[Guy Leopold]]
 |director= [[Christopher Barry]]
@@ Line 248: / Line 248: @@
 {{TitleSort}}
-[[de:{{StoryTitle}}]]
-[[fr:The Dæmons]]
 [[Category:Doctor Who (1963) television stories]]
 [[Category:Third Doctor television stories]]
@@ Line 261: / Line 258: @@
 [[Category:Season 8 stories]]
 [[Category:Dæmon stories]]
+[[Category:Stories set in the 1970s]]
 [[Category:Five part serials]]
-[[Category:Stories set in the 1980s]]
+[[de:{{StoryTitle}}]]
+[[fr:The Dæmons]]

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