| 04: The Gallifreyan Recommencement | |
 Preceeded by Sentinel Followed by Rapture The Heavens | |
| Featured cast | |
| The Doctor | Matthew Kopelke |
| Chloe Richards | Lorna Hill |
| Production notes | |
| Recorded | December 1999 |
| Released | Part 1: March 2000 Part 2: May 2000 Part 3: July 2000 Part 4: Sep. 2000 |
The Doctor's having a bad day. Not only has his power capacitor overloaded, but he's been sitting on a temporal fault-line for several weeks, and no-one has bothered to tell him. But that's not his biggest problem.
Paul's having a bad day. Not only has he been sent on his first field correction on his own, but he's managed to run into the most famous of all renegade Time Lords - the Doctor. But that's not his biggest problem.
Chloe's having a bad day. Not only is the Doctor refusing to get into the holiday mood, but there's hippies wearing only red and green paint dancing around the streets of Blackpool. But that's not her biggest problem.
From the depths of time, an old enemy of the Doctor's returns, and this time, he wants to kill the Doctor - completely, totally, and utterly, and he's prepared to go to any measures to achieve his goal.
It's no-one's day today.
Crew[]
Recording, post-production & CD mastering: Matthew Kopelke. Music: Peter Howell, Howard Richardson, & John Carpenter. Series theme: Ron Grainer. Realisation: Dominic Glynn. Cover illustration and packaging design: Chris Sutor. Press & PR: David Hutchison. Recording: BTR's Lacaroo Street Studios. Script Editor: Witold Tietze. Producer: Matthew Kopelke. Director: Scott Marshall.
Downloads[]
Plot[]
Part One: Chloe is annoyed to find the Doctor has been working non-stop for nearly a week carrying out repairs on the Tardis. They are taking a break at a holiday resort in Blackpool, but Chloe is bored with watching the Doctor working all the time. Despite promising to take some time off and relax, the Doctor continues working all-but uninterrupted.
Meanwhile, the Time Lords detect a temporal fluctuation developing on Earth in 1971. Tlancyravel, a field operative, is sent to track down and correct the disturbance.
After the Doctor and Chloe attend the Illuminations, the Doctor announces he's nearly finished the repair work, and unveils a side project he's also been working on. A neighbour asking to borrow some lentils gets the surprise of his life as K9 mk.IV trundles forward to shoo him away.
Tlancyravel arrives on the Golden Mile, his Tardis cloaking itself around a Punch and Judy stall. The stall's owner, William E. Sims Esq., is mortified to discover he's been locked out of his own stall.
K9 and the Doctor both determine through various means that someone is using a temporal tracking device nearby. They locate the device and find Tlancyravel, who by coincidence has been tracking down the Tardis – while the Doctor's been working on his repairs, something inside has been generating ripples of up to 2.2 on the Bocca Scale.
The Doctor lets Tlancyravel into the Tardis in order to find the cause of the disturbance, and they find the Cloister Bell is tolling. The Doctor leaves to investigate this, and Tlancyravel is struck by a bolt of energy from the Tardis console. The Master revels in this new body, and swears he is now able to kill the Doctor outright.
Part Two: The Doctor suddenly returns, and explains that on a previous occasion, he had trapped the Master in a pure chronal energy form inside the Tardis' systems, and attempted to disperse him throughout the Vortex – apparently without success, it now appears. Checking over the instruments, the Doctor discovers that the Master has escaped.
Chloe takes the news of the Master's escape badly, and reminds the Doctor of the deal they made when she came on board. K9 and the Doctor persuade Chloe to take a night's rest before they deal with the problem.
The next morning, the group find the Doctor's car has been stolen. The Doctor is incensed, and storms off to the local police station, leaving K9 with Tlancyravel to continue their search. At the police station, the Doctor is given some unexpected assistance by Detective Inspector McAndrews, who is also a UNIT operative with a message to deliver: a note from the Doctor to himself telling him to get back on the search for the Master.
The Doctor and Chloe arrive at the Golden Mile, where they locate the Punch and Judy stall housing Tlancyravel's Tardis, and the body of William E. Sims – which confirms the Doctor's suspicions that the Master has been masquerading as Tlancyravel ever since they were inside his Tardis. The Doctor tries to talk to the Master inside this Tardis, but only succeeds in attracting the attention of a policeman, who arrests the Doctor and Chloe on suspicion of murdering Sims. The Master makes use of the distraction to leave.
Part Three: The Doctor and Chloe are questioned over the death of Sims, but only reveal details to Det. Insp. McAndrews, in order to have the matter handled by UNIT. As the group are leaving the police station, they stumble across the Doctor's car – crashed into the building by a joyrider. McAndrews arrests the joyrider, and the Doctor and Chloe take a taxi back to their apartment.
Back at the Tardis, the Doctor plugs K9's hard drive into the console and extracts what K9 had learned during their excursion: the Master had set course to travel back to Ancient Gallifrey. They set off in pursuit, the Doctor harbouring reservations over the Tardis' ability to travel back to before Gallifrey had achieved time travel...
On the night before the Remote Stellar Manipulator mission is due to be launched, Omega finds Rassilon at work calculating last-minute course corrections. Omega tells Rassilon of his wife's concerns for his welfare, and of his own worries over the uses the Remote Stellar Manipulator would be put to if the mission is successful. Rassilon is confident of the mission's success, and promises that he'll go home to his wife and children soon.
The Master lands in a flea market, where he is confronted by an irate stallholder demanding he move his “stall”. He refuses, and attempts to enforce his will on the stallholder, but the stallholder can't be influenced. The Master instead dupes his way out of the confrontation, and escapes. The stallholder and his hired muscle are left struggling to move the “stall” off their plot.
As the Doctor feared, his Tardis has a very rough journey back into Gallifreyan history...
