The War Machines
| 027 – The War Machines | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Doctor Who serial | |||
| File:Warmachine.jpg A War Machine | |||
| Cast | |||
Others
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| Production | |||
| Directed by | Michael Ferguson | ||
| Written by | Ian Stuart Black Kit Pedler (idea) | ||
| Script editor | Gerry Davis | ||
| Produced by | Innes Lloyd | ||
| Executive producer(s) | None | ||
| Production code | BB | ||
| Series | Season 3 | ||
| Running time | 4 episodes, 25 minutes each (material missing from parts 3-4) | ||
| First broadcast | June 25–July 16, 1966 | ||
| Chronology | |||
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The War Machines is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in 4 weekly parts from June 25 to July 16, 1966. This serial is the first appearance of Michael Craze and Anneke Wills as pending companions Ben Jackson and Polly, as well as marking the departure of Jackie Lane as Dodo Chaplet. It should not be confused with the Second Doctor story The War Games.
Plot
Synopsis
The TARDIS lands in London, near the Post Office Tower, in 1966. The Doctor is unsettled by a sensation of a strange energy nearby. Visiting the newly-completed Tower, the Doctor and Dodo meet Professor Brett, the creator of WOTAN (Will Operating Thought ANalogue), an advanced problem-solving computer that thinks for itself. Curiously, WOTAN even knows what the word 'TARDIS' stands for. In four days' time, on C-Day, WOTAN will be linked to other major computers to take them over, including those of the White House, Cape Kennedy and the Royal Navy.
Dodo goes with Polly, Brett's secretary, to the local Inferno nightclub, where they meet Able Seaman Ben Jackson, while the Doctor attends a Royal Scientific Club meeting about WOTAN, lead by Sir Charles Summer. Before Brett can depart the CPO Tower for the meeting, he is hypnotised by a humming noise emitted by WOTAN. He then fetches Krimpton, an electronics colleague, from the meeting and takes him to WOTAN, who is likewise possessed by the computer. Major Green, the chief of security in the Tower, is also taken over, and sends WOTAN's control signals to Dodo at the nightclub via telephone. Going to the tower, WOTAN tells her "Doctor Who is required. Bring him here."
WOTAN has concluded that mankind cannot develop the world any further, and intends to take over using an army of War Machines - mobile computers like itself. Using its hypnotic control, WOTAN enlists a workforce to construct 12 War Machines around London, which is the first capital to become controlled. One of these machines is built in a warehouse in Covent Garden, close to the Inferno nightclub. Dodo, the Doctor, Ben and Polly leave for Sir Charles' residence, where the Doctor has been invited to stay, in a taxi that drops off a tramp by the nightclub. Looking for a place to sleep, the tramp discovers Brett and a workforce building Machine 3 in the warehouse. The tramp is caught, and killed when he tries to escape.
The next day, Dodo manages to get the Doctor to telephone Brett at the CPO Tower, and he is nearly possessed by WOTAN. Thinking the Doctor is now controlled, Dodo gives herself away by revealing that the War Machines are being "contructed in strategic points in London". The Doctor breaks WOTAN's hypnotic control over her, and she is sent to stay with Sir Charles' wife in the country to recover.
When Polly fails to show up to a luncheon with Ben, the Doctor sends the lad to investigate the area around the nightclub, after reading about the death of the tramp in the newspaper. Ben also discovers the War Machine in the warehouse, now fully assembled and being tested under Major Green's supervision. Ben is detected by the Machine, and caught by the now hypnotised Polly. However, Ben is spared when Polly states that "WOTAN requires all the slave labour we can find". While working with the others, Ben learns that the 12 War Machines are to attack at noon the next day. He escapes, although seen yet not stopped by Polly, and alerts the Doctor and Sir Charles. Polly is sent back to the Tower to be punished by WOTAN.
