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Story Seven
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Story Code
G
Title
The Sensorites
“Friends” Title
The One With The
Round Feet
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Episode Titles
Strangers In Space
The Unwilling
Warriors
Hidden Danger
A Race Against
Death
Kidnap
A Desperate
Venture
Current availability
All six episodes
exist.
Source
UK Gold omnibus
repeat transmission.
End credits seem to have been created especially
for this transmission. This is another
of UK Gold’s occasional quirks which I shall not mention again.
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Date
2750.
Carol, John and
Maitland come from the twenty-eighth century, which must set this story
somewhere between about 2700 and 2800.
Genre
Alien culture.
Plot synopsis
1. The Ship has landed on a spaceship in
orbit around a planet called the Sense-Sphere.
Its pilots - Maitland and Carol Richmond - are unable to leave, as the
Sensorites who inhabit the world are controlling their ship and their
minds. The TARDIS crew save them when
the ship is put into freefall, but a Sensorite steals the lock from the TARDIS,
trapping them on the ship. Barbara and
Susan bump into John, the third crewmember and Carol’s fiancé, whose mind has
been disturbed by his experiences. A
high-pitched whine signals the approach of a Sensorite travel machine, and one
of the aliens is spied outside the viewing port.
2. The intruding Sensorites try to make
John attack Barbara and Susan, but the women return their telepathic attack by
concentrating on the words “we defy you.”
The travellers are reunited, and deduce that mineralogist John
discovered that the Sense-Sphere is rich in the valuable mineral molybdenum,
hence his attack being much worse than those on Maitland and Carol. The Sensorites arrange a parley via Susan,
and explain that they won’t let any of them leave because Earthmen have
betrayed them in the past. They start to
take Susan away to the planet, threatening to kill the others if she doesn’t
co-operate.
3. The crew turn the lights off, which
renders the Sensorites powerless. After
much further discussion, it is agreed that Barbara and Maitland will remain on
the ship, while the others will go down to the Sense-Sphere: John will be cured, and they will negotiate
for the release of the ships. It is
explained that ten years ago, an Earth expedition discovered the molybdenum,
but since their ship exploded, the Sensorites have been dying in their
thousands. The planetary Elders argue
over the decision to allow the humans to land:
the City Administrator attempts to kill the aliens with the
Disintegrator, but is prevent just in time by the Second Elder. Whilst talking to the First Elder, Ian
suddenly collapses with the disease - the Elder says he will die.
4. The Doctor deduces the water is to
blame - the Elders drink a different water, which is why they are
unaffected. He creates an antidote, but
this is intercepted on its way to Ian by the Administrator, whose paranoid fear
of the outsiders has led him to capture the Second Elder and use his sash to
impersonate him. Susan fetches more, and
Ian begins to recover. Meanwhile, the
Doctor goes to investigate the aqueduct, despite the Sensorites’ belief that
monsters live there. He finds the cause
of the poisoning - Deadly Nightshade - but hears a roar nearby.
5. Ian and Susan rescue the Doctor, whose
coat has been torn by something. Realising
that one of the Sensorites bears them ill will, they go back to the city to
find out who. The Administrator
blackmails the Second Elder into supplying him with the Disintegrator key once
more, but the Elder destroys it, and the Administrator’s accomplice kills
him. This Sensorite claims to the First
Elder that the Doctor killed him, but his story is seen through thanks to the
Doctor’s enforced change of apparel.
Suspicion falls on the late Second Elder as the travellers’ enemy, and
ironically they suggest the City Administrator as his replacement. Too late, John (now fully cured) tells them
he overheard the Administrator plotting against them. The Doctor and Ian return to the
aqueduct: however, the new Second Elder
tampers with their weapons and map.
Meanwhile, in the city, Carol is kidnapped.
6. Carol is forced to write a note
claiming she has returned to the ship, but Barbara has just come down, so this
is seen through. John and the Sensorite
Senior Warrior rescue her. Barbara and
John go to look for the Doctor and Ian, keeping in touch with Susan using a
Sensorite mind transmitter. The Doctor
and Ian, meanwhile, have discovered survivors from the old Earth expedition,
who have been poisoning the water for ten years, quite insane, believing themselves
to be at war. They are captured. The villainous Sensorite is discovered thanks
to his alterations to the map, and is banished to the outer wastes. The TARDIS lock is returned, and Maitland and
his crew take the insane humans back to Earth.
Ian annoys the Doctor, who threatens to put him off the Ship at the next
stop.
Pitch
A story proving
you should never drink the water when abroad.
