 As with the all the stories from this season "The Brain of Morbius" contains elements that are attributed to classic horror and science fiction films. This particular story was influenced by Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, and particularly to the James Whale Frankenstein film released by Universal Studios, (the mad scientist and the stitched up corpse, the young girl's/blind woman's ignorance of the monster, the creature being chased over a cliff by torch-carrying villagers/women), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Condo's infatuation with Sarah) and Forbidden Planet (the name Morbius).
The original script was written by Terrance Dicks, using some ideas from his script of the 1974 stage play "Doctor Who and the Daleks in Seven Keys to Doomsday". However, he was out of the country when production limitations required Script Editor Robert Holmes to make substantial changes to the story. Upon returning to the UK Terrance Dicks learnt of the changes and disliked them; as a result, he demanded the replacement of his name on the credits with ‘Robin Bland’ - a pseudonym for Terrance Dicks and Robert Holmes.
The director assigned to this story was Christopher Barry, whose last Doctor Who work had been on the previous season story "Robot" – which introduced Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor.
The story was recorded entirely in studio without any location filming.
Philip Madoc, who plays Solon, has previously appeared in the Second Doctor stories "The Krotons" and "The War Games". He would return to the show in "The Power of Kroll". He also had a role in the 1966 Amicus Doctor Who film, Daleks: Invasion Earth 2150 AD, staring Peter Cushing as Doctor Who.
Colin Fay, who played the part of Solon’s servant Condo, was an opera singer.
The headless monster seen in the first and second episodes was played, un-credited, by Alan Crisp.
This story introduces the Sisterhood of Karn and delves a bit more into the history of Gallifrey – The Doctor’s home planet which is revealed is within a few billion miles of Karn. The Virgin Books’ New Adventures novel "Lungbarrow", written by Marc Platt, places Karn in Gallifrey's solar system.
Morbius was one-time leader of the High Council and tried to steer the Time Lords down a path towards destruction and conquest. He promised eternal life to his fanatical followers, many of whom were mercenaries, and came to Karn to seize the Elixir of Life. The Sisterhood was involved in his capture and Morbius was seemingly destroyed in a dispersal chamber.
It is explicitly stated that Morbius was the first Time Lord to be sentenced to execution in the race's history. Morbius is also heard to claim he is a Time Lord of the ‘First Rank’, implying levels of Time Lords.
It is revealed that the crashed spaceships are caused by the Sisterhood of Karn who guard the Sacred Flame of Life. Uniquely in the galaxy the Sisterhood are equal to Time Lords in terms of mental prowess, and in the past the Time Lords occasionally used the elixir. It is also suggested that The Doctor is sent to Karn by the Time Lords.
The Virgin Books’ New Adventures novels "Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible" (also written by Marc Platt) and "Lungbarrow" expands on who the Sisterhood are and how they came to be and their animosity with the Time Lords/Gallifrey. These stories establish that the Sisterhood of Karn are the remnants of an all-female cult that once ruled Gallifrey, which was led by the Pythia, and was outlawed when Rassilon came to power.
The Doctor is heard to state his age is 749.
Kriz, a creature killed by Condo in Part One, after its spaceship crash-lands on Karn, is identified as a Mutt, an insect species from the 1972 Third Doctor story "The Mutants". The reuse of a Solonian mutant was due to the fact that the production team did not want to spend the money to create an entirely new costume for a small role.
The Hoothi, briefly mentioned in this story, play a significantly greater role in the Virgin Books’ The New Adventures novel "Love and War" written by Paul Cornell.
The Doctor's killing of Solon marks one of the few occasions in shows history (and possibly the first) in which the character is shown directly and deliberately killing another humanoid being (although he does this while trying to stop Morbius). Other similar examples include the Fifth Doctor shooting the Cyberleader in "Earthshock" and the Sixth Doctor smothering Shockeye in "The Two Doctors". In addition similar incidents have occurred in "Day of the Daleks", "The Invasion of Time", "The Ribos Operation" and "Vengeance on Varos".
