Season 1, Episode 5 | 6 parts | First broadcast: 11 April – 16 May 1964 | Writer: Terry Nation | Director: John Gorrie
Cast
- William Hartnell as the Doctor
- Carole Ann Ford as Susan Foreman
- William Russell as Ian Chesterton
- Jacqueline Hill as Barbara Wright
- George Coulouris as Arbitan
Summary
Arriving on the planet Marinus, the travellers find an island of glass surrounded by a sea of acid, where the keeper Arbitan asks for their help recovering the four scattered keys to the Conscience of Marinus, a machine that once enforced universal peace. Setting out across the planet’s wildly varied landscapes, the group is separated into a string of self-contained mini-adventures as they race to retrieve the keys before the sinister Voord can seize the Conscience for themselves.
Interesting Facts
- The serial’s “quest across strange lands” structure, built around finding scattered keys in a series of different settings, was devised as a way for a single scriptwriter to sustain a six-part story with varied production demands.
- It was written as a replacement after an earlier commissioned script proved unworkable, and Terry Nation used the story to try ideas outside the Dalek formula that had made him famous.
- Its middle episodes were largely shot on film rather than videotape to accommodate the fast turnaround between wildly different sets and costumes.
- All six episodes survive in the BBC archive.
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