The Armageddon Factor (TV story)

The Armageddon Factor was the sixth and final story of Season 16 and concluded the season-long Key to Time story arc. Mary Tamm makes her final appearance as Romana, while her ultimate replacement, Lalla Ward, appears in the story in a different role. The Black Guardian appears for the first time, and isn't seen again until Mawdryn Undead.

Synopsis

The final segment of the Key to Time is at the heart of a devastating war between neighbouring planets Atrios and Zeos. The Doctor discovers a sinister entity manipulating events, and that the cost of obtaining the final segment may be more personal than he imagined.

Plot

Twin planets Atrios and Zeos are locked in a long-running war. The young Princess Astra, nominal leader of Atrios, is appaled at the devastation, but the Marshal, in charge of the war, actually possesses the power. The Marshal secretly confesses to his aide-de-camp Shapp that they are losing, and is desperate for the edge that will lead him to victory. On instruction from an unseen entity, he leads Astra on a fool's errand into a trap, where she is abducted and transmatted to an unknown location. Meanwhile, he watches helplessly as the last fleet of Atrian fighter ships are shot down by Zeon forces.

The Doctor and Romana land on Atrios, and the TARDIS is soon buried in rubble resulting from a Zeon aerial bombardment. They meet the Marshal, who implores the Doctor to assist the situation. The Doctor proposes a shield that will prevent the Zeons from attacking, but the Marshall insists that he create a weapon that will allow him to achieve total victory. He notices that the Marshal is acting under an outside influence.

The Doctor, Romana, K9, Shapp, and Merak (Astra's lover) are transported to Zeos, where they discover that the planet is vacant. The entire Zeon war operation is being conducted by the powerful supercomputer Mentalis. K9 interfaces with Mentalis and they discover that in the event of its destruction, it will destroy both Zeos and Atrios - a concept known as the Armageddon Factor. They then learn that the Marshal, in a last-ditch effort, is piloting the last remaining Atrian warship to destroy the Zeon capital with a nuclear missile, and the oncoming attack will set the mutual destruction in motion.

Desperate to stop the Marshal's attack, the Doctor uses the five segments of the Key to Time, plus an artificial sixth segment made from chronodyne, to generate a temporary time loop around the Marshal's ship. They then discover the ultimate truth: a third party, known as the Shadow, is manipulating the entire war from his enormous vessel midway between the two planets. He is an agent of the Black Guardian, and has been overseeing the final segment of the Key (Princess Astra herself), setting the war in motion, employing the renegade Time Lord Drax to construct Mentalis, and simply waiting while the Doctor risked life and limb to find the first five segments.

The Doctor persuades Drax to assist him and they manage to foil the Shadow's plans. When the artificial time loop expires, the war rockets are deflected by a force field and destroy the Shadow and his ship instead.

Astra converts herself into the final segment, completing the Key to Time and giving the Doctor, for the moment, absolute power over the entire Universe. The White Guardian appears and demands that the Doctor hand the Key over to him. When he callously dismisses Astra's sacrifice, however, the Doctor realises that he's actually the Black Guardian in disguise, and orders the Key segments to disperse (reuniting Astra and Merak). The Black Guardian is furious and threatens to destroy the Doctor, but the Doctor installs a randomizer on the TARDIS console, ensuring that neither he nor the Black Guardian knows where they'll end up next.

Cast

Crew

References

Astronomical objects

Atrios and Zeos have been waging nuclear war on each other, despite the fact that for the last five years Zeos has been uninhabited and that its warfare has been prosecuted by Mentalis, a computerised commandant built by Drax at the behest of the Shadow.

Computers

K9 is influenced by the computer Mentalis, which only he can communicate with.

The Doctor

He and Drax graduated from the "Class of 92", where they were "on the tech course together".
Drax says that was 450 years ago.
The Doctor was called Theta Sigma by Drax and his other classmates (DW: The Happiness Patrol, clarifies that this was a nickname, not the Doctor's actual name).
The Doctor actually has a doctorate. This clashes with previous statements by the Doctor; it could be that he chooses not to explain his "honourary" doctorate (see The Ark in Space).
The Doctor mentions Troy

Individuals

First appearance of the Black Guardian.

Substances

The Doctor makes a false sixth segment out of chronodyne.

TARDIS

The Doctor installs the randomiser in the TARDIS.

Transport technology

There is a transmat between Atrios and Zeos.

