Dinosaurs on a Spaceship (TV story)
Dinosaurs on a Spaceship was the second episode of the seventh series of Doctor Who produced by BBC Wales.
Synopsis
An unmanned spaceship hurtles towards certain destruction -- unless the Doctor can save it, and its impossible cargo… of dinosaurs!
Plot
Egypt, 1334 BC. The Doctor is about to leave in the TARDIS after stopping a giant locust-like alien when Nefertiti corners him against it, coming on to him. A device in the Doctor's pocket goes off, and he and 'Neffie' promptly leave.
India, 2367. The Indian Space Agency have detected a spaceship the size of Canada hurtling towards the Earth. They tell the Doctor they will shoot it out of the sky should it come closer than 10,000 kilometers of the planet. The Doctor then goes to Africa in the early 20th century, offering a trip to the spaceship to a hunter called John Ridell. He agrees.
Meanwhile, Rory's father Brian is changing a light bulb in their house (in the presence of the Ponds) when the TARDIS materializes around them. As they fly off onto the spacecraft, Brian is understandably confused. As they depart onto the ship, the Doctor confronts him, believing him to have teleported on board, before Rory explains it is his father. A door suddenly opens in the wall, revealing 2 Ankylosaurs, causing the team to flee.
Hiding in a notch in the wall, Ridell offers to dispatch one of the dinosaurs with a knife, to which the Doctor abruptly denies. As the dinosaurs walk off, the team comes across a computer screen. The Doctor requests out loud a teleport to the engine room at the bottom of the craft, and him, Rory and Brian are promptly transported onto a beach. The Doctor confirms the beach is not on Earth, and Brian spots what he believes is a kestrel in the sky. The Doctor instructs them to dig, and Brian produces a trowel from his coat. He digs about a foot into the sand and discovers that there is a metal floor underneath. The Doctor discovers the ship is powered by hydroelectricity, produced by the wave of the 'sea'. He then notices the 'kestrels' are actually pterosaurs, and they are closing in on them. They hide in a cave, which seems to house something else that is marching towards them. They find that the thing is actually 2 large robots, who announce they are very cross with them.
Amy, Nefertit and Ridell move through the ship, surpassing a T-Rex nest and ending up in a leafed computer room. Nefertit notices there are no crew, and thinks a plague may have wiped them out. Amy finds a computer and discovers the ship is SZilurian, but also sees there are thousands less on the ship than when it launched.
Cast
- The Doctor - Matt Smith
- Amy Pond - Karen Gillan
- Rory Williams - Arthur Darvill
- Riddell - Rupert Graves
- Brian Williams - Mark Williams
- Solomon - David Bradley
- Queen Nefertiti - Riann Steele
- Indira - Sunetra Sarker
- Robot 1 - Noel Byrne
- Robot 1 voice - David Mitchell
- Robot 2 - Richard Garaghty
- Robot 2 voice - Robert Webb
- Bleytal - Richard Hope
- ISA Worker - Rudi Dharmalingam
Crew
| Executive Producers Steven Moffat and Caroline Skinner |
|
|
|
|
| Not every person who worked on this adventure was credited. The absence of a credit for a position doesn't necessarily mean the job wasn't required. The information above is based solely on observations of the actual end credits of the episodes as broadcast, and does not relay information from IMDB or other sources. |
References
Culture
- Brian calls the Doctor Arthur C. Clarke when the Doctor, Rory and he are in the engine room.
- When the Doctor disables Solomon's robots, they sing "Daisy Bell" - a reference to HAL's disabling in Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
- Amy says that John needs a lesson in gender politics.
Sports
- Brian enjoys golf and carries golf balls around with him.
Story notes
- The Doctor claims to be a Sagittarius, but qualifies this statement by adding, "Probably." Interestingly enough, November 23 (the first airdate of Doctor Who in 1963) falls during the time that Sagittarius is occupied by the sun.
- The Doctor kisses Rory affectionately on the mouth after Rory suggests checking if the Silurian Ark has defence systems. This is the second same-sex kiss featured in the series and the first initiated by the Doctor. The first kiss was between Captain Jack Harkness and the Ninth Doctor in The Parting of the Ways.
- Rory gives his father a shot and promises it won't hurt. Afterwards, when Brian yelps at the pain of the shot, Rory says, "I lied." This scene paralleled the one done in DW: The Time of Angels when, like her father, River Song gave Amy a shot and promised it wouldn't hurt, only to later explain that she lied.
Ratings
- The episode received overnight ratings of 5.5million viewers in the UK.
Filming locations
to be added
Production errors
- The Doctor's socks constantly change from stripey blue socks to his normal black socks.
- On the final postcard sent by Rory's dad, the TARDIS exterior resembles how it looked before the redesign in The Eleventh Hour.
- The flying reptiles identified by the Doctor as pterodactyls are actually pteranodons, a relation, though different species of pterosaur, as noted by the distinctive spike-like crest on the back of its head.
Continuity
- Rory states that he is 31 years old. If Rory was born in 1989 (considering that Amy and Rory are the same age in DW: Let's Kill Hitler and Amy's birth year according to DW: The Big Bang was 1989), then The Doctor picks up Rory, Amy and Brian in 2020, which seems to be the same year that Amy and Rory went back to the hill and waved to themselves in DW: The Hungry Earth, an episode also featuring Silurians. Alternatively, he could be including time spent with the Doctor.
- Rory's mobile phone rings on the spaceship and Brian is shocked by how it can work in space. On previous occasions the Doctor has been shown to convert a mobile phone into a "superphone". He has done this for Rose Tyler, (DW: The End of the World), and Martha Jones. (DW: 42)
Home video releases
DVD releases
to be added
Blu-ray releases
to be added
External links
to be added
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
