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Doctor Who (film)

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Doctor Who is a television movie based on the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was originally broadcast on May 14, 1996 on the Fox Network. In order to avoid confusion with the series name, the executive producer Philip Segal subsequently suggested that fans of the series could refer to the telemovie by the unofficial title Enemy Within although this title was never used during production.

160 - Doctor Who
Cast
Production
Directed byGeoffrey Sax
Written byMatthew Jacobs
Script editorNone
Produced byPeter V. Ware
Matthew Jacobs
Executive producer(s)Philip David Segal
Alex Beaton
Jo Wright (for the BBC)
Production codeNone
SeriesNone
Running time85 mins (UK)
89 mins (US)
First broadcastMay 12, 1996 (Canada)
May 14, 1996 (USA)
May 27, 1996 (first UK)
Chronology
← Preceded by
Survival 		Followed by →
Rose

Synopsis

The Master's last wish was for his old enemy, the Doctor, to bring his remains home. In San Francisco on New Year's Eve, 1999, a trap is sprung that could mean the end of the world. Only the newly-regenerated Eighth Doctor can stop the Master — if he can only remember who he is.

Plot

Template:Spoiler

File:Doctorwho1996.jpg
The Doctor and the Master in their climactic battle

On the planet Skaro, the renegade Time Lord known as the Master is put on trial by the Daleks, and executed. His last wish is for his remains to be returned to Gallifrey by his greatest enemy, the Doctor.

In the TARDIS, the Seventh Doctor stows the urn containing the Master's remains in a container, locking it with his sonic screwdriver, then settles in for the trip back to the Time Lords' planet. As he relaxes with a copy of The Time Machine by H.G. Wells and listens to a jazz record, he does not see the container shake and shatter. A gelatinous slug-like creature oozes out of the container and enters the TARDIS console, causing sparks to fly out. The Doctor tries to compensate, but the TARDIS systems indicate a critical timing malfunction and initiate an emergency landing. The Doctor finds, to his horror, that the Master's container is cracked open.

On December 30, 1999 in San Francisco, a Chinese-American teenager named Chang Lee and his two friends run from rival gang members. An ambush opens fire on them, and as Lee is about to be shot, a high wind whips up in the alley and a police box materialises in front of him. The Doctor steps out only to be shot by the startled gang, and he falls. Lee finds his friends dead and the Doctor gravely wounded. He is unable to warn Lee about the worm oozing out of the TARDIS lock and following Lee as he calls for an ambulance.

In the ambulance, Lee signs the paperwork that Bruce, the paramedic, gives him, putting the Doctor's name as "John Smith". The Doctor is wheeled into the operating theatre while the worm hides in the ambulance, and then in Bruce's uniform. The medical staff are puzzled by the fact that the Doctor's X-rays reveal two hearts which are racing wildly. They decide to page the on-call cardiologist, Dr. Grace Holloway, who is at a performance of Madame Butterfly. To the annoyance of her boyfriend, Brian, she rushes back to the hospital, still in her evening wear.

Puccini plays as Grace starts to operate. The Doctor's eyes snap open and he tries to tell Grace that he is not human, and that he needs a beryllium atomic clock, but the staff puts him back under. The use of a cardiac probe goes wrong as Grace is unfamiliar with the Doctor's physiology. The Doctor goes into a seizure and flatlines. Grace is angry and upset, demanding to see the patient's X-rays, and is disturbed when she sees the two hearts and realizes it is not a double exposure as assumed.

Grace tells Lee that "Mr. Smith" is dead, and when Grace figures out that he does not really know the dead man, Lee takes the Doctor's belongings and runs off. Now past midnight on December 31, the Doctor's body is put in the morgue freezer. In Bruce's house, the now cobra-like manifestation of the Master creeps out of his uniform and forces itself into Bruce's mouth while he is sleeping next to his wife. The Master has taken over his body.

In the mortuary, the body of the Doctor crackles with electricity, and he regenerates into the Eighth Doctor, who rises from the gurney, disoriented and amnesiac. The Doctor manages to pound the door of the storage chamber off its hinges, frightening the morgue attendant into a faint. Confused, he staggers into a disused section of the hospital, clad only in a sheet and the tag still on his toe. As he spies his reflection, he cries out in anguish, "Who...am...I?"

