#AtoZChallenge2023: Doctor Who Inferno

Something a little different again since I will talk about a single serial of Doctor Who. This time it is 1970's "Inferno."  It is the second serial (from the seventh season) to feature Jon Pertwee as the Doctor in exile on Earth.  The Time Lords have crippled his TARDIS and removed all knowledge of how to Time Travel from his mind. He is stuck on Earth and not taking it well, so he tinkers with the TARDIS all the time with mostly disastrous results. 

In Inferno he manages to slip into a parallel universe with a Fascist Britain. In both universes there is an experiment to drill through the Earth's crust, but at the point they are doing will cause catastrophic problems. The fascist universe is slight ahead in time as the "prime" universe so the Doctor knows what needs to be done.

I liked this episode for a lot of reasons. First it played into my growing interest in the idea of the Multi-verse, something that I began to explore in the comic "Crisis on Infinite Earths" and later in books like "Job: A Comedy of Justice" and "The Coming of the Quantum Cats."  It was something that at the time I was really ready to enjoy.  

Secondly, and this is the big one, it was the Doctor Who episode that introduced me to other Doctors. 

Growing up I watched Doctor Who on my local (St. Louis) PBS station KETC.  Now KETC has a huge market, and they played the Tom Baker era almost exclusively. But they were not the only local PBS station. Just to the north of me was WILL out of Urbana IL and it was connected with the University of Illinois at Urbana.  While I did not get that station on our cable package there were some in town that had access to it. Also there was a steady stream of VHS tapes coming down from Urbana to my hometown from people going to school there. Inferno was one such tape.

I remember watching it in, of all places, my High School's library. One of my friends had it and was watching in the "media room" which was supposed to be off limits to general students unless you worked there. I didn't. But I was fascinated by this episode and mostly by this "new to me" Doctor. I knew Pertwee came before Baker and that his Doctor was a different sort, but this episode was an eye-opener for me.

Recently, I had the chance to rewatch in prep for today's post. It is slower than I remember, but just as good.  Though I do find it very odd that I am right now older than Pertwee was in this episode (he was 51).

I have made a habit since first watching this one to check out all the Pertwee/3rd Doctor episodes I can. I know there are a few I have never seen. I have not sought them out because I do enjoy the joy of stumbling upon them just like I did with Inferno.

Since moving to the Chicago area I have had the chance to talk to others who watched Doctor Who from the same time period and how their PBS stations differed from my local St. Louis one. It has been very interesting and I'll talk more about it on "P" day.

All images are used with permission from the BBC and are copyrighted 2023 by the BBC.

#Dungeon23 Tomb of the Vampire Queen, Level 4, Room 11

A small passageway in the back of Room #10 leads down to a rough-cut cave.  

A small glowing stone is stuck into a small pedestal in the middle of the cave.  There is plenty of track around the stone, wearing out the stone ground. The area 5' radius around the stone is untouched. 

The stone is a Chaos Stone, one of the artifacts of the mages.  It is made of pure chaos and its effects are random.

Any character touching the stone rolls a 2d6 and consults the table below.

• 2: The character is transported to a random location within 100 feet of the stone.
• 3-4: The character is granted a temporary penalty to one of their ability scores by -1.
• 5-6: The character is cursed with a minor ailment, such as -3 on attack rolls or saving throws. 
• 7: The stone has no effect.
• 8-9: The character is blessed with a minor boon, such as +3 on all attack rolls or saving throws.
• 10-11: The character gains a powerful boon, such as a +2 bonus to one of their ability scores.
• 12: The character gains a permanent +1 to one ability score determined at random.

A character can only touch the stone once for effect.  Unless noted, the effects last 1d6+6 turns.

The stone is fixed to the pedestal. Any attempts to remove it will cause it to shatter. If the shards are collected they could be sold to a high level magic-user or alchemist for 20-50 gp (1d4+1 x10).

#AtoZChallenge2023: Doctor Who Highlanders & Outlanders

Back in 1966/67 a Doctor Who serial aired called "The Highlanders" and it featured the Second Doctor and introduced us to the soon-to-be companion Jamie McCrimmon, played by Frazer Hines during the Battle of Culloden.

