 This story was the first of three loosely connected stories known as "The Black Guardian Trilogy", and introduced Mark Strickson as new companion, Vislor Turlough, as well as reintroducing Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (aka The Brigadier) and The Black Guardian.
"The Black Guardian Trilogy" is the third "trilogy" during John Nathan-Turner’s time as producer - the first two being the E-Space adventures in Season Eighteen and the Season Eighteen to Season Nineteen bridge of The Master stories.
This trilogy also sees the introduction of a concept favoured by Script Editor Eric Saward, of an ‘evil’ companion whose presence would heighten the level of suspense in Doctor Who. It was intended that Turlough would join The Doctor in the first part of the trilogy ("Mawdryn Undead"), while secretly acting as an agent of The Black Guardian. He would try to destroy the Time Lord in the second story ("Terminus"), and this would build up to a climactic confrontation with The Black Guardian in the final story ("Enlightenment") when a decision would then be made as to whether the character would continue in the show.
The role of the new companion went to Mark Strickson, whose television work to date had included Strangers and Juliet Bravo. Mark Strickson even turned down a regular role in the hospital drama Angels so that he could join Doctor Who.
Because Mark Strickson was visually very similar to Peter Davison - especially his blond, longish hair - Make-up Designer Sheelagh Wells came up with an efficient way of dying Mark Strickson’s hair ginger. His hair was also cropped shorter than Peter Davison’s.
In this story Valentine Dyall reprises his role as The Black Guardian - who had last appeared in the 1979 Fourth Doctor story "The Armageddon Factor" at the end of Season Sixteen. In "Mawdryn Undead" The Black Guardian enlists the help of stranded alien Turlough to wage vengeance on The Doctor for his earlier crime of sabotaging his plans to obtain The Key to Time.
Originally the third story for Season Twenty would have been given to the long-delayed "Song of the Space Whale" (or "Space Whale"), in which Turlough would have been one of a group of colonists.
In 1978, comic book writer Pat Mills (whose credits included "Judge Dredd" for 2000AD) and his writing partner John Wagner had approached then-Script Editor Anthony Read about writing for Doctor Who. The writing duo developed a storyline which was finally submitted to the Doctor Who production office in 1980. Pat Mills and John Wagner, and Eric Saward when he came on board the show in 1981, continued working on this story. However, after a number of changes, including amending it from a Fourth Doctor story to one featuring the Fifth Doctor, John Wagner becoming increasingly unhappy with the project, and he was released from his involvement. Despite work continuing on this storyline, including the introduction of Turlough and The Black Guardian, a, disagreement arose between Pat Mills and Eric Saward as to the portrayal of several characters and ideas. Finally, it became clear that "The Song of the Space Whale" would not be ready to serve as Turlough’s introductory story and so it was abandoned.
The late cancellation of "The Song of the Space Whale" meant that a replacement story was needed at short notice. Peter Grimwade, who had previously contributed "Time-Flight" at the end of Season Nineteen, had been working on an idea inspired by the legend of the Flying Dutchman and the gimmick of action occurring in the same place at vastly different times. Entitled "Mawdryn Undead" this story was under consideration for later in the season or perhaps the next. Peter Grimwade agreed to hurriedly prepared "Mawdryn Undead" as a replacement.
Several changes to Peter Grimwade’s original concept were necessary in order for "Mawdryn Undead" to work as the first part of the new trilogy. Not only would Turlough and The Black Guardian need to be included, but Peter Grimwade’s initial plan for his two ‘time zones’ to be centuries apart would have to be changed to a matter of just a few years. This was to enable the inclusion of a character who would be present in both ‘time zones’.
The original idea was that William Russell might reprise his role as Ian Chesterton, one of the original regulars from the programmes’ first two seasons (from 1963 – 1965) - hence the school setting as Ian Chesterton was a science teacher. Unfortunately, the shooting schedule for this story was in direct conflict with William Russell’s theatre work. Ian Marter (who played Harry Sullivan) was then approached but he too was busy.
The production team then contacted Nicholas Courtney, who had played the popular Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. John Nathan-Turner had met Nicholas Courtney at Tom Baker’s farewell party in early 1981 where Nicholas Courtney had indicated his desire to return to Doctor Who. Having last appeared in the 1975 Fourth Doctor story "Terror of the Zygons" Nicholas Courtney confirmed he was interested and consequently The Brigadier was inserted into Peter Grimwade’s scripts - now retired and teaching maths.
Nicholas Courtney was made up slightly differently to play the two versions of The Brigadier. The 1977 version retained the character’s familiar moustache, while The Brigadier in 1983 was clean-shaven and also had greyer hair, including a bald spot.
The inclusion of The Brigadier in this story’s two ‘time zones’ (1977 and 1983) however, contradict established Doctor Who history as in the 1975 Fourth Doctor story "Pyramids of Mars", companion Sarah Jane Smith indicated that she comes from 1980 - and so (according to this story) after The Brigadier had retired! This anomaly was pointed out by fan consultant Ian Levine but the production team ignored his advice, preferring to retain the hook of setting part of "Mawdryn Undead" during Queen Elizabeth’s Silver Jubilee so resulting in perhaps the shows’ most notorious continuity error.