As dawn comes to San Francisco, the Doctor rummages through the worker's lockers, finding pieces of costumes for the New Year's Party. Lee searches through the Doctor's things and finds the TARDIS key (as well as the sonic screwdriver and a pocket watch). The Master awakens in Bruce's body, saying that he needs to find the Doctor, and that the body will not last long. When Bruce's wife sees the green glow of his eyes, he kills her.

The hospital administrator discusses the Doctor with Grace, and burns the X-rays so that they can cover up the death of the patient. Grace is indignant and threatens to resign. She gathers her things and leaves the hospital, followed by the Doctor, who in his confused state latches on to her as someone he recognizes. Grace tries to fob him off, thinking that he is insane, but he climbs into her car anyway. Suddenly the Doctor screams as he removes the remains of the cardiac probe from his chest. As the Doctor tells her that he has two hearts, Grace begins to realize that this might be the same man, impossible as it seems. The Doctor cries for Grace to drive off and she does.

The Master goes to the hospital to find the Doctor's body but is told it is missing. A nurse tells "Bruce" that the Doctor's property is with the Asian youth, and the Master thanks her and goes off. When Grace and the Doctor arrive at her home, she finds that Brian has moved out and taken most of the furniture. Grace listens to the Doctor's chest and confirms that he has two hearts. The Doctor starts to remember details, saying that he was dead too long this time — the anaesthetic nearly destroyed the regenerative process. Grace asks the Doctor not to talk to her like she is a child; the dead stay dead. However, she is startled when he tells her about the dream she had as a child to hold back death, and that she will do great things.

In Chinatown, Lee uses the key to enter the TARDIS, and is shocked when he sees its dimensionally transcendental interior. The TARDIS also seems to respond to Lee, powering itself on when he touches the console. Somehow, the Master is already there, and hypnotises Lee into giving him the Doctor's belongings. He tells Lee that the "dead man" has stolen his body and they need to find him before the Master dies.

Grace and the Doctor go for a walk, and she theorises that he might be the product of a genetic experiment. The Doctor remembers more details — he is from Gallifrey, and remembers a meteor storm he saw with his father. In the TARDIS, the Master convinces Lee that the Doctor is the evil one and that they must stop him. The Master brings him to the Cloister Room, where the Eye of Harmony is housed. The Master uses Lee's retinal pattern to open the Eye. As the Eye opens, the Doctor's memories start flooding back and he kisses Grace in joy.

The Eye projects images, first of the Seventh, then the Eighth Doctor — and his retinal structure, which is human. The Master concludes that the Doctor is half-human. Meanwhile, the Doctor senses that the Master has opened the Eye, and that he will be able to see through the Doctor's eyes. He shuts them, but not before the Master spots Grace. The Doctor tells Grace that the Master wants to force him to look into the Eye, so that the Doctor's soul will be destroyed and the Master can take his body. He explains that if the Eye is not closed, the planet will soon be sucked through it, and that he needs an atomic clock to fix the timing mechanism on the TARDIS to prevent this. They have until midnight.

Grace, now believing the Doctor to be insane, runs back into the house to call an ambulance to take the Doctor away. The Doctor convinces her, showing that the molecular structure of the planet is changing by walking through her picture window. The Master hears all this and goes with Lee to drive the ambulance to Grace's house as "Bruce". On the television, the Doctor sees reports of weather patterns changing around the world, and then a report of an event in San Francisco showcasing the unveiling of an atomic clock at the Institute of Technological Advancement and Research.

The Master arrives at the door but the Doctor does not recognize him. They ask him to take them to the Institute. The ambulance lurches as they stop for a traffic jam, and the Master's sunglasses fall, revealing his alien eyes. The Doctor takes a fire extinguisher and fires it in the Master's face as he spits burning, bile-like venom at them, hitting Grace in the wrist. Grace and the Doctor escape from the ambulance. The Doctor commandeers a police motorcycle by threatening to shoot himself. The ambulance, driven by Lee, races the Doctor and Grace on the motorcycle towards the Institute.

