Production Code: 5Z
First Transmitted
1 - 04/01/1982 18:55
2 - 05/01/1982 19:00
3 - 11/01/1982 18:55
4 - 12/01/1982 19:05
Plot
The newly regenerated Doctor escapes with his companions back to the TARDIS. Suffering from post-regeneration trauma, he only narrowly manages to save the ship from destruction as it plunges back to Event One, the hydrogen in-rush that preceded the creation of the universe.
He then seeks sanctuary in the peaceful domain of Castrovalva, only to discover that it is an illusory, dimensionally paradoxical trap set for him by the Master with the unwilling aid of a kidnapped Adric. The Doctor eventually wins the day by enlisting the help of the Castrovalvan people who, although also part of the Master's creation, are nevertheless able to exercise free will.
Episode Endings
The TARDIS is heading back in time toward the hydrogen inrush that created the universe. The air is getting hotter and hotter and the ship starts to buck and shudder. The Master appears on the scanner screen and bids Tegan and Nyssa farewell forever.
Nyssa and Tegan are carrying the Doctor toward the city Castrovalva in the zero cabinet - a box made out of the doors of the TARDIS's now jettisoned zero room (a healing environment). They see Castrovalva perched on a rocky mountain ahead and hide the cabinet while they go to try to find a way in. When they return, they find blood on the ground, and the Doctor missing.
The Doctor, Tegan and Nyssa decide to leave Castrovalva. They traverse some walkways but arrive back in the main square from which they left. The Doctor is affected by the spatial disturbance and they go back to his room, intending to return him to the zero cabinet. When they get there, they discover that the cabinet has gone. The Doctor, seeing an impossibly fragmented view of Castrovalva through the window, realises that they are caught in a space/time trap.
The Doctor and his friends make their way back to the TARDIS. Tegan is disappointed that she was not, after all, responsible for piloting the TARDIS to Castrovalva - it was all down to the Master. The Doctor, contemplating his regeneration, comments that, whoever he feels like, it is absolutely splendid.
Roots
The work of Dutch artist M.C. Escher (set design, concepts of recursion and the title).
Jorge Luis Borges, especially Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius.
Tennyson's The Lady of Shalott.
Dialogue Triumphs
Tegan : "If... My dad used to say that "if" was the most powerful word in the English language"
Shardovan : [To the Master.] "You made us, man of evil. But we are free!"
The Doctor : [Finds a medicine bottle labelled 'the solution'] "Oh my little friend, if only you were!"
The Doctor : [Asks a group of women the quickest way out of town. They all point in different directions] "That's democracy for you."
Shardovan : [Is asked by the Doctor if he sees the 'spatial anomaly' of Castrovalva.] "With my eyes, no, but in my philosophy..."
Dialogue Disasters
Nyssa : "I know so little about telebiogenesis."
Double Entendre
Tegan : "All right, enormous thrust!"
Continuity
The new Doctor wears glasses to read. In an area of the TARDIS that Nyssa thinks 'hasn't been used for centuries' is the Zero Room ('An isolated place cut off from the rest of the universe'), used by Time Lords after difficult regenerations. The Doctor says that there is a polygonal Zero Room under the Junior Senate block on Gallifrey.
The Doctor can levitate inside the Zero Room (and in the Zero cabinet made from the doors of the room after it is part of the 25 per cent of the TARDIS jettisoned to escape Event One). The TARDIS has a room full of cricketing memorabilia (see Four to Doomsday).
The Cloister Bell is heard again as the TARDIS heads backwards in time towards the beginning of the universe. The automatic systems override is situated behind a removable roundel. The TARDIS databanks state that Castrovalva is in Andromeda, a planet in the Phylox series, but as with many elements, including Tegan's ability to land the TARDIS, these are later revealed to have been part of the Master's plan.
The Doctor sees a stick of celery and declares 'definitely civilisation' and, at the end of the story pins an unreal sprig to his lapel. [Since his Enlightenment replacement is also unreal, this is why they don't wilt.]
Location
The Pharos Project, Sussex (ambulance insignia); Castrovalva.
Links
We see the mannerisms of the first ('I wonder, boy, what would you do if you were me, hmm?', 'Fit as a fiddle, Vicki'), second ('Jamie, you go back... when I say run, run', a scene with the recorder), third ('Not far now Brigadier, if the Ice Warriors don't get there first' [an untelevised adventure?], 'Not forgetting to reverse the polarity of the neutron flow'), and fourth Doctors ('Now, ordinary spaces...').
There are also mentions of companions ('Romana's always telling me I need a holiday', 'Get K9 to explain it to you', 'Where were we, Jo?') and old enemies ('Oh, the Ogrons and the Daleks. I think it does us good to remind ourselves that the universe isn't entirely peopled with nasty creatures out for themselves')
There are also references to Full Circle ('Ever been to Alzarius?'), Warriors' Gate ('We left Romana at the gateway') and Logopolis.
The ion bonder from The Keeper of Traken is mentioned.
Trivia
Tom Baker appears in the pre-titles sequence, in the reprise from Logopolis Part Four, but uncredited. This is the first story on which the Doctor is credited as 'The Doctor' on the closing credits. Previously the credit has always read either 'Dr. Who' or 'Doctor Who'.
A pre-titles sequence in part one reprises the ending of Logopolis, in shortened and redubbed form and with slightly rescored incidental music to give it a more up-beat quality.
New opening and closing title sequences are used, similar to the previous season's and again designed by Sid Sutton but this time incorporating Peter Davison's face in place of Tom Baker's.
The Doctor affixes a stick of Castrovalvan (and therefore, presumably, illusory) celery to his lapel.
Technobabble
We have a mean free path tracker, a referential differencer, a three micron beam wedge, the science of telebiogenesis and recursive occlusion. Ambient complexity is alleged to be the cause of many failures of regeneration.
Goofs
As with his first regeneration, the metamorphosis in the Doctor's body also has an effect on his clothes (the Doctor's boots becoming shoes).
The TARDIS is parked in a different field from that seen in Logopolis.
The security guards up on the radio telescope never come down.
The security guards chasing the companions change between seasons.
Nyssa and Tegan's handbags appear on the console, not having been there in Logopolis.
When the Doctor levitates in the Zero Room his coat tails levitate too, and his collar question marks are reversed.
The camera wobbles when Mergrave and Ruther go to see what caused the noise.
In the very last scene a fence is visible on the deserted planet.
Fashion Victim
The Castrovalvan silly hats competition.
Adric should have 'adjusted his clothing' before being put into the web.
Cast & Crew
Cast
The Doctor - Peter Davison
Adric - Matthew Waterhouse
Nyssa - Sarah Sutton
Tegan - Janet Fielding
Child - Souska John
Head of Security - Dallas Cavell
Mergrave - Michael Sheard
Portreeve - Neil Toynay
Ruther - Frank Wylie
Shardovan - Derek Waring
The Master - Anthony Ainley 'Neil Toynay' is an anagram of 'Tony Ainley'. This was the second time in the series' history that a pseudonym had been used for an actor in order to conceal a plot twist (the first instance having occurred on season two's The Rescue)
Crew
Director - Fiona Cumming
Castrovalva