Pyramids of Mars
Pyramids of Mars is a story from the science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was written by Stephen Harris and directed by Paddy Russell. It comprises four 25 minute episodes and was first transmitted in the UK on BBC1 between 25/10/75 - 15/11/75. The story invovles the Doctor preventing Sutekh, an ancient alien with almost limitless power, from breaking free from his imprisonment and destroying the Earth. The cast was Tom Baker, Elizabeth Sladen, Bernard Archard, Michael Sheard, Peter Mayock, Peter Copley, George Tovey, Gabriel Woolf, Nick Burnell, Melvyn Bedford and Kevin Selway.
Part 1
Marcus Scarman, Professor of Archaeology at All Souls College, Oxford University, is excavating a blind pyramid in Saqarra, Eqypt. The door to the mastaba (burial chamber) is inscribed with the Eye of Horus. Scarman's Egptian assistants panic and flee at the sight of the glowing heiroglyph, leaving the Professor to enter the chamber alone. As he holds a light up to see the undisturbed tomb, he is blasted by a green ray that eminates from a seated and cowled figure.
The Doctor and Sarah-Jane Smith are travelling in free space to UNIT headquarters in the TARDIS. At the moment the tomb is disturbed, the TARDIS is forced out of its flight path and an apparition of an alien face appears in the console room, witnessed by Sarah-Jane. The Doctor speculates that mental projection could potentially have this effect on the TARDIS; "..but... of that force is beyond imagination." The Doctor follows the engery source back to its point of origin and lands the TARDIS in the Scarman family home, a former priory in a large estate in the Home Counties of England.
The Doctor and Sarah-Jane explore the priory and find what appear to be Egyptian artefacts in the storeroom in which the TARDIS materialised. Discovered by the butler, they are told that the house has been taken over by a myterious Egyptian gentleman by the name of Ibrahim Namin. The butler politely asks them to leave. As he turns to inspect the room after the Doctor and Sarah-Jane's departure via the window, a sarcophagus lid is seen to be moving...
In another part of the priory, Namin is being confronted by Doctor Warlock, an old friend of Professor Scarman. Their heated debate is interrupted by a scream. Warlock and Namin find that the scream came from the butler, who has been crushed to death in the storeroom. Namin shoots Warlock in order to prevent him from going for help. The Doctor, who has witnessed the argument and heard the scream, prevents the shot from being immediately fatal by using his scarf to pull the gun in Namin's hand. The three make their escape in to the grounds of the estate. Instead of following, Namin removes the lid of another sarcophagus to reveal a Mummy. Holding up his ring, he commands the Mummy to activate and orders it to persue the time travellers.
The Doctor, Sarah-Jane and Doctor Warlock hide in the woods until the persuing Mummies are called off the hunt by Namin, who is summoned to the central room of the house by a blast of organ music. The three fugitives make their way to a hunting lodge in the grounds that is used by Laurence Scarman, Professor Scarman's brother, as a home. Laurence is an amateur scientist and the Doctor uses a Marconiscope to detect an alien signal coming from Mars. After confirming that the year is 1911, the Doctor decodes the signal as "Beware Sutekh". Sutekh is revealed to be from a race called the Osirians from a planet called Phaester-Osiris. Sutekh was a powerful paranoid meglomanic who came to believe that all life was his enemy. He was persued across the galaxy by his brother Horus and was finally defeated on Earth by the combined might of 740 Osirians. The battle passed in to Eqpytian theology and was depicted in the tomb of Tutmoses III. The Doctor returns to the house in order to formulate a plan to stop Sutekh, followed by Sarah-Jane and Laurence Scarman.
Namin and the Mummies greet the arrival of Sutekh's assistant who travels to the priory via a time tunnel, the portal of which is disguised as an upright sarcophagus. The Servant of Sutekh appears as a dark-helmeted humanoid figure dressed in black. The Servant ignores Namin's pleas for his life, saying; "I am the Servant of Sutekh. He needs no other. Die. I bring Sutekh's gift of death to all humanity."