When the Doctor and Grace reach the Institute, they see the ambulance in the parking lot. Grace and the Doctor mingle at the reception, introducing the Doctor as "Doctor Bowman" from London, but are blocked from entering the room containing the clock. They manage to sneak in anyway, and the Doctor removes the timing chip. As they make their way out, they see Lee and the Master and try to avoid them, running into a group of security guards who have been paralysed by the Master's venom. The Doctor triggers the fire alarm as he and Grace head for the roof, descending to the ground using a fire hose. They get back on the motorcycle and ride back towards Chinatown and the TARDIS.

They gain access to the TARDIS with the spare key the Doctor keeps in a cubbyhole above the 'P' in the "POLICE BOX" sign. As they enter, they hear the cloister bell signalling disaster. The Doctor installs the beryllium chip into the console and closes the Eye, but it may be too late — the Eye has been open too long. The only way to prevent the destruction of Earth is to go back before the Eye was opened, but the TARDIS is out of power. Grace challenges the Doctor to think - his knowledge of what happens to her in the future must come from somewhere. The Doctor proposes directing residual power from the Eye directly into the time rotor, jump starting the TARDIS. But as the Doctor sets things up below the console, the Master's venom takes effect on Grace, making her take up a tool and knock the Doctor out, just as the Master and Lee enter the console room.

The Doctor wakes up in the TARDIS cloisters, strapped down. He tries (apparently) unsuccessfully to convince Lee that the Master has been lying to him. The Master, in the meantime, has changed into Gallifreyan garb. Grace, still possessed by the Master, chains the Doctor on the upper balcony, attaching to his head a metal harness designed to keep his eyes open while he stares into the Eye of Harmony. The Master tries to get Chang Lee to open the eye but makes a slip which makes Lee realize the Master has lied. The Master breaks Lee's neck, and uses Grace to open the Eye instead.

The glow from the Eye focuses onto the Doctor and the Master, linking them both and starts to transfer the Doctor's regenerations to the Master. The Doctor shouts for Grace to go to the console room and divert the power to start the TARDIS or everyone will die. As the clock counts down to midnight, Grace struggles with the console circuitry, and manages to connect the wires just as the clock strikes midnight. The time column starts to move and the TARDIS goes into a temporal orbit, suspending everything at the moment of destruction. Grace runs back to the Cloister Room and tries to free the Doctor from his chains but the Master pushes her over the side of the balcony and kills her.

The Doctor and the Master battle over the Eye of Harmony, and in the struggle, the Master gets sucked into the Eye and is seemingly destroyed. The clocks on the TARDIS continue ticking backwards, and a glow from the TARDIS washes over the bodies of Grace and Lee, bringing them back to life as the Eye closes once more. The Doctor then resets the console and brings them back to December 31, just before the stroke of midnight in San Francisco, and time proceeds again as normal.

Back in San Francisco, Lee returns the Doctor's things to him. The Doctor tells Chang Lee not to be around next Christmas, and the teen leaves. The Doctor asks Grace to go with him, but she declines, saying that she's not afraid of life anymore. The Doctor kisses her goodbye, and enters the TARDIS, which then dematerialises. The Doctor settles back in his chair in the console room, picks up the H.G. Wells book he was reading earlier, replays the record, and heads off for further adventures.

Cast

Cast notes

Miranda, the wife of Bruce, is played by Eric Roberts' real-life wife, Eliza Roberts.

