Production Code: 7P
First Transmitted
1 - 22/11/1989 19:35
2 - 29/11/1989 19:35
3 - 06/12/1989 19:35
Plot
The Doctor takes Ace to present day Perivale so that she can revisit old friends. Most of them however have been transported by cat-like Kitlings to the planet of the Cheetah People, a race with the power to teleport through space. Ace is transported and joins up with two of her friends, Midge and Shreela, and a boy named Derek.
The Doctor follows and encounters the Master, who has drawn him into a trap to try to gain his help. This planet gradually transforms its inhabitants into Cheetah People - an influence to which the Master himself has fallen victim - while they in turn, through the savagery of their actions, cause the planet to move ever closer to total destruction.
Midge is overcome by the planet's influence, and the Master uses him to teleport to Perivale. Ace, who has developed an affinity with a Cheetah woman called Karra, gains the same ability and takes the Doctor and the others back as well. The Master causes Midge's death and kills Karra, who has followed them all to Earth. Then, succumbing to the influence of the now-disintegrating Cheetah planet, he drags the Doctor back there.
The Doctor refuses to fight him, however, and is transported back to Earth. He rejoins Ace, and they head off for new adventures.
Episode Endings
The Doctor and Sergeant Paterson find themselves in the middle of a Cheetah camp. The Doctor pulls back the flap of a tent to find, seated inside, the Master. The Master's eyes glow yellow and he comments that the Doctor's arrival is an unexpected pleasure.
Ace falls under the planet's influence, her eyes glowing yellow. The Doctor looks perturbed.
The Doctor and Ace head back toward the TARDIS.
Roots
Val Lewton's Cat People.
Cats (a poster).
Lord of the Flies.
The Wizard of Oz (Ace gets to do her Dorothy bit again, clicking her heels to go home).
Dialogue Triumphs
The Doctor : "If we fight like animals, we'll die like animals!"
Ace : "I felt like I could run forever, like I could smell the wind and feel the grass under my feet, and just run forever."
The Doctor : "The planet's gone, but it lives on inside you, and it always will."
The Doctor : "There are worlds out there where the sky is burning, where the sea's asleep and the rivers dream, people made of smoke and cities made of song. Somewhere there's danger, somewhere there's injustice and somewhere else the tea is getting cold. Come on, Ace, we've got work to do."
"I thought you'd died. Or gone to Birmingham."
Continuity
The Doctor can stun with one finger, juggle, ride both horse and motorcycle, has a calculator/scanner fob watch [and regards Earth or the TARDIS as his home]. He knows of the Cheetah People, but nothing about them.
Ace's friends (Ange, Jay, Stevie, Flo, Shreela and Midge) used to meet at the Youth Club, pub or Horsenden Hill on Sundays. She can ride horses, and the police once let her off with a warning. Her Mum has reported her as missing. She supports hunt saboteurs, and drinks Diet Coke.
[The Master seems to have been brought to the planet as prey, and hypnotically controls the Cheetah People and, through his connection to the planet, has linked mentally with the Kitlings.] His recognises the Doctor despite never having seen this regeneration. [Time Lords tend to be able to do this.]
Location
Sunday in Perivale, the 1980s
The unnamed planet of the Cheetah People, a [telepathic?] organism that transforms its inhabitants.
Trivia
Comedy duo Hale and Pace make a cameo appearance, playing shopkeepers Harvey and Len.
Stunt legend Eddie Kidd doubles for William Barton in a motor cycle crash scene in Part Three. This led to the series' regular stunt arranger Tip Tipping walking off the production, as Kidd was apparently not a member of the actors' union Equity.
A poignant final monologue by Sylvester McCoy as the Doctor, was over-dubbed after the story's completion when it became apparent that the series would probably not be returning to production in the near future.
Hale and Pace swapped roles shortly before recording - Hale was originally to have played Harvey and Pace was originally to have played Len.
Goofs
That awful shot of the colliding bikes.
Why doesn't the Master, as much a Cheetah Person as Ace is, just teleport off the planet? [The Master doesn't realise that to use the teleportation powers does not necessarily mean becoming a full Cheetah Person.]
Cast & Crew
Cast
The Doctor - Sylvester McCoy
Ace - Sophie Aldred
Ange - Kate Eaton
Derek - David John
Harvey - Norman Pace
Karra - Lisa Bowerman
Len - Gareth Hale
Midge - William Barton
Neighbour - Michelle Martin
Paterson - Julian Holloway
Shreela - Sakuntala Ramanee
Squeak - Adele Silva
Stuart - Sean Oliver
The Master - Anthony Ainley
Woman - Kathleen Bidmead
Crew
Director - Alan Wareing
Survival