The End of the World (Doctor Who)
158 – "The End of the World" | |||
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Doctor Who episode | |||
Cast | |||
Guest
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Production | |||
Directed by | Series 1 | ||
Running time | 44 minutes | ||
First broadcast | 2 April 2005 | ||
Chronology | |||
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"The End of the World" is the second episode of the
In the episode, the alien
"The End of the World" is the first episode of
Plot
The
Meanwhile, the gifts brought by the Adherents of the Repeated Meme contain robotic spiders that immediately work at disabling functions on Platform One. The Steward of Platform One recognises something is wrong, but is killed when the spiders lower the solar filter of his room and expose him to the powerful solar radiation. After Rose insults Cassandra, the Adherents follow her and knock her unconscious. They drag her into an observation room and set the solar filter to descend. The Doctor gets the filter back up but cannot get her out.
The Doctor determines that the Adherents sabotaged Platform One. However, they are robots commanded by Cassandra. Cassandra admits to being the saboteur: her original plan was to create a hostage situation (with herself as one of the "victims") and profit from the compensation she would have had, but now intends to gain money from her stock holdings in the companies of the guests' competitors to increase in value after they die. Cassandra teleports off the station as the spiders bring down the shielding on the entire station. The Doctor and the sentient tree humanoid Jabe travel to the bowels of Platform One to restore the automated shields, but it requires one of them to travel through several spinning fans. Jabe sacrifices herself within extreme heat to hold down a switch to slow down the fan blades. This allows the Doctor to reactivate the system just before the expanding Sun hits the station and destroys Earth.
The Doctor reverses Cassandra's teleport and brings her back onto the station. In the elevated temperature and without moisture, Cassandra's body creaks and ruptures, snapping from her frame, despite Rose's request that The Doctor save her. The Doctor explains to her, now free from the observation room, that he is the last of the
Production
Conception
"The End of the World" was conceived as a deliberately expensive spectacle to show off how much the new Doctor Who could do.[1] Platform One was designed to be like a "hotel for the most poshest, richest, and influential aliens in the universe",[1] and is partly based on Douglas Adams' The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.[2]
One function of the episode is to reveal that the Doctor is the last of his people.[1] Davies had also initially intended to have the last humans escaping the doomed Earth aboard massive space arks (similar arks appeared in the serial The Ark). This was dropped when the complexity of the character of Cassandra was fully realised during development.[3] The episode features the first appearance of concepts such as the psychic paper, the Time War and the words 'Bad Wolf', which would go on to form a story arc throughout the series.[2] It also mentions the TARDIS' universal translation capabilities, which had been referenced in the 1976 serial The Masque of Mandragora.[2] An unaired scene would have shown the Doctor to have nine strands of DNA instead of one, an allusion to his eight previous incarnations.[4]
This episode begins with a cold open, the first time Doctor Who did this, which would soon become a standard feature. The show had previously used pre-credits teaser sequences, but only for some special episodes in the 1980s, such as the post-regeneration Castrovalva (1982); the 20th-anniversary special, The Five Doctors (1983); and the 25th-anniversary story, Remembrance of the Daleks (1988).[5]
The villain
Filming
"The End of the World" was scheduled as part of the second production block along with "The Unquiet Dead".[10] Camille Coduri's scene as Jackie Tyler was shot in advance during the first production block because of commitments for the film The Business that would make her unavailable. The scene was shot at the Unit Q2 warehouse in Newport on 7 September 2004.[11]
The main recording for the episode began in the studio at Unit Q2 from 22 September.[12] Many of the Platform One interiors were filmed at the Temple of Peace in Cardiff from 6 to 14 October.[13]
During the recording of "The Unquiet Dead" on 20 October, several
Due to complexities in animating Cassandra, some of her lines were dropped and the episode underran. To compensate, Davies came up with the character of maintenance worker Raffalo, and scenes between Raffalo and Rose were filmed at the Temple of Peace on 19 February 2005.[13]
At a talk in 2018, Euros Lynn chose the final scene of the episode, in which the Doctor and Rose get chips, as one of his favourite scenes from his directorial tenure on Doctor Who.[16] The scene was one of the final shot for the series[17] and the people behind the Doctor and Rose were not paid extras.
Effects and costumes
The episode contains 203 visual effects shots that were completed over eight weeks, compared to "about 100" in the film Gladiator; Russell T Davies joked that there never would be an episode of the same scale due to the expense in producing it.[1] As of "The Wedding of River Song" (2011), no Doctor Who episode contains as many special effects shots.[18] Producer Phil Collinson also said the episode had more monsters than ever before.[8]
Both Cassandra and the robotic spiders — other than an inactive one — are completely CGI creatures.
Other effects include the creation of a fake 7" single for
Broadcast and reception
According to a March 2006 interview with Russell T Davies, he requested for this episode to be broadcast back-to-back with "Rose", but the request was given to the BBC too close to transmission to do so.[22] In the United States the Sci-Fi Channel did run the two episodes consecutively on 17 March 2006.[22] The broadcast of "The End of the World" in the US was watched by 1.61 million viewers.[23] In Canada, the episode had 899,000 viewers, making it the evening's 4th-most viewed primetime show.[24]
Overnight figures showed that "The End of the World" was watched by 7.3 million viewers in the UK, down 2.6 million viewers from the premiere.
