 The name of this story was influenced by the novel "Journey to the Centre of the Earth" by Jules Verne. It is the first televised Doctor Who story to include the word ‘TARDIS’ in its title.
At seven words long, this story shares the record for the longest televised story title to date with "The Doctor, The Widow and the Wardrobe", which also is a title inspired by a book.
This story has been written by Stephen Thompson, the author of the 2011 story "The Curse of the Black Spot". He had previously worked with Steven Moffat on the acclaimed Sherlock for which he has written two episodes: 'The Blind Banker' and 'The Reichenbach Fall'. Stephen Thompson has also written for the ITV serial Whistleblowers and is the author of several plays including the award-winning Damages.
Lead writer and Executive Producer Steven Moffat gave the concept of a story discovering the centre of the TARDIS to writer Stephen Thompson as he was ‘haunted’ by the 1978 Fourth Doctor story "The Invasion of Time", which was set on the TARDIS but used hastily-constructed sets. Stephen Thompson was also interested in mathematics and has remarked, ‘anything involving multi-dimensional geometry gets me excited’. Steven Moffat left the rest of the story to be developed by Stephen Thompson.
This story was directed by Mat King, his first work on the show. Mat King has directing experience on a wide variety of television productions including in Australia and the USA. His credits include the television movie Star Runners for the American Sci-Fi Channel, Spirit Warriors and Holby City for the BBC, and DCI Banks and Law & Order: for ITV - the latter starring Freema Agyeman who played the Tenth Doctor’s travelling companion Martha Jones.
This story guest-stars Ashley Walters (also known as Asher D) playing the part of Gregor Van Baalen. Ashley Walters has been acting professionally since he was 10 years old, when he had a guest role in The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. He went on to have a regular part in the long-running BBC children's series Grange Hill, and has appeared in many other television productions including Storm Damage, Urban Gothic, Dark Realm, Holby City, the sci-fi drama Outcasts and Series Four of Hustle as Billy Bond. His film work includes appearances in Anuvahood, Speed Racer, Alex Rider: Stormbreaker, and Goal!. As well as acting he is a successful rap artist and performed as part of the group So Solid Crew, writing the lyrics to their 2001 Number One hit, "21 Seconds".
Ashley Walters was in trouble with the producers on the first day of filming when he tweeted a picture of himself, in his costume in his trailer, with the word ‘space’. The picture was immediately removed.
The part of Bram van Baalen is played by Mark Oliver who starred alongside Matt Smith in the BBC’s 2009 series Moses Jones.
Sarah Louise Madison, Ruari Mears and Paul Kasey are credited on-screen as Time Zombies, but not in the Radio Times.
The read through for this story was held immediately after production of the 2012 Christmas special "The Snowmen" was completed - on Wednesday 29th August 2012. It took place in the BBC’s Roath Lock studios in Cardiff.
Principle filming began on Tuesday 4th September 2012 and ran through to Monday 24th September.
Except for a few scenes, this story is set entirely within the TARDIS. The vast majority of this story was therefore filmed in studio but the scene on the edge of a rocky ravine was shot on location in the Argoed Isha Quarry in the Vale of Glamorgan on Wednesday 28th November 2012.
This story is important to this season’s narrative arc, it also contains the first instance of the Eleventh Doctor confronting Clara Oswald about her multiple lives and deaths.
The Doctor is heard to state that the TARDIS is 'infinite'.
When Clara explores one of the TARDIS’ many rooms she finds The Doctor’s cot, first seen in "A Good Man Goes to War" and what looks to be Amy’s toy TARDIS from "Let’s Kill Hitler". She also comes across a magnifying glass - possibly the one used by The Doctor in the console room in "The Power of Three" and that Donna Noble used in the 2008 Tenth Doctor story "The Unicorn and the Wasp"- and an umbrella that looks very similar to the one The Doctor had in the 1987 Seventh Doctor story "Paradise Towers".
During Clara’s exploration of the TARDIS she passes several rooms mentioned before in the show, such as the swimming pool which was first seen in the 1978 Fourth Doctor story "The Invasion of Time". It was also mentioned by The Doctor in "The Eleventh Hour" and it was heard, but not seen, in "Day of the Moon" when River Song falls off a building and landed safely in the swimming pool.
Clara also discovers that the TARDIS has an observatory with a telescope that resembles the light chamber from Torchwood Estate that was seen in the 2006 Tenth Doctor story "Tooth and Claw".
She is seen hiding from the Time Zombies in the TARDIS library which has been mentioned many times, most notably in "The Eleventh Hour" when The Doctor tells young Amelia about the swimming pool in the library.
While in the library Clara discovers that The Doctor has kept a book titled "History of the Last Great Time War". This war, between the Daleks and the Time Lords, has been mentioned several times since the shows' revival in 2005.
The library also contains the Encyclopaedia Gallifreya, which is knowledge in liquid form contained in glass bottles.
When the one of these bottles leaks we hear knowledge ebbing away, you might just be able to catch the familiar voice of Timothy Dalton as Rassilon from the 2009/10 Tenth Doctor story "The End of Time".
The TARDIS's Cloister Bell is heard after the TARDIS is pulled out of flight and suffers heavy damage to the console room. This is the second story in a row where we hear the Cloister Bell as it was also heard in the preceding story "Hide". It was introduced in the 1980 Fourth Doctor story "Logopolis" and warns of impending or immediate danger.
