previously on Doctor Who...
And now...
Doctor Who and his fellow time travellers have recently escaped a world ruled by insects, Rome at the time of Nero, and England in the far future...
...but as they departed Palestine in the 12th Century, the TARDIS was plunged into darkness, and the friends stood motionless, frozen in time.
EPISODE ONE: "The Space Museum" (24th April 1965)
UK Number 1: "Ticket to Ride" The Beatles
We find our intrepid time travellers exactly where we left them, and I do mean exactly, as they're stood completely motionless following their departure from the third Crusade on Earth.
On the planet Xeros, a barren, sandy world that's home to a collection of out of service space craft...
...the TARDIS materializes.
Inside, although they remain frozen, its inhabitants are now dressed in their more usual clothing. How's that happened?
The mysterious change of outfit is immediately obvious to Ian: "Doctor, we've got our clothes on!"
"Well, I should hope so, dear boy, I should hope so!"
Great stuff from Hartnell.
Vicki isn't satisfied by his answer that their crusading outfits are probably hanging up in a wardrobe, so he suggests she goes to have a look - as long as she brings him back a glass of water!
Is "It's time and relativity, dear boy!" the First Doctor's equivalent of 'timey wimey' (i.e. convenient non-explanation)? He bats away Ian's continued curiosity in favour of a look at the scanner screen.
Vicki finds the clothes exactly where the Doctor said they would be, which doesn't exactly make things any clearer.
On her way back to the control room, she stops by the food machine for that glass of water the Doctor asked for.
Still distracted by her misgivings over the clothes, Vicki relaxes her grip on the glass, and can only watch as it falls to the floor and smashes.
But then something incredible happens, as the pieces reassemble, the water un-spills, and the glass returns to her hand, as if time has rewound.
The Doctor will have a harder time explaining that one away.
Taking in the view from the scanner, Barbara suggests they're in a spaceship graveyard. This could almost be Karn, but if the parallel occurs to the Doctor, he doesn't panic.
The Doctor notes that all the craft are from different time periods, and seem rather too well kept to have simply been dumped here.
Vicki arrives with the Doctor's glass of water, and he tells her not to worry about dropping a glass as they're easily replaced.
Vicki points out that they won't have to replace it as it's the very glass he's holding in his hand.
Barbara and Ian are amazed...
...but the Doctor again takes everything in his stride. He's sussed that they're at a museum, and fancies a mooch around.
Ian reasons that if it's a museum there must be someone in charge around here.
The Doctor suggests that if there are answers to be found as to what exactly is going on with all these mysterious goings on, that's where they're to be found, and opens the TARDIS doors.
Quality bit of business from William Russell here as they make their way out of the TARDIS - see how his hand movements match up with what he's doing when he exits the police box prop on another set.
Vicki points out the planet's advanced state of erosion. The Doctor doesn't tend to do too well with dead planets. Ian says he's always associated extinction with extreme cold, like on the dark side of the moon.
He's rather more startled, though, by the discovery that despite the dusty ground, they none of them are leaving any footprints. It's like they're not there at all...
Onward to the museum!
Looks like there's only one way in, but the doors are closed.
Whilst impressed by the strange architecture of the building, Barbara can't help noticing that the planet is giving them the silent treatment.
Unexpectedly, the doors open of their own accord, and the travellers hide beside the entrance as two humanoid aliens in white uniforms and kerazy hairdos make their way out of the building.
Barbara is unsuccessful in helping Vicki to stifle a sneeze...
...but oddly the aliens didn't seem to hear her at all.
Making their way inside, Barbara is taken by how light it is despite the lack of windows. The Doctor suggests that the walls are imbued with a fluorescent property.
The Doctor was right, it is a museum. He tells Vicki to keep her hands to herself. She shouldn't touch the exhibits too!
One of the exhibits is a familiar foe - a Dalek! It seems to be an invasion of earth model judging by the eye, but without the bumper.
The Dalek is dead as a Dodo, though, and Vicki isn't very impressed.
In fact, she thinks it looks quite friendly. Ian tells her she wouldn't say that if they ever encountered them again, "which to say the least is very unlikely. I hope." Good luck with that.
Once again, the gang dives for cover as two beat poets walk in, natter in silence, then naff off.
Baffled, the friends decide to move on to one of the other exhibits.
Vicki tries to finger an exhibit but her hand passes right through it.