Under Sir Charles' instruction, an army taskforce investigates the warehouse, but their weapons are somehow disabled by the War Machine. They are forced to retreat, but when Doctor stands defiently before the Machine as it emerges from the warehouse, it stops - it had not been completely programmed. With the deactivation of Machine 3, the workmen, including Major Green, are released from its control. Examining the Machine's programming, the Doctor learns that the 11 others have been built across London, and are meant to attack at noon today. Soon after, there are reports of another War Machine - Machine 9 - taking to the streets, having gone rogue while it was being tested. With the help of the army, the Doctor traps the Machine in an electromagnetif forcefield - paralysing it - and reprogrammes it to destroy WOTAN. Ben goes to the CPO Tower ahead of Machine 9, and drags Polly out of the WOTAN room as the Machine enters and attacks the immobile computer. Krimpton is killed, but WOTAN is destroyed before it can give the order for the other 10 War Machines to commence their attack - and Brett and all the others who have been hypnotised return to normal.
Ben and Polly meet the Doctor at the TARDIS, to explain that Dodo has decided to stay in London. The Doctor thanks them and heads into the Police Box - followed by Ben and Polly, who enter the TARDIS with the intent to return Dodo's key, which the Doctor dropped earlier. They are then suddenly whisked off into time and space...
Continuity
Naming issues
WOTAN is pronounced "Votan" – as, it is explained, the Norse god sometimes was. It stands, though, for Will Operating Thought ANalogue, which is indicative of its ability to connect to the human brain.
WOTAN refers to the Doctor as "Doctor Who" – the only time the character is ever given this name within the series' narrative (though he is often credited as such in the end titles). While there is nothing in the series that directly contradicts it, many fans see this as an error and several theories have tried to account for it, one noting that WOTAN may have been misinformed, since it also described the Doctor as "human". WOTAN also manages to discern the meaning of the acronym TARDIS; how it manages to do so is not explained.
Destination Earth
This serial is the first in the series to be completely set on a contemporary Earth. The previous landings of the TARDIS in the 1960s were either brief (the Empire State Building sequence from The Chase, several landings during The Daleks' Master Plan, the stop over on Wimbledon Common in The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve) or exceptional (Planet of Giants, where the TARDIS crew were shrunk down to the size of insects and could not fully interact with present day humans). Here, for the first time, we see the Doctor take a leading role in the protection of the planet, which becomes a regular theme for the series from here on.
The decision to set more episodes on present-day Earth was taken because the producers felt that the audience was becoming bored with the purely historical episodes that had been a major element of the show to date. As a result, this story marks the beginning of the turn away from historical stories. The next two historical stories, "The Smugglers" (which immediately follows "The War Machines") and Season 4's "The Highlanders", were to be the last historical stories until Season 19's "Black Orchid".
Synchronicity
The episode appears to end on 20 July 1966 - the date given in dialogue for the Second Doctor story The Faceless Ones, also set in London, where Ben states that that is the same date as when he and Polly joined the Tardis. However, it appears to start on 12 July as Sir Charles Summer says that "Computer Day, will be next Monday, July 16th, that is in four days time." (Though the days of the week mentioned in The War Machines mean it cannot be 1966 if they're the same in Doctor Who continuity as in the 'real' world, where 12 July 1966 was a Saturday.)
Curiously, at the start of the latter serial, the Doctor comments that he feels the same sensation as he felt when the Daleks were around. While this appears to be intended to equate the War Machines and WOTAN to the Daleks, it is interesting to note that the events of the serial are revealed later in the series to happen contemporaneously with the Second Doctor serial The Evil of the Daleks.
The Past Doctor Adventures novel The Time Travellers by Simon Guerrier is set in an alternative reality where the Doctor had not been around to stop WOTAN. The villain is never referred to by name, only as "the Machine", and while he was overthrown thousands were left insane by his mind-control and Britain was reduced to a technologically backward dictatorship.
A later serial that also foreshadows the internet is The Green Death, which features a very similar computer villain. The Face of Evil also sees the Doctor encountering another such being (this time having been linked with his own brain rather than that of a human) and commenting on how familiar the threat has become.
Production
Template:DoctorWhoEpisodeHead Working titles for this story included The Computers.[1]
The idea for this story came about when Kit Pedler was being interviewed for a position as science adviser to the series. The producers asked all of the interviewees what would happen if the recently-built Post Office Tower somehow took over. Pedler suggested that it would be the work of a rogue computer that communicated with the outside world by means of the telephone system. The producers liked this suggestion and not only offered Pedler the job but developed the idea into a script (one of the few to feature a 'Story Idea by' credit).
