|
"Before you start annihilating the thing, why don't we just take a look at it?"
|
The Third Doctor's Early Adventures |
Companions and Allies: The Brigadier, Liz Shaw, Sgt. Benton, Jo Grant, Capt.
Mike Yates Major Enemies: Autons, Nestene, Silurians, The Master
|
Spearhead from Space |
Location: England |
Date: Late 1969 |
The TARDIS lands in a forest where UNIT soldiers search
for meteorites which have come down in formation. The Doctor has
collapsed and is taken to a hospital, where the press is tipped off
about his alien nature. Lethbridge-Stewart has recruited Dr.
Elizabeth Shaw as UNIT's scientific advisor, and they go to the
hospital after learning that the alien was found near a police box.
The Brigadier is surprised when a man he doesn't recognize calls him
by name. As he and Liz leave, The Doctor is kidnapped by Channing
and his associates. While escaping, he's accidentally shot by a UNIT
soldier, and lapses into a coma as he's returned to the hospital.
When he recovers, he steals the clothes of one of the doctors and
takes off in the man's roadster. He traces the TARDIS to UNIT HQ and
demands to see the Brigadier. He agrees to help UNIT, but then
convinces Liz to get the TARDIS key, using the excuse that he needs
some equipment. When he tries to leave, he finds that he can't
operate the TARDIS due to mental blocks implanted by the Time Lords.
UNIT troops are confronted by a living mannequin which is also
seeking the meteorites, but they do manage to recover one of them.
The Doctor and Liz discover it's part of a group mind, and learn
from John Ransome that the plastics factory where he worked has been
taken over by Channing, and is guarded by the mannequins, which are called Autons.
General Scobie, UNIT's army liaison, has been replaced by an Auton,
which steals the meteorite and takes it to the factory. The Doctor
and Liz go to Madame Tussaud's wax museum following a tip from
Ransome, and find the real Scobie, as well as other government
leaders. More Autons come to life, breaking out of shop windows and
killing bystanders. The Doctor and Liz build a machine to disable
them, and go to the factory with the Brig and his men. "Scobie" and
a squad of regular army troops attempt to stop them, but The Doctor
disables the Scobie Auton (and the general recovers, to the surprise
of the patrons of Madame Tussaud's). As Liz and The Doctor enter the
factory the device fails, and The Doctor is attacked by the Nestene
Intelligence, which controls the Autons. Liz fixes the machine, and
the Nestene and Channing, also an Auton, are defeated. The Doctor
agrees to work for UNIT, provided he gets Liz as his assistant,
facilities to work on the TARDIS, and a car like the one he stole.
He adopts the name "Doctor John Smith", an alias first used by The
Second Doctor (The Wheel in Space).
|
The Silurians |
Location: England |
Date: 1970 |
Wenley Moor atomic research center is having problems, and
the Brig asks The Doctor and Liz to investigate. There have been
power losses and unexplained illnesses, including a man who's been
driven mad. The Doctor finds the man drawing monsters, and when he
investigates the caves housing the complex, he sees a dinosaur and
the tracks of a reptilian humanoid. UNIT troops wound one of the
creatures, but it escapes and later kills Dr. Quinn, the scientist
who discovered the beings, which he has identified as Silurians (The
Doctor later says they should have been called Eocenes: The Sea
Devils). The Doctor and Liz find a map to their base in Quinn's
house, and learn that the power losses are caused by them bringing their
people out of hibernation. The Silurians ruled Earth before the rise
of man, but went into suspended animation in the caverns to avoid
the effects of a planet they believed would crash into Earth. The
object was caught by Earth's gravity and became the Moon, and the
Silurians remained asleep until the research center went online. The
Doctor convinces a Silurian elder to attempt peace talks, but the
leader of another faction unleashes a plague to eliminate the
humans. The elder gives a sample of the disease to The Doctor, who
finds a cure. He's captured before he can develop it, but Liz makes
the vaccine using his notes. With this plan thwarted, the rebel
Silurians try to use the center's reactor to power a device to
destroy the Van Allen belt surrounding Earth, and all but one return
to hibernation. The Doctor escapes, and shuts down the reactor. He
still wants to try diplomacy, and after he's assured that peace
talks will begin, he and Liz head back to London. Bessie breaks
down, and they witness the explosion of the caves, which the
government has ordered the Brigadier to carry out.
|
The Ambassadors of Death |
Location: England |
Date: 1970 |
UNIT is
providing security for the recovery of Mars Probe 7. The Doctor
identifies a noise transmitted from the ship as a message, but his
attempts to decode it are hampered by one of the scientists at
Britain's Space Centre. The Doctor realizes that the astronauts,
who've been removed from the capsule by order of General Carrington,
one of the crew of Mars Probe 6, are really aliens who've been
substituted for the real crew. The aliens are radioactive, and their
touch is lethal to humans. The Doctor pilots a spacecraft to the
alien ship in an effort to locate the real crew, and learns that the
aliens are ambassadors. Their captain threatens to attack Earth
unless they are safely returned. Carrington plans to use the
captives for a series of attacks which he hopes will unite mankind
against the aliens, whom he blames for the death of one of his Probe
6 crewmembers. The Doctor alerts UNIT, and builds a translator which
enables him to convince the ambassadors of his good intentions.
