The Daleks' Master Plan (TV story)

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The Daleks' Master Plan was the fourth story of Season 3 of Doctor Who. At twelve episodes running five hours, it remains the longest undisputed Doctor Who story to date (the 14-episode Season 23 was broadcast under the single title TV: The Trial of a Time Lord, but there is debate as to whether this is one story or four interconnected stories). Currently, only episodes 2, 5, and 10 are known to exist in the BBC archive.

As part seven was to air on Christmas Day, it was decided that it should be a comedic episode with little to do with the overall plot as many would not be watching. This episode saw the Doctor turn to the camera and wish the viewer "a merry Christmas".

This story was intertwined with Mission to the Unknown, which acted as a prologue by setting the scene and introducing characters necessary to the plot of The Daleks' Master Plan.

Katarina, only introduced in the previous serial, became the first companion to die while travelling with the Doctor. Later in the story, Sara Kingdom, who was introduced during this story and was played by Jean Marsh, became the second. This story saw the first appearance of Nicholas Courtney in Doctor Who. It also saw the Monk make a return, the first individual antagonist to get a rematch with the Doctor.

Synopsis

In the year 4000, the Daleks conspire to conquer the Solar System. Their scheme involves treachery at the highest levels and a weapon capable of destroying the very fabric of time. Only the Doctor and his friends can prevent catastrophe — and there is no guarantee they will escape with their lives...

Plot

The Nightmare Begins (1)

Some six months after the events of Mission to the Unknown, the Doctor's TARDIS arrives on the planet Kembel and the First Doctor leaves the TARDIS to try to find medical aid for the wounded Steven, leaving him with the Trojan servant girl Katarina.

File:Dmp ep1.JPG
Space security agent Kert Gantry

Meanwhile, two Space Agents, Bret Vyon and the injured Kert Gantry, are also on the planet, trying to find out what happened to their agent, Marc Cory. Eventually Gantry tells Vyon to go on without him, as he will slow Vyon down.

Seconds after Vyon leaves, a Dalek finds Gantry and kills him. Vyon spots the Doctor leaving the TARDIS, and takes the key from him at gunpoint before knocking him out. Eventually finding the TARDIS, Vyon demands that the occupants take him off the planet, but Katarina barely understands what's going on, much less how to work the ship. Steven briefly recovers and knocks Vyon out after seeing him threaten Katarina. The Doctor returns and places Vyon in a restraining chair, then goes back outside.

On Earth, Mavic Chen, Guardian of the Solar System, announces to the people that he will be going on a holiday. In reality he is joining the alliance formed by the Daleks. He arrives on the planet Kembel soon afterwards. Seeing Chen's spaceship (a "Spar") arrive, the Doctor returns to the TARDIS, only to find it surrounded by Daleks.

Day of Armageddon (2)

Mavic Chen meets with the troublesome Zephon.

Katarina had released Vyon, who cured Steven with field medicine. They meet up with the Doctor soon after, just as the Daleks set fire to the jungle to drive out any further intruders.

While the alliance prepares for a meeting of its leaders, Chen and another leader, Zephon, watch the jungle burn. Chen goes to the meeting, but Zephon refuses to go with him, saying that he will go when he feels like it. The Doctor and his companions infiltrate the city and spot Zephon going to the meeting. They knock Zephon out, tie him up, dress the Doctor in Zephon's large cloak and send him to the meeting while the other three break into Chen's spar.

Arriving at the meeting, the other leaders express irritation at the tardiness of "Zephon." The meeting begins, and the Dalek Supreme reports their ultimate weapon, the Time Destructor, is now complete. Chen reveals he has procured a sample of the extremely rare element taranium, necessary to operate the Time Destructor. Meanwhile, the real Zephon has untied himself. He sounds the alarm. In the resulting confusion, the Doctor steals the taranium and flees. However, Vyon hears the alarm and prepares to take off in the spar without him.

Devil's Planet (3)

The Doctor gets to Chen's spar just in time for take-off. The Daleks blame Zephon for the situation, saying his tardiness let the Doctor and companions find him, but Zephon defends his actions and accuses Chen of arranging to have the taranium stolen back. Chen says that Zephon's accusation is nonsensical. The Daleks agree, concluding that Zephon is the one who's responsible. Zephon tells the Daleks that two of the other leaders will also leave if he does. Finally, Zephon announces that he is leaving the alliance. He does not get the chance — a Dalek kills him.

