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| Previous: The Sixth Doctor | Next: The Eighth Doctor |
| The Seventh Doctor (1987-1989) | |
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Season
Twenty-Four: Clowning Around First appearance of Ace. |
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Season
Twenty-Five: Unfinished Business The silver anniversary season. |
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Season
Twenty-Six: Journey's End The original Doctor Who series is cancelled. |
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1993 Special:
Echoes Of Former Glories The thirtieth anniversary special. |
| Season Twenty-Four: Clowning Around |
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Sylvester McCoy played the Doctor from Time And The Rani in September 1987 to Survival in December 1989 and resumed his role in Doctor Who (1996) in May 1996. He also appeared in Dimensions In Time in November 1993. |
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Ace was a troubled teenager from Perivale in London who met the Doctor after an accident teleported her to Iceworld in the far future. Sophie Aldred played Ace from Dragonfire in November 1987 to Survival in December 1989. She returned for Dimensions In Time in November 1993. |
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| The Production Team |
| A replacement was finally found for Eric Saward in the form of Andrew Cartmel, who took over the script editor reigns at the start of the season. The team of Cartmel and John Nathan-Turner would remain in place throughout the remaining three seasons of the original Doctor Who series. |
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Time And The Rani by Pip and Jane Baker,
directed by Andrew Morgan
The Rani lures the TARDIS to Lakertya, where she requires the Doctor's
aid to complete a device which will draw on the intelligence of history's
greatest geniuses to help her reshape the universe to her own design. To
this end, she drugs the newly-regenerated Doctor and masquerades as Mel to
gain his trust. The real Mel, however, allies herself with the native
Lakertyans, who have been suffering under the rule of the Rani and her
bat-like Tetraps. It is up to Mel to rouse the Lakertyans to rebellion,
and free the Doctor from the Rani's clutches.
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Paradise Towers by Stephen Wyatt,
directed by Nicholas Mallett
Deciding to take a holiday, the Doctor and Mel go to Paradise Towers. Upon
their arrival, however, they find the famed complex in ruins. It
transpires that, long ago, the adults all went off to fight a war and
never returned. Now the only ones left are the Kangs, riotous gangs of
teenaged girls; the Rezzies, cannibalistic old women; the Caretakers, who
ostensibly look after the Towers; and the cowardly Pex, who had been too
scared to go off to war. But another entity also lurks in Paradise Towers:
Kroagnon, the building's architect, who has taken mental possession of
the Chief Caretaker and the cleaning robots in an attempt to rid his
creation of human life forever.
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Delta And The Bannermen by Malcolm
Kohll, directed by Chris Clough
The Doctor and Mel win a vacation on a time-travelling tour bus to a 1950s
holiday camp. Also on the bus is Delta, the last of the Chimeron race, who
is being hunted by the genocidal Bannermen and their brutish leader,
Gavrok. When a mercenary on the bus alerts Gavrok to Delta's whereabouts,
it is up to the Doctor and Mel to stop the assassins and find a way to
give the Chimerons a new lease on life.
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Dragonfire by Ian Briggs, directed by
Chris Clough
The TARDIS lands on Iceworld, an enormous shopping complex on Svartos.
There, the Doctor and Mel meet up with a time-displaced teenaged waitress
from Earth named Ace and their old friend Sabalom Glitz. Glitz is
searching for the treasure of the legendary Dragon which is supposed to
dwell beneath Iceworld. But when the Doctor joins Glitz in his quest, they
discover more than they bargained for, unearthing the millennia-old secret
of Kane, Iceworld's murderous ruler.
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| Making History |
| Despite intense criticism from some sectors of fandom, Sylvester McCoy was praised by BBC management as the man who saved Doctor Who. The show was back in the good books -- for now. |
| Season Twenty-Five: Unfinished Business |
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Remembrance Of The Daleks by Ben
Aaronovitch, directed by Andrew Morgan
Two factions of Daleks arrive on 1963 Earth via a time corridor. They are
in search of the Hand of Omega, a powerful and ancient Gallifreyan stellar
manipulator the Doctor was hiding prior to his first inadvertent trip with
Ian and Barbara. With the help of the British army, it is up to the Doctor
and Ace to defeat both of the warring Dalek factions, even as the Daleks'
human allies infiltrate their party.
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The Happiness Patrol by Graeme Curry,
directed by Chris Clough
Terra Alpha is under the steel fist of Helen A and her executioner, a
sadistic robot made out of sweets called the Kandy Man. Joy is perpetual
on Terra Alpha, because to be unhappy invites the wrath of Helen A's crack
police force, the Happiness Patrol. Allying themselves with Terra Alpha's
repressed natives, the Pipe People, a former Happiness Patrolwoman named
Susan Q and blues player Earl Sigma, the Doctor and Ace must end Helen A's
reign of terror.
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Silver Nemesis by Kevin Clarke, directed
by Chris Clough
In the year 1638, the Doctor sent a statue called Nemesis, made out of
deadly living validium which was once Gallifrey's last line of defense,
into orbit around the Earth. In 1988, the Nemesis statue's orbit decays
and it returns to Earth, where it is pursued by three factions -- the
Cybermen; a Neo-Nazi named DeFlores; and the mad, time-travelling Lady
Peinforte, who nearly gained possession of the statue in 1738 and who
knows the darkest secrets of the Doctor's past.
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The Greatest Show In The Galaxy by
Stephen Wyatt, directed by Chris Clough
Despite Ace's protestations that she hates clowns, the Doctor takes the
TARDIS to Segonax to see the famed Psychic Circus. But upon his arrival,
the Doctor discovers the Circus has become something sinister: its
founder, Kingpin, has disappeared; the callous Chief Clown deals violently
with performers who try to flee; and prospective Circus stars must
perpetually please an enigmatic family with their act -- or be killed.
