Tag: The Fifth Doctor

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Classic Season 18 Doctor Who

Logopolis

Doctor WhoAfter he takes complete measurements of a British Police Box, the inspiration for the exterior appearance of the TARDIS, the Doctor plans to visit Logopolis to seek the help of the mathematical geniuses there, whose near-mystic incantations of intricate mathematical formulas actually keep the universe from dying a premature death. Thanks to the interference of the Master, the Doctor becomes trapped, and an Australian stewardess named Tegan wanders into the TARDIS, assuming it to be a real Police Box. The Doctor also receives a distress call from Nyssa, whose father has gone missing on Traken. A mysterious ghostly figure appears and disappears, but the Doctor remains silent as to its identity, and the Master finally emerges from the shadows on Logopolis, poised to destroy the universe by eliminating its guardians. All the while, the TARDIS cloister bell counts down last remaining hours of the Doctor’s fourth life.

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Christopher H. Bidmead
directed by Peter Grimwade
music by Paddy Kingsland

Guest Cast: Anthony Ainley (The Master), John Fraser (Monitor), Dolores Whiteman (Aunt Vanessa), Tom Georgeson (Detective Inspector), Christopher Hurst (Security Guard), Ray Knight, Peter Roy, Derek Suthern (Policemen), Robin Squire (Pharos technician)

Broadcast from February 28 through March 21, 1981

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 19 Doctor Who

Castrovalva

Doctor WhoChaos ensues in the wake of the Doctor’s regeneration. Security guards at the Pharos Project arrest Tegan, Nyssa and Adric, who are just beginning to try to comprehend what has happened to the Doctor, let alone help him. They manage to divert the guards and get the Doctor back to the TARDIS, but at the last moment, the Master’s TARDIS appears, blocking Adric’s escape. The Master then disappears again, and Adric returns to help the Doctor, who is trying to find the recuperative Zero Room. Adric has also gotten the TARDIS underway to its next destination – which turns out to be the explosive event which created the Milky Way. The Doctor, still experiencing sudden changes of personality, is barely able to help Tegan and Nyssa evade disaster by jettisoning parts of the TARDIS, and Adric is nowhere to be found. But when the Zero Room is accidentally blasted away in the emergency, the Doctor’s friends must find a place where he can recover. And all too conveniently, the relaxing planet of Castrovalva is at the top of the list.

Season 19 Regular Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Matthew Waterhouse (Adric), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Janet Fielding (Tegan)

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Christopher H. Bidmead
directed by Fiona Cumming
music by Paddy Kingsland

Guest Cast: Anthony Ainley (The Master), Derek Waring (Shardovan), Michael Sheard (Mergrave), Frank Wylie (Ruther), Dallas Cavell (Head of Security), Souska John (Child)

Broadcast from January 4 through 12, 1982

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 19 Doctor Who

Four To Doomsday

Doctor WhoThe Doctor, trying to return Tegan to Heathrow Airport, manages to get the TARDIS to the correct time and date – but in the wrong place, landing aboard a vast spaceship which is slowly making its way toward Earth. The Doctor and his friends eventually meet Monarch, ruler of the alien Urbankans, who are preparing to visit Earth on what Monarch claims is a mission of peace. But it seems that the Urbankans have already paid Earth a visit – representatives of various periods and cultures in the planet’s past. But none of it is real – the “abductees” aren’t really human, and Monarch’s mission is one of conquest, not peace.

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Terence Dudley
directed by John Black
music by Roger Limb

Guest Cast: Stratford Johns (Monarch), Philip Locke (Bigon), Paul Shelley (Persuasion), Annie Lambert (Enlightenment), Burt Kwouk (Lin Futu), Illario Bisi Pedro (Kurkutji), Nadia Hammam (Villagra)

Broadcast from January 18 through 26, 1982

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 19 Doctor Who

Kinda

Doctor WhoOn the planet Deva Loka, an investigation team studies the primitive native Kinda people, and are rather alarmed when the Doctor and Adric are rounded up by an automatic security device. The Doctor has brought the TARDIS to Deva Loka so Nyssa can rest and recover from her expeiences aboard Monarch’s ship. Tegan, in a nearby forest, drifts off to sleep and is visited by the Kinda, and her body is inhabited by an evil spirit from their lore, the Mara. The Doctor learns that, pending the final report from the increasingly unstable investigators, the Kinda could be displaced by human colonization of their world…unless all of them are destroyed by the Mara first.

