 This story was hastily commissioned from Terry Nation when another of his stories, apparently a revival of his abandoned Season One historical "The Red Fort", fell through.
This story is the third adventure featuring the Daleks, and the only story to feature the Beatles.
This story introduces new companion Steven Taylor played by Peter Purves in the final episode, although he is seen earlier in this story playing the role of tourist (Morton Dill, the young man from Alabama) whom the travellers meet at the top of the Empire State Building. This won him the role of Steven.
Earlier drafts of the story used the names "Bruck" and "Michael" for the character of the captured astronaut, before settling on "Steven".
This story features the departure of Jacqueline Hill (who plays Barbara Wright) and William Russell (who plays Ian Chesterton).
Jacqueline Hill, who played companion Barbara Wright, returned to Doctor Who to play Lexa in "Meglos" in the Fourth Doctor's final season. Jacqueline Hill passed away in the late 1990's.
The scenes viewed on The Time Space Visualiser include: Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, William Shakespeare and Elizabeth I discussing Falstaff and The Beatles.
It was originally planned for The Beatles to appear as themselves, but under heavy "aging" make-up, to represent themselves in the future. This though was objected by their manager and so instead a clip of them singing "Ticket to Ride" was taken from an episode of Top of the Pops that was broadcast on the 15 April 1965. In an unusual twist, the original version of the performance has now been junked, and the only surviving footage is the 25 seconds in this story.
Vicki's mention of a statue of The Beatles in Liverpool predicts the real-life memorial that exists there today.
The scenes of Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address were realised with an actor in this production instead of with stock footage as initially planned.
William Shakespeare and Queen Elizabeth I both reappear in the Tenth Doctor story "The Shakespeare Code".
This is the first story in which Daleks sport solar panels around their midsections, thus making them energy-independent; this feature would remain throughout the rest of the show's history. In "The Dalek Invasion of Earth", the Daleks used dishes to receive energy from a central antenna, and in "The Daleks", they drew static electricity from the metal floors of their city.
It is strongly implied in this story that the Daleks have the power of flight; they are seen moving on two levels of the Marie Celeste, and the cliffhanger to the first episode shows a Dalek that has been buried in sand free itself by rising vertically. It would not be until the 1985 Seventh Doctor story "Revelation of the Daleks" that a Dalek would actually be shown airborne.
This is one of the few Dalek stories to incorporate humour, and is the only story to attempt comical performances from the Daleks, including a stammering Dalek who cannot do simple mental arithmetic.
Some of the Daleks appearing in this story were created by Shawcraft Models for the 1965 Amicus Doctor Who film Doctor Who and the Daleks, staring Peter Cushing as Doctor Who. Although the plan had been to refurbish them to resemble the television Daleks, this proved to be impractical, and the borrowed Daleks were therefore used only in the background of shots. As this story was broadcast before the movie was released, this marks the first appearance of the movie Daleks.
The Daleks would return to the Empire State Building in the Tenth Doctor story "Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks".
In the last two episodes the robots the time travellers encounter are called 'Mechonoids' throughout the scripts and in the closing credits of the final episode. However, the name was spelt 'Mechanoid' in the closing credits of the fifth episode. As this is the name first seen on screen it has been adopted as the correct spelling.
The Big Finish Productions Sixth Doctor audio story, "The Juggernauts", features resurrected Mechanoids.
The sequences, in the final episode, with Barbara and Ian back on Earth in the bus were filmed as part of the recording block for the following story, "The Time Meddler" and were directed by that story's director, Douglas Camfield.
In 1966 an audio of the final episode was edited together with new narration (provided by David Graham) and released on a 33 rpm vinyl album by Century 21 Records in the UK and by Astor Records in Australia.
A novelisation of this story, written by John Peel, was published by Target Books in July 1989. It was the first of several Dalek story novelisations John Peel would write after Target came to an agreement with Terry Nation's estate. Because many of the changes made to Nation's original script were for timing and budgetary reasons, rather than artistic ones, John Peel restored most of Nation's original ideas in his novelisation. The one exception was omitting the fifty-year reunion of the Beatles, since by the time John Peel came to write the novel, Beatle John Lennon had been killed.
This story was released alongside "Remembrance of the Daleks" in a special Dalek tin set titled "The Daleks: Limited Edition Boxed Set" on VHS in 1993 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Doctor Who.
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The Firsts:
The introduction of new companion Steven Taylor played by Peter Purves.
The first Doctor Who story to include music from the Beatles.
The first appearance of the Mechonoids.
The first use of non-purpose built Daleks - These being cinema film Daleks.
The first time a monster would appear in more than one story in the same season. These being the Daleks.
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(Position = 122 out of 159)
(Position = 157 out of 200)
