Season 3, Episode 5 | 4 parts | First broadcast: 5–26 March 1966 | Writer: Paul Erickson and Lesley Scott | Director: Michael Imison
Cast
- William Hartnell as the Doctor
- Peter Purves as Steven Taylor
- Jackie Lane as Dodo Chaplet
- Inigo Jackson as Zentos
Summary
At least ten million years into the future, the TARDIS materialises aboard a vast generation ship carrying the last survivors of humanity and their servant race, the Monoids, on a centuries-long voyage to a new world. When Dodo unknowingly brings a common cold aboard, the disease devastates a population with no immunity to it, and the travellers depart only to return centuries later to find the ship’s delicate balance of power has shifted dramatically in their absence.
Interesting Facts
- This is one of the few Doctor Who stories structured as two distinct halves separated by a leap of centuries within the same serial, letting the consequences of the travellers’ first visit play out before they return.
- The ordinary human cold becomes the story’s most dangerous threat, a rare science-fiction take on disease and immunity for the series.
- All four episodes survive complete in the BBC archive, one of only three complete serials from Season 3.
- It was one of the final stories overseen by producer John Wiles before Innes Lloyd took over the role.
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