The Money Shot
A Sensorite
appears at the viewing port. (Episode 1)
The Doctor and his kind
• Susan waxes lyrical
about her home planet: “Grandfather and
I don’t come from Earth. It’s ages since
we’ve seen our planet. It’s quite like
Earth, but at night the sky is a burnt orange, the leaves on the trees are
bright silver.”
• Once again, as
in An Unearthly Child, the Doctor and
Susan’s comments suggest they’d like to return home.
• Susan appears to
have a gift for telepathy, and the Doctor claims he sometimes knows what his
companions are thinking. Susan’s
abilities seem more proficient than his, but probably only when aided by the
extraordinarily high Ultra High Frequencies on the Sense-Sphere.
• Does the above
suggest that possible the Doctor and Susan’s home planet also has
extraordinarily high Ultra High Frequencies?
Do people there communicate by telepathy too?
• The Doctor
speaks out against weapons, but ambivalently.
“I have never liked weapons of any kind, but they’re handy little
things.”
The TARDIS log
• Ian notes that
the static on the scanners could have been caused by an unsupressed motor. The Doctor suggests a magnetic field. Cam we take it the scanner is nothing more
than a telly?
• Despite how
complex it is constantly made out to be, the TARDIS lock can be cut off,
producing a burning smell! In fact, the
entire opening mechanism is removed, permanently locking the door. At least the Sensorites do acknowledge that
the lock is “an electronic miracle.”
• The Doctor’s
comments suggest the door could be broken down, but to do so would discharge
the dimensions within the Ship (i.e. bad.)
Past Journies
• The Doctor and
Susan have presumably visited the planet Esto (see Alien Worlds.)
The history of Earth
• In the twenty
eighth century, the whole lower half of England is now Central City - there has
not been a London for four hundred years (or a Big Ben!) And Earth still has too much air traffic.
• The people of
Earth clearly still get engaged and married.
Alien Worlds
• The Sense-Sphere
is a planet rich in the mineral molybdenum, a fact which the indigenous
Sensorites wish to keep to themselves. It also has extraordinarily high levels of
Ultra High Frequencies (or did I already mention that?)
• The Sensorites
are virtually identical semi-humanoids.
They look a bit like caricatures of wise old men...but have circular,
flat feet. They all wear nondescript
tunics.
• They speak much
as we do, but have also developed a method of telepathy using small transmitter
discs which they place against their foreheads.
Even Barbara is able to use one of these, so their own abilities are probably
limited to being able to hear what other Sensorites are transmitting.
• Their irises
contract in the dark, making them very vulnerable to lack of light.
• They also cannot
stand loud noises of any kind.
• Sensorites’
hearts are in the centre of their chests.
• The planet is
ruled by two Elders. The First Elder
wears two sashes to mark him out, the Second only one.
• The Elders are
at the head of a strict caste system:
“The Elders think and rule, the Warriors fight, and the Sensorites work
and play.” An example of the
distinctions made is that the Elders drink the Crystal Water, while everyone
else makes do with the everyday water from the aqueduct.
• The Sensorites
claim their society is based on trust, making treason and plotting
impossible. The Senior Scientist describes
it as the perfect society, with all contented.
This, of course, is easily shown to be a trifle naive.
• Their space
travel ability is limited to being able to nip back and forth to the spaceship
in orbit.
• Somehow, as seen
in the cliffhanger to Strangers In Space,
the Sensorites seem able to survive in the vacuum of space.
• According to
Susan, the planets on the planet Esto use thought transference. If you stand in between two of them, they let
off a screeching noise.
Script Heaven
• The Doctor “Yes,
it all started off as a mild curiosity in the junkyard, and now it’s turned out
to be quite a...quite a great spirit of adventure, don’t you think?”
• The Doctor “No,
Barbara. I learned not to meddle in
other people’s affairs years ago. Now,
now, now, don’t be absurd. There’s not
an ounce of curiosity in me, my dear boy.
Tell me, why are you in danger?”
• Carol “You’re
very strange people.” Susan “Are we?” Carol “Well, you come from nowhere, and
you seem to be going nowhere.”
• Carol “Do you
know who I am?” John “You’re good.”
• Carol “It’s
rather like an eyelid. These shutters
over my eyes.” Scientist “Yes. To see
all the time is...not a good thing.”
• Administrator
“Weakling! Betrayer of our people! Coward!
I should imprison you in some room wherein no light can shine and fill
that room with noise!”
• Ian “Oh,
and...congratulations.” New Second Elder “When you address one of the Elders,
you call him sir.”