On course for Earth, the Doctor reveals he found a tape while in the jungle. The group plays it back. It turns out to be from Agent Cory, whose brief statements confirm what they already know. As they near the prison planet Desperus — where convicts are simply left, without any guards or means of escape — the Daleks use a randomiser to disable the controls of the spar.

The spar crashes on the planet, causing minor damage to the ship. Realising that the impact should have totally destroyed the spar, the four conclude the Daleks want them alive and begin repairing the ship. Upon seeing the landing, a group of prisoners attempts to get on-board, but the Doctor electrifies the ship entrance and the prisoners are left unconscious. A Dalek ship arrives, but misjudges its landing and suffers a damaging crash. The spar takes off again, and Katarina goes to check the airlock. She finds a convict who got onboard just before take-off. The convict, Kirksen, holds her at knifepoint.

The Traitors (4)

File:Dmp ep4.JPG
Kirksen struggles with Katarina.

Kirksen threatens to kill Katarina unless the travellers take him to the nearest planet — Kembel. The group eventually agrees, but their decision proves irrelevant. Katarina opens the airlock, blowing herself and Kirksen into space. Stunned, Steven suggests that she must have done it accidentally, but the Doctor thinks it was deliberate.

Seeing the events, the Daleks remotely destroy the pursuit ship for their failed mission, but seem satisfied that the delay caused by the crash will allow Chen enough time to get to Earth and have the trio arrested when they arrive.

Arriving on Earth, the three evade detection. They go to see Vyon's old friend, Daxtar. Daxtar seems co-operative, but the Doctor realises he's allied with Chen when he mentions the taranium before anyone else does. Vyon kills Daxtar, much to the Doctor's annoyance, but there's little time to dwell on this as Chen's security agents, led by Sara Kingdom, arrive. Vyon allows the Doctor and Steven to get away by throwing himself at Kingdom. Vyon tries to reason with her, but she kills him. Warned of the importance of the taranium by Chen, she orders Borkar, her colleague, to "shoot on sight" and "aim for the head."

Counter Plot (5)

File:Dmp ep5.JPG
The Doctor examines a piece of equipment.

Sara Kingdom chases the Doctor and Steven to a laboratory, where all three are accidentally caught up in a molecular dissemination experiment and are transported to the planet Mira.

Chen pretends he planned this accident. He tells the Daleks where to find the Doctor and Steven. On Mira, Kingdom (who is Vyon's sister) is forced to join forces with the Doctor and Steven as they are attacked by Visians, invisible, savage creatures. The Doctor and Steven convince Sara of Chen and the Daleks' true intentions, just as a Dalek ship arrives. The Daleks fend off an attack from the invisible creatures and demand they surrender. The Doctor reluctantly announces that "the Daleks have won."

Coronas of the Sun (6)

File:Dmp ep6.JPG
The Daleks finally catch the Doctor.

Fortunately for the Doctor and his companions, more invisible creatures attack, allowing them to escape and steal the Dalek ship. They try to return to Earth, but the Daleks take control of the ship remotely. They use a magnetic beam to draw it to Kembel. Realising they don't have much time, the Doctor decides to build a fake taranium core which he can give to the Daleks while keeping the real one. Steven gets the idea to charge up the fake core with gravitic energy, but in the process encloses himself in a force field and is left barely conscious.

After landing, the three negotiate with Chen (who has returned to Kembel) to be allowed to conduct the handover of the (fake) taranium core at the TARDIS. The Daleks refuse, but Chen persuades them that they don't have anything to lose. He thinks the Doctor will be unable to stop them after the core has been handed over. The Doctor and Sara return to the TARDIS, while Steven hands over the core. The Daleks try to kill him, but the force field protects him, though it is exhausted in the process.

After leaving Kembel, the TARDIS lands, but the Doctor warns that "the whole atmosphere is entirely poisonous."

The Feast of Steven (7)

"Incidentally a happy Christmas to all of you at home!"

The group has actually landed in a polluted area of 1960s England outside a police station. They are arrested, but escape. The TARDIS next lands on the set of a 1920s silent film, causing many problems for the film crew (such as the Doctor being mistaken for a cultural advisor and the lead actress nearly quitting because she thinks the director wants to replace her with Sara) before escaping. After that they have a toast to Christmas and the Doctor wishes a merry Christmas to everyone "at home".