Arnold T Blumburg of the magazine Now Playing gave "The End of the World" a grade of "A−", praising the spectacle as well as the performances of Eccleston and Piper and their developing characters. However, he felt that the climax suffered from pacing issues.[21] SFX called it a "brave episode to air so early, but it works", praising the way the alien concepts were reminiscent to the classic series. However, the reviewer wrote that "the full drama of the event is never quite captured" and "the murder plot...never quite takes flight, but it provides the framework for some brilliant scenes".[28] In Who Is the Doctor, a guide to the revived series, Graeme Burk described "The End of the World" as "sheer, unadulterated fun", particularly praising the emotional connection that was built between the Doctor and Rose.[29] Burk felt that there could have been more of a build-up to the Cassandra revelation, but commented that "a lot of the success of the story" was due to her.[29] Burk's co-author Robert Smith added that the episode allowed Eccleston to shine by offering the Doctor a wide range of emotions.[30] Despite their positive reviews, Burk and Smith noted that the switch at the end of the hallway with giant fans was "contrived" and "silly".[31] In 2013, Patrick Mulkern of Radio Times felt that the episode had everything to be expected from Davies' Doctor Who: boldness, camp, and emotional and character drama.[32] The A.V. Club reviewer Alasdair Wilkins gave the episode a grade of B+, noting that the episode was not concerned with plot, but it succeeded in character moments and reintroducing Doctor Who.[33]
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly". Doctor Who Confidential. Series 1. Episode 2. 2 April 2005. BBC. BBC Three.
- ^ a b c d e Mcalpine, Fraser (2015). "'Doctor Who': 10 Things You May Not Know About 'The End of the World'". BBC America. Retrieved 17 February 2020.
- ^ "The End of the World". shannonsullivan. Retrieved 14 March 2020.
- ^ "The End of the World". Outpost Gallifrey. Archived from the original on 14 September 2007. Retrieved 15 March 2020.
- ^ Traynier, David (15 December 2019). "DOCTOR WHO SERIES 12 TO REINTRODUCE PRE-TITLES SEQUENCES". The Doctor Who Companion. Retrieved 14 March 2020.
- ^ a b Lloyd Pack, Roger (24 May 2004). "ALL THE PRESIDENT'S CYBERMEN". Daily Mirror. Retrieved 17 February 2020.
- ^ "The End of the World – Fact File". BBC. Retrieved 27 March 2012.
- ^ a b "Doctor Who: Behind the scenes". CBBC Newsround Extra. 1 April 2005. Retrieved 14 March 2020.
- ^ Russell T Davies (writer), James Hawes (director), Phil Collinson (producer) (15 April 2006). "New Earth". Doctor Who. Series 2. Episode 1. BBC. BBC One.
- ^ Ainsworth, ed. (2016). Doctor Who: The Complete History. Volume 48, p. 92.
- ^ Ainsworth, ed. (2016). Doctor Who: The Complete History. Volume 48, p. 93.
- ^ Ainsworth, ed. (2016). Doctor Who: The Complete History. Volume 48, p. 95.
- ^ a b "Doctor Who in Wales – Temple of Peace, Cathays Park, Cardiff". BBC Cymru Wales. Retrieved 10 June 2018.
- ^ a b Ainsworth, ed. (2016). Doctor Who: The Complete History. Volume 48, p. 98.
- ^ a b Ainsworth, ed. (2016). Doctor Who: The Complete History. Volume 48, p. 99.
- ^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dewyqn8w8R4
- ^ https://open.spotify.com/episode/5j9uhtWITBBQ9HZCCJzoyS?si=22Uyy9lMRIK65qxGKCNkhQ
- ^ a b c Burk and Smith, 2012, p. 11
- ^ Lyons, Beverley (10 March 2005). "See Who Jimmy; Ugly alien is one of the Doc's good gyes". Daily Record. Retrieved 8 December 2013.
- ^ Burk and Smith, 2012, p. 9
- ^ a b Blumburg, Arnold T (6 April 2005). "Doctor Who – "The End of the World"". Now Playing. Archived from the original on 1 September 2005. Retrieved 21 January 2013.
- ^ a b
Nazzaro, Joe (14 March 2006). "Who Timing Was Right". Sci Fi Wire. Archived from the originalon 13 June 2006. Retrieved 1 December 2006.
- ^ "US Debut Ratings". Outpost Gallifrey. 22 March 2006. Archived from the original on 24 March 2006. Retrieved 7 December 2013.
- ^ Lyons, Shaun (21 April 2005). "Wednesday-Thursday Series News Updates". Outpost Gallifrey. Archived from the original on 11 September 2007. Retrieved 15 March 2020.
- ^ Plunkett, John (4 April 2005). "Doctor Who loses 2.5 million viewers in timewarp". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 March 2012.
- ISBN 978-0-563-48649-7.
- ^ "Ratings Guide". Doctor Who News. Retrieved 17 February 2020.
- ^ "Doctor Who: The End of the World". SFX. 2 April 2005. Archived from the original on 17 April 2006. Retrieved 15 April 2012.
- ^ a b Burk and Smith, 2012, p. 11-12
- ^ Burk and Smith, 2012, p. 12-13
- ^ Burk and Smith, 2012, p. 10
- ^ Mulkern, Patrick (5 February 2013). "Doctor Who: The End of the World". Retrieved 18 February 2013.
- ^ Wilkins, Alasdair (24 November 2013). "Doctor Who: "The End of the World"/"The Unquiet Dead"". The A.V. Club. Retrieved 29 November 2013.
Bibliography
- Ainsworth, John, ed. (2016). Doctor Who: The Complete History. Vol. 48. ISSN 2057-6048.
- Burk, Graeme; Smith, Robert (6 March 2012). "Series 1". Who Is the Doctor: The Unofficial Guide to Doctor Who-The New Series (1st ed.). ISBN 978-1-55022-984-4.
External links
- BBC Doctor Who Homepage
- "The End of the World" at the Doctor Who Stories Website
- "The End of the World" at BBC iPlayer
- Doctor Who Confidential — Episode 2: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
- "The End of the World" at IMDb