Carrington is prevented from making a worldwide broadcast to alert
other nations to the alleged threat, and The Doctor starts
negotiations for exchanging the ambassadors for the Probe 7 crew.
|
Inferno |
Location: England |
Date: July 1970 |
At Project Inferno, which is penetrating Earth's crust in
search of a new power source, some workers have been infected by a
green slime brought up by the drill. The slime is changing them into
savage creatures. The Doctor is already working at the project,
using some of its power for experiments on the TARDIS console, and
he and Liz are caught up in UNIT's investigation. The project's
head, Professor Stahlman, rejects the advice of The Doctor and
drilling consultant Greg Sutton to shut the drilling down. No one
knows that Stahlman has already been infected by the slime. Sir
Keith Gold, the government minister overseeing the project, heads to
London in an attempt to stop Stahlman, but the drilling goes on in
his absence. The Doctor continues his work, but an attack by one of
the creatures causes a power surge, and he and the console vanish. The Doctor finds himself in a
dimension where Inferno is more advanced, and discovers that this
Britain is a fascist state, with duplicates of his UNIT allies as
its enforcers. This world's version of Stahlman has caused Sir
Keith's death, leaving only The Doctor and Sutton to stop him. They
fail, and The Doctor sees the onset of this Earth's destruction.
He's convinced this world's Liz Shaw of his origins, and she helps
him escape. The Liz of his own dimension finds him in shock, but
realizes that his mumbled message to reverse the drill will buy them
time to try to convince Stahlman to shut the project down. The
recovered Doctor tries to destroy the drill, but is stopped by
Stahlman and arrested by UNIT. He escapes, and he and Sutton battle
the transformed Stahlman, and manage to shut the process down with
only seconds to spare. Sir Keith has survived the accident which
killed his counterpart, and orders the project closed. Before the
project's power is finally shut down, The Doctor, who's been
berating the Brigadier for his pomposity, tries again to move the
TARDIS console. He sheepishly returns moments later, having managed
to get only as far as the project's garbage dump.
|
Terror of the Autons |
Location: England |
Date: Autumn 1970 |
Captain Mike Yates has
become the Brig's second-in-command, and Liz Shaw has returned to
Cambridge. The Brig assigns Josephine Grant, whose influential uncle
pulled strings to get her a job, as The Doctor's assistant. Jo
immediately wrecks one of his experiments, but he can't work up the
nerve to tell her he doesn't want her help. The Doctor's classmate,
The Master, has arrived on Earth, and has used the radio telescope
at Beacon Hill to summon the Nestene. UNIT is called to investigate
missing scientists at Beacon Hill, and while they are there one of
the Time Lords alerts The Doctor of The Master's plans. The last
remaining Auton meteorite has disappeared, and The Brigadier orders
a search of plastics factories. The Master has already taken over
Farrell Plastics, and is making Autons and other Nestene devices. He
captures Jo and hypnotizes her, ordering her to destroy The Doctor
with a bomb, but The Doctor breaks the hypnosis. Jo can't remember
where The Master is, but a car belonging to one of the scientists is
traced to Rossini's Circus. When The Doctor and Jo go there, he
finds The Master's TARDIS, and steals its dematerialization circuit.
After a scuffle with controlled circus people, they're captured by
Autons disguised as policemen, but are rescued by UNIT. The Master's
circuit won't work in The Doctor's TARDIS, but without it he's also
stranded on Earth. Reports of deaths come in, which The Doctor finds
are caused by plastic daffodils which spray a mask over the victim's
face, suffocating him, and then dissolving without trace. He traces
The Master, and while UNIT battles the Autons, convinces him the
Nestene will turn on him when his usefulness ends. Together they
prevent it from arriving on Earth, but The Master escapes by using a
disguised Farrell as a decoy.
|
The Mind of Evil |
Location: England |
Date: Late 1970 |
UNIT is providing security for a peace
conference, and disposing of a missile with a nerve gas warhead. The
Doctor and Jo have gone to Stangmoor Prison to see Professor
Kettering demonstrate the Keller machine, a device which drains evil
impulses from criminals. Barnham, the prisoner chosen for the
experiment, collapses, and a witness is found dead, apparently from
rat bites. The man had a fear of rats, and Kettering, who feared
drowning, is found near the machine, his lungs full of water. The
Doctor learns the machine has been in use for nearly a year, and
that Keller's assistant was a young Chinese woman. He's with the
machine as a riot starts, and sees his fear of fire (Inferno)
come to life. Before he can continue investigating he's called away.
The peace conference has been disrupted by the murder of the Chinese
delegate. The Master, who's bugged UNIT HQ, learns the route for the
missile transport. He's used Chin Lee, a young woman from the
Chinese delegation, to commit the murder, and plans to have her kill
other delegates. The Doctor impresses the new Chinese delegate with
his command of Chinese dialects and his friendship with Chairman
Mao, and he learns about Chin Lee, who he realizes was Keller's
assistant. He and the Brig stop her from killing the American
delegate. The Master helps the convicts gain control of Stangmoor,
and The Doctor is captured when he returns. The Master plans to
steal the missile and use it to destroy the peace conference. He
wants The Doctor to help him control the Keller machine, which
houses an alien parasite which feeds on evil. The Master also is
subject to the creature, and his greatest fear is The Doctor
laughing at him. The prisoners hijack the missile, and Captain Yates
is captured when he follows them. The Keller machine is now mobile,
and The Doctor learns that it's unable to act when Barnham, whose
evil impulses are gone, is present. The Master leaves to arm the
missile. UNIT troops attack the prison, and the Brigadier prevents
an inmate from shooting The Doctor. Yates has escaped and found the
airfield where the missile's been taken. The Master offers to
exchange it for his dematerialization circuit, and The Doctor
agrees. He arrives with Jo, Barnham, and the Keller machine, which
attacks The Master. The Doctor disarms the missile but The Master
escapes in a van, running over Barnham in the process. The missile's
destroyed and the Keller machine is caught in the blast. The Master
calls The Doctor to thank him for returning his circuit, and
promises to return to destroy Earth and The Doctor.
| |
|