Volcano (8)

Meanwhile, back on Kembel, the fake taranium core is fitted to the Time Destructor,. It is tested on another representative, Trantis, who has proven useless to the Daleks. However, there is no effect and the fake core quickly exhausts itself, leaving Trantis unharmed. The Daleks accuse Chen of lying about the taranium. Chen realises the Doctor switched the cores. They send a request for a time machine to pursue the Doctor. Trantis is killed by a Dalek.

The TARDIS briefly materialises in the Oval back on Earth during a cricket match, then on the volcanic planet Tigus. The three travellers have been followed by the the Monk, who damages the TARDIS's door lock, then mockingly informs the Doctor and companions they are stranded on the planet for the rest of their lives. Not to be deterred, the Doctor counteracts this by using his ring to get them back inside the TARDIS. The Monk is surprised by this, but follows the Doctor to his next destination. The TARDIS then arrives in Trafalgar Square immediately after midnight, 1 January 1966.

Meanwhile, the Daleks' time machine has arrived on Kembel. The task force leave in it and the rest of the Daleks join the Supreme in a victory chant.

Golden Death (9)

The TARDIS arrives in ancient Egypt at the foot of the Great Pyramid of Giza. Mavic Chen and the Daleks soon arrive in their time machine and begin their search for the taranium. Realising the Monk and someone else have arrived, Steven and Sara go to find out who it is while the Doctor repairs the lock; but they are arrested as looters by the guards of the Pharoah's treasures. The Monk tries to find the Doctor, but is found by Chen and the Daleks who offer him an ultimatum — help them find the taranium or the Daleks will kill him. Unsurprisingly, the Monk accepts. The Doctor follows the Monk for a time, discovering his TARDIS and changing its shape into a police box. He follows the Monk back to the Doctor's TARDIS,. After confronting him and hearing the Monk's story and plea to give in to the Daleks, he decides to deal with him. Steven and Sara escape and, looking for the Doctor, decide the TARDIS must have been moved inside the pyramid. They find it, but the Doctor is nowhere to be found. Sara spots a bandage-wrapped hand reaching out from a large box.

Escape Switch (10)

File:Dmp ep10.JPG
The Doctor listens to Mavic Chen's offer

It is the Monk, wrapped up by the Doctor. Steven and Sara take him to go and find the Doctor. He claims the Doctor did it out of malice. They don't get far before being caught by the Daleks and Chen, who demands the taranium. In desperation, the Monk suggests using Steven and Sara as hostages. Chen accepts this and tells the Daleks that the Doctor will not allow the two to be killed.

Chen announces over a loudspeaker with a range of seven Earth miles that unless he hands over the taranium, Sara and Steven will be killed. The Doctor is dismayed, but has no choice but to comply. Some Egyptians hear this. One thinks it is the voice of a God, but the other says Gods would speak in words they understand. When the Doctor hands over the core, the Daleks try to kill them and the Monk but they all escape, helped by an attack by the Egyptian guards. While the guards disable some of the Daleks, most of them escape and return to their time machine with Chen.

Back in the TARDIS, the Doctor admits that he did not have time to build another fake and had to hand over the real taranium. However, he's stolen the Monk's directional unit — evidenced when the Monk lands on an ice planet and realises that without any control over the direction of his TARDIS he now has little chance of ever catching the Doctor. He promises to come after the Doctor when he gets off the planet.

The Doctor fits the control and takes off, though he says the TARDIS may be destroyed. The console room is engulfed in a flash of white light.

The Abandoned Planet (11)

The directional control has burnt itself out almost instantly (due to the Monk's TARDIS being a later model than the Doctor's), but it's enough to get them back to Kembel. The three leave the TARDIS, but Sara and Steven lose the Doctor in the jungle and proceed to the city alone, led by the Doctor's Power Impulse Compass. They find the Dalek city deserted and the alliance leaders imprisoned. The leaders agree to turn on the Daleks. In exchange they are released from the prison cell. They take off in their ships — apart from Chen, whose spar explodes just after take-off.

Searching the jungle, they find the entrance to a second, underground city which the Daleks are now using. As they prepare to enter, Chen appears, having faked his death, and takes them prisoner. He leads them into the underground city.