Part 2
After killing Namin, the Servant transforms in to Marcus Scarman, although he appears to be an animated corpse. Scarman is then ordered by Sutekh, immobile in his pyramid, to secure the perimeter of the estate and to construct an Osirian war missile. After Scarman and the Mummies leave to execture their orders, the Doctor, Sarah-Jane and Laurence Scarman enter the main room. The Doctor locates the time tunnel and accidentally activates it. He stops it using the TARDIS key but is knocked unconscious by the energy discharge from a booby trap. Laurence hides the three of them in a Priest Hole for fear of being discovered by Marcus Scarman.
In another part of the estate, a poacher called Ernie Clements finds a Mummy trapped one of his snares. He retreats but is prevented from escaping the estate by the energy barrier that Sutekh has ordered to be generated in order to secure the perimeter. Once Scarman has finished placing the barrier generators, he finds Doctor Warlock and interrogates him regarding the other people within the barrier. Clements hears Doctor Warlock's death scream and tracks Marcus Scarman back to the house.
While in hiding, the Doctor realises that he will be able to stop Sutekh controlling his Servant and the Mummies by using Namin's ring and Laurence Scarman's scientific apparatus. Marcus Scarman is prevented from finding them by the sudden appearance of Clements. Clements fires his shotgun in to Marcus Scarman's back and is amazed to see the explosion reverse and all damage healed. Clements panics and retreats, persued by the Mummies.
The Doctor locates Namin's corpse, dumped by the Mummies in the same room as the TARDIS. Retrieving the ring, all three hide in the TARDIS to avoid detection. Laurence Scarman is amazed by the dimentionally transcendental nature of the TARDIS. Sarah-Jane opines that they can just leave in the TARDIS, "...because we know that the world didn't end in 1911." The Doctor demonstrates by moving the TARDIS forward in time to 1980, the year that Sarah-Jane says that she is from. The doors open, and Sarah-Jane and Laurence Scarman look out on to a blasted wilderness, with thunder, rain and lightning hammering down on to ash fields. The Doctor explains that they have no choice but to return to 1911 and stop Sutekh.
The companions return to 1911 and retreat to the hunting lodge in order to jury-rig a jamming unit to prevent Sutekh controlling his servants. Scarman finds it too hard to deal with the Doctor's assertion that Marcus Scarman is dead and that the being with his appearance is just a puppet. Laurence overhears the Doctor telling Sarah-Jane that when the jamming device is activated, all of Sutekh's servants will stop, Marcus Scarman included.
At the crucial moment when the device is activated, Laurence Scarman attempts to stop it from happening. The Mummies overrun the hunting lodge after finding and killing Clements. They knock Laurence out and throw the Doctor to the floor. One of the Mummies attacks the jamming device and is disabled by a sudden discharge of power. Sarah-Jane is threatened by a Mummy as she leans back against the table contaning the jamming device...
Part 3
The Doctor shouts to Sarah-Jane to grab the ring that they took from Namin and to order the Mummies to return to Control. Surveying the ruined equipment, the Doctor decides that the only thing that he can do is to blow up the partially-assembled rocket in the stable courtyard of the Priory. Laurance Scarman suggests using blasting gelignite. Clements held a supply in his hut on the estate. The Doctor and Sarah-Jane leave to locate the gelignite, ordering Laurence to strip the bindings from the now deactivated Mummy left in the hunting lodge.
The Doctor finds the energy barrier and deactivates a generator in order to get through. The deactivation is detected by Sutekh, who orders Marcus Scarman to investigate. Marcus finds Laurence in the hunting lodge. Laurence tries to make Marcus remember his childhood in order to revive his humanity, but fails. Marcus tortures Laurence in order to find our more about the Doctor.
The Doctor and Sarah-Jane find the gelignite and hide it near the rocket before returning to the lodge. There they find Laurence in a rocking chair and a Mummy stripped of its bindings. Sarah-Jane discovers that Laurence has been strangled and the Doctor surmises that Marcus Scarman was the attacker. He then asks Sarah-Jane to disguise him in the bindings in order for him to place the gelignite on the rocket without being detected.