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Christopher Bailey
directed by Peter Grimwade
music by Peter Howell

Guest Cast: Richard Todd (Sanders), Nerys Hughes (Todd), Mary Morris (Panna), Simon Rouse (Hindle), Adrian Mills (Aris), Lee Cornes (Trickster), Sarah Prince (Karuna), Anna Wing (Annatta), Roger Milner (Anicca), Jeffrey Stuart (Dukkha)

Broadcast from February 1 through 9, 1982

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 19 Doctor Who

The Visitation

Doctor WhoThe Doctor finally lands the TARDIS at Heathrow – in the 1600s, long before air travel – and immediately becomes the object of hostility from the locals, who fear for their lives since a falling star heralded the coming of a new and virulent plague. They befriend a rogue named Richard Mace, who is helpful as a guide, but is almost useless as a protector when they find an android lurking in an abandoned house. Tegan is stunned and Adric is taken prisoner, while the Doctor, Nyssa and Mace escape. Tegan and Adric are interrogated by a hideously wounded Terrileptil creature, the master of the android, and self-declared destroyer of mankind.

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Eric Saward
directed by Peter Moffatt
music by Paddy Kingsland

Guest Cast: Michael Robbins (Richard Mace), Michael Melia, David Summer, Michael Leader (Terileptils), Peter Van Dissel (Android), James Charlton (Miller), John Savident (Squire John), Anthony Calf (Charles), John Baker (Ralph), Valerie Fyfer (Elizabeth), Richard Hampton (Villager), Neil West (Poacher), Eric Dodson (Headman), Jeff Wayne (Scytheman)

Broadcast from February 15 through 23, 1982

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 19 Doctor Who

Black Orchid

Doctor WhoThe TARDIS brings the Doctor and his friends to a railway station in 1925, where a car is waiting for them – and the Doctor seems to be expected by name. He and his companions are taken to Lord Cranleigh’s estate, where the Doctor turns the tide in a game of cricket. But as all the guests prepare for a fancy dress party, the Doctor’s costume is stolen and his curiosity leads him down a hidden passage in the house. By the time the Doctor emerges, he is the prime suspect in at least two murders – and due to his own disappearance into the house’s secret passageways, he has no alibi. Someone in the house does know who the real killer is, but if she tips her hand, other dreadful secrets could destroy the Cranleigh family.

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Terence Dudley
directed by Ron Jones
music by Roger Limb

Guest Cast: Vanessa Paine (Ann Talbot), Barbara Murray (Lady Cranleigh), Michael Cochrane (Lord Cranleigh), Gareth Milne (George Cranleigh), Moray Watson (Sir Robert Muir), Ivor Salter (Sergeant Markham), Ahmed Khalil (Latoni), Brian Hawksley (Brewster), Andrew Tourell (Constable Cummings), Timothy Block (Tanner), James Muir (Police driver), Caron Heggie (Ann’s maid), Derek Hunt (Footman), David Wilde (Digby)

Broadcast from March 1 through 2, 1982

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 19 Doctor Who

Earthshock

Doctor WhoA 26th century geological expedition is ambushed underground, leaving only a single survivor. When she crawls her way back to the surface camp, she reports the massacre. A squadron of security troops arrives to investigate, but they also consider her a suspect. However, when the troops return to the subterranean caves to look for the evidence, they first find a pair of killer androids…and then they find four people claiming to be time travelers, who instantly become the prime suspects. But these travelers – the Doctor and his unharmonious trio of companions – are more of a threat to the plans of the Cybermen (once again wearing new suits of high-tech armor). It seems that, fearing an upcoming conference of interplanetary superpowers that could spell the end to the Cybermen’s war effort, the silver ones plan to slam a huge space freighter into the Earth, obliterating a large portion of the planet’s surface. But when Adric manages to thwart the Cybermen’s plans by accidentlly sending the freighter back in time (but still on the same trajectory), he’s either helping to prevent the human race from coming into existence…or ensuring that event.