Casting the Doctor

The producers of the television movie compiled several lists of actors to consider for the part of the Doctor. Actors considered by the producers and casting agents included: Adam Ant, Rowan Atkinson, Chris Barrie, Sean Bean, Jeremy Brett, Jim Broadbent, Pierce Brosnan, Simon Callow (who later played Charles Dickens in "The Unquiet Dead"), Martin Clunes, Robbie Coltrane, Billy Connolly, Peter Cook, Michael Crawford, Liam Cunningham, Tim Curry, Timothy Dalton, Alexis Denisof, Christopher Eccleston (who later played the Ninth Doctor in the 2005 series of Doctor Who), Trevor Eve, Rupert Everett, Ralph Fiennes, Colin Firth, Matt Frewer, Stephen Fry, Hugh Grant, Rupert Graves, Martin Jarvis, Robert Hardy, Nigel Havers, Anthony Stewart Head (who later played Mr. Finch in "School Reunion"), John Hurt, Eric Idle, Derek Jacobi, Ben Kingsley, Hugh Laurie, Robert Lindsay, Rob Lowe, Malcolm McDowell, Mark McGann (brother of Paul), Tim McInnerny, Ian McKellen, Alfred Molina, Sam Neill, Bill Nighy, Richard O'Brien, Peter O'Toole, Michael Palin, Nathaniel Parker, Jonathan Pryce, Aidan Quinn), John Sessions, Tony Slattery, Patrick Stewart, Peter Ustinov, Kevin Whately, Tom Wilkinson and Edward Woodward.

Of this extensive list (not all of whom are mentioned here), Crawford, Curry, Idle, Rees, Connolly, Eve, Palin, Lindsay and Price were the producers' early favourites. Not all were interested in the project, or available for the intented filming dates. Casting sessions took place in March 1994; actors who actually auditioned for the role include Liam Cunningham, Mark McGann, Robert Lindsay, Tim McInnerny, Nathaniel Parker, Peter Woodward, John Sessions, Anthony Head and Tony Slattery. Paul McGann was first considered around the time of these auditions, but did not formally audition for the part until later.[1]

Continuity

  • This is one of four Doctor Who adventures to be set on New Year's Eve 1999 and New Year's Day 2000. The Virgin Missing Adventures novel Millennial Rites by Craig Hinton, published in October 1995, the Past Doctor Adventures novel Millennium Shock by Justin Richards, published in May 1999, and the comic strip Plastic Millenium, published in the Doctor Who Magazine Winter 1994 Special, all take place on those dates. This would mean that the fourth, sixth and seventh incarnations of the Doctor were in London at the same time that his eighth incarnation was "born" in San Francisco.
  • The book that the Doctor sits down to read at the beginning and the end of the movie is The Time Machine by H. G. Wells. The Doctor shared an adventure with Wells in the 1985 Sixth Doctor serial Timelash. In 1973's Frontier in Space, the Master is seen reading Wells's The War of the Worlds. In the untelevised story Shada, Professor Chronotis can be seen with a copy of The Time Machine, which is later visible throughout the episode.
  • The scene where the newly-regenerated Eighth Doctor breaks down the metal door at the morgue is echoed in the 2005 episode, Aliens of London when a mock-up porcine "alien" breaks through the metal door of the morgue at Albion Hospital (similarly terrifying Dr Sato).
  • The "time tunnel" effect of the 2005 Doctor Who revival is reminiscent of the vortex that the TARDIS travels through in the opening credits of the television movie.

The Doctor

  • The television movie remains Paul McGann's sole televised story as the Doctor. It has nonetheless had a significant impact on the Doctor Who mythos, with an ongoing Doctor Who novel line, comic strip, and audio series that featured the Eighth Doctor for years, until the arrival of the new television series in 2005. Several of the audio plays have been broadcast in serial form on the digital radio channel BBC7, accompanied by promos (delivered in-character by Paul McGann) that attempted to spin the audios as "backstory" for the 2005 series; in late 2006, BBC7 and Big Finish announced a new series of Eighth Doctor radio plays, with a format hewing more closely to the current television series. Although BBC Books intended to continue publishing occasional Eighth Doctor novels as part of its Past Doctor Adventures line, as of the debut of the new series all classic novel lines have been put on hiatus.
  • The Seventh Doctor is seen wearing a totally different costume to the one he wore during his 1987-1989 tenure: gone is the question mark pullover and umbrella. In fact the only thing remaining from his original costume is his hat (which is actually owned by Sylvester McCoy).
  • The Seventh Doctor's first words in this movie are "There, that should do it", as he locks the casket with his sonic screwdriver. The same words were spoken by the Fourth Doctor in Destiny of the Daleks, as he sets up an explosive device. His final words were "Timing malfunction! The Master, he's out there! I've got to stop..."
  • Chang Lee gives the unconscious Seventh Doctor the alias "John Smith". The Doctor's use of that alias has a long history in the series, beginning with The Wheel in Space and then several times thereafter, in particular during the Third Doctor's tenure with UNIT as "Dr John Smith". The alias is next mentioned in the 2005 episode The Empty Child. For other aliases used by the Doctor, see The Doctor - "Doctor who?"
  • It can be argued that Grace technically "kills" the Seventh Doctor on the operating table, triggering his (delayed) regeneration. This is the only time in the series history that a companion has been directly responsible for the change, albeit unintentionally.
  • While rummaging through lockers in search of clothing, the Doctor momentarily examines a long multi-coloured scarf, similar to that worn by the Fourth Doctor. The Eighth Doctor also offers a policeman a jelly baby, a favourite confectionary of the Second and Fourth Doctors.
  • The Ninth Doctor alludes to the controversial kiss between the Doctor and Grace in The Long Game (2005) when he explains that time travel means immersing oneself in the period, including "kissing complete strangers... or is that just me?"
  • The controversy in fan circles over the revelation that the Doctor is half-human is slyly referenced in The Parting of the Ways (2005). When Rose Tyler suggests that the Daleks are half-human, the Dalek Emperor decries the words as "blasphemy".