The Doctor manages to avoid detection, even when given a key rocket instrument to place on board. He returns to Sarah-Jane, who detonates the gelignite using a hunting rifle. They see the explosion retreat back upon itself. The Doctor realises that Sutekh is holding back the detonation using mental power alone. He realises that he has one chance left to defeat Sutekh and resolves to travel to Sutekh's prison using the time tunnel in order to distract him and cause the missile to explode. He does this but is then trapped by Sutekh's will.
Part 4
Sutekh interrogates the Doctor and discovers that he is a Time Lord from Gallifrey. He then locates the TARDIS and decides to use this to travel to the pyramids of mars in order to deactivate the Eye of Horus, the force that paralyses him. The Doctor avoids being killed by claiming that the TARDIS controls are isomorphic, they respond to him alone. Sutekh returns the Doctor to the Priory as another of his servants. He orders Marcus Scarman to bring a Mummy and Sarah-Jane in to the TARDIS to travel to Mars.
Once arriving on Mars, Sutekh orders Scarman to dispose of the Doctor and the Mummy strangles him. Scarman and the Mummy then find the way out of the first chamber beneath the pyramid and leave Sarah-Jane weeping over the Doctor. The Doctor then reveals that his alien physiology allowed him to avoid suffering the terminal effects of strangulation and they then set off in search of Scarman.
The Eye of Horus is located at the end of a corridor beneath the pryramid. The corridor is divided in to a series of chambers and progress through the chambers is dependent upon solving logical and philosophical problems. Sutekh navigates Scarman and the Mummy through each problem with no deliberation but the Doctor and Sarah-Jane are slower. They almost catch up with Scarman and duck back to avoid him. When Scarman passes through the bulkhead door, a Decatron Crucible is materialised around Sarah-Jane. The voice of Horus is heard to tell the Doctor that the Crucible has two switches and that he is allowed to ask one question of one Guardian of Horus. The Guardians materialised at the same moment as the Crucible and are Mummies swathed in gold bindings. The Doctor realises that he has limited time as Sarah-Jane has no air supply within the Crucible and will die unless he can solve Horus' riddle, 'Which is the Guardian of Life?'
The Doctor thinks rapidly and realises that Horus is following the rules of Logic and being devious at the same time. He asks one Guardian; "If I were to ask your friend which switch was the death switch, which would he indicate?". The Doctor realises that the Guardians are contra-programmed so that one will always give a false answer. The Doctor reasons that if the Guardian he asked was the true Guardian then it must have indicated the death switch and the if it is the automatic liar then it must still be the death switch. The Doctor presses the other switch and the Crucible and the Guardians disappear.
Scarman and the Mummy reach the chamber containing the Eye of Horus. Another Guardian of Horus appears and does battle with Sutekh's Mummy. Sutekh realises that he is moments away from freedom and channels all of his power through Scarman in order to destroy the Eye of Horus. Scarman momentarily transforms in to Sutekh's physical appearance before falling to the floor and decaying in to dust in an instant. The Doctor and Sarah-Jane arrive too late and Sarah-Jane dispairs. The Doctor looks back and sees the bulkhead doors open one-by-one, revealing the TARDIS at the end of the corridor. He shouts "No! The time factor!", and they return to Earth.
Back in the priory, the Doctor exits the TARDIS at a run, holding a piece of equipment. He runs to the main room of the priory and attaches the equipment to the time tunnel entrance. Sutekh appears and travels to the mouth of the tunnel, where he pleads with the Doctor to release him. The Doctor commands Sutekh to continue to travel in time until the moment of his death in the eighth millennium. The Doctor explains to Sarah-Jane that they had four minutes to return to Earth from Mars and set the trap because this is the amount of time that it takes for radio waves to propagate between the two planets. The Doctor then used the time control from the TARDIS to move the mouth of the time tunnel in to the far future, which Sutekh could never hope to reach.
As they pack up the equipment and prepare to leave, a thermal inbalance in the time tunnel causes it to catch fire. The Doctor remarks that the priory burnt down and that the building housing a UNIT headquarters was built on the site. The Doctor and Sarah-Jane escape and the last image is of the priory in flames.