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Eric Saward
directed by Peter Grimwade
music by Malcolm Clarke

Guest Cast: Beryl Reid (Briggs), James Warwick (Scott), Clare Clifford (Kyle), June Bland (Berger), David Banks (CyberLeader), Mark Hardy (Cyber Lieutenant), Steve Morley (Walters), Suzi Arden (Snyder), Ann Holloway (Mitchell), Anne Clements (Trooper Bane), Mark Straker (Trooper Carter), Alec Sabin (Ringway), Mark Fletcher (Crewmember Vance), Christopher Whittingham (Crewmember Carson), Carolyn Mary Simmonds, Barney Lawrence (Androids), Jeff Wayne, Steve Ismay, Peter Gates-Fleming, David Bache, Graham Cole, Norman Bradley, Michael Gordon Brown (Cybermen)

Broadcast from March 8 through 16, 1982

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 19 Doctor Who

Time-Flight

Doctor WhoThe authorities at Heathrow Airport are suspicious when a Police Box appears in their terminal within moments of the disappearance of a Concorde aircraft in mid-air. The Doctor drops the name of U.N.I.T. and is allowed to help in the search for the whereabouts – or, he suspects, the whenabouts – of the missing plane. The Doctor, with Nyssa, Tegan and the TARDIS in tow, takes the next Concorde flight on an identical vector, and soon finds himself on prehistoric Earth, along with the passengers and crew of the other plane. A strange being called Kalid has hijacked the two planes into Earth’s past to use their passengers and crew as slave labor for a sinister task – and Kalid is also very interested in the Doctor’s TARDIS.

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Peter Grimwade
directed by Ron Jones
music by Roger Limb

Guest Cast: Anthony Ainley (The Master/Kalid), Nigel Stock (Professor Hayter), Richard Easton (Captain Stapley), Keith Drinkel (Flight Engineer Scobie), Michael Cashman (First Officer Bilton), Peter Dahlsen (Horton), Brian McDermott (Sheard), John Flint (Captain Urquhart), Judith Blyfield (Angela Clifford/Tannoy voice), Peter Cellier (Andrews), Hugh Hayes (Anithon), Andre Winterton (Zarak), Matthew Waterhouse (Adric illusion), Graham Cole (Melkur illusion), Chris Bradshaw (Terileptil illusion), Tommy Winward (Security man), Barney Lawrence (Dave Culshaw)

Broadcast from March 22 through 30, 1982

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

Arc of Infinity

Doctor WhoThe Doctor and Nyssa’s visit to a tranquil region of space known as the Arc of Infinity is cut short by a strange phenomenon – some kind of entity penetrates the TARDIS and tries to merge with the Doctor’s body. The attempt is short-lived, and the Doctor escapes harm, but apparently the incident has been noticed – the Time Lords are recalling him to Gallifrey. With Nyssa in tow, the Doctor returns home only to discover that his biodata extract has been accessed by an unknown party – information that could be used to allow someone to take over his physical form. Fearing the ramifications of a Time Lord being taken over by an alien entity, the High Council – now led by the regenerated Borusa as Lord President – votes to have the Doctor executed. But a second attempt at a merge interrupts the execution, and the Time Lords find out that it’s no alien entity at work, but one of their own.