Daleks and the Master

  • Although the Doctor's most famous alien adversaries, the Daleks, are not seen in the film, they are heard condemning the Master to death during the film's opening sequence (sporting their trademark war cry of: "EX-TER-MIN-ATE!!"). However, their 'appearance' and role here has proven to be controversial amongst fans for a number of reasons, ranging from the arguably trivial (the DWAS said that their voices were "too squeaky") to the claim that it was uncharacteristic of the Doctor to run an errand for his mortal enemies (but see below).
  • The exact crimes for which the Daleks put the Master on trial is not known. One fan theory involves the events of Frontier in Space, where the Master allied himself with the Daleks but their plans for galactic conquest came to nothing because of the Third Doctor. In the Doctor Who Annual 2006, Russell T. Davies writes in an article about the Time War that President Romana of Gallifrey signs a treaty involving the "Act of Master Restitution" with the Daleks. The exact terms of the treaty are not elaborated on, but the Act suggests that part of it was the handing over of the Master to the Daleks.
  • At several points during the film, including the opening credits, the Master is seen sporting cat's eyes. This is an apparent allusion to the cheetah virus he was infected with at the end of his last appearance, Survival.
  • The Master tried to use the Eye of Harmony to obtain a new set of regenerations before, in The Deadly Assassin. He was also offered a new set of regenerations by the Time Lords in The Five Doctors, but his continued quest for regenerations in later stories like Planet of Fire implies that he never received them.
  • This remains Eric Roberts' sole appearance as the Master. See also Celebrity appearances in Doctor Who.

The TARDIS

  • The TARDIS appears to materialise around Chang Lee early in this film, but immediately thereafter he steps out from behind it, which means it presumably materialised in front of him. In contrast, in the 2005 series finalé The Parting of the Ways, Rose Tyler (along with a Dalek) is transferred into the TARDIS interior when it materialises around her.
  • As established in The Deadly Assassin (1977), the Eye of Harmony was housed on Gallifrey; its presence on the TARDIS therefore appears to be a contradiction. Fan theory quickly resolved the conflict by speculating that the "Eye" on the TARDIS was merely a spaciotemporal link to the actual Eye, presumably contained on all TARDIS crafts as a source of energy. This theory was itself soon worked into licensed material such as the BBC novel range.
  • The Eye of Harmony can only be opened by using a human retinal pattern. This may have been because the Doctor, according to the film, was in fact half-human. Since this connection was not made explicit in the film, though, many viewers find this confusing, as a human would have no reason for operating a TARDIS or opening the Eye (at least in theory). An explanation for this is attempted in the 2000 Big Finish Productions audio play The Apocalypse Element. There, a Dalek invasion of Gallifrey necessitated using a non-Time Lord eye to act as a security key for Gallifrey's retinal scanner locks, with the eye chosen belonging to the Sixth Doctor's human companion Evelyn Smythe.

