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The Crimson Horror (TV story): Difference between revisions
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*The Doctor tells Clara that he once spent a while trying to get a "[[Tegan Jovanka|gobby Australian]]" to [[Heathrow Airport]]. | *The Doctor tells Clara that he once spent a while trying to get a "[[Tegan Jovanka|gobby Australian]]" to [[Heathrow Airport]]. | ||
=== Influences === | |||
* Jenny's leather catsuit was an homage to the outifts [[Diana Rigg]] wore in ''[[The Avengers (TV series)|The Avengers]].'' | |||
* The unnatural slurry which caused the eponymous “horror” was suggested by ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carry_On_Screaming! Carry On Screaming!]'', in which a chemical sludge turned young women into mannequins. | |||
* Mr Sweet was derived from “the repulsive story of the red leech”, an untold exploit of [[Sherlock Holmes]] mentioned at the start of the [[1904]] short story [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Golden_Pince-Nez ''The Adventure of the Golden Pince-Nez''.] | |||
* The Thursday brothers took their surname from [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton GK Chesterton]'s surreal [[1908]] thriller ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Was_Thursday The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare]''. | |||
== Story notes == | == Story notes == | ||
*The episode had the working title of ''Mother's Ruin.'' | |||
*This story marks the first time in the revived series that a companion's associates have successfully [[deduce]]d the person's time-travelling affairs with the Doctor's on their own, along with the Doctor's ability to time-travel, without questioning the Doctor directly or getting a firsthand experience of the TARDIS. [[Artie Maitland|Artie]] and [[Angie Maitland]] discovered pictures of Clara's travels from [[TV]]: ''[[Cold War (TV story)|Cold War]]'', ''[[Hide (TV story)|Hide]]'', and a picture of Clara during her Victorian life ([[TV]]: ''[[The Snowmen (TV story)|The Snowmen]]'') on the [[Internet]], which exposed her secret. | *This story marks the first time in the revived series that a companion's associates have successfully [[deduce]]d the person's time-travelling affairs with the Doctor's on their own, along with the Doctor's ability to time-travel, without questioning the Doctor directly or getting a firsthand experience of the TARDIS. [[Artie Maitland|Artie]] and [[Angie Maitland]] discovered pictures of Clara's travels from [[TV]]: ''[[Cold War (TV story)|Cold War]]'', ''[[Hide (TV story)|Hide]]'', and a picture of Clara during her Victorian life ([[TV]]: ''[[The Snowmen (TV story)|The Snowmen]]'') on the [[Internet]], which exposed her secret. | ||
* Likewise to the above, Clara sees herself in a past life for the first time by looking at the Victorian era photo of herself in London, ([[TV]]: ''[[The Snowmen (TV story)|The Snowmen]]'') cluing her in that she really has lived more than one life, which the Doctor confronted her over in their last adventure, but she later forgot due to the day being rewritten. ([[TV]]: ''[[Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS (TV story)|Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS]]'') | * Likewise to the above, Clara sees herself in a past life for the first time by looking at the Victorian era photo of herself in London, ([[TV]]: ''[[The Snowmen (TV story)|The Snowmen]]'') cluing her in that she really has lived more than one life, which the Doctor confronted her over in their last adventure, but she later forgot due to the day being rewritten. ([[TV]]: ''[[Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS (TV story)|Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS]]'') | ||
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*This story contains no extra-terrestrial elements outside of the Doctor, the TARDIS, and Strax. | *This story contains no extra-terrestrial elements outside of the Doctor, the TARDIS, and Strax. | ||
*As Mrs Gillyflower launches the rocket, she sings the line "I'll labour night and day to be a pilgrim." This is from [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Dearmer Percy Dearmer's] version of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bunyan John Bunyan's] hymn, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Be_a_Pilgrim 'To Be a Pilgrim'] or 'He who would valiant be'. Furthermore, Mrs Gillyflower sings it to the melody 'Monks Gate', to which the words were set by composer [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Vaughan_Williams Ralph Vaughan Williams]. | *As Mrs Gillyflower launches the rocket, she sings the line "I'll labour night and day to be a pilgrim." This is from [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Percy_Dearmer Percy Dearmer's] version of [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bunyan John Bunyan's] hymn, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_Be_a_Pilgrim 'To Be a Pilgrim'] or 'He who would valiant be'. Furthermore, Mrs Gillyflower sings it to the melody 'Monks Gate', to which the words were set by composer [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Vaughan_Williams Ralph Vaughan Williams]. | ||
*[[Matt Smith]] and [[Diana Rigg]] would later appear together in | *[[Matt Smith]] and [[Diana Rigg]] would later appear together in ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Night_in_Soho Last Night in Soho]'' (Rigg's final film before her death)''.'' | ||
*[[Diana Rigg]] and [[Mark Gatiss]] both appeared in ''[[Game of Thrones]]'' as Olenna Tyrell and Tycho Nestoris respectively. [[Matt Smith]] played Daemon Targaryen in the prequel series ''[[House of the Dragon]]''. | *[[Diana Rigg]] and [[Mark Gatiss]] both appeared in ''[[Game of Thrones]]'' as Olenna Tyrell and Tycho Nestoris respectively. [[Matt Smith]] played Daemon Targaryen in the prequel series ''[[House of the Dragon]]''. | ||
*[[Steven Moffat]] was originally going to write this episode, but his slow progress on ''[[The Snowmen (TV story)|The Snowmen]]'' made this impossible. | |||
*[[Mark Gatiss]] is an avowed fan of Victoriana, having previously set ''[[The Unquiet Dead (TV story)|The Unquiet Dead]]'' during the time period. | |||