Season 20 Regular Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Janet Fielding (Tegan), Mark Strickson (Turlough)

Order the DVDwritten by Johnny Byrne
directed by Ron Jones
music by Roger Limb

Guest Cast: Leonard Sachs (President Borusa), Michael Gough (Hedin), Ian Collier (Omega), Colin Baker (Maxil), Paul Jerricho (Castellan), Neil Daglish (Damon), Elspet Gray (Thalia), Max Harvey (Zorac), Andrew Boxer (Robin Stuart), Alastair Cumming (Colin Frazer), John D. Collins (Talor), Maya Woolfe (Hostel receptionist), Malcolm Harvey (The Ergon), Guy Groen (Second receptionist)

Broadcast from January 3 through 11, 1983

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

Snakedance

Doctor WhoHaving rejoined the TARDIS crew after their adventure with Omega in Amsterdam, Tegan begins experiencing recurring nightmares. The Doctor spots an even more pressing problem: someone has reset the TARDIS’ coordinates, and it can only have been Tegan. The time travelers arrive on the planet Manussa…the homeworld of the evil Mara influence which possessed Tegan on Deva Loka. In this point in Manussa’s history, the Mara has become a mere legend of an evil vanquished, and the cause for an annual celebration. But the Mara, now once again in control of Tegan’s body, intends to possess the minds of every Manussan during the height of the festivities – unless the Doctor can find a way to stop it.

Order the DVDwritten by Christopher Bailey
directed by Fiona Cumming
music by Peter Howell

Guest Cast: John Carson (Ambril), Colette O’ Neil (Tahna), Preston Lockwood (Dojjen), Martin Clunes (Lon), Brian Miller (Dugdale), Hilary Sesta (Fortune Teller), George Ballantine (Hawker), Jonathon Morris (Chela), Barry Smith (Puppeteer)

Broadcast from January 17 through 25, 1983

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

Mawdryn Undead

Doctor WhoA schoolboy named Turlough cons a classmate into “borrowing” a vintage roadster belonging to one of the teachers at his private school, naturally getting into an accident moments later. During a near-death experience, Turlough is forced into a deadly pact by the Black Guardian: Turlough’s new mission is to kill a Time Lord known as the Doctor at any cost. Soon afterward, the Doctor lands the TARDIS on a seemingly derelict spacecraft orbiting Earth in both space and time, only to find that somehow, someone on board is still maintaining the vessel. The Doctor soon becomes a pawn in alien renegades’ plot to end their pitiful immortality, and discovers that his old friend Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, now a math teacher at Turlough’s school, is a pawn. It also soon becomes evident that Turlough is no ordinary schoolboy.

Order the DVDwritten by Peter Grimwade
directed by Peter Moffatt
music by Paddy Kingsland

Guest Cast: Nicholas Courtney (Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart), Valentine Dyall (Black Guardian), David Collings (Mawdryn), Angus MacKay (Headmaster), Stephen Garlick (Ibbotson), Roger Hammond (Dr. Runciman), Sheila Gill (Matron), Peter Walmsley (First mutant), Brian Darnley (Second mutant), Lucy Baker (Child Nyssa), Sian Pattenden (Child Tegan)

Broadcast from February 1 through 9, 1983

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

Terminus

Doctor WhoAt the Black Guardian’s bidding, Turlough interferes with the TARDIS internal systems enough to cause a critical failure: parts of the timeship’s interior are now surrounded by a deadly haze, and those sections could be open to the time vortex at any moment. Nyssa’s room is engulfed, and the Doctor performs an emergency merge with the nearest spacecraft in space-time to allow her to escape onto the other ship. When he stabilizes the TARDIS and then goes to retrieve Nyssa, however, the Doctor learns that he inadvertently sent his friend onto a plague-carriers’ ship – and Nyssa, now infected, can never leave, nor does that transport’s small crew seem even remotely inclined to help any of the people contaminated with Lazar’s Disease.