Story notes

Originally the sixth segment was to be the Shadow's shadow.
Lalla Ward appears as Princess Astra; next season she would play Romana.
This story had the working title of Armageddon.
Episode 1 was promoted as the 500th episode of Doctor Who.
This was the last 6-part story broadcast.
According to Mary Tamm in the DVD featurette "There's Something About Mary", it was while filming this serial that she made her final decision to leave the series.
Twenty-three minutes into transmission of Part Five, a technical fault on the playback equipment – which occurred at the point where the Doctor is being escorted to the TARDIS by the Mute and the Shadow removes his control device from Princess Astra, telling her when she asks who he is, “The Shadow that accompanies you all” – resulted in the programme going off the air for twenty seconds. BBC continuity apologised to viewers for the breakdown in transmission, displaying a TEMPORARY FAULT caption slide and playing music, "Gotcha" by Tom Scott (better known as the theme music to Starsky and Hutch), until the fault was rectified. When transmission was restarted, the 625 line PAL Colour Videotape had been slightly rewound so that there was a repeat of the action immmediately prior to the break.

It was on the set of The Armageddon Factor that Tom Baker was very angry with some scripts, but Michael Hayes got along with Baker.

Outtakes and gag reel footage

Several clips of scene performances not intended for broadcast have been circulated from this serial, including two sequences videotaped during rehearsal (Mary Tamm is seen wearing glasses and hair-curlers). In one scene, Tamm and Baker jokingly pretend to move in for a kiss after delivering a line, and in another widely circulated clip, the Doctor replies to a negative comment from K9, "You never f---- know the answer when it's important!" Producers laughed at both of these outtakes.

It was also during production of The Armageddon Factor that Baker, Tamm and John Leeson filmed a brief one-minute gag scene dubbed "Doug Who?" for the BBC staff Christmas party. The scene begins with the Doctor and Romana sitting on the floor by the TARDIS console, apparently kissing off screen, and then acting tipsy as they share a bottle of vodka with K9, who is asked to sing a few bars of "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". The Doctor then asks K9 what he wants for Christmas; K9 replies and then asks the Doctor for what his desire is, to which the Doctor looks into the camera and then leers at Romana, who leers back before the two actors and the crew break into laughter.

To date, the rehearsal outtakes have not been commercially released, though they are widely available on video-posting websites. "Doug Who?", retitled "Merry Christmas Doctor Who", is included as a bonus feature in the expanded Key to Time DVD set released in 2007 in the UK and 2009 in Region 1.

Ratings

Part 1 - 7.5 million viewers
Part 2 - 8.8 million viewers
Part 3 - 7.8 million viewers
Part 4 - 8.6 million viewers
Part 5 - 8.6 million viewers
Part 6 - 9.6 million viewers

Myths

Theta Sigma is the Doctor's real name. It's later established in DW: The Happiness Patrol that this is a nickname.
The outtake in which Tom Baker barks at K9 "You never f---ng know the answer when it's important" is sometimes described as an outtake from actual filming, and sometimes is used as an illustration of Baker's temperament on the set. In reality -- as revealed from an actual viewing of the clip -- it was simply a joke that occurred during a taped rehearsal (as evidenced by the fact Mary Tamm is not in full costume, is wearing her off-screen glasses and has her hair up in rollers).
Similarly, the rumour that Baker and Tamm filmed an unbroadcast kissing scene also stems from the existence of another rehearsal gag take, as well as the infamous "Doug Who?" skit (described above). Nothing of this sort was filmed for TV broadcast. Nor was "Doug Who?" ever intended as part of the televised story either.
A longstanding myth holds that Mary Tamm revealed to the production team that she was pregnant and this led to her resignation during or after production of Armageddon Factor. This is openly contradicted by Tamm in interviews and the 2007/09 DVD featurette "There's Something About Mary" in which she states she chose to leave because she was no longer satisfied with the character of Romana and would have returned to film a regeneration if she'd been invited.

Filming locations

BBC Television Centre (Studio 3), Shepherd's Bush, London
Ealing Television Film Studios, Ealing Green, Ealing

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.