Whilst the Doctor muses that they just need to add two and two together to get three, they have another bizarre and silent encounter with the black-clad young men.
Yet again, the time travellers are treated like they don't even exist. How rude!
It comes as something of a relief (if another minor mystery) when they discover the TARDIS is also inside the museum.
At least they can just get in go. Can't they? Actually, no. As the Doctor demonstrates, either the TARDIS isn't really there, or they aren't.
The penny seems to be dropping for the Doctor, but before he can articulate his suspicions they're greeted by an altogether more chilling sight: there's a copy of each of them as exhibits in glass cases.
"Here we are, face to face with the 4th Dimension!"
The 4th Dimension? Didn't they get to Number 6 with "Baby I Want Your Love Thing?"
It seems the TARDIS jumped a time track and now they have to wait until time catches up with them.
This has all been a glimpse into the future, or at least a future.
The minute the cases disappear, they'll be in sync with the planets' inhabitants, and in great danger.
If they're not careful, the future they've glimpsed will come to pass, and they'll make exhibits of themselves!
No sooner have they reached this conclusion than sure enough, time begins to play out as it should always have done...
The travellers change from their crusading outfits into their everyday clothes...
Vicki drops her glass and it smashes on the floor...
The TARDIS is discovered by the men in the white uniforms...
... and their footprints appear in the sand.
Sure enough, the glass cases from the future fade before their eyes as they sync up with the present.
Destiny is catching up with them, and unless the Doctor can figure out a way to stop it, they're doomed to be trapped as exhibits in the Space Museum forever!
Cliffhanger!
EPISODE TWO
"The Dimensions of Time"
1st May 1965
UK Number 1: "Ticket to Ride" The Beatles (2nd Week)
Isn't this the one with the Rani in Albert Square? I'll dig out me 3D specs.
We start the episode with a visit to the crazy haired Moroks, and their rather wooden Governor, Lobos.
Lobos bemoans that his posting is due to last another two thousand Xeron days, but he prefers to count it in "Mimmians" so that it's only two. If you count it in leap ice ages, it's barely even one.
He was just as bored on their home planet of Morok, but he didn't know when he was well off.
Much to his annoyance, a messenger barges in without knocking, to tell him that an alien space craft has been found, and at least three aliens are at large.
Ordering a search, Lobos knows that they won't be the only ones hunting the visitors. So will "the rebels", though he dismisses them as "local rabble" and "children".
Inside their hideout, Xeron rebels Sita and Dako fret that their friend Tor is late. Dako tells Sita that if Tor has been captured they'll need to strike, even if they are massively outgunned. As in the Moroks have guns, and they don't.
Tor arrives, and pours cold water on their panicked planning, telling his friends that if they're going to attack they have to be sure of winning.
Tor is played by Jeremy Bulloch, who will go also on to play Hal the archer in The Time Warrior, and Boba Fett in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi!
With a little help from Barbara and Vicki, Ian liberates a ray gun but when he starts fooling around with it, he gets a good telling off from the Doctor.
Ian tells him he'd only intended to use it to bluff their way out. It's only an exhibit after all.
Vicki begins to panic about their apparent fate. Barbara maintains a more level head, determined to break the chain of events that lead to their imprisonment.
The Doctor is in agreement, and the friends begin to ponder on how they might find the TARDIS and leave.
The Doctor ponders who would want to put them on display, but Ian hardly feels that's a detail that they need to worry about in the grand scheme of things.
As they decide to go and find their fate for themselves, Vicki notices that Ian has lost a button. The contemplation of small details leads to the Doctor namedropping James Watt, in whose company he claims to have been when the inventor was working on his steam engine.
By now the Doctor has fixed on a course of action; find the TARDIS and leg it. If only the others had thought of that, eh? Trying to navigate the maze-like corridors, the party seems rather lost, which even the Doctor has to admit, despite claims that he has the homing instincts of a pigeon.
Lobos receives word that the alien spaceship has been secured. Bad news for the time travellers, if only they knew.
Sita, Dako and Tor follow the travellers, wary of the ray gun that Ian wields.
As the travellers move through another room, the Doctor is side-tracked by an interesting exhibit.
As Ian calls him to hurry up, the Doctor is dragged off through a secret sliding wall!
Boba Fett always gets his man.
As the Doctor feigns unconsciousness, Sita and Tor leave to get something to bring him around, leaving Dako to stand guard over their captive.
Ian, Barbara and Vicki can't work out where the Doctor has disappeared to. Ian insists he's not blaming Barbara and denies being irritable.