The time travellers learn that the Circus has fallen under the influence
of the evil Gods of Ragnarok, and the Doctor's next performance may prove
to be his last.
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| Making History |
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Doctor Who marked its silver anniversary in 1988, and, as if in
celebration, its ratings took a definite turn for the better. With
Sylvester McCoy now playing the Doctor in the darker, less cartoonish
manner he had desired from the beginning -- an outlook much favoured by
Andrew Cartmel and the new crop of writers he was working with on the show
-- Doctor Who had entered a period of stability the likes of which
it had not enjoyed in five years. It would not last long.
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| Season Twenty-Six: Journey's End |
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Battlefield by Ben Aaronovitch, directed
by Michael Kerrigan
The TARDIS picks up a distress call from modern-day Earth. The Doctor and
Ace discover that a UNIT platoon, led by Brigadier Bambera, has come under
assault whilst transporting a nuclear warhead. The attackers turn
out to be Arthurian knights from another dimension, led by the legendary
sorceress Morgaine, whose magical powers appear to be real. When the
Doctor meets Ancelyn, a knight opposed to Morgaine, he learns that a
future incarnation of himself will become Merlin, and that he buried King
Arthur and Excalibur beneath the waters of a nearby lake. The Doctor must
confront Morgaine, who has summoned a demonic entity known as the
Destroyer of Worlds.
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Ghost Light by Marc Platt, directed by
Alan Wareing
The Doctor takes Ace back to 1883, to a house called Gabriel Chase she
would burn down a century later after sensing a lingering presence of
evil within. In the 19th century, Gabriel Chase is the home of amateur
scientist Josiah Smith, who is conducting research into evolution against
the wishes of the Church. But there is far more to Smith than meets the
eye: he is in fact an alien who has spent millennia adapting to humanity,
and now intends to assassinate Queen Victoria and take over the British
throne. Meanwhile, buried in the basement is Smith's former master, a
powerful alien being who intends to halt all evolution on Earth. And the
Doctor has inadvertently awakened him.
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The Curse Of Fenric by Ian Briggs,
directed by Nicholas Mallett
The Doctor and Ace land in England during World War II, at a secret
seaside base which houses the Ultima Machine, a powerful codebreaking
device. But disturbances plague the installation: Russians are trying to
steal the Ultima, mysterious Viking runes are found in a church crypt, and
vampiric Haemovores are rising from the ocean. The Doctor discovers his
ancient foe, Fenric, has manipulated events in order to gain his freedom.
And central to Fenric's schemes is none other than Ace.
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Survival by Rona Munro, directed by Alan
Wareing
Ace returns to Perivale to visit her friends, only to find many of them
have gone missing. The Doctor discovers that they have been abducted to an
alien planet by a race called the Cheetah People. Pursuing them, the time
travellers find the Cheetah People are being controlled by the Master, who
is trapped on the planet, and is slowly turning into a Cheetah Person
himself. The Doctor must find a way off the planet, before they all
succumb to the dying world's animalistic influences.
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| Making History |
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With ratings dipping lower than ever for Season Twenty-Six, the decision
was finally taken to place Doctor Who on hiatus, indefinitely.
Despite persistent promises from the BBC, however, the hiatus was
effectively a cancellation, with the programme's production office closing
down soon thereafter for the first time in more than a quarter of a
century. But that would not be the end of Doctor Who...
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| 1993 Special: Echoes Of Former Glories |
| The Production Team |
| For the thirtieth-anniversary special, John Nathan-Turner returned one last time to his old job. Due to the nature of the project, no separate script editor was retained. |
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Dimensions In Time by John
Nathan-Turner and David Rodan, directed by Stuart McDonald
The Rani kidnaps the First and Second Doctors and places the other Doctors
and their companions in a time loop in Albert Square, bouncing back and
forth between 1973, 1993 and 2013 and changing identities each time. The
Rani is assembling a vast intergalactic menagerie, with which she seeks to
harness the power of a time tunnel and control galactic evolution. The
final ingredient needed is a human -- and one of the Doctor's companions
will be her next victim.
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| Making History |
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Dimensions In Time was the BBC's effort to celebrate Doctor Who's thirtieth anniversary on November 23rd, 1993. Reuniting all the surviving Doctors together with many past companions and villains, Dimensions aired in two short installments during the 1993 Children In Need telethon. It was filmed via a new process which, with the use of special glasses, permitted the viewer to watch the story in 3-D, without impeding audience members who did not use the glasses. Dimensions In Time was also a crossover with the popular BBC soap opera EastEnders, being set in the same location and featuring several cast members from that show as well. Meanwhile, there had been activity behind the scenes in trying to revive Doctor Who, either as an ongoing series again or as a feature film. BBC Enterprises (shortly to become BBC Worldwide) wanted to make a direct-to-video movie celebrating the thirtieth anniversary, entitled Lost In The Dark Dimension (or simply The Dark Dimension), featuring all the surviving Doctors. The Daltenreys group, with various partners, had been trying to raise funds for a big-screen version since 1987. Several groups, most famously a collaboration between Dalek creator Terry Nation and Cyberman co-creator (and former Doctor Who script editor) Gerry Davis, tried to acquire the rights to produce Doctor Who independently, though no deals were ever finalised. Interest even came from across North America, where Philip Segal of Columbia Pictures made inquiries about a British/American co-production. And although Segal's initial efforts bore no fruit, they would lay the groundwork for greater developments in the near future. |
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