The Mind of Evil
056 – The Mind of Evil | |||
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Doctor Who serial | |||
Cast | |||
Others
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Production | |||
Directed by | Season 8 | ||
Running time | 6 episodes, 25 minutes each | ||
First broadcast | 30 January 1971 | ||
Last broadcast | 6 March 1971 | ||
Chronology | |||
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The Mind of Evil is the second serial of the
In the serial, the alien
All six episodes of the serial exist as black and white
Plot
The Third Doctor and Jo visit Stangmoor Prison to examine a new method of treating criminals, whereby negative impulses are removed from the mind using the Keller Machine. Professor Kettering, who is managing the use of the process at the behest of the absent Emile Keller, reconditions a number of inmates including Barnham, a hardened criminal who reverts to an innocent and childlike state due to the process. The Doctor's suspicions about the Keller Machine are heightened following a string of deaths, including that of Kettering himself, which occur when the machine is operated. Each death seems to involve personal phobias – and the Doctor is threatened by an inferno when he gets too close to the machine.
Meanwhile, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and the troops of UNIT are handling the security arrangements for the first World Peace Conference. Captain Chin Lee of the Chinese delegation is behaving strangely and attempting to heighten tension in relations with the United States. It emerges that her actions are under the influence of the Master. She uses the transmitted power of the Keller Machine against the American delegate, Senator Alcott, who barely survives the attack. Captain Chin Lee is deconditioned by the Doctor, and tells him that Emile Keller is the Master, whom the Doctor has previously trapped on Earth by stealing the dematerialisation circuit of his TARDIS.
At Stangmoor a riot has broken out and resulted in a dangerous criminal, Harry Mailer, seizing control of the prison. Jo is briefly taken hostage, but she enables the guards to retake the prison. The Master, who has heard of the riot by eavesdropping on UNIT's radio communications, arrives and meets Mailer, to whom he supplies enough gas grenades for Mailer and his prisoners to retake control of the prison. The Doctor returns to the prison only to be captured by the Master, who sets the Keller Machine loose on the mind of his old foe, weakening the Doctor considerably. But the Master is losing control of the Keller Machine, which contains an alien Mind Parasite that is dangerous even to a Time Lord, and forces the Doctor to help him contain its power. This done, the Doctor is returned to his cell.
The Master has come to Stangmoor to recruit the prisoners as a private army, and uses them to hijack a UNIT convoy transporting a deadly Thunderbolt nerve gas missile, which he intends to fire at the Peace Conference. Captain Mike Yates, who was in charge of the convoy, is taken prisoner by the criminals. Left in the dark, the Brigadier decides the Thunderbolt missile must be at Stangmoor and comes to the rescue in a "Trojan Horse" style assault. UNIT troops take control of the prison, killing Mailer and the other leading rioters. But the Keller Machine is growing stronger, and now breaks free of the temporary restraints placed on it by the Doctor, who discovers by chance that Barnham, having previously been subjected to the Keller process and thus having no evil left in his mind, has become immune to the Mind Parasite.
Yates contacts UNIT and informs them that the Thunderbolt is hidden on an abandoned airfield near the prison. The Doctor contacts the Master, offering to return his dematerialisation circuit in exchange for the missile. The Master agrees on condition he will come alone. But the Doctor uses Barnham to transport the Keller Machine to the airfield and turn the Mind Parasite loose on the Master. With the Master helpless, the Doctor is able to trigger the missile's self-destruct circuit and the Thunderbolt and the Keller Machine are destroyed. The Master uses the chaos to escape with his dematerialisation circuit, killing Barnham in the process. He contacts the Doctor by telephone to taunt him that he is now free while the Doctor remains trapped in his exile on Earth.