Controversy

With its often dramatic changes or additions to established continuity, the TV movie has caused considerable controversy within Doctor Who fandom, some fans charging that it violates canon in several areas. Although the controvery has dimmed somewhat in the wake of the 2005 series (which goes some lengths to address or resolve some of the conflicts), some Doctor Who fans go so far as to disavow the movie from "official" continuity. Meanwhile, other fans insist that all of these points can be easily explained or interpreted in the context of the series. Some lasting points of contention include:

  • The Doctor's being revealed as being half-human.
  • That the Eye of Harmony hypothetically should be on Gallifrey; not in the TARDIS, as shown here.
  • That the Doctor and his companion, Grace, enter into a romantic relationship (often seen as a taboo).
  • That The Doctor uses the term "cloaking device" to refer to the TARDIS' chameleon circuit.
  • That the movie's take on the Time Lord regenerative process differs from earlier depictions.
  • That the interior of the TARDIS significantly differs from earlier versions.

The writers of numerous original Doctor Who novels that followed the movie, such as Terrance Dicks and Lance Parkin, have attempted to reconcile these and other points of continuity, with varying degrees of success.

Several rebuttals have been made by other fans, starting with the argument that continuity in the original series was never that strong anyway. Specific rebuttals include:

  • Although the Doctor has stated that he is not from Earth, there is nothing to explicitly contradict a mixed heritage. Indeed, the series contains vague hints that may support the theory, depending on interpretation. In The Evil of the Daleks, the Daleks identify the Doctor as "more than human"; in Planet of the Spiders, when the TARDIS returns the dying Third Doctor to Earth, he states it brought him "home". In addition, the Doctor's family background has never been explored in the series beyond the fact that he travelled for a time with his granddaughter, and an occasional reference to other relatives. Alternatively, as the film claims that a Time Lord can change species upon regeneration, some fans speculate that only the Eighth Doctor may be half-human. Another popular theory draws from the time the Seventh Doctor spends masquerading as a human named Joh Smith in Paul Cornell's 1995 Virgin New Adventures novel Human Nature, speculating that the Doctor's human DNA is left over from that experience. Although the revived television series has thus far avoided the issue, the New Series Adventures novel Only Human (2005) states that the Doctor's DNA is "close" to that of humans.
  • The Eye of Harmony shown in the telemovie was just a power-tap; a dimensional link to the actual Eye of Harmony. This explanation has been used in spin-off media, and referenced in a "beginner's guide" to the show on the official Doctor Who website.
  • The Doctor had an arguably romantic relationship in The Aztecs, and as he also had a granddaughter, presumably he had sexual relations at some point. In the 2005 series, the Ninth Doctor's (and later the Tenth's) relationship with his companion, Rose Tyler, seems to verge on actual romance, as did the Fourth Doctor's relationship with the second incarnation of Romana. Furthermore, the 2006 episode School Reunion portrays the Doctor's earlier relationship with Sarah Jane Smith in a nominally romantic light.
  • Different eras of the series use different terminology. In 1965's The Time Meddler the TARDIS' disguising mechanism was called a "camouflage unit". The term "chameleon circuit" was introduced in the Target Books novelisations, then only first used in the series proper in 1981's Logopolis. "Cloaking device" is a common term in late 20th century English and would be instantly understandable where "chameleon circuit" would not be. In the 2005 series episode Boom Town, when Rose refers to the TARDIS's cloaking device, the Doctor clarifies that it is called the chameleon circuit.
  • Furthermore, the Doctor may have misused terms or provided incorrect biographical information while his mind remained partially addled post-regeneration.
  • The concept of regeneration has never been consistent and nothing in the telemovie directly contradicts the television series.
  • The interior of the TARDIS had already changed several times throughout the series, if in more subtle ways. For that matter, the interior depicted in the 2005 series is an even more radical departure (whereas the version seen in the movie somewhat recalls the wood-panelled console room used in the series during 1976-1977). In Doctor Who Magazine, 2005 series producer Russell T. Davies explains that the TARDIS interior can be reconfigured in much the same way as its exterior; he compares the process to a Winamp skin.