The Destruction of Time (12)

They go through the underground city. Chen leads them into the control room in grandiose fashion. Thinking that he was still imprisoned in the first city, the Dalek leader announces their alliance is over. Chen refuses to accept this. He proclaims himself the leader of the alliance. He tries to kill the Dalek leader, but his blast has no effect. The Dalek orders Chen taken outside and killed. Chen flees, boasting he is immortal. He's quickly proven wrong when a Dalek patrol corners him and guns him down.

Taking advantage of the distraction, the Doctor enters the control room and activates the Time Destructor. The Daleks return, but are powerless to do anything with the Doctor threatening to increase the Destructor's power. He jams a door, delaying the Daleks' pursuit. He orders Sara and Steven back to the TARDIS, but Sara refuses to go. The two flee through the jungle with the Time Destructor, but begin to rapidly age and deteriorate. The Daleks pursue them, but seem immune to the effects. The Doctor and Sara reach the TARDIS but have been aged massively by the Destructor. They collapse and Sara disintegrates. Steven rushes outside and tries to deactivate the Destructor, but cannot do anything. As he begins to rapidly age, he tries to help the Doctor, but is ordered back into the TARDIS. Fortunately, when trying to deactivate the Destructor he reverses it, thus causing the two to revert to approximately their previous ages. The pursuing Daleks try to destroy the Destructor with their weapons but cause it to run uncontrollably fast, destroying the Daleks and reducing the planet to a lifeless, barely habitable wasteland.

The Doctor and Steven emerge from the TARDIS some time later, the Destructor having burnt itself out. "What a terrible waste..." mutters the Doctor, remembering all the people and creatures, including friends, who have lost their lives.

Cast

Uncredited cast

Crew

References

Individuals

Technology

  • Earth is developing long distance teleportation technology.
  • In the TARDIS, the Doctor places Bret Vyon on a "magnetic chair" that blocks him in a force field that works on an electromagnetic principle.
  • Bret Vyon produces tablets of an anti-toxin able to cure Steve's poisoning.
  • The Doctor steals the Monk's directional unit for his TARDIS to enable a return to Kembel.
  • The Doctor fiddles with the Monk's TARDIS' chameleon circuit, changing his TARDIS from a block of stone to a motor cycle, a stage coach, a Western wagon, a tank and a police box.
  • The Daleks use a voice audio to broadcast Chen's message with a range of 7 earth miles. The Egyptians cannot understand the message.
  • Steven uses an impulse compass whilst in the Kembel jungle.

Timeline

Time travel

Weapons

  • The core of the Time Destructor contains one emm of taranium (a mineral only found on Uranus).
  • The manipulator arm of the Daleks can be used as a flamethrower.

Story notes

  • This story had the working titles of: The Daleks (Part IV) (meaning, the fourth Doctor Who story to feature the Daleks) and Battle Of Wits.
  • Only "Day of Armageddon" (Episode 2), "Counter Plot" (Episode 5) and "Escape Switch" (Episode 10) survive on 16mm film telerecordings. "Day of Armageddon" was recovered in 2004 when a former Head of Engineering at Yorkshire Television returned it to the BBC. This is the only recovered episode to feature footage of Katarina.
  • As a special Christmas-themed episode, "The Feast of Steven" (Episode 7) was considered unsellable to other countries; the story was instead offered for sale as an eleven-part adventure. Because of this, videotape masters were wiped and no film telerecording of "The Feast of Steven" was made for international distribution; it became the first episode of Doctor Who to be seemingly lost forever. "The Feast of Steven" was also the first episode to let one of the main characters 'break the fourth wall' with the Doctor addressing the camera: "Oh and incidentally, a happy Christmas to all of you at home."
  • Because "The Feast of Steven" was never sold abroad, it is possible – though this cannot be confirmed – that two versions of the closing scene of "Coronas of the Sun" were recorded; one bearing the closing caption "Next Episode: THE FEAST OF STEVEN" for UK transmission, and the other reading "Next Episode: VOLCANO" for overseas sale.
  • This story features the first appearance of Nicholas Courtney, a favourite of the story's director Douglas Camfield, here playing Bret Vyon. He would appear as Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart in another Camfield story, The Web of Fear.
  • Nicholas Courtney and Jean Marsh later appeared in the Seventh Doctor story Battlefield.
  • The Daleks' Master Plan and Mission to the Unknown were the only 1960s Doctor Who stories offered for overseas sale but never purchased.
  • Unless one counts The Trial of a Time Lord, which can be considered four different stories, this is the longest single story in the series' history.
  • Douglas Adams' third Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy novel, Life, the Universe and Everything, contains a scene which bears a striking resemblance to the sequence in "Volcano" in which the TARDIS materialises on a cricket pitch. In Adams' novel, a Chesterfield sofa bearing Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect materialises in the middle of the pitch at Lord's Cricket Ground, and two rather nonplussed cricket commentators discuss whether such an event has ever happened before — just as, in "Volcano", two nonplussed cricket commentators discuss the equally unprecedented appearance of the TARDIS on the pitch at the Oval.