*[[Mark Gatiss]]' first impulse was to write a celebrity historical in a manner similar to [[Charles Dickens]] in ''[[The Unquiet Dead (TV story)|The Unquiet Dead]]''. At the time, he and [[Steven Moffat]] were also showrunning ''[[Sherlock (series)|Sherlock]]'', which gave Gatiss the idea to feature [[Arthur Conan Doyle]]. Gatiss thought that the plot might be tied to his primary career as a physician, and specifically his specialisation in ophthalmology. The starting point therefore became the debunked forensic technique of optography. However, with so many characters fighting for space in his narrative, Gatiss quickly concluded that the celebrity historical was the wrong approach to take, since there was little for Doyle to do once the scenario was introduced. | |||
*[[Mark Gatiss]] felt that the series hadn't explored the north of England, so he set the story in his native Yorkshire. He discussed the notion with his friend [[Matthew Sweet]], whoss first published book had been [[2001]]'s ''Inventing the Victorians'', a deconstruction of the popular view of the Victorian era. He prompted Gatiss to think in terms of the era's factory workers, and the miserable conditions in which they toiled. Gatiss named Mr. Sweet after him. | |||
*[[Mark Gatiss]] felt that the series boasted too few strong female antagonists, and he thought that one would be particularly effective in opposition to Madame Vastra. | |||
*At the time, [[Mark Gatiss]] and [[Rachael Stirling]] were appearing in a stage production of ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Recruiting_Officer The Recruiting Officer].'' Gatiss was also a friend of [[Diana Rigg]]. One evening, Gatiss had dinner with Stirling and Rigg and knowing that mother and daughter had never acted together, he mooted the idea of including characters written especially for them. Stirling was enthusiastic, while Rigg ,who had never seen the series, and rarely appeared in episodic television, was persuaded after viewing a showreel of the programme's iconic villains which had been assembled by ''The Recruiting Officer''<nowiki/>'s stage manager, Michael Dennis. | |||
*[[Diana Rigg]] was keen on the Yorkshire setting, having been born in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doncaster Doncaster]. | |||
*Sweetville was inspired by real planned communities in the North, such as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saltaire Saltaire] (built in [[1851]] by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titus_Salt Sir Titus Salt] to house workers at his textile mills) and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akroydon Akroydon] (developed from [[1859]] by [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Akroyd Colonel Edward Akroyd] to service his mills). | |||
*Mrs Gillyflower's protest that she could not bear the sight of sick people was adapted from an incident relayed to [[Mark Gatiss]] by [[Rachael Stirling]], in which [[Diana Rigg]] had been discomfited by a hospital stay following a knee operation. | |||
*The antagonist of the episode was originally intended to be "mummies" that were "all in black, sort of like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Widows Scottish widows]", inspired by sufferers of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phossy_jaw Phossy jaw] condition. | |||
*The scenes shot in the Sweetville streets were shot around the BBC's [[Cardiff]] studios. Production Designer [[Michael Pickwoad]] emphasised that the street had to be "almost too perfect" to demonstrate how the influence of Mrs. Gillyflower had corrupted it from within. | |||
*The original plot would’ve had more of a focus on the matchgirls' strike of [[1888]], with a monster being born from the [[phosphorus]] in the matches. | |||
*In [[Mark Gatiss]]' original conception, Mrs Gillyflower escaped after the launch of her rocket, leading to a carriage chase which ended when the villainess was thrown and impaled on a statue. As a token of his thanks, the Doctor gave Vastra a portable [[perception filter]] which she could use to disguise her Silurian nature. | |||
*In the first draft, Clara was revived only at the very end of the story but, when it was decided that she should have a greater presence in the narrative, [[Mark Gatiss]]' second version saw her take over much of Jenny's role. Vastra's partner now went missing early in the episode while infiltrating Sweetville, and it was Clara who donned the catsuit and fought the Pilgrims. Later drafts found a compromise, with Jenny reinstated throughout the script, and Clara's resuscitation positioned earlier than planned. | |||
*''[[The Snowmen (TV story)|The Snowmen]]'' was originally intended to enter production several weeks before this episode, but was delayed as [[Steven Moffat]] struggled with its script. In the end, the timing was appropriate to pair the two stories as Block Six of season seven, given the commonalities of cast and setting. | |||
*The bulk of the episode was recorded before ''[[The Snowmen (TV story)|The Snowmen]],'' and hence marked the first time that [[Neve McIntosh]], [[Catrin Stewart]] and [[Dan Starkey]] had worked on the series since ''[[A Good Man Goes to War (TV story)|A Good Man Goes to War]].'' [[Matt Smith]] was delighted to see the trio return. | |||
*This was originally meant to be the fourth episode of season 7b. It was later pushed back to fifth and finally sixth. The epilogue was originally meant for ''[[Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS (TV story)|Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS]].'' | |||
*The first material to be shot was the scenes on Sweetville. | |||
*Recording paused for two weeks to facilitate various promotional engagements, including a major panel at the [[San Diego Comic-Con]]. | |||
*It was discovered the episode underran. Since [[Neve McIntosh]], [[Catrin Stewart]] and [[Dan Starkey]] would be returning for ''[[The Name of the Doctor (TV story)|The Name of the Doctor]]'', two new sequences were developed which featured Vastra, Jenny and Strax. These were the scenes in Vastra's carriage of the Paternoster Gang plotting en route to Yorkshire, plus Vastra and Strax discussing how Jenny would locate the Doctor. | |||
===Ratings=== | ===Ratings=== | ||
The episode was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on [[BBC One]] on 4 May 2013. Overnight ratings showed that it was watched by 4.61 million viewers live. The final UK ratings was 7.37 million.<ref>[http://guide.doctorwhonews.net/info.php?detail=ratings&type=date Doctor Who Ratings - UK final]</ref> | |||
===Filming locations=== | ===Filming locations=== | ||