Jaime quickly became a favorite among the fans. In the late sixties, he was often voted the #1 fan favorite, and this also included "the best legs on TV."

One of those fans was author Diana Gabaldon. Who took her love of this episode and crafted her own tale about the Scottish Highlands, the Battle of Culloden, and Time Travel. One of the stars of these novels (and later) series was a Highlander named Jamie Fraser. 

Of course I am talking about the wildly successful "Outlander" novels and TV series.

I have never read the novels, but I have seen the series. It is quite fun really. The time-travel elements are only a plot device, as opposed to something central as in Doctor Who.  Frazer Hines even made a guest appearance. 

Outlander is not the only property inspired by Doctor Who, either directly or indirectly.

"DC's Legends of Tomorrow" (2016-2022) was part of the "Arrowverse" subset of DC Comics TV shows. It dealt with a group of misfit heroes, led by Rip Hunter, played by Arthur "Rory" Darvill (fresh off of Doctor Who). Now DC has always had time travel and Rip is an established character, but the Doctor Who elements here are turned way up.

Douglas Adams who was a script editor and writer for Doctor Who in the Tom Baker years gave us "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy."  Not only was the book inspired by Adams, but Adams was also good friends with Lala "Romana II" Ward, and the Tenth Doctor even name-drops Adam's famous protagonist, Arthur Dent in "The Christmas Invasion."

One could argue that the Borg from Star Trek: The Next Generation are more or less Cybermen.  Comics publisher IDW makes this even clearer with their Doctor Who / Star Trek Crossovers.  It doesn't end there. For years fans speculated that Guinan, Whoopi Goldberg's character, was something akin to a Time Lord.  Same with the Travellers, which now include Wesley Crusher, and the "Supervisors" Tallinn (Star Trek Picard), and Gary Seven (Star Trek The Original Series).  Gary even has a sonic screwdriver-like device. So many in fact that this topic really deserves a post on it's own. Maybe I'll touch more on that later on.  IDW Comics also featured an "Assignment: Earth" comic and the original episode, "Assignment: Earth" which introduces Gary Seven, began with the Enterprise slingshotting to Earth in the 1960.

Bill & Ted, in their movies travels in time and space use a phone booth. You could argue that Rufus, played by George Carlin, was pretty close to a Time Lord.

The shadow of the Doctor is long. Both in their universe and ours.

All images are used with permission from the BBC and are copyrighted 2023 by the BBC.

#Dungeon23 Tomb of the Vampire Queen, Level 4, Room 10

Behind the secret door (in reality a "Troll Hole") is Room 10.

Inside are a group of other (4) Trolls.   

This cave and Room 9 are actually just one cave. The trolls that live here have built a partition to hide room 10.

Inside this cave is all the Troll's treasure (D x4) is here.

#AtoZChallenge2023: Doctor Who The Five Doctors

Last week I did a Sunday special on the 10th Anniversary show "The Three Doctors." This week I am covering the 20th Anniversary special, "The Five Doctors."

The Five Doctors got it's Global premier on November 23, 1983, exactly 20 years after the first episode appeared.

Like the previous anniversary special this one involved the Doctor getting caught up in the machinations of an evil and powerful Time Lord. This time though, the Doctor was pulled in, and in doing so he felt pieces of himself "breaking away like an iceberg."

Of course, there was a problem. Tom Baker, the Fourth Doctor and still the actor with the longest tenure as the Doctor, did not want to return so soon after leaving the role. A choice he much later came to meet with some regret. So his incarnation was stuck in a "time eddy" which honestly worked out ok. They had some footage they had from a canceled show (Shada) and used that to fill in the blanks.

Sadly William Hartnell the original First Doctor had died in 1975 so Richard Hurndall was brought in to play the character. He sadly would die the year after this. I am not sure of the details, but I am wondering if the First Doctor would have been stuck. But the script, as these thing do, went through a lot of rewrites so who knows what could have been.  Tom Baker did get a chance to come back later. William Hartnell is at least featured in a clip before the show begins.  There is a nice story about how Bill Hartnell's wife Heather was invited to the set and she told the then current Doctor, Peter Davidson, how much he reminded her of Bill and how he would have loved to have seen him in this role. 