Ratings

  • "The Nightmare Begins" - 9.1 million viewers
  • "Day Of Armageddon" - 9.8 million viewers
  • "Devil's Planet" - 10.3 million viewers
  • "The Traitors" - 9.5 million viewers
  • "Counter Plot" - 9.9 million viewers
  • "Coronas Of The Sun" - 9.1 million viewers
  • "The Feast Of Steven" - 7.9 million viewers
  • "Volcano" - 9.6 million viewers
  • "Golden Death" - 9.2 million viewers
  • "Escape Switch" - 9.5 million viewers
  • "The Abandoned Planet" - 9.8 million viewers
  • "Destruction Of Time" - 8.6 million viewers

Myths

  • Sara Kingdom was going to be a replacement companion for Katarina. (Not quite true. When it was realised that the character of Katarina would not work as a regular, Nation was asked to write her out as soon as he could. It doesn't appear likely that Marsh, who at the time was much in demand for film and TV appearances, would have signed on for an ongoing role.)
  • The incident at the end of the seventh episode when the Doctor looks directly into camera and proposes a toast to everyone at home was an unscripted ad lib on William Hartnell's part and outraged the production team. (This action was scripted and rehearsed. It was in fact a tradition in the sixties for scenes of this kind to be included in special Christmas editions of popular series. Besides which, if the production team had really disliked it they could simply have edited it out. As indicated above, the episode was considered "disposable" by the BBC as well.)
  • The Time Meddler's TARDIS was stuck with the appearance of a police box (it clearly takes on the form of a block of ice on the ice planet)
  • The Time Meddler was stuck on the ice planet (there is no reason to believe this - the directional unit was taken, not the means to travel)

Filming locations

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.
  • Marc Cory's tape message, heard in Devil's Planet, is different from the one he left in Mission to the Unknown.
  • In Coronas of the Sun, when the Doctor orders Steven, from inside the TARDIS, to give up the taranium, his voice is briefly "Dalekised."
  • At the very beginning of Volcano, the grammes operator accidentally plays the TARDIS background "hum" rather than the Daleks' control room sounds; the one is quickly cross-faded to the other.

Continuity

Home video and audio releases

  • Lost in Time Region 2

    Lost in Time Region 2

  • Lost in Time Region 4

    Lost in Time Region 4

  • Lost in Time Region 1

    Lost in Time Region 1

  • Lost in Time Region 1 (Disc 1)

    Lost in Time Region 1 (Disc 1)

  • Soundtrack release

    Soundtrack release

  • The Lost TV Episodes - Collection Two box set

    The Lost TV Episodes - Collection Two box set

  • Region 4 re-release

    Region 4 re-release

External links

Footnotes

  1. ↑ INFO: "The Temple of Evil"
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Dalek television stories
For the purposes of this list, a "Dalek story" is one in which one living, authentic Dalek plays a part within the confines of the story, outside of flashbacks to previous stories and cliffhangers that lead into the following story. For this reason, stories such as The Space Museum are not counted due to the Daleks' appearance being defined by their importance to following stories, while stories such as The Wheel in Space and The Waters of Mars are absent due to the Daleks' only contribution being references to past Dalek stories. Stories like The Wedding of River Song, Hell Bent, Once, Upon Time and The Vanquishers are also not included due to the Daleks' appearance being restricted to a single scene of no consequence to the plot of the story, while the TV movie is also absent due to the Daleks only being heard from off-screen.
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Because of the ubiquity of this race, no attempt will be made here to list every appearance in every medium. Instead, we focus on televised appearances here, and invite you to explore a complete list of appearances elsewhere.
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