In the fourth episode images of The Doctor's previous three incarnations appear on the screen of the mind-bending machine during the battle between The Doctor and Morbius. The images of both Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee came from "The Three Doctors", while William Hartnell was represented by a photograph from "The Space Museum".
Various other images also appear during this battle of wills. While the identity of these other faces are never explicitly stated there has been a long running speculation that these are earlier incarnations of The Doctor, that precede the First Doctor. This though has since been countermanded by other information (especially in the 1983 Twentieth Anniversary Special "The Five Doctors" - also written by Terrance Dicks - where the Fifth Doctor states he is the fourth regeneration therefore confirming that the there were no previous incarnations prior to the First Doctor when the show started in 1963). The myth persists to this day, despite other stories ("Mawdryn Undead", the 1996 film "Doctor Who: The Movie" and "The Next Doctor") clearly stating that all of The Doctors' incarnations have been accounted for in the television show.
These additional images may be ‘phantom pasts’ created by The Doctor in order to fool Morbius into prolonging the struggle, thus maximising the chance of overloading his mind. Or they could be younger images of the First Doctor. It is far more likely that they are other incarnations of Morbius. In fact during the Mind Bend, we see the present day faces of Morbius and The Doctor switching back and forth, giving further credibility to the idea that the unknown faces were incarnations of Morbius, not of The Doctor.
The photographs used are of Directors; Christopher Barry and Douglas Camfield, Script Editor; Robert Holmes, Production Unit Manager; George Gallaccio, Producer; Philip Hinchcliffe, Writer; Robert Banks Stewart and Production Assistants; Chris Baker and Graeme Harper.
At the end of this story the TARDIS is seen to dematerialises instantaneously, with a flash and a puff of smoke, rather than fading away gradually. The dematerialisation sound is also played at a higher speed than usual.
As with "Genesis of the Daleks", from the previous season, this story drew criticism from National Viewers' and Listeners' Association president Mary Whitehouse who was becoming increasingly vocal in her opposition to Philip Hinchcliffe and Robert Holmes' more horrific slant on the show. It would not be the last time that Mary Whitehouse and the Doctor Who production team would come into conflict.
Australian Censors originally categorised this story as for Adults Only and the ABC screened it after their 8.30pm watershed. Subsequently the rating was revised and the story has since been screened pre-watershed in Australia.
Interestingly in the 1984 Fifth Doctor story "Planet of Fire" The Doctor visits the planet Sarn where he discovers the Numismaton Flame. Given the similarity of the planets’ names (Karn and Sarn) they may be the same planet at very different periods of history. (Sarn is equivalent with twentieth century Earth while Karn is far in Sarah's future).
The story was repeated on BBC One as a sixty minute omnibus in 1976.
The initial home-video release of this story (released in July 1984) used a heavily edited omnibus movie print, with a running time of less than an hour. This was apparently in an attempt to make the story acceptable for young viewers. This edit was heavily criticised and eventually an uncut version was released in July 1990. Similar edits have not been released for any of the other stories.
The BBC Books’ The Past Doctors Stories novel "Warmonger", written by Terrance Dicks, is both a sequel and prequel to this story and covers much of Morbius's reign before he was captured by the Time Lords. This story also explains how Morbius's brain survived his execution and the Fifth Doctor's involvement in the surrounding events.
Morbius is briefly resurrected, after the events of this story, and comes much closer to overthrowing the Time Lords in the Eighth Doctor Big Finish Productions audio story "Vengeance of Morbius".
The audiobook, read by Tom Baker, of the Target novelisation of this story, which was released by the BBC in February 2008, was broadcast, in eight parts, on BBC Radio 7 in April 2010.
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The Firsts:
The first Doctor Who story to be written under the pseudonym of Robin Bland.
The first (and only) Doctor Who story to have a heavily edited omnibus home-video release.
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(Position = 38 out of 159)
(Position = 40 out of 200)