The film also rattled cages amongst several people associated with Doctor Who. Former script-editor Terrance Dicks famously said, "It's incoherent crap!"; writers Pip and Jane Baker were particularly critical of the abundance of apparent plot holes, and of how McGann spends most of his screen time "in a daze". Even Sylvester McCoy commented that the script — in particular the regeneration, and the scene where the Master attempts to take the Doctor's lives — robbed the Doctor of his dignity. In a 2005 episode of Doctor Who Confidential, McCoy mused, "I always thought [that] the [Doctor Who] film would probably have done better if they had begun the film with Paul [McGann]; and once the series had got going, I should then have come in to show how it [the regeneration] had happened."

Despite this, the television movie is generally accepted as canonical, as evidenced by the current production team classifying Christopher Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor and by the BBC featuring the Eighth Doctor in a 40th anniversary tribute montage included on a number of DVD releases during 2002-2003.

Production

File:DoctorWho96.jpg
Doctor Who 1996 movie poster
  • Producer Philip Segal had been trying for some years to launch a new American-produced series of Doctor Who, but the Fox Network - the only American network that showed any interest - was only prepared to commit to a single telemovie. It was hoped that, if the telemovie were successful, Fox might be persuaded to reconsider a series; however, the telemovie's ratings performance in America was not strong enough to hold Fox's interest. Reportedly, Fox had the choice of commissioning a new Doctor Who series or greenlighting an original project called Space: Above and Beyond and chose the latter.
  • Writer Matthew Jacobs's father Anthony Jacobs played the role of Doc Holliday in the 1966 First Doctor serial The Gunfighters, and the young Matthew visited the studio during production.
  • The movie was filmed in Vancouver, British Columbia, the first time any Doctor Who story had been filmed in the "New World" (although the 1985 Sixth Doctor story The Two Doctors was originally going to be filmed in New Orleans). It had its debut broadcast on the Edmonton, Alberta CITV-TV station on May 12, two days prior to the Fox Network showing.
  • In "Weird Science", an episode of the documentary Doctor Who Confidential in 2005, Sylvester McCoy revealed that during the sequence where he locks the casket with his sonic screwdriver, he held the tool pointing the wrong way (although in the original series, it was seen being used both ways). The sonic screwdriver was blurred in post-production to conceal the error. This is also the only time the Seventh Doctor was seen using a sonic screwdriver.

Also see: History of Doctor Who

Opening sequence

  • The opening pre-credits sequence went through a number of modifications, with several different voice overs recorded. At one stage the voice over was to be made by the old Master, played by Gordon Tipple, however in the end this was not used. Tipple is still credited as "The Old Master" though on the final edit his appearance is very brief, stationary and mute. If the original pre-credits sequence voice-over as voiced by Gordon Tipple had been used, it would be unclear if Sylvester McCoy was playing the Seventh Doctor (he is simply credited as "The Old Doctor"). Only the rewritten narration (as read by Paul McGann) makes his number of regenerations clear.
  • John Debney was commissioned to write the score for this film, and intended to replace Ron Grainer's original theme music with a new composition. Ultimately, Debney did in fact use Grainer's music for the theme, although Grainer was not credited.
  • Instead of designing a new Doctor Who logo for this film, it was decided instead to use a modified version of the logo used during the early part of the Jon Pertwee era of the original series (1970-1973). This logo, being the final form from the "classic series", is used to this day by the BBC for all Doctor Who merchandise relating to all of the first eight Doctors.

Alternative titles

  • There is some disagreement over exactly what the movie should be called. The production documentation only referred to the project as "Doctor Who". Segal suggested the unofficial title "Enemy Within" as an alternative at Manopticon 5, apparently after being repeatedly asked what the actual title for the movie was. The DVD release is labelled Doctor Who: The Movie. The most common fan usage appears to refer to it as "the television movie", the "TVM", or variations thereof. See: Doctor Who story title controversy
  • Upon translation into French, this film was renamed Le Seigneur du Temps ("The Lord Of Time").