So we get a lot of favorite companions back, a lot of favorite enemies, and more workings into the happenings on Gallifrey.

A couple of standouts. Susan, the Doctor's Grandaughter is back and she recognizes right away they are on Gallifrey. So meaning she is also a Time Lord and allows her early character to retroactively say the planet's name first.   Fan favorite Sarah Jane is back, including her K-9 from "K-9 and Co." She interacts with the Third Doctor again.  She tries to explain to him that she saw him regenerate into the Fourth Doctor and says "you became..." but he interrupts with "all teeth and curls?" Meaning Tom Baker.  The lines were supposed to be Elizabeth Sladden's (Sarah Jane) but Jon Pertwee thought it was funnier coming from him. It was. 

There are a lot of DVD versions of this out. I have the Special Edition which swaps out some of the 1983 special effects for "updated" ones that are nearly universally hated. I have not seen the 25th anniversary version (the 45th for Doctor Who) but I wonder if they are restored?  I watched it recently on PlutoTV and it was the original 1983 broadcast version, so that was nice.

The story is a bit contrived, but no more so than any other Doctor Who story and it was a lot of fun really.  Still one of my favorites.

All images are used with permission from the BBC and are copyrighted 2023 by the BBC.

#Dungeon23 Tomb of the Vampire Queen, Level 4, Room 9

Returning to Room 7 and taking the passage ahead takes the characters to another cave. 

Inside the cave is a large Troll. 

The troll is near the far side of the cave. He attacks as soon as the characters enter.

The troll has no visible treasure, it is all behind the secret door in the wall opposite of the tunnel the characters came in from.  

Additionally there are passages to the left and to the right.

#AtoZChallenge2023: Doctor Who Gallifrey

"Ah, you should have seen it, that old planet. The second sun would rise in the south, the mountains would shine. The leaves on the trees were silver. When they caught the light every morning, they lit the forest on fire." 

- The Tenth Doctor, Gridlock

Next to the Earth, the planet that gets the most mention in Doctor Who lore, is his home world of Gallifrey.

It has been called many things during the run of Doctor Who, most just "The Home World" in the earliest episodes. Among other names, it is known as "Jewel" and "the Shining World of the Seven Systems." It wasn't even named Gallifrey until the time of the Third Doctor in the episode "The Time Warrior" (December 1973) so a full decade went by before we ever learned its proper name.

What do we know about the Doctor's home planet? Well, it s mostly orange in color. Has two suns. It is much larger than the Earth, but humans seem to be fine on it. Likely this is due to Time Lord science. We learn it is in the constellation of Kasterborous at galactic coordinates 10-0-11-0-0/0-2 from Galactic Zero Centre.  It also seems to be part of our galaxy as opposed to a "galaxy far, far away."

Gallifreyians look human, and not all of them are Time Lords. The Time Lords appear to be an elite ruling class and the rest are just regular folk. I am fairly sure though all of them have the same two hearts and ability to regenerate. 

Gallifrey is also special because it is the home of the Untempered Schism, a rip in the fabric of Time and Space that all Time Students of the Academy are taken too. Some Time Lords are driven mad by it, like the Doctor's arch rival The Master. Others, like the Doctor, see it and want to run.  

In addition to this (and likely related to it in some way) is the Eye of Harmony, a stable black hole that is near Gallifrey and in the heart of every TARDIS. This is what gives the Time Lords mastery over time and space. 

We see very little of Gallifrey in the series, even after 60 years. There is the Citadel, the primary city of the Time Lords, and Arcadia, Gallifrey's "Second City."  So like a Time Lord Chicago, I am thinking.

And we know that in the Time War The Doctor (thought) he had burned all of Gallifrey to stop the war. Turns out he (and all his other selves) figured out how to tuck it away in a pocket Universe. Though the Master may have destroyed yet again. Hard to say about an ancient planet where the rules of time and space no longer apply.

All images are used with permission from the BBC and are copyrighted 2023 by the BBC.