Only one War Machine prop was actually constructed; the production team changed the numbers, to represent the different machines.
The titling style of each episode in this serial differs from the standard titles of other serials. Instead of a title overlay, after the "Doctor Who" logo has faded, the screen shifts to a solid background containing four inversely-coloured rectangles aligned down the left-hand side (reminiscent to an old-style computer punch card). The title, one word at a time, scrolls upwards - "THE", "WAR", "MACH", "INES" - with a final flash displaying the complete title on two lines. Another flash reveals the writer, the next flash reveals the word "EPISODE", and the final flash shows the actual episode number. All of the lettering displayed in this titling sequence is shown in a retro-computer font. Each of the four episodes' title sequences have slight variations to them.
Casting
- Michael Craze provided the voice of a policeman heard in Episode four.
- WOTAN received a credit as "And WOTAN" at the end of the first three episodes, the only time a fictional character was credited as itself in the series.
- Jackie Lane's contract expired midway through production of this story. She does not appear again after episode two; Dodo's off-screen departure is relayed to the Doctor by Polly.
- This is the last William Hartnell era serial, and the only serial featuring Anneke Wills and Michael Craze, to exist in its entirety.
Missing episodes
Aside from its soundtrack (recorded off-air by fans), this serial was lost in the junk of episodes in the 1970s. The master videotapes for the story were the last of those starring William Hartnell to be junked, surviving until 1974.[2] The 16mm film telerecording copies held by BBC Enterprises were also the last of their kind to be destroyed, surviving until 1978, shortly before the junking of material was halted by the intervention of fan Ian Levine.[3]
In 1978, a collector in Australia provided a copy of episode 2. Later in 1984 copies of all four episodes were returned from Nigeria. Episodes 2, 3 and 4 all had cuts to them, but most have been restored due to a combination of the other copy of episode 2, material used in a promotional item on the BBC's Blue Peter and censored clips from Australia. Some of the restored footage did not have its accompanying soundtrack, and so the missing sound was restored from the off-air recordings.
To date, only episodes 3 and 4 do not exist in their entirety as was originally intended. Episode 3 is missing a visual brief bit of dialogue with Krimpton talking. This was replaced in the VHS release with a combination of a shot of WOTAN with the accompanied dialogue from the off-air recordings. Episode 3 is also missing around 59 seconds worth of the battle in the warehouse. Episode 4 is missing only a small amount of material. The first instance occurs with the man in the telephone box. Part of the continuing closeup of the man talking on the telephone is missing, but this was compensated on the VHS release by continuing in audio-only over the top of the beginning of the high shot of the phone box. There are also two lines of dialogue missing when Polly reports back to WOTAN. This scene, however, has not been re-instated for the VHS release as it was felt that there wouldn't be enough visual material to drop into the gap.
The DVD release has all of the episodes recreated and restored to their original length.
Commercial releases
The serial was released on VHS in 1997, with an item from Blue Peter and a BBC1 "globe ident" (from the first part of the story) as extras. A DVD issue was released in August 25th 2008. With the advance in technology since the original VHS release, the sections which were missing from it have been reinstated using the audio and appropriate visual material. It features a commentary by Anneke Wills & the director Michael Ferguson.
Also, in 2007, an audio CD of the serial's soundtrack, with linking narration by and bonus interview with Anneke Wills, was released.
In print
A novelisation of this serial, written by Ian Stuart Black, was published by Target Books in February 1989.
References
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Briefwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Pixley, Andrew (2005). "No Further Interest". Nothing at the End of the Lane — The Magazine of Doctor Who Research and Restoration (2): pp. 38–43.
{{cite journal}}:|pages=has extra text (help); Unknown parameter|month=ignored (help) - ^ Bignell, Richard (2005). "Withdrawn, De-accessioned and Junked". Nothing at the End of the Lane — The Magazine of Doctor Who Research and Restoration (2): pp. 44–49.
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External links
- The War Machines at BBC Online
- Template:Brief
- Template:Doctor Who RG
- Template:OG
- Doctor Who Locations - The War Machines