The Master finds Rassilon still at work, and tells him of a fault on the ship that requires attention. They leave immediately for the launchpad.
The Tardis arrives in one piece, on the day of the launch. The Doctor and Chloe deduce that the Master is intending to kill the real Rassilon and impersonate him, taking his place in the history books, which would give him untold power and influence over the generations to come.
At the launchpad, the Master pulls a gun on Rassilon, declaring his intent for Rassilon to board the ship and die with it, one way or another.
Part Four: The Doctor and Chloe are searching for signs of the Master's arrival. Chloe is bailed-up by a flea market stallholder selling “dreamcatchers”, and the Doctor talks him into demonstrating the gadget – which instead replays the stallholder's memory of his earlier confrontation with a man that Chloe recognises as the Master. They question the stallholder over the replay, finding out where the Master was heading at the time.
With Rassilon out of the way, the Master tracks down his wife and children, to ensure they are no impediment to the future he has planned...
The Doctor and Chloe arrive at the launchpad, where they are stopped by a launch technician. Rassilon is missing, and the launch can't proceed without him. Chloe realises that Rassilon is stowed-away on the ship, and the Doctor informs the staff.
After Rassilon has been rescued, he discusses with the Doctor what the Master told him of his plans. Rassilon knows the Master, the Doctor and Chloe are from his future, and he won't jeopardise the timelines by halting the launch. The launch technician interrupts the discussion, breaking the news to Rassilon of media reports that his wife and children have been found dead. Rassilon, while shaken by the news, remains committed to the launch going ahead.
The Doctor deduces that the Master would flee back to modern time now that his plans have failed, and the Doctor and Chloe resume searching for the other Tardis. At the flea market, the stallholder happily informs the Doctor and Chloe that the interloper's “stall” is finally off his plot. The Doctor realises the Master has already gone, but he also knows where the Master has gone – with Tlancyravel's Tardis failing, the Master is heading for the Tardis he had left behind on the day the Doctor and Chloe first met.
The Doctor and Chloe find Tlancyravel's Tardis abandoned in Chloe's flat. The Doctor sends it back to Gallifrey, with a note inside explaining what has happened. Having finally had a chance to think over all that had transpired during this adventure, and during her time with the Doctor, Chloe becomes distraught over the deaths of innocents she has seen – and Tlancyravel's death in particular, as it occurred due to being possessed by the Master, as Chloe was briefly during her first encounter with the Doctor. The Doctor attempts to explain how and why he can carry on, but Chloe has decided she can't leave her life to fate anymore, and she's leaving.
The Doctor slowly walks to the Tardis, and Chloe watches the ship take off.
Episode endings[]
- After an explosion of energy in the TARDIS console room, Paul is taken over by the formly trapped essence of the Master.
- With the Doctor and Chloe detained by the Blackpool Police, the Master steals Paul's TARDIS and departs for an unknown place.
- The Master lures Rassilon to the time ship launch site, and after pulling a gun on him, declares that he will die on the ship.
- With Chloe distraught over the Master's actions, the Doctor slowly steps into his TARDIS and leaves her behind, forever.
Additional credited cast[]
Tlancyravel / The Master (Bill Billingsley), Supervisor Chanson (Kathryn Fallon), Bill Simms (Witold Tietze), Hippies (Scott Marshall & David Hutchison), K9 (David Hutchison), McAndrews (Witold Tietze), Police Officer (David Hutchison), Rassilon (Sam Andrews), Omega (David Hutchison), Adrindus (David Hutchison), Street Dwellers (Owen Spratley, Witold Tietze, & Wendy Musgrove), Stall Manager (Owen Spratley), Sweeney (Kathryn Fallon), Joyrider (Chris Sutor), The Controller (Kane Major), Rassilon's Wife (Wendy Musgrove).
Popular myths[]
Things to listen out for...[]
- Tlancyravel travels to Earth in a Type 70 TARDIS, the sound effect of which was lifted directly from the then brand new Big Finish audio adventure The Sirens of Time.
- BTR Graphic Designer Chris Sutor makes a rare audio appearance as the joyrider who steals the Doctor's car.
Things you probably never knew...[]
- This story underwent many significant changes during the writing phase; chiefly, wavering between being a three-part story and a four-part story. The change to three parts occurred when Sentinel was expanded to four episodes, and writer Scott Marshall became temporarily unavailable to continue his work after writing part two. Script editor Witold Tietze devised a very jokey third episode that saw the Doctor ending up at a Professor X fan convention. This was not the X-Men character but a catch-all "fiction within the fiction" Doctor substitute used by some New Adventures novels. One notion was that the Doctor could bump into the star of said series, one Matthew Kopelke...
- When it was ultimately decided that this serial would keep its original length, Scott Marshall returned to the writer's chair, completely rejecting Witold Tietze's suggested third part and moving away from the comedic tone of earlier episodes into much more serious territory. This material consists of the scenes set on Gallifrey, and was always part of Marshall's original prooposal, hence the serial's title.
- Rassilon's wife was named Suigen in the script, but this name was never spoken in dialogue, and was dropped from the credits in post-production. The name is an anagram of "genius", and was created on that basis.
- This story features the largest cast to appear in a single BTR production. It also features what was up to that point the largest number of speaking parts in a single Doctor Who story, which Scott Marshall achieved at Witold Tietze's request.
- Although Scott Marshall receives sole writing credit for this serial, the scripting process was actually a heavy collaboration between Marshall and script editor Witold Tietze. Indeed, the title pages of the original draft scripts featured accurate breakdowns of the contribution each author made to each episode.
Quote, unquote[]
- The Master: 'Now I intend for you to board that ship and die with it, one way or another.'
- Chloe: 'Forge me an empire, or whatever it is you do best.'