When Vicki suggests he's been captured by some of the people they saw earlier, Barbara says her imagination is running away with her. Not that far-fetched, though, is it now?
Barbara can't decide whether to go back or forwards now.
Ian says that asking lots of questions isn't going to change their future, but has to concede her point that if they don't find some answers they won't have a future at all.
Sita and Tor return to their hideout to find that Dako's been Hartnell-ed. "One minute was silence and the next minute a whirlwind hit me." We already know he's quite the scrapper when he wants to be, he did teach the Mountain Mauler of Montana
everything he knows, after all.
Turns out the wily old Doctor's hidden inside the Dalek! He's no Nick Briggs, though, when it comes to the voice.
He doesn't get too far, though, before he's grabbed by the Moroks. Ouch.
The Doctor's friends are becoming dejected at going round in circles.
Suddenly, Ian is inspired by the tale of the Minotaur, and realizes they need a thread to mark their way.
Which is all well and good until Barbara realizes he's talking about sacrificing her cardigan.
Shoved in an unfamiliar room...
...the Doctor tries to find a way out.
Giving up, he sits down in the only chair in the room.
But no sooner has he sat down, than metal arms trap him where he is!
Elsewhere, the Xeron lads have found Ian's (well, Barbara's) thread and decide to see where it takes them.
The Doctor finds himself a captive audience when the wall facing him slides back to reveal Governor Lobos behind a table.
When Lobos introduces himself as Governor, the Doctor points out that Museum's have Curators, not Governors.
He's always thought he'd make a great curator.
Lobos laments the Moroks having abandoned their galaxy conquering ways, which the Doctor likens to the rise and fall of the Roman empire.
Lobos claims that he too is a scientist, and continues his interrogation by showing off a mind-reading device, plucking his companions' location from the Doctor's thoughts, and dispatching guards to capture them.
The Doctor outwits the machine with a little concentration: when asked how he got here, he visualizes a Penny Farthing bicycle!
Having completely unwound Barbara's cardy, the companions start to lose hope.
But when they open the next door, there's the TARDIS! It seems the Moroks have brought it inside the museum, which would be good news... if they could get to it.
The Doctor is busy running rings around Lobos, claiming to be from the planet of the Walruses.
When Lobos points out that the Doctor is not amphibious that's just asking for trouble, and he soon finds himself terrified with a swimsuit selfie.
Lobos has had enough and decides it's time for the Doctor's date with destiny.
"Take him to the preparation room!" (Hardly the most terrifying of cliffhangers).
EPISODE THREE
"The Search"
8th May 1965
UK Number 1: "Ticket to Ride" The Beatles (3rd Week)
Unable to reach the captured TARDIS, Ian, Barbara and Vicki may have no other choice than to continue looking for the Doctor.
By the TARDIS, the Xeron Commander, another morose and miserable sod, laments his lot in life, telling his underlings that he's bound to get it in the neck from Lobos when he finds out they can't get into the strange box.
Sure enough, Lobos is less than impressed.
He demands that they force it open and the Commander orders up some laser cutting equipment for the job.
Barbara, Ian and Vicki can only listen in horror as Lobos tells the Commander of the Doctor's capture.
They'll soon be in the same boat, though, as one of the Morok guards happens upon the travellers and gets the drop on them.
Vicki is forced to hand over the gun they pinched from the exhibit.
Is Ian seriously contemplating letting the guard shoot him just to see if it changes their future? Doesn't seem a very good plan.
In the end, it's all a bit "when I say run..." as Ian encroaches on the guard, so that Barbara and Vicki can make a run for it when he makes a move.
And so he does, with a well-aimed punch.
The Moroks at the TARDIS come to help their colleague, leaving Ian facing overwhelming odds.
Lobos sends the Commander after Barbara and Vicki, leaving the remaining two guards to manhandle Ian away as he returns to his office.
William Russell, man of action.
Ian gets the better of his guards and is soon at large himself.
Lots of familiar incidental music used in this serial - though I'm more familiar with it in later serials. Some of it definitely appears in The Tomb of the Cybermen. This story is no Tomb of the Cybermen.
Separated from Vicki, Barbara hides in a store room.
Once she's satisfied that that dummy's not an Auton she hides behind a box.
In the nick of time, as it turns out, as the Morok guards come to search for her. Luckily she's able to shift around and avoid detection.