Script Hell
• Ian “There’s one
thing about it, Doctor, we’re certainly different from when we started out with
you.” Susan “That’s funny, grandfather and I were talking about that just
before you came in. How you’ve both
changed.” Barbara “Oh, we’ve all changed.” Susan “Have I?” Barbara “Yes!” And so on, and so on...honestly, this belongs
at the end of an episode of He-Man.
• The Doctor “You
know, I think these Sensorites have found the way to take control of your
mind.” No shit, Sherlock. You don’t have to spell everything out
for us.
• Susan “That must
have looked funny! Flip-flap, flip-flap...” Someone shoot this child, please.
• The Doctor “Yes,
but the fact is that you didn’t kill him.
Shows great promise for the future of your people.” Patronising arse!
Name-dropping
• The Doctor
claims to have met Henry VIII. He threw
a parson’s nose at the King and was sent to the Tower - where the TARDIS was
parked!
• He also claims
to have met Beau Brummel, who said he looked better in a cloak.
The Doctor’s Achievement
The cause of the
Sensorites’ ten-year affliction has been discovered and nullified. All the humans are allowed to go home, and
John is cured.
Things I learned from Doctor Who
• What a
spectrograph is.
• Iron melts at
1,539˚C. Molybdenum melts at 2,622˚C.
• Cats can see
better in the dark than humans because their irises dilate at night.
• The symptoms of
atropine poisoning.
Body Count
Only the Second
Elder buys it in this story.
1.
Screams / Twists Ankle
• This is Ian and
Barbara’s first foray into their own planet’s future. True to form, they act like the worst kind of
tourists - “Is Big Ben still on time” indeed!
Checkov’s Plot Device
Checkov’s Previous
Earth Expedition.
EffectsWatch
• The model shot
of Maitland’s ship flying off is pretty good, considering.
The TARDIS wardrobe
• The Doctor’s
jacket is ruined in the tunnels, but he says he has more in the Ship.
Dudley!
• Classic stuff
here. Ian feels Maitland’s pulse and
proclaims him “Dead.”
DA-DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!
• “Will he let me
into my ship, I wonder?”
DA-DA-DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!!!!
Whoops
• There is a
plethora of line fluffing on display here.
The Administrator’s accomplice is heard to say “I heard them over,
over...t-t-talking.” But honours go to
William Hartnell, not only for “The First Elder...Scientist, I mean...” but
also for reading “-INEER” as “I-N-N-E-R.”
Notes
• There is a
bizarre scene near the beginning when the crew all pat themselves on the backs
for being in such an interesting series and patronise the audience silly before
re-capping on the story so far. What was
the writer thinking? See first entries
in Script Hell and Script Heaven.
• The travellers
do seem to be getting along very well by this stage (the final scene
notwithstanding).
• Putting the
travellers’ exact relationship down on paper quite startlingly, Barbara states
that they depend on the Doctor: he
leads, and they follow. Quite a contrast
from the power-jockeying of An Unearthly
Child.
• Again, one of
the leads (Jacqueline Hill, this time) goes on holiday for a couple of
episodes.
• For the first
time, we pass through the TARDIS doors along with the travellers.
• Maitland’s ship,
espied on the scanner at the end, is the series’ first “real” spaceship.
• I love the bit
where Susan stands up to the Doctor.
“Dictated to by petty thieves and my own granddaughter!” Beautiful.
She appears to be growing up and out of his shadow (“I’m not a child any
more.”) The Doctor claims this is their
first argument in all their years of travel.
Maybe all this is going to make her less annoying. Maybe.
• I don’t like
John’s ability (according to Susan) to tell good and evil people apart. It’s altogether too convenient.
• There’s a lovely
scene between Susan (again! Good grief!)
and the First Elder in which her wanderlust and homesickness are both
highlighted. It concludes with her speculating
that they’ll all go home one day.
• Whatever Barbara
says, it seems to me that the Administrator’s ambition is secondary to a desire
to save his planet from the outsiders fuelled by irrational hatred.
• Men in the
future wear Seiko kinetic watches. You
see? Some day, all watches will be made this way!
• After the Doctor
defended Ian in The Keys Of Marinus,
the positions are here reversed when the Doctor is accused of murdering the
Second Elder.
• Once again, the
crew are willing to just leave the people they meet to their fate, and only
stop when they are cut off from their Ship.
Queries
• Why are Carol
and Maitland not surprised to meet twentieth century citizens?
• How did the
Sensorites know how to deal with the TARDIS lock?