Strangely the Radio Times credits Nicholas Courtney as ‘Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart’ in the combined cast for episodes one and two, and as ‘Brigadier’ in the combined cast for episodes three and four. All on-screen credits read ‘The Brigadier’.
As had been done during the recording of the previous season, there was an eleven-week break prior to the start of production of this story to allow Peter Davison to make the third (and, as it transpired, final) season of the sitcom Sink or Swim.
The Director allocated to this story was Peter Moffatt, who had last worked on last season’s "The Visitation".
David Collings, who played Mawdryn, also appeared in the Fourth Doctor stories "Revenge of the Cybermen", as Vorus, and "The Robots of Death", as Poul. He would himself play an alternate Doctor in the Big Finish Productions Doctor Who Unbound audio story "Full Fathom Five".
Angus MacKay, who played the Headmaster, previously played the part of Borusa in "The Deadly Assassin".
The cast for this story also includes Sian Pattenden (young Tegan Jovanka), Lucy Baker (young Nyssa) and stunt doubles Nick Gillard, Mark McRide, Richard Sheekey and Paul Heasman - all are uncredited.
This story follows directly on from "Snakedance" with Tegan, during the opening sequence, still unsure if she is finally free of the Mara. This was the scene that was postponed from "Snakedance" due to the final episode of that story overrunning.
For the third year running, John Nathan-Turner arranged for a story to feature a montage of old clips. This occurred in this story with a flashback sequence of clips from earlier stories when the 1983 version of The Brigadier, who has been suffering the effects of a nervous breakdown, regains his memory of The Doctor. They were used so as to highlight The Doctor’s past relationship with The Brigadier.
During The Brigadier’s flashback he sees: Yeti ("The Web of Fear"), Cybermen ("The Invasion"), the Axons ("The Claws of Axos"), Daleks ("Day of the Daleks"), the First Doctor ("The Three Doctors"), the Second Doctor ("The Three Doctors"), the Third Doctor ("Spearhead From Space"), the K1 Robot ("Robot"), a Zygon and the Fourth Doctor ("Terror of the Zygons"). All of the clips were shown in sepia tinted black and white. As well as featuring The Brigadier in his previous rank, as Colonel, former companions Liz Shaw, Jo Grant and Sarah Jane Smith are also seen.
Meanwhile, other continuity was revealed including The Brigadier talking of thirty years of soldiering. The Brigadier also has a photograph of himself from his UNIT days. He also reveals that Sergeant Benton left the army in 1979, to sell second hand cars, and that Harry Sullivan had been seconded to NATO and was last heard of doing something ‘hush hush’ at Porton Down.
It is revealed that The Brigadier left UNIT in 1976 and started teaching at a public school. Shortly after, he appeared to suffer from a nervous breakdown, actually caused by meeting his future self, and many of his memories of UNIT were temporarily lost. Later stories "The Five Doctors" and "Battlefield" would reveal that he later re-established his relationship with UNIT.
It soon becomes apparent that Turlough is clearly not of Earth. The headmaster states that his parents are dead. Turlough seems to wish to return home (see "The King's Demons" and "Planet of Fire"). Turlough’s origins though are not finally explained until "Planet of Fire".
The transmat capsule shares certain properties with the TARDIS, most notably dimensional transcendence, and the transmat beam interferes with the TARDIS workings. Although not explicitly stated, the action on Mawdryn’s ship towards the end of the story must take place in 1983, or else there would be no spacecraft for The Doctor to avoid at the beginning, and no capsule for Turlough to discover. Strangely Tegan seems to know a lot about transmits. This though could be due to her experiences in Virgin Books’ The Missing Adventures novel "Cold Fusion" by Lance Parkin.
It is revealed that when people from two different time zones touch there is a large explosion of energy as the time differential is ‘shorted’, known as the Blinovitch Limitation Effect (see also "Day of the Daleks", where it is described in different terms). Presumably Time Lords are immune to this (see "The Three Doctors", "The Five Doctors" and "The Two Doctors").
The Doctor is heard to state once more that he can only regenerate twelve times, and has done so four times already (see the 1976 Fourth Doctor story "The Deadly Assassin"). This confirms that there were no earlier incarnations before the ‘first’ incarnation played by William Hartnell.
In the fourth episode, The Doctor is heard to say that he might try to ‘reverse the polarity of the neutron flow’. This phrase is often associated with the Third Doctor.
At one point Mawdryn finds in the TARDIS and wears the red coat worn by the Fourth Doctor.
Interestingly ‘Mawdryn’ is a Welsh word meaning ‘undead’ - making the title of this story read "Undead Undead".
Peter Grimwade’s previous story, "Time-Flight", also takes place in two different times.
Another example of Time Lord technology being used to create perpetual regeneration was seen in the 1978 Fourth Doctor story "Underworld".
| |
|
The Firsts:
The first story of the "The Black Guardian Trilogy" mini-series
The introduction of companion Vislor Turlough played by Mark Strickson.
The first re-appearance of The Brigadier (played by Nicholas Courtney) since the 1975 Fourth Doctor story "Terror of the Zygons".
The first appearance of the Black Guardian for 4 years - since the 1979 Fourth Doctor story "The Armageddon Factor".
|
|
(Position = 76 out of 159)
(Position = 102 out of 200)