In episode two, after the TARDIS has left, it can be seen behind Romana just after K9 begins blasting a door.
In Part three Shapp's gun falls apart when it hits the floor.
In Part four, when K9 exits the transmat, he's got the new left panel he gains in episode five
In Part six Astra regains the circlet Merak had used to distract the Mute.
In Part six one of the Mutes kicks up a piece of studio carpet.
At the end the Doctor refers to Princess Astra as 'a human being' when in fact she is an Atrion.
A number of shots call for the Shadow to lean his head back (when laughing manically, or exulting triumphantly). These shots have the unfortunate side-effect of exposing the actor's real nostrils, and making the mask - with its moulded skull-like nose - look blatantly fake.

Continuity

The Doctor mentions the absence of "water" or "swamps" upon arrival on Atrios, referencing the location of The Power of Kroll.
BFA: The Judgement of Isskar begins a new series of Key to Time stories.
The Black Guardian reappears in DW: Mawdryn Undead, Terminus, Enlightenment and MA: The Well-Mannered War.
Drax also features in the novels PDA: Divided Loyalties (in a flashback sequence to the First Doctor's school days) and PDA: The Quantum Archangel (in an alternate timeline where he is working with the Master, the Rani and the Monk to destroy Earth), as well as in Search for the Doctor, a Make Your Own Adventure book by Dave Martin.
The fate of Princess Astra is revealed in BFA: The Chaos Pool.
The Chaos Pool also explains Romana's decision to regenerate and take Astra's form in the next TV story DW: Destiny of the Daleks.
The Doctor has been shrunk before in DW: Planet of Giants.
The randomiser remained installed until DW: The Leisure Hive.
K9 is called a tin dog again in DW: School Reunion.
Later, in DW: The Pandorica Opens, the characters for theta and sigma are the first two sigils under River Song's "Hello Sweetie" message written to the Eleventh Doctor as the oldest words in recorded history.
In SJA: The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith, the Trickster mentions how the Doctor once held the Key to Time, it is also implied that the Shadow is a member of the Pantheon of Discord.

Timeline

This story takes place after DW: The Power of Kroll
This story takes place before ST: Life from Lifelessness

DVD and Video releases

DVD releases

Released along with The Ribos Operation, The Pirate Planet, The Stones of Blood, and The Androids of Tara as Doctor Who: The Key to Time. This October 2002 release was only in Region 1. Extras include commentary by Tom Baker, Mary Tamm and John Leeson, a photo gallery and production information subtitles.

Also released with same stories as Doctor Who: The Key to Time, an extras-laden box set limited to 15,000 in its initial UK release on 24 September 2007, later followed by wide release in Region 1 on 3 March 2009 as The Key to Time - Special Edition. In the 2009 version, The Armageddon Factor is presented over two discs, with the six episodes and minimal extras on disc one and the remaining extras on disc two.

Contents (2009 version):

Disc One:

Commentary by Tom Baker, Mary Tamm and John Leeson (carried over from the 2002 set).
New commentary by Mary Tamm, John Woodvine and Michael Hayes.
Production subtitles.
Doctor Who Annual 1979 DVD-ROM feature (PC/Mac)
Radio Times Billings - Original listings from Radio Times (DVD-ROM PC/Mac)

Disc Two:

Defining Shadows - featurette on the production of the serial, featuring interviews with Bob Baker, Dave Martin, Richard McManan-Smith, Lalla Ward, David Harries, Barry Jackson.
Directing Who - retrospective on Michael Hayes' work directing the serials The Pirate Planet, The Armageddon Factor and City of Death.
Rogue Time Lords - featurette on various errant Time Lords featured throughout the series.
Pebble Mill at One interview with Tom Baker promoting the broadcast of the 500th episode of Doctor Who, Armageddon Factor part 1.
Pebble Mill at One featurette on Dick Mills and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, featuring the creation of sound effects for The Armageddon Factor.
The New Sound of Music - a brief look at Dick Mills creating a sound effect for Doctor Who.
Merry Christmas Doctor Who - an infamous skit filmed for BBC staff viewing only in which the Doctor and Romana get a little tipsy while celebrating the season and get K9 to sing a holiday song.
Alternative/deleted scene from the serial.
BBC continuity announcements played before and after each episode of the serial.
Photo Gallery
Bonus series: Five episodes of Late Night Story, a never-shown series from 1978 featuring Tom Baker performing dramatic readings of: "The Photograph" by Nigel Kneale, "The Emissary" by Ray Bradbury, "Nursery Tea" by Mary Danby, "The End of the Party" by Graham Greene, and "Sredni Vashtar" by Saki.