Broadcast

  • Commercials on the Fox network advertising the film used special effects footage from the 1986 story The Trial of a Time Lord, although this footage was not used in the movie. This marked the first time that footage from the original BBC series had been shown on a major American network.
  • The television movie received disappointing US ratings (partly due to the popularity of the programmes it was up against, partly because of poor marketing by the Fox Network, and partly because of unfamiliarity among average American TV viewers with the British series). However, when shown on BBC One in the United Kingdom thirteen days after its American broadcast, it received over 9 million viewers in Great Britain alone (the highest drama ratings in Britain for the whole week).
  • Third Doctor actor Jon Pertwee died a few days after the US broadcast of the film, and the UK broadcast included an epitaph to the actor.

In print

File:Audio Book dwNovel of the Film.jpg
The audiobook version of the novelisation

The television movie was novelised by Gary Russell and published by BBC Books in May 1996. It was the first novelisation of a televised Doctor Who story to not be published by Target Books (or related companies) since Doctor Who and the Crusaders in 1965. It is also the last novelisation of a televised story to date.

Basing the adaptation on an early draft of the script, Russell adjusted some details to make it more consistent with the original series, and the novelisation also contains elements that were cut from the shooting script for timing reasons.

  • The novel begins with the Seventh Doctor receiving a telepathic summons from the Master (à la The Deadly Assassin) to collect his remains from Skaro and a short prologue detailing how the Doctor escapes from the planet with the casket. This was originally intended to be a pre-credits sequence in the movie, and was subsequently contradicted by the ending of the novel Lungbarrow, where Romana gives the Seventh Doctor the assignment to retrieve the Master's remains.
  • More detail is given to Chang Lee and Grace's backstory, including his recruitment into the Triads and his seeking a father figure as well as flashbacks to Grace's childhood.
  • The Eighth Doctor finds the Seventh Doctor's clothing in the hospital rather than the Fourth Doctor's scarf. Also, the sequence where Chang Lee and the Master see the Seventh Doctor in the Eye of Harmony features all the previous Doctors as originally drafted.
  • The scene where the Doctor and Grace meet the motorcycle police officer is relocated to a traffic jam on the Golden Gate bridge (impossible to film in the movie since it was shot on ___location in Vancouver).
  • When the Doctor first kisses Grace, he immediately pulls back, grins apologetically and murmurs, "I'm sorry, don't know what came over me there." This makes the romantic nature of the kiss more ambiguous. Instead of the second kiss at the end, he gives her the Seventh Doctor's straw hat as a memento.
  • The Doctor is still referred to as half-human, to which the Master comments, "The Doctor once claimed to be more than just a Time Lord — He should really have said less than a Time Lord!" This was a reference to a line cut from Remembrance of the Daleks.
  • Instead of dying and brought back to life, Grace and Lee are merely rendered unconscious, though aware of what is happening around them. Russell also spends some time showing the Doctor and them discussing what a "temporal orbit" is.

The canonicity of the novelisation, like all spin-off fiction, is unclear.

The novelisation was the first Doctor Who novel published by BBC Books. The book was actually published prior to the conclusion of Virgin Books' contract for publishing original Doctor Who fiction, so the next release by BBC Books did not occur for about a year when the Eighth Doctor Adventures series began with The Eight Doctors. The novelisation was released as a standalone work and is not considered part of this series. The Eighth Doctor Adventures series ran until 2005 when it was discontinued.

In 1997, the novel was also released as an audio book, read by Paul McGann.

DVD and video releases

The movie was released on home video in the United Kingdom the week prior to its debut broadcast on BBC One. Hundreds of fans queued in London at midnight in order to buy a copy at the earliest possible moment. The unedited version was released on DVD in 2001. Both versions have also been released in countries such as Australia and New Zealand. However there has been no home entertainment release of any form in North America owing to complicated licensing.

Awards

Trivia

  • Eric Roberts (The Master) and Will Sasso (Pete, the morgue attendant) later worked together as cast members of the ABC TV sitcom Less Than Perfect.

References

  1. ^ Segal, Philip (2000). Doctor Who:Regeneration. London: HarperCollins. pp. 34–44. ISBN 0-00-710591-6. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
 
Wikiquote has quotations related to Doctor Who (1996).

Reviews

BBC novelisation

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