Lost In Time: The Daleks' Master Plan

What A Long Strange Trip It's Been

The Daleks' Master Plan
Doctor Who Series three Serial four

Episodes 1,3,4,6-9,11,12 missing

Credits

Regular cast
Dr. Who .................................................................................... WILLIAM HARTNELL
Steven Taylor ........................................................................... PETER PURVES
Katarina  .................................................................................. ADRIENNE HILL
Sara Kingdom ........................................................................  JEAN MARSH

Mavic Chen ............................................................................. KEVIN STONEY

Dalek voices ............................................................................ PETER HAWKINS
                                                                                                   DAVID GRAHAM

Crew

Title Music ........................... by RON GRAINER with the BBC Radiophonic Workshop

Incidental music composed ..................................................... by TRISTRAM CARY

Designer .................................................................................. RAYMOND CUSICK

                                                                                                   BARRY NEWBERY

Costumes ................................................................................ DAPHNE DARE

Make-up .................................................................................. SONIA MARKHAM

Film cameraman ...................................................................... PETER HAMILTON

Lighting .................................................................................... GEOFF SHAW

Sound ...................................................................................... ROBIN LUXFORD 

Story Editor .............................................................................. DONALD TOSH

Producer ...................................................................................JOHN WILES

Director .................................................................................... DOUGLAS CAMFIELD

Episode 2 Day of Armageddon transmitted BBC1 20 November 1965

Written by Terry Nation

The Doctor, Katarina, Steven and Earth Space Agent Bret Vyon are stranded outside the TARDIS on the planet Kembel by the Daleks guarding it. Spotting an array of differing space crafts, Bret is dismayed to find he recognises one. It's the personal ship of Mavic Chen the Guardian of the Solar System. What can he be doing with the Daleks?

The Doctor impersonates one of the delegates at a meeting between Chen, the Daleks, and alien delegates of other galaxies. He discovers that Chen has mined the rare metal Taranium, only found in our solar system, which the Daleks need for their Time Destructor weapon. The Daleks learn of the TARDIS crew's presence, and burn down the jungle. Not knowing if the Doctor managed to escape, Bret takes off in Chen's craft, stranding the Doctor once again.

This is an excellent episode, tense and exciting, with just enough action and intrigue to keep your interest. The jungle planet Kembel is wonderfully realised, helped by having the Dalek sequences shot on 35mm film at Ealing studios. The picture quality is excellent. Added to this, we have the wonderful models, and the costume and make-up of the alien delegates, all of whom look individual and genuinely alien, including Mavic Chen. Kevin Stoney's performance as him is excellent, and I live the way he writes, almost calligraphy with pen held between little and index finger. A nice touch. This episode is also notable for the only appearance we have of Adrienne Hill as companion Katarina. Nicholas Courtney, who would later become The Brigadier, here turns in a fine dramatic performance, and the cliff-hanger is genuinely full of danger. A fine episode which shows  a much darker tone to earlier Who serials, Wiles & Tosh stamping their mark on a twelve-part epic that they didn't want but which they bequeathed from Verity.

TARDIS rating: 4.5/5 (not used for overall rating for the First Doctor)

Additional cast

Bret Vyon ................................................................................ NICHOLAS COURTNEY

Zephon ................................................................................... JULIAN SHERRIER

Trantis ..................................................................................... RAY EVANS

Episode 5  Counter Plot transmitted BBC1 11 December 1965

Written by Terry Nation

Pursued by Space Agent Sara Kingdom, the Doctor and Steven hide in a strange room, which contains a small probe with instruments and white mice. Kingdom comes in just as they discover it's a laboratory. Earth scientists start the cellular dissemination machine, which like the Star Trek transporter, breaks down the three to molecular level then transports them thousands of miles away to the planet Mira, where the Daleks are waiting. They all come under attack from the hostile natives, the invisible 8 foot Visians.

Another great episode, this is the first time we see Jean Marsh as Sara Kingdom, and she's excellent. There's wonderful production design, the laboratory a wonderful set, and they've reused the brilliant Kembel jungle set for Mira. Douglas Camfield manages a real piece of magic with the transportation sequence, aided by the vision mixer, and George Pollock's transparencies. Wonderful sequence. And Kevin Stoney simply dazzles every time he's on the screen as Chen. The episode is slightly marred however by a sense of repetition and plot delay, necessary to cover the entire  three months of this epic.

TARDIS rating: 4.5/5 (not used for overall rating for the First Doctor)

Additional cast and crew

Borkar ..................................................................................... JAMES HALL

Froyn ....................................................................................... BILL MEILEN

Rhynmal .................................................................................. JOHN HERRINGTON

Karlton ..................................................................................... MAURICE BROWNING

Special photographic transparencies ...................................... by GEORGE POLLOCK

Episode 10 Escape Switch transmitted BBC1 15 January 1966

Written by Dennis Spooner

Sara and Steven find the TARDIS in the Great Pyramid in ancient Egypt. There they discover the Meddling Monk (Peter Butterworth), whom Steven had met in 1066 England in the earlier serial The Time Meddler. All three are captured by the Daleks and Mavic Chen, and held hostage unless the Doctor releases to them the real Taranium core for the Time Destructor.

Reluctantly, he does so, but not before stealing the flight directional circuit from the Monk's TARDIS, which he also made to look like a police box. The Monk escapes but when he flies off he lands somewhere he did not intend. The Doctor also hopes the police box look will fool the Daleks into following the wrong TARDIS.

Not having seen the previous episode as it's missing, the Ancient Egypt setting seems irrelevant to the plot, and mere window dressing. It's nice to see the Monk back, but this is his last appearance. The production team missed an opportunity there for a pre-Master villain for the Doctor, who could replace the Daleks if Nation withheld permission for their use (as he later did) and cheaper in production terms (how much does a monk's habit cost?).

The whole enterprise feels like a delaying tactic to prolong the serial for its 12 part length. The only real incident here is the Doctor having to return the real Taranium core. At the end, he replaces his TARDIS's own faulty flight directional circuit with the Monk's. The TARDIS console seems to explode. It would have been a nice new development if the Doctor was now able to control his journey. Nicely acted, with fine production and set design by replacement Barry Newbery, but not as gripping as the first two instalments.

TARDIS rating: 3/5 (not used for overall rating for the First Doctor)

Additional cast

The Meddling Monk ................................................................ PETER BUTTERWORTH

Khephren ................................................................................ JEFFREY ISAAC

Tuthmos .................................................................................. DEREK WARE

Hyksos .................................................................................... WALTER RANDALL

Overall, it's a shame that apart from the odd film clip that was censored by other countries TV stations, and fortunately found and returned to the BBC, we only have three of the 12 episodes, a quarter of the story. It's hard to tell how good this serial is, and it's a shame that this serial is lost while the absolutely execrable The Gunfighters survives. I'd gladly swap them as, from the first two surviving episodes, this looks to be a dark violent tale spanning time and space, a more serious and foreboding version of the earlier The Chase serial.