Settings: The War Machines

The last serial of the third season is another one available to watch in its original form. Fan opinion tends to divide between ‘middling’ and ‘good’, which is a positive for the Hartnell era. It’s significant in being the first full-length story with a contemporary setting where the protagonists can interact with the people around them. Naturally, this makes for a different type of story than space opera sci-fi or most time-travel games. Moreover, it’s one where the focus is not on the setting, since that’s merely today’s world (or what was today’s world at the time of broadcast). Although this will become more common later, this is the only instance in the Hartnell era, so let’s see how that affects things.

Where & When

The date is specifically stated: the main story takes place between the 12th and 14th July 1966, with the brief final scene six days later, on the 20th. The action is almost entirely confined to the West End of central London, from Bloomsbury to Fitzrovia. 

Settings: The Savages

After a brief respite, we’re back to stories that are entirely missing again, with another piece of relatively high-concept science fiction. The opinion of those who have watched the fan restorations or listened to the soundtrack is generally not positive. This may be because of the time spent building up the setting, and how long it takes to get to the action, and, as always, it’s worth noting that there are dissenting voices that find it a worthy story. This may improve now that the soundtrack has been animated and, in any event, something that’s strong on setting is a perfect fit for what I’m doing here…

Where & When

The story is set on an unnamed human colony world in the “far future”. With no other reference points, it’s impossible to say just how far into the future this is, or, for that matter, whether the planet is in our own galaxy or another. A common interpretation among fans is that it is set after the destruction of Earth, perhaps thousands or millions of years after The End of the World, but that’s merely a guess.

Settings: The OK Corral (The Gunfighters)

There’s practically a rule in TV series that involve time travel that, sooner or later, at least one episode must be a Western. Based on the same historical event as Star Trek’s “Spectre of the Gun”, this is classic Doctor Who’s offering. While it has the benefit of surviving in its original form, it is regarded as middling to weak by most fans. 

That may partly be due to the English actors not making convincing Americans, and partly due to the comedic tone of the early episodes, but perhaps mainly because it is narrated using a repetitive song. Fortunately, few RPGs insist that the GM sing out descriptions of events, so we can at least escape that element.

Where & When

Because the gunfight is a famous historical event, this is another serial that we can date precisely: it takes place on the 25th and 26th of October 1881. Most of the story is set in the town of Tombstone in what was then the Arizona Territory of the United States.

Settings: The Celestial Toyroom

This next story is, arguably, the most divisive in the show’s history. According to review aggregator websites, fans are pretty much evenly split as to whether it’s a masterpiece, complete rubbish, or somewhere in between. Given the simple nature of the plot, it’s unlikely that the fact that it’s largely missing makes much difference here, especially now that an animated version exists. Whether or not it would succeed as an RPG scenario is, perhaps, something that equally relies on the tastes of the players.

What’s more significant for these posts, however, is that, like The Edge of Destruction, it doesn’t fit with the usual format. So, as with that story, this is going to be a placeholder post rather than something more detailed. Largely because there isn’t much detail to go into.

Settings: The Ark and Refusis

It’s not until we reach this, the sixth story, that we find a third-season serial that fully survives in its original form. While the story is relatively high-concept and uses an unusual plot device for the show, it’s widely regarded as a middling example of its kind, rather than anything particularly memorable (for good or ill). The biggest problem is that the underlying message of the story can be interpreted negatively if one takes the Human/Monoid relationship as a metaphor for apartheid-era South Africa or for the southern US at the time of broadcast. But so long as we don’t play it that way, this doesn’t have to be insurmountable.

Where & When

The first part of the story is set ten million years in the future, on a vast spaceship travelling between the stars. The second half takes place on the planet Refusis II, seven centuries after the first. This is apparently a very long way from Earth, perhaps not even in our galaxy, although we don’t have any specifics.

Settings: The St Bartholomew's Day Massacre

Following The Daleks' Master Plan, we’re back with another historical, and this time it’s perhaps the most obscure period of history the show has picked for such a story – at least for those of us who aren’t French. It’s another one that tends to divide opinion, with older fans regarding it as above-average for the era, and newer ones generally disdaining it. A lot of that may have to do with the fact that it’s entirely missing, with just a few publicity photos surviving and not even the on-set shots and stills that we normally have. Leaving that aside, let’s see what we can do with a story that not only leaves out the sci-fi elements but is set during a period most players probably have very little knowledge of.

Where & When

For the first time, we return to a previous setting for a full-length story: Paris. As with The Reign of Terror, it’s built around a real-world historical event, so we can state the date precisely: it takes place between the 20th and 24th of August 1572.

Settings: Giza (The Daleks' Master Plan, Pt 2)

The second half of The Dalek’s Master Plan covers even more settings than the first, including, as it does, a whistle-stop journey through time and space in the style of the mid-section of The Chase. However, most of these settings are visited only briefly, so we don’t have scope to say much that’s definitive about them. While the focus of this post will therefore be the section of the story set in Ancient Egypt, I will also take a quick look at the other places we see.

Where & When

Before returning to Kembel for the conclusion of the story, the protagonists make short stops at various locations on 20th-century Earth before arriving on the planet Tigus. This is uninhabited, leaving the date both irrelevant and impossible to determine. The main setting of this half of the story, however, is Ancient Egypt. This section is set in the Giza pyramid complex at an unspecified date in the early 26th century BC.