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'Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death'
12 March 1999, 4 episodes
Writer: Steven Moffatt
Director: John Henderson
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Roots: Blackadder; Withnail and I; Absolutely
Fabulous; Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice; Victoria Wood
As Seen On TV, and of course Doctor Who.
Goofs: The Master's rather enthusiastic TARDIS console looks
like it's about to shake itself apart! The Doctor's shirt changes colour
with each regeneration. The waistcoat of his female incarnation is of a
different design and is buttoned down the opposite side (c.f. 'The Power
of the Daleks', 'Castrovalva'). If the Master falls into the sewers three
times within the space of a few minutes - relative to the Doctor - then
surely he should meet himself trying to climb out earlier. Why then don't
his 'older' selves warns his 'younger' self about what has happened so
they can avoid falling into the sewers once again?
Fashion Victims: The Master's Gallifreyan robes. Emma's two-colour
outfit.
Technobabble: The Master's Dalek bumps can detect ion-charged
emissions and operate as etheric-beam locators ('Genesis of the Daleks')
at a distance of up to twenty thousand light years. The Master has given
the Daleks a 'zectronic energy beam'.
Dialogue Disasters: 'Oh no, the planet of the bottom burpers.'
'Goodbye forever, Mr and Mrs Doctor!'
'Prepare for five hundred miles of fear and faeces.'
The Master on the Doctor's final female form: 'I have to say, Doctor,
you are rather gorgeous.'
Dialogue Triumphs: 'Your certain death is now certain!'
'It will be the deadly vengeance of deadly revenge!'
The Master and the Doctor try to outwit each other: 'Say hello to the
Spikes of Doom' 'Say hello to the Sofa of Reasonable Comfort'
'I have grown weary of all the evil in the cosmos. All the cruelty,
all the suffering, all those endless gravel quarries.'
The tenth Doctor to Emma 'You're the only companion I've had.'
'Oh. Bugger'
Emma's eulogy to the dying twelfth Doctor is rather splendid.
'Maybe even the Universe can't bear to be without the Doctor.'
'I think I can see the On switch!'
But the best line in the entire production has to be the Doctor's:
'Look after the Universe for me. I've put a lot of work into it.' Lovely
stuff.
Continuity: The Doctor and the Master have been battling for
many centuries. The Master initially plans to lure the Doctor to the planet
Zaston Four. A long, multi-coloured scarf can be seen hanging off the hat
stand in the Doctor's TARDIS, and a second Doctorish stovepipe hat rests
on a nearby table.
It is not exactly clear which incarnation of the Master this is. His
Gallifreyan robes suggest that this adventure takes place after 'Doctor
Who', but no explanation is offered as to how he escaped the Doctor's TARDIS
or why his physical appearance is different. The Master once again has
his own TARDIS. He can view the interior of the Doctor's TARDIS on his
scanner ('The Time Monster', 'Castrovalva'). Direct visual and verbal communication
is possible between TARDISes.
The natives of the planet Tersurus were once the most kindly and peace-loving
race ever encountered by the Doctor, but also the most shunned and abhorred
species because they communicated by precisely-modulated gastric emissions.
Both the Doctor and the Master communicate with the Tersuron Architect [presumably
in this manner; both Time Lords are clearly well-versed in the language
and later communicate with each other in it on the Dalek spaceship]. The
Tersurons were all wiped out when they discovered fire. No-one has set
foot on the planet for a hundred years [it was on Tersurus that Chancellor
Goth found the dying Master, as recalled in 'The Deadly Assassin'. An obvious
opportunity to tie this in with the events of 'The Curse of Fatal Death'
by having the aged Master become the near-rotten version seen in the former
has been overlooked - or perhaps even deliberately avoided].
The Master falls into the sewers of Tersurus thanks to the Doctor having
bribed the Architect to move the trapdoor. It takes the Master 312 years
to climb out, with only dung slugs for food and occasional company on long
lonely nights. He makes it back to his TARDIS and travels back in time
to the present day [via an earlier attempt to bribe the Architect and then
onto Skaro] bringing with him the Daleks [this implies that it is possible
for the Doctor and the master to meet outside each others' relative timelines].
