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| The Yeti |
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 Patrick Troughton had successfully taken over the lead row and had made the part his own. Many at the time mourned the loss of William Hartnell playing the part. But a strong following for Patrick Troughton had already started. The Second Doctor was much more hands-on, more physical, and more prone to slapstick. The beginnings of this were evident in Season Four but it was in this season that they came to the fore. The type of stories reflected the more physical side that Patrick Troughton, along with Frazer Hines as companion Jamie McCrimmon, could bring to the show.
This season is renowned for its more futuristic and alien invasion storylines - Gone were the historical stories that had been the mainstay of the previous four seasons. The new format devised by Innes Lloyd and Gerry Davis truly came centre-stage with every story except for "The Enemy of the World" featuring monsters. Despite having so many monsters this season is more notable for being the first season not to include a Daleks story (apart from a complete repeat of "The Evil of the Daleks" that was shown after "The Wheel in Space"). Despite this it is still considered as the classic ‘monster’ season – and one of the best seasons of the whole show.
During this season, the Cybermen returned, for their third and fourth stories, to cause The Doctor more problems, and we were introduced to two new classic monsters: The Great Intelligence, with its dangerous servants the Yeti (in the only two stories they would appear in), and the conniving Martian soldiers - The Ice Warriors (The Ice Warriors would appear in three more stories. These being: next season’s "The Seeds of Death" and then with the Third Doctor in "The Curse of Peladon" and its sequel "The Monster of Peladon"). The Doctor would also have to face a duplicate of himself bent on world domination. But it was when the TARDIS was forced to land in the London Underground – thanks again to the interference of The Great Intelligence - that The Doctor joined forces, for the first time, with Colonel Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart (played by Nicholas Courtney). Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart is an Army Officer who would soon be promoted and would become the long lasting semi-regular character that is best known as The Brigadier of the newly created United Nations Intelligence Taskforce, or UNIT for short.
Continuing his travels with The Doctor was former Scottish piper Jamie McCrimmon (played by Frazer Hines) – who would remain with The Doctor right through his second incarnation. At the end of the previous season The Doctor and Jamie were joined by a young Victorian girl called Victoria Waterfield (played by Deborah Watling). She and Jamie would form a strong bond. So much so that Jamie would become devastated, at the end of "Fury From the Deep" - the penultimate story of this season - when Victoria elected to stay on earth rather than continue travelling in the TARDIS. The final story of the season would though introduce to the show new companion Zoe Heriot (played by Wendy Padbury).
Behind the camera major changes occurred midway through the season. Innes Lloyd's wish to leave the show was finally granted enabling him to hand over the producer’s role, as of "The Web of Fear", to Peter Bryant. Before becoming the full time producer Peter Bryant had been acting as Story Editor during the beginning of the season. As a trial he produced the season’s opening story "The Tomb of the Cybermen". With Peter Bryant now the show's permanent producer, Derrick Sherwin arrived to take over as Story Editor for the latter portion of this season.
Like the previous two seasons very few episodes survive to this day - even though this season was not as affected as much, by the junking of stories, as the previous season. Thanks to a lucky find in 1992 and 2013 we have two complete stories – the classic Cybermen story "The Tomb of the Cybermen", which was returned from Hong Kong, and "The Enemy of the World" which was discovered in Nigeria. Other gems still held in the BBC archives include: episode one of "The Abominable Snowmen" and all but episode three of its sequel "The Web of Fear" (which was also discovered in Nigeria in 2013), four of the six episodes of "The Ice Warriors" and episodes three and six of the season’s finale "The Wheel in Space". Sadly, apart from a few Australian censor clips, nothing remains of the classic "Fury From the Deep" - a story considered by many to be the greatest Doctor Who story.
Having only seven stories this has been the shortest season to-date. A trend that would continue as the demands to create more sophisticated stories continued to grow and with the prospect of the show being made in colour only just over a year away.
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| Defrosting Tombs |
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Like the previous two seasons there are very few episodes remaining in the archives but we are lucky that there is two complete stories still remaining – thanks to a surprise find, in 1992, when the "The Tomb of the Cybermen" was returned from Hong Kong, and then in 2013 "The Enemy of the World" was discovered, along with five episodes of "The Web of Fear", in Nigeria.
This story includes some notable firsts. It is the first time new companion Victoria Waterfield travels in the TARDIS; the first time we get to see Cybermats and the first appearance of the Cyber Controller. This story also includes the classic scenes of the tombs themselves (remember this was before CGI was invented). Frozen at first we get to see the tombs defrosting and the Cybermen inside start to come alive. As the Cybermen break out of their sealed compartments and make their way down to ground level, one central tomb remains sealed – inside which will emerge the Cybercontroller.
Other things to watch out for in this season include the Yeti terrorising the London Underground in "The Web of Fear" with the fantastic sets, created by David Myerscough-Jones, that were easily mistaken for being the real London Underground. Having made their debut in "The Abominable Snowmen" the Yeti proved to be so popular their return - in their sequel story, roaming the dark, claustrophobic tunnels - was to be even better. Proving they were a menace in the London Underground as well as on the Himalayan mountains.
Unfortunately the season’s best story, "Fury From the Deep", no longer exists in the BBC archives, except for a few short clips that were recovered from Australian Censors and silent 16mm colour location film. The audio soundtrack does exist and so even though we can no longer watch the seaweed creature attacking the oil rigs and The Doctor’s hair-raising piloting of the helicopter we can at least hear Victoria’s unique method of defeating the enemy. One scene that we can watch, thanks to it being considered to be the most horrifying scene in Doctor Who, is where Mr Quill and Mr Oak attack Maggie Harris in her quarters by emitting a toxic gas from their gapping mouths.
The Cybermen would return again in this season’s finale, "The Wheel in Space". Despite being another story including the menacing Cybermen, and where the Cybermats are used again to devastating effect, this story is more renowned for being the introduction of new companion Zoe Heriot. Her role on The Wheel, as the parapsychology librarian, means that she's received brainwashing-like training in logic and memory. Zoe's abilities may not be in question but The Doctor’s statement ‘Logic, my dear Zoe, merely enables one to be wrong with authority’ sums up her whole upbringing perfectly. Even though only two episodes currently exist there is just enough of this story remaining to be able to appreciate the lengths the Cybermen will go to, in their continued quest to invade Earth, and also how Victoria’s recent departure, having left a huge hole in Jamie McCrimmon’s heart, is so quickly filled.
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(Position = 8 out of 31)
(Position = 7 out of 36)