• And how did they
get to it in the first place without that high-pitched whine being heard?
(Unless we are to presume that one of the two Sensorites was already on board
before the TARDIS landed, and only the second one arrived at the end of Strangers In Space.)
• Why does the
Sensorite at the Disintegrator have to explain about the heat sensors to the
City Administrator? What sort of an
administrator is he?
• The Warriors
fight. Who do they fight, if all
Sensorites trust each other and they don’t yet have space travel? Who is the Disintegrator gun generally used
against? What is the point of the heat
sensors?
• Where,
precisely, does the Deadly Nightshade come from? Or is it just parallel evolution?
• Are the humans
very convincing roarers, or do they have a cassette player handy?
• Where, exactly,
are the TARDIS crew when they watch Maitland’s ship go off? Have they made the Ship just hop off into
space for the sake of waving goodbye, or what?
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On-screen Credits
Taken from The Television Companion.
CAST
Dr. Who - William
Hartnell, Ian Chesterton - William Russell, Barbara Wright - Jacqueline Hill,
Susan Foreman - Carole Ann Ford, John - Stephen Dartnell, Carol - Ilona
Rodgers, Maitland - Lorne Cossette (1-3), First Sensorite - Ken Tyllsen (2-3),
Second Sensorite - Joe Greig (2-3), First Elder - Eric Francis (3-6), Second
Elder - Bartlett Mullins (3-5), City Administrator - Peter Glaze (3-6), First
Scientist - Ken Tyllsen (4-5), Second Scientist
- Joe Greig (4), Warrior - Joe Greig (5-6), Sensorites - Arthur Newall
(3-6), Anthony Rogers (3-6), Gerry Martin (3-5).
CREW
Written by Peter R
Newman. Title Music by Ron Grainer and
the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. Incidental
Music by Norman Kay. Costumes - Daphne
Dare. Make-up - Jill Summers; Sonia
Markham (6). Studio Lighting - Peter
Murray. Studio Sound - Les Wilkins; Jack
Brummitt. Production Assistant - David
Conroy. Assistant Floor Manager - Val
McCrimmon; Dawn Robertson. Story Editor
- David Whitaker. Designer - Raymond P
Cusick. Associate Producer - Mervyn
Pinfield. Producer - Verity
Lambert. Directed by Mervyn Pinfield
(1-4); Frank Cox (5-6).
Familiar Faces
Peter Glaze was
later to be better known being less villainous on the children’s programme Crackerjack (Crackerjack!)
Stephen Dartnell
(John) Yartek in The Keys Of Marinus.
Review
There is an awful
lot to praise in this six-parter. It’s
really an impressive attempt to present an alien society (if a little
simplistic - the caste system, near-identical appearances and minimal locations
are a bit of a cop-out). Giving the line
“To them, we may appear ugly” to a Sensorite is a nice touch, and on the whole
it is a wonderful balance, if a little let down by the Doctor’s patronising
“Yes, well done, you’re almost as good as normal people now” attitude in the
final episode, an attitude from much pulp science fiction suffers. The aliens are, by and large, well-written,
especially the First Elder - Eric Francis gives an excellent performance,
understated yet refusing to be outclassed by Peter Glaze, having a whale of a
time as the baddy. The two groups of
humans are less convincing, although mention must go to Stephen Dartnell, whose
broken-minded spaceman steals the honours in the first three episodes. The leads, however, after a fairly absurd
start (I must repeat, what the hell was going on there?) are more than
serviceable - Ian and Barbara are incapacitated for about half of the action,
leaving William Hartnell to take centre stage, and despite fluffing his lines a
little too often, he rises to the occasion, with a well-scripted and more than
usually well-delivered set of episodes.
Of course, much attention is paid over the course of the story to Susan,
against whom I have been slowly taking a dislike to date. But to be fair, she spends almost the entire
story not being annoying, and as is noted above, has a number of actually
rather good scenes - unfortunately, this is all scuppered by the hideous
“flip-flap” moment. Ouch. Anyway, on the whole the story overcomes plot
holes, restrictive face masks, obvious lack of rehearsal time and occasionally
rather intrusive incidental music to present a pleasingly ambitious take on an
entirely alien culture, in a far more sensible and less action-oriented way
than The Daleks tried to do, and one
scarcely notices that sod all really happens until the third episode. Oddly, however, it’s not a story I feel
myself particularly tempted to return to, and despite its ambitions, the whole
thing seems a little... pedestrian. And
they really should have given Peter Glaze a final scene.
Rating: 6 / 10