Tricky mistakenly describing the TARDIS as ‘some kind of escape pod’ and The Doctor tells Clara that the TARDIS is not like a ‘cheese grater’.
The TARDIS display, that declares ‘Engine Status: Overload’, also mentions the Console room, Eye of Harmony, Library, Observatory, and Arch-Recon. All these rooms are seen in this story, although Arch-Recon is named fully as the architectural reconfiguration system.
This is the third time The Doctor has forced others into helping him, by threatening to blow the TARDIS up, once again admitting that the TARDIS self-destruct is a hoax. The first time he did this was in the 1985 Sixth Doctor story "Attack of the Cybermen" and the second time was in the 2010 story "Victory of the Daleks".
The TARDIS' sentience is alluded to yet again when the salvage team tries to open it, Tricky senses that she seems to ‘suffer’.
When Bram tries to dismantle the TARDIS console we hear an audio mosaic of lines from previous stories - some more clearly than others. We initially catch The Doctor’s granddaughter, Susan, from the 1963 First Doctor story "An Unearthly Child", revealing how the initials of TARDIS stand for ‘Time and Relative Dimension in Space’. Also from that story, towards the end of the sequence, you can hear Ian Chesterton expressing his astonishment at the nature of the ship! The clips heard in this scene are, in respective order:- The voice of Susan saying ‘I made up the name TARDIS from the initials: Time and Relative Dimension In Space’ ("An Unearthly Child", episode 1).
- The Eleventh Doctor saying ‘You sexy thing! and then Idris (the TARDIS in human form) replying ‘See, you do call me that! Is it my name?’ followed by The Doctor's exclamation of ‘You bet it's your name!’ ("The Doctor's Wife").
- The Third Doctor saying ‘The TARDIS is dimensionally transcendental’ and his companion, Jo Grant, asking him ‘What does that mean?’ ("Colony in Space", episode 1).
- The Fourth Doctor discussing trans-dimensional engineering with Leela ‘That's trans-dimensional engineering. A key Time Lord discovery’ ("The Robots of Death" - episode 1).
- The Ninth Doctor saying to Rose Tyler ‘The assembled hordes of Genghis Khan couldn't get through that door, and believe me they've tried’ ("Rose").
- Martha Jones struggling to understand the TARDIS ‘It's just a box with that room crammed in!’ ("Smith and Jones").
- Amy Pond saying ‘We're in space!’ ("The Beast Below").
- Ian Chesterton asking The Doctor ‘It can move anywhere in time and space?’ ("An Unearthly Child", episode 1).
- The Fifth Doctor asking ‘You've changed the desktop theme, haven't you?’ ("Time Crash").
The Eye of Harmony is seen in its entirety for the first time in this story. It is revealed to be a star caught at the moment of collapse into a singularity. It was partially seen within the TARDIS in the 1996 Eighth Doctor television movie "Doctor Who: The Movie". It was also referenced in "Hide".
Previously Tegan Jovanka and Nyssa reported feeling increased gravitational effects as they approached the centre of the TARDIS (see the 1982 Fifth Doctor story "Castrovalva").
The TARDIS again reconfigures its internal architecture. (see "Logopolis" and "The Eleventh Hour").
The Doctor states that the architectural reconfiguration system is made from living metal (see "Robot" and "Silver Nemesis").
The TARDIS has ‘echo’ copies of the control room (see "The Doctor's Wife").
The Doctor uses the TARDIS extractor fans again, this time activating them from the console rather than by vocal command (see "Let's Kill Hitler" and "The Angels Take Manhattan").
Although the action was normal before the show was revived in 2005, this is the first time since the revival that The Doctor has closed the TARDIS doors from the console, rather than manually shutting them.
The Doctor interacts with a past version of himself as he did in "The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang" and "Space/Time").
Tricky thinks he's an android, as this is what his brothers told him. This was a cruel joke as a means of relieving boredom during the long hours in space between salvage operations and so that Gregor could take command of the salvage ship.
Clara briefly learns The Doctor's true name, in the Time War book she found in the library, but then forgets it when The Doctor rewrites the entire adventure. This makes her the second person (other than The Doctor himself) in a televised story who is explicitly stated to know The Doctor's true name, the first being River Song in "Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead".
The Doctor comments that the Time Lords had 'dreadful hats' (see The Deadly Assassin", "The Invasion of Time", The Trial of a Time Lord season of stories and "The End of Time".) He further mentions that they had bad fashion sense, but were very, very smart.
The events of this story are influenced by a crack in time, formed by a rupture in the TARDIS engines. A similar crack in time was formed, in Season Thirty One (New Series 5), by the destruction of the TARDIS and The Doctor once again steps through a crack in time and space to undo events as he did in the 2010 story "The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang".
Until this story Clara was unaware that she had two other lives. The Doctor is heard to mention the Dalek Asylum ("Asylum of the Daleks") and their battle against The Great Intelligence in Victorian London ("The Snowmen"). Clara however, forgets their conversation when The Doctor rewrites time.
Despite time being rewritten, Gregor remembers something that The Doctor had told him not to forget (see also "The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang").
This story was first shown on Jenna-Louise Coleman's 27th birthday.
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The Firsts:
The Eye of Harmony is seen in its entirety for the first time.
The first Doctor Who story to be directed by Mat King.
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(Position = 8 out of 9)
(Position = 201 out of 241)