Continuity
The Mind Parasite attacks the Doctor on three separate occasions. The first visions are tongues of flame, enveloping the Doctor's terror-stricken face. He tells Jo as he recovers, "Not long ago I saw an entire world consumed by fire..." This is a reference to the recent serial Inferno (also written by Don Houghton).[2]
Production
Working titles for this story included The Pandora Machine, Man Hours and The Pandora Box.[3]
The production filmed in
Cast notes
The serial features a guest appearance by Michael Sheard, who had previously appeared with William Hartnell in
Katy Manning stated this as her favourite story from her three years on the show as Jo Grant.[8]
Broadcast and reception
Episode | Title | Run time | Original air date | UK viewers (millions) [9] | Archive [10] |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | "Episode One" | 24:39 | 30 January 1971 | 6.1 | Manual colourisation |
2 | "Episode Two" | 24:31 | 6 February 1971 | 8.8 | Chroma dot colour recovery |
3 | "Episode Three" | 24:30 | 13 February 1971 | 7.5 | Chroma dot colour recovery |
4 | "Episode Four" | 24:40 | 20 February 1971 | 7.4 | Chroma dot colour recovery |
5 | "Episode Five" | 23:34 | 27 February 1971 | 7.6 | Chroma dot colour recovery |
6 | "Episode Six" | 24:48 | 6 March 1971 | 7.3 | Chroma dot colour recovery |
Commercial releases
In print
ISBN 0-426-20166-3 | |
A novelisation of this serial, written by Terrance Dicks, was published by Target Books in March 1985.
Home media
The original soundtrack for this serial was released on
For many years, this story was unique amongst the BBC's holdings of Pertwee-era serials in that the BBC held no complete colour copies of any of its episodes. However, about four and a half minutes of colour footage from episode six existed on an off-air domestic NTSC
The serial was released on DVD in June 2013.[18] Episodes two to six were restored to colour via the chroma dot colour recovery technique used for other black-and-white Pertwee-era stories.[19] The telerecording of episode one does not contain chroma dot information (this was filtered out at the time it was made) and was recoloured using colour referenced from the other restored episodes. Keyframes, including the first frame of a shot and every fifth frame thereafter (approximately 7,000 in total) were hand coloured by Stuart Humphryes. Motion-estimation software was then used to interpolate the extrapolated colour from the key frames into the intervening frames.[20]
On 8 March 2021, this story was released on Blu-ray alongside the rest of Season 8 with a brand new restoration.[citation needed]
References
- ^ "Dr Who in Detail 3". A Brief History of Time Travel. Archived from the original on 15 September 2011. Retrieved 12 September 2008.
- Doctor Who: The Discontinuity Guide, Virgin Books, 1995, p. 122.
- ISBN 0-426-20486-7.
- ^ Kent Film Office (30 January 1971). "Kent Film Office The Mind of Evil Article".
- ^ Unsigned, "The UNIT Story: Part One", Doctor Who Magazine Winter Special (UNIT Exposed), 1991, Marvel Comics, Ltd., p. 15, col. 2.
- ^ Unsigned, "The UNIT Story: Part One", Doctor Who Magazine Winter Special (UNIT Exposed), 1991, Marvel Comics, Ltd.,, p. 15, col. 3.
- ^ "BBC One - Doctor Who, Season 8, the Mind of Evil - the Fourth Dimension".
- ^ The Mind of Evil DVD commentary (episode two), BBC DVD
- ^ "Ratings Guide". Doctor Who News. Retrieved 28 May 2017.
- ^ Shaun Lyon; et al. (31 March 2007). "The Mind of Evil". Outpost Gallifrey. Archived from the original on 18 May 2008. Retrieved 31 August 2008.
- ISBN 978-0-563-40588-7.)
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link - ^ Braxton, Mark (21 October 2009). "Doctor Who: The Mind of Evil". Radio Times. Retrieved 25 February 2013.
- ^ Berriman, Ian (31 May 2013). "Doctor Who: The Mind of Evil Review". SFX. Retrieved 8 July 2013.
- ^ Sinnott, John (11 June 2013). "Doctor Who: The Mind of Evil". DVD Talk. Retrieved 9 July 2013.
- ^ "Doctor Who: The Mind of Evil". Big Finish Productions. Retrieved 23 November 2012.
- ^ https://restorationteam.impossiblethings.net/mind.htm
- ^ BBC Warner DVD. B0051V55XA. 13 September 2011
- ^ "UK DVD schedule confirmed to September". Doctor Who News. Retrieved 9 October 2013.
- ^ On February-19-2012 (19 February 2012). "Doctor Who: Radio Free Skaro » Blog Archive » Radio Free Skaro No. 296 – Cleaning Up the Corn Field". Radio Free Skaro. Retrieved 9 October 2013.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - ^ "Pertwee DVD". Babelcolour. Retrieved 9 October 2013.
External links
- The Mind of Evil at BBC Online
- List of clips from missing Doctor Who episodes with information on clips from The Mind of Evil
Target novelisation
- The Mind of Evil title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database