But the guards have locked the door behind them, trapping her inside.
Having given her pursuers the slip, Vicki comes to a stop by the secret entrance to the rebel hideout, and finds herself recruited in no time at all.
When they realize Barbara is also on the loose, Tor sends Dako to look for her.
Fuming, Lobos posts guards on all the exits and leaves one to keep watch on the TARDIS.
It's a sensible move, but Ian is able to lure the guard exactly where he wants him...
... and soon has him at his mercy.
The guard blabs that the Doctor is in the preparation room, where he's soon to undergo a process rather like embalming. Ian orders him to take him to the preparation room so he can put a stop to it.
Receiving orders direct from their home planet to step up the offensive against the Xeron rebels, Lobos orders the section of the building that they believe Barbara and Vicki to be in flooded with "Zaphra gas".
Her attempt to lever the door open proving fruitless, Barbara rests.
But she's soon startled by approaching footsteps...
...and raises a piece of wood in self-defence.
Tor, Sita and Vicki leg it, with Tor promising that Dako will bring Barbara to them.
Sure enough, it's Dako that has found Barbara in the store room.
He's just about convinced Barbara that he's friendly, and his people the peace-loving victims of Morok subjugation, when the Zaphra gas starts to flood in.
Back in the Xeron hideout, Vicki enjoys a pint of Guinness as Sita and Tor explain that their people were enslaved by the Moroks and are usually shipped out to other worlds in the Morok Empire, but they managed to stay behind to fight for freedom.
Vicki decides what these rebels need are guns, cos they solve everything, and encourages Tor to take her to the armory.
The Xerons have thought of this already, of course, but the armory has a security system based on something like a lie detector. Vicki wants a closer look at this device, fancying her chances of hacking the system.
Ian's captive tries to stall, nervous to lead him further while there are so many people about. Sure enough the Commander approaches, so with his gun still trained on the guard, Ian instructs him to find out what's happened to his friends.
The Commander soon explains that they're using Zaphra gas to flush out their quarry, and as soon as he's gone Ian once again insists on being taken to their leader.
At the armory, a bored guard soon has more excitement than he can manage, as the Xeron rebels knock him unconscious.
In order to take guns from the armory, they'll have to answer the computer's questions correctly.
Vicki listens intently to the questions. "What is your rank? What is your name? Do you have the Governor's permission to approach? Have you a requisition signed by the Governor? What is its reference number?"
Vicki decides to start examining the computer's insides.
Lobos orders his men to prepare for their alien quarry to be flushed out.
Barbara is not enjoying the smoky gentleman's club atmosphere of TV Centre in the 60s one little bit, and is overwhelmed.
Vicki has the computer run its questions again, and is completely up front about her revolutionary intentions.
To Tor's surprise, access is granted, and the guns are theirs.
She explains that she fixed it so that she only had to answer the truth, not necessarily to give the answer the computer expected.
As Tor begins to arm the other rebels, Vicki wonders if her revolution can keep her and her friends from their fate as museum exhibits.
Ian reaches Lobos' office.
When he produces his gun, Ian is only met with smug triumphalism from Lobos, who tells him the Doctor's reached the 2nd stage of "preparation".
"He is beyond your help!"
Sad to say that after a magical first episode, I do find that this quickly degenerates into a dull empire vs. rebels runaround, particularly in this "Hartnell on holiday" third episode.
EPISODE FOUR
"The Final Phase"
15th May 1965
UK Number 1: "King of the Road" Roger Miller
He can't say when the Doctor may be recovered, because reversing the process has never been attempted before.
Having armed themselves, the Xeron rebels prepare to storm the Morok barracks.
Vicki plans to return to the museum to find her friends, so Tor gives her a gun and sends Sita along with her.
As the Moroks begin their attempts to drill the TARDIS lock, the Commander grows suspicious about the lack of guard on the alien craft and decides to get to the bottom of things.
Maybe humans are more resistant to Zaphra gas than Xerons, because Barbara is able to redouble her efforts and drag Dako clear of the fume-filled corridor.
The Doctor begins to defrost and soon comes around.
Not quite fully defrosted, the Doctor's joints are a bit stiff, and he needs a sit down.
The Doctor tells Ian that he was in fact fully conscious throughout the process and has heard every word.
Lobos suggests the Doctor's brain could still have been affected by the process, but he's having none of it.
The Doctor tells Lobos he's lucky his conscience won't allow him to let the Governor find out for himself how it feels.
