The Tenth Planet

“Doctor, you’ve got the most fantastic wardrobe!” – Polly

Sadly this episode no longer exists in it’s entirety, but I hold out hope they may do something similar with this that they did with the Invasion. There’s always hope…

“He has correctly written down what we have just seen and he did it before we saw it!”

The Doctor in this episode pulls off a few tricks that would make Derren Brown proud, for starters he correctly predicts the appearance of the twin planet Mondas. Sadly research into when the theory of continental drift is gloriously vague, only stating it was finally accepted in the 1960’s, which gives us three possibilities into why the explanation of Mondas is so fundamentally flawed. Either:

• 1. The serial was made prior to the official confirmation of the theory
  2. The theory was too new to be considered by the writers
  3. The theory was ignored outright.
  Even without the intervention of continental drift, the idea of another planet having carbon copies of the landmasses on earth is so fundamentally flawed it makes me wonder if Kit Pedler was off ill that week and the episode was penned in his name only.

“We are called Cybermen”

The first appearance of the Cybermen and the last appearance of the First Doctor. This serial has a fair bit going for it. The initial design is quite unsettling, as the Cybermen were bred from fear of cosmetic surgery, hence the exposed hands and the gauze facemask. It’s the invasion of Michael Jackson clones. Of course on their first appearance the Cybermen are a little softer than they have been in the past, being more of authorative school teachers than robotic invaders, even making orders to “look after him”, it’s altogether harder to tell where you can pitch the Cyberman’s intentions in this one.

“I have a personal stake in all this.”

Cutler is the repository for the emotional counterbalance in this episode. Through most of the first half of the serial he’s essentially relegated to the powerless shouty general, but at the end of the second episode he receives a blow as his son is sent on a potentially deadly mission to try and save Zeus V. From this point onwards his character becomes altogether more irrational and aggressive, which given his initial appearance is saying something. This comes to a head when he effectively orders genocide of Mondas and ignores orders that the result could also be a great loss of life on earth, in ignoring this he also abuses the power he has by having Ben, Polly and an unconscious Doctor imprisoned. His death has both underscores of sadness and relief, as whilst his situation rouses sympathy, his abrasive character undermines it somewhat.

“There’s hundreds of them sir!”

The adventure carries on from the dramatic initial overtake of the base, it’s retake by Ben and the sight of the new formation of ships. This is added to by the clear divide in loyalties with Cutler between his line of duty and his duty as a family. As he puts it, there are three priorities, one of which is getting his son back, showing he has a personal vendetta in this, the second being the imminent invasion of the Cybermen and the third is the drain of power being caused by the earth’s twin. Cutler’s desperation with trying to get the Z-bomb authorised is sinister in it’s own way, as he somehow manages to out think Geneva. His desperation turns to paranoia then manic near-insanity, ignoring the fact his actions will have dire consequences. To add to all this, the Doctor is critically ill…

“This old body of mine is wearing a bit thin”

The groundbreaking process of regeneration is established here, as William Hartnell exited apparently due to health concerns, though some believe it was due to Hartnell being too expensive an actor to keep on contract. All the same Patrick Troughton makes his first uncredited appearance as the Doctor and would carry on until 1969. Considering this episode has so much in it, the first appearance of the Cybermen, the first regeneration and the last full appearance of William Hartnell in the lead role, the episode itself is actually quite boring, the pace is too slow and as a result the whole thing suffers from a severe case of being uninteresting. It’s a good thing the episode has so many critical elements to it’s name, making it culturally significant in the process, because as a story it’s merely average.