The Daleks augment the Master's body by replacing his right hand with a
plunger.
The Master falls into the sewer pit for a second time when he rushes
at and misses the Doctor. he falls in a third time when a Dalek knocks
into him. In all, the Master spends a total of 936 years climbing out of
the sewers.
The Daleks augment the Master's aged body for a second time, giving
him back his appearance as well as fitting him with firm 'Dalek bumps'
on his chest (see Technobabble). For some strange reason the Daleks have
chairs on board their spaceship, a fact that does not go unnoticed by Emma.
The Doctor is currently in his ninth incarnation. According to the
Master the Doctor still has many many more lives left. The Doctor has grown
weary of saving the Universe and wants to retire and get married. For the
first time the Doctor has fallen in love with his female companion. He
is fatally wounded by Dalek energy-weapons fire. His 'lick-the-mirror-handsome'
tenth persona is injured by an explosion when he attempts to rewire the
Daleks' zectronic energy beam controller. His shy-in-the-presence-of-girls
eleventh self is blown up when he goes down the corridor to examine a console
in another area of the spaceship. The Doctor loses his boyishly handsome
twelfth form (his third regeneration in the space of a minute) when he
is hit by residual zectronic energy. Pure zectronic energy is so powerful
that it can destroy the ability to regenerate. However, the Doctor's will
to survive triggers his twelfth and final regeneration, but he is no longer
the man he used to be. His thirteenth incarnation is female. The Doctor
says he has always wanted to get his hands on one.
At the end of the tale the Master decides to renounce evil and follow
the path of goodness in honour of his fallen foe. The Daleks likewise plan
to honour their enemy.
The sonic screwdriver has three settings, one of which is 'vibrate'.
THE VALEYARD
If it is absolutely necessary to do so, it is rather difficult to reconcile
the Valeyard into the Doctor's final series of regenerations. Of course,
the twelfth Doctor is out of view briefly, so the power of the zectronic
energy could have 'created' the Valeyard off-screen. Indeed, the Valeyard's
dark side could have arisen from the Doctor's subconscious horror at losing
so many lives in such a short time, hence the Valeyard's desire to extend
his own life by taking the sixth Doctor's future incarnations.
Location: The space-time vortex, the planet Tersurus, a Dalek
space ship
Untelevised Adventures: Obviously there is an adventure in which
the Doctor regenerated for an eighth time. The Doctor's meeting with Emma
is off-screen and presumably on Earth (she knows about father Christmas,
the Wizard of Oz and Scooby Doo), but the style of her dress suggests she
is not from a contemporary time period. They have since fallen in love
with one another. During the 'two hours relative' between his first conversation
with the Master and his arrival on Tersurus, the Doctor goes back in time
by a hundred or so years on three separate occasions to bribe - or dine
with - the Architect of Castle Tersurus. The Doctor knows about the Tersurons
and their ultimate fate. He estimates that he has saved every planet in
the known Universe a minimum of twenty-seven times.
Q.v. The TARDIS Scanner, 'Full Circle'
The Bottom Line: 'I'll explain later'.
As spoofs go, this is
one of the best. Rowan Atkinson unexpectedly downplays his usual comedy
style and as a result offers a very likeable Doctor. The all-too-brief
cameos of future Doctor (played respectively by Richard E Grant, Jim Broadbent,
Hugh Grant and Joanna Lumley) provide a humourous taste of what could have
been had the series continued. Having Joanna Lumley as the first female
Doctor sees the dream of many fans finally realised. Jonathan Pryce's OTT
Master looks like Delgado but exudes some of the camp charm of the Anthony
Ainley and Eric Roberts versions. This interlude is best not analysed too
deeply, and should be accepted for what it is - a tongue firmly in cheek
take-off in aid of a good charity cause. Besides, it is doubtful that even
the money-hungry BBC would be so stupid as to let the Doctor officially
lose all his remaining incarnations in such an overtly silly manner.