The Commander and his guards enter through the Governor's office and soon get the drop on Ian and the Doctor, clubbing the teacher to the ground.
It seems the Doctor may not have evaded his fate as an exhibit after all.
One of Lobos' guards hears Barbara and Dako approaching the door he's guarding and prepares to pounce.
Lobos is less than impressed with the excuses of Ian's guard and orders the Commander to arrest him for his failure. Although perturbed by the lack of response from the barracks, Lobos gleefully promises the Doctor and Ian that they'll soon be reunited with Barbara and Vicki "perhaps for centuries."
Barbara and Dako run straight into trouble as they escape the Zaphra gas only to be caught by the waiting Morok guard.
Luckily, however, Sita and Vicki arrive to gun him down and rescue them.
As Barbara and Vicki are reunited, Sita tells Dako that their revolution has finally started.
Barbara decides it's time to go and look for the Doctor and Ian. Sita suggests they'd've been taken to the Governor's office.
The Commander chooses that moment to shoot Sita down, and tells Vicki and Barbara that the Governor's office is exactly where they'll be going.
Worried that their arms may have fallen into Xeron hands (seriously, that's what he actually says), the Commander hauls them away, leaving the stunned Xerons lying on the ground.
Lobos finds that the Xeron revolution is now in full swing, with no answer from the armory. He instead turns his attention to ensuring that the time travellers become permanent fixtures of the museum.
Ian makes a fruitless attempt on the door, but the Doctor tells him to save his strength.
Instead the teacher decides he can at least delay, if not prevent, their fate if he smashes the main element of the embalming machine.
The Doctor bursts his bubble by pointing out its hardly likely to be the only one of its' kind. Barbara doesn't blame Ian for letting off steam, though.
Vicki hopes that they've done enough to change their supposed future, but Barbara points out that each of them trod a separate path and they've all ended up here.
Whilst the kinder interpretation would be that despite everything that's happened, our friends still appear doomed, it does rather seem that everything that's happened between the end of episode 1 and now has pretty much been a waste of everybody's time.
The Doctor hopes that Vicki is right and they don't need to change their own future as such, just influence that of those around them, so the future changes around them.
Indeed, the Xeron revolution would never be happening had Vicki not helped the rebels to arm themselves.
Tor sees off a Morok guard that tries to tackle him, and his comrades give chase to a lone runner.
Once through the doors, they soon make short work of him.
Tor revives the stunned Dako, who confirms that Vicki and her friends are in the Governor's office.
Sensing the game is up, Lobos starts putting his important bits of paper in a briefcase, readying an escape via a ship at the spaceport.
But the poets arrive and shoot the last of the Morons down. Hurrah, how jolly!
Vicki is overjoyed to see Tor again, and the Doctor is happy to conclude that their future doesn't look too bad after all!
Ian and Barbara watch as the Xerons start to dismantle the museum and retake their planet, with Tor overseeing the relocation of vital equipment.
The Doctor has discovered that the source of the dimensional trouble was a busted spring or summat.
"We landed on a separate time track, wandered around a bit, and until this little thing clicked itself into place, we hadn't actually arrived."
Ever the opportunist, the Doctor has convinced Tor to let him have one of the exhibits: a Time Space Visualizer. That'll come in handy. Once.
Ian suggests they could have picked up a smaller souvenir.
The Doctor is not about to start asking permission from the teachers about what nick nacks he wants to take aboard his TARDIS, though.
He's obviously got big plans for that TVS.
Anyway, he's had enough of this dump and tells everyone to say their goodbyes.
He wishes Tor farewell, and encourages Vicki to do likewise.
She gives him a last, wistful, look before waving goodbye and boarding the TARDIS.
Tor can only watch in bemused astonishment as the TARDIS dematerializes.
In a galaxy far, far away...
...a dead planet hangs in space like a spider in a web.
In a technologically advanced city, sensitive equipment flickers into life, alerting one of the city's inhabitants.
It's a Dalek! This is indeed the planet Skaro, and it's clear that the Daleks have been searching the time/space vortex for signs of their greatest enemy.
The Dalek technician reports that the TARDIS has left the planet Xeros and is once more travelling through time and space.
I guess we know what we're in for next week!
For all this story's faults the first episode is amazingly good, but thereafter it nosedives into a pretty dull goodies vs. baddies runaround saved only by some moments of charm from Hartnell and that ending.
TTFN! K.