Order the DVDwritten by Stephen Gallagher
directed by Mary Ridge
music by Roger Limb

Guest Cast: Valentine Dyall (Black Guardian), Liza Goddard (Kari), Dominic Guard (Olvir), Rachel Weaver (Inga), Martin Muncaster (Tannoy voice), Martin Potter (Eirak), Andrew Burt (Valgard), Tim Munro (Sigurd), Peter Benson (Bor), R.J. Bell (The Garm)

Broadcast from February 15 through 23, 1983

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

Enlightenment

Doctor WhoThe Doctor receives a very vague warning of danger from the White Guardian, but Turlough’s interference – passed off as worrying that the TARDIS console would be damaged by the White Guardian’s energy requirements – leaves the Doctor with only a shred of the information he needs. The TARDIS arrives on a vintage sailing ship, whose crew is not at all perturbed by the Doctor’s arrival, and whose officers are beings who live outside of time itself. The Doctor discovers that he is now taking part in a yacht race through the blackness of space, and the Eternals care nothing for the human sailors they’ve abducted. At the finish line lies the promise of everlasting enlightenment – or, if Turlough continues to fall under the sway of the Black Guardian, death for the Doctor.

Order the DVDwritten by Barbara Clegg
directed by Fiona Cumming
music by Malcolm Clarke

Guest Cast: Valentine Dyall (Black Guardian), Cyril Luckham (White Guardian), Keith Barron (Striker), Lynda Baron (Wrack), Christopher Brown (Marriner), Tony Caunter (Jackson), Clive Kneller (Collier), James McClure (First Officer), Leee John (Mansell), John Cannon (Helmsman), Byron Sotiris (Critas)

Notes: As a vocalist, guest star Lynda Baron had already been associated with Doctor Who, singing the background song heard throughout the William Hartnell story The Gunfighters.

Broadcast from March 1 through 9, 1983

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

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Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

The King’s Demons – Part 1

Doctor WhoThe arrival of the TARDIS coincides with a dangerous digression in Earth’s history: King John is holding court at the keep of Sir Ranulf, insulting his host and demanding financial tribute toward the continuance of the Crusades. Ranulf’s son, Hugh, challenges the King’s champion, Sir Gilles, in a fight for his father’s honor, but before blood is drawn, the TARDIS materializes, and the Doctor is surprised by how unfazed King John is by its appearance…one of many clues leading the Doctor to believe that this isn’t the real King John. According to history, King John should be in London right now, where many of his loyal subjects will shortly present him with the Magna Carta – a document to secure not only their own rights, but which will shape democracy in Britain for centuries to come. When the Doctor draws an armed challenge from Sir Gilles, he manages to emerge victorious…but finds himself facing one of his mortal foes, who has no business being in England in 1215.

Order the DVDwritten by Terence Dudley
directed by Tony Virgo
music by Jonathan Gibbs & Peter Howell

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Janet Fielding (Tegan Jovanka), Mark Strickson (Turlough), Anthony Ainley (The Master/Sir Gilles Estram), Frank Windsor (Ranulf), Gerald Flood (King John/voice of Kamelion), Isla Blair (Isabella), Christopher Villiers (Hugh), Michael J. Jackson (Sir Geoffrey), Peter Burroughs (Jester)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

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Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

The King’s Demons – Part 2

Doctor WhoWith the unmasking of the Master – posing as King John’s knight “champion” – the Doctor is now more certain than ever that an impostor is trying to prevent King John from singing the Magna Carta. The time travelers discover that his majesty is not all that he appears – King John has been replaced by an intelligent, shapeshifting android called Kamelion. But at the moment, Kamelion is merely a puppet, and his strings are held by the Master, who escaped from Xeriphas (bringing Kamelion, a Xeriphan invention, with him) and now hopes to unravel the entire history of western civilization.

Order the DVDwritten by Terence Dudley
directed by Tony Virgo
music by Jonathan Gibbs & Peter Howell

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Janet Fielding (Tegan Jovanka), Mark Strickson (Turlough), Anthony Ainley (The Master), Frank Windsor (Ranulf), Gerald Flood (King John/voice of Kamelion), Isla Blair (Isabella), Christopher Villiers (Hugh), Michael J. Jackson (Sir Geoffrey), Peter Burroughs (Jester)

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green