The Sensorites (TV story)

The Sensorites was the seventh story of Season 1. While the dialogue of "The Daleks" and "The Keys of Marinus" never made it clear if these stories were set in the past, present, or future, this was the first story to be categorically set in the future, and especially the future of Earth.

Summary

The Doctor, Ian, Barbara and Susan arrive in the TARDIS on board a spaceship. Their initial concern is for the ship's human crew who are suffering from telepathic interference from the Sensorites, but Susan communicates with the Sensorites and finds that the aliens are fearful of an attack from the humans and are just defending themselves. Travelling to the Sense Sphere (the Sensorites' planet) the Doctor then seeks to cure an illness the Sensorites and Ian have succumbed to, but finds that this has been caused by deliberate poisoning. The political maneuvering of the Sensorite City Administrator adds an additional threat to the TARDIS crew as he seeks to discredit and implicate them.

Plot

The TARDIS travellers land on a moving spaceship and find the crew apparently dead. However, one of the crew members, Captain Maitland, regains consciousness and Ian Chesterton fully revives him and another woman, Carol Richmond. These two tell the travellers that they are on an exploration mission from Earth and are orbitting Sense Sphere. However, its inhabitants, the Sensorites, refuse to let them leave the orbit. The Sensorites visit and stop the travellers from leaving, while sending them on a collision course, which the Doctor diverts. The travellers then meet John (whose mind has been broken by the Sensorites) and find out that he is Carol's fiancé.

Returning to to plague the crew, the Sensorites freeze Carol and Maitland once more. The Doctor breaks Maitland's mental conditioning, but cannot help John. Susan's telepathic mind is flooded with the many voices of the Sensorites who remain scared of the humans and are trying to communicate with her. Meanwhile, the Doctor works out that the Sensorites attacked the human craft because John, a mineralogist, had discovered a vast supply of molybdenum on Sense-Sphere. Susan reports that the Sensorites want to make contact with travellers, asking the crew to go aboard Sense-sphere and reveal that a previous Earth expedition caused them great misery. The Doctor refuses but Susan, under duress, agrees and departs.

The Doctor deduces that the Sensorites need plenty of light, so Ian reduces the lighting on the ship, in a bid to rescue Susan. As a result, Susan returns to the spacecraft. The Doctor then asks the Sensorites to return his lock and is invited to go to Sense-Sphere to speak with the leader. Susan, Ian, Carol and John join him while Barbara and Maitland stay behind. John is promised that his condition will be reversed. On their journey to Sense-Sphere, the party learn that the previous visitors from Earth exploited Sense-sphere for its wealth, then argued. Half of them stole the spacecraft, which exploded on take-off.

The Sensorite Council is divided over the issue of inviting the party to Sense-Sphere: some of the councillors plot to kill them on arrival, but some believe that the humans can help with the disease that is currently killing many Sensorites. Their first plot is foiled by the other Sensorites, but they continue to plot in secret. The humans are not told of the first plot, and John and Carol are cured. In the main conference room, Ian starts vomiting and collapses. Suffering from the disease that has blighted the Sensorites, he is told that he will soon die.

It turns out that he was actually poisoned by drinking water from the general aqueduct. The Doctor finds the problem aqueduct and starts work with the Sensorite scientists. The plotting Sensorites impersonate the Sensorite leader and steal the new cure, before it is given to Ian, but a new one is made easily and Ian is cured.

Meanwhile, investigating the aqueduct, the Doctor finds strange noises and darkness. He finds and removes deadly nightshade (the cause of the poisoning), but on going back, meets an unseen monster. Susan and Ian find him unconscious with a ripped coat, but otherwise unharmed. On being recovered, he tells of his suspicion that some Sensorites are plotting to kill them. The plotting Sensorites kill the Second-Cheif and one of them replaces him in his position.

John tells the others that he knows the lead plotter, but he is now too powerful, so The Doctor and Carol go down to the aqueduct to find the poisoners. Their weapons and map were tampered with and are useless.

