Production Code: 6S
First Transmitted
1 - 22/03/1984 18:40
2 - 23/03/1984 18:40
3 - 29/03/1984 18:40
4 - 30/03/1984 18:40
Plot
A race of giant gastropods has taken over the planet Jaconda. Their leader, Mestor, now intends to cause an enormous explosion in order to spread his people's eggs throughout the galaxy, and he kidnaps juvenile twin geniuses from Earth to work out the necessary mathematical equations. Space fighters led by Lieutenant Hugo Lang are dispatched to get the twins back, but they come under attack and Lang is the sole survivor when his ship crashes on the asteroid Titan 3.
The Doctor and Peri become involved and help Jaconda's elderly former ruler Professor Edgeworth, who is really a Time Lord named Azmael, to defeat Mestor and free the planet's bird-like indigenous people from the gastropods' reign of terror. Azmael, however, sacrifices his life in the process.
Episode Endings
The injured Hugo Lang suddenly raises himself from the floor of the TARDIS and, assuming the Doctor has wiped out his entire command, aims a gun at the Time Lord.
Ignoring threats from Hugo, Peri activates the TARDIS scanner just in time to see the dome of the 'safe house' on Titan 3 destroyed in a huge explosion. Believing that the Doctor was still inside, she breaks down in tears.
Azmael has the Doctor restrained from going to rescue Peri from the gastropods. The Doctor is distraught at the prospect of his companion being killed.
The Doctor tells Peri: 'Whatever else happens, I am the Doctor - whether you like it or not!'
Roots
Caligula.
Beau Brummel (influences on the Doctor's character).
Thomas Moore's Lalla Rukh.
Longfellow's Excelior.
Dialogue Triumphs
The Doctor : "Well, look at me. I'm old, lacking in vigour, my mind's in turmoil. I no longer know if I'm coming, have gone, or even been. I'm falling to pieces. I no longer even have any clothes sense... Self-pity is all I have left."
The Doctor : "In my time I have been threatened by experts!"
The Doctor : "The very core of my being is on fire with guilt and rage!"
Dialogue Disasters
The Twins : "Our genius has been abused."
Fabian : [On the subject of her latest order] "May my bones rot for obeying it!"
Mestor : [Instructions to Azmael] "Take care not to blow their hearts, or their minds!"
The Doctor : [Whispers] "The sound of giant slugs!"
Double Entendre
The Doctor : "Thou craggy knob!"
The Twins : [To Azmael] "Why do you like to play the man of mystery? It's a role you play very badly!"
Continuity
The Doctor displays advanced medical talents. Azmael doesn't recognise the regenerated Doctor (whereas on most other occasions other Time Lords do). Fiesta 95 is a holiday planet. The space police service is run by a minister.
QV
Location
Asteroid Titan 3, Joconda, Earth, August [2200].
Links
The second Doctor's Yeti coat, the third Doctor's velvet jacket, and Tegan's coat are seen in the costume room.
The Doctor says 'Brave heart, Tegan.'
Untelevised
Azmael last met the Doctor in the Doctor's fourth incarnation, and was the best teacher the Doctor ever had. On that occasion, Azmael got drunk.
Trivia
New opening and closing title sequences make their debut - somewhat gaudier versions of the previous ones, incorporating Colin Baker's face rather than Peter Davison's - designed by Sid Sutton and Terry Handley.
Distinguished actor Maurice Denham plays Edgworth.
Fabian was originally envisaged as a male character, and the Jocondan Chamberlain as a female one.
Myth
The Edgeworth character was originally intended to be the first Doctor. (He wasn't.)
Goofs
The Jocondan's awful death by embolism.
Azmael keeps a slug-killing potion hanging around, but has never thought of using it.
The tin foil sofa.
The twins believe Edgeworth's story that his teleportation into their living room is a conjuring trick.
Why do the kidnappers stop off on Titan 3?
Peri makes no mention of the Doctor's heroic sacrifice on her behalf, nor thanks him for it (no wonder he's touchy).
Why does Azmael call himself Edgeworth anyway?
Peri is lusted after by an alien hermaphrodite slug.
She has a touching faith in the notion that, as a policeman, Hugo cannot be a homicidal maniac.
The twins' father is indeed being 'melodramatic' when he tells them that their mathematical skills could change events on a massive scale: the sums Mestor requires could have been done by the Brigadier.
The altered revitaliser machine sends Peri 10 seconds back in time, and thus... back to the TARDIS? (Only if the TARDIS is exactly on the same line of planetary rotation, and exactly ten seconds of rotation away. Putting three planets in the same orbit, would not, even if fluffed, 'blow a hole in the universe'.)
Fashion Victim
The Jocondans, with their Bostick glue guns.
Mestor, in a horribly bad costume that makes him look cross eyed.
Azmael chooses to wrap his sofa in aluminium foil.
The Doctor, Peri and Hugo all go into the TARDIS costume room and emerge with awful clothes.
Cast & Crew
The Doctor - Colin Baker
Peri - Nicola Bryant
Chamberlain - Seymour Green
Drak - Oliver Smith
Edgeworth - Maurice Denham
Elena - Dione Inman
Fabian - Helen Blatch
Hugo Lang - Kevin McNally
Jocondan Guard - John Wilson
Mestor - Edwin Richfield
Noma - Barry Stanton
Prisoner - Roger Nott
Remus - Andrew Conrad
Romulus - Gavin Conrad Gavin Conrad's real name was Paul Conrad, but he could not be credited as such as there was another actor already working under that name.
Sylvest - Dennis Chinnery
Crew
Director - Peter Moffatt
The Twin Dilemma