Elsewhere, a mysterious assailant abducts Carol and forces her to write saying she has left back for the ship. Neither Susan, John or Barbara believe this so they go to investigate and find her imprisoned. Susan, John and Barbara overpower the guard and release Carol. On finding out about the tampered tools, they go into the aqueduct to rescue the Doctor and Ian. The leader discovers the plotters a little while later.

Ian and the Doctor discover that the monsters were actually the survivors of the previous Earth mission, and they had been poisoning the Sensorites. Their deranged Commander leads them to the surface, where they are arrested by the Sesnsorites. The Doctor and his party return to the city, pleading clemency for the poisoners. The leader of the Sensorites agrees and sends them back with Maitland, John and Carol to Earth, for treatment for madness.

Cast

Crew

Notes

All episodes exist in 16mm telerecordings
Negative film prints of all epsisodes where recovered from BBC Enterprises in 1978
Jacqueline Hill does not appear in episodes 5 and 6 as she was on holiday while they were filmed
This story was nearly cancelled as a result of a studio dispute
Hidden Danger was postponed for one week due to a sporting event
Stephen Dartnell appears as John. He had previously appeared as Yartek in The Keys of Marinus
John Bailey, later to feature as Edward Waterfield in 1967's The Evil of the Daleks has a role here as the Commander
Designer Raymond Cusick used almost all curves in his sets for the Sense Sphere, feeling that this would give a more alien look
Russell T. Davies has acknowledged the Sensorites as an influence on the basic concept of the Ood in "The Impossible Planet" and "The Satan Pit."

Ratings

Strangers in Space - 7.9m viewers
The Unwilling Warriors - 6.9m viewers
Hidden Danger - 7.4m viewers
A Race Against Death - 5.5m viewers
Kidnap - 6.9m viewers
A Desperate Venture - 6.9m viewers

Myths

The Humans responsible for poisoning the water supplies were part of a group called INEER. (The initials INEER were meant to be the end of the word Engineer.)
Arthur Newall appeared in Doctor Who as a Dalek. (He in fact appeared in this story as a Sensorite.)

Location filming

This story was filmed at BBC Television Centre Studio TC3, and Lime Grove Studio D

Continuity

Dialogue suggests the Doctor has only 1 heart at this stage of his life.
Despite travelling together for years the Doctor and Susan have never argued.
Dialogue seems to confirm Susan and the Doctor are from the same planet, indicating that she was born on Gallifrey.
Susan has telepathic abilities which the Doctor is not aware of however it is suggested that many of those on Gallifrey have such abilities as the Doctor suggests her skills could be perfected if she gets home.
Gallifrey is similar to Earth but the sky at night is burnt orange and the tree leaves are bright silver.
The Doctor once argued with Henry VIII as he wanted to be sentenced to the Tower of London where the TARDIS was located.
The Doctor and Susan encountered telepathic plants on the planet Esto.

Discontinuity

The Sensorites are able to cut the lock out of the TARDIS doors, which has the somewhat counter-intuitive effect of completely sealing the ship. From season 2 onwards the TARDIS is depicted as being effectively invulnerable to this kind of brute-force attack.
During episode 1 while the Doctor is delivering his lines the camera hits the table in front of him.
The drill marks are visible before Maitland starts to use the drill.
It is stretching credibility to the extreme to suggest that the Sensorites can only recognise each other by the sashes they wear. Visits to the swimming baths on the Sense-Sphere must be fraught with opportunities for social embarrassment.
Despite this story being set in the 28th Century the astronauts wore contemporary looking space suits. Not a trend which is seen in other stories set in this time period.

Story novelisation

The story novelisation was published as Doctor Who: The Sensorites in July 1987 ISBN 0426202953. The story was written by Nigel Robinson and was number 118 in the series of 156 Doctor Who novels published by Target Books.