The verdict: the enigmatic planet

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Episode of the Doctor Who series
title The verdict: the enigmatic planet
Original title The Trial of a Time Lord: The Mysterious Planet
Country of production United Kingdom
original language English
length 4 × 25 minutes
classification Season 23, episodes 1–4
640th - 643rd episode in total ( list )
First broadcast September 6, 1986 to
September 27, 1986 on BBC One
German-language
first broadcast		 February 7, 1995 to
February 10, 1995 on VOX
Rod
Director Nicholas Mallett
script Robert Holmes
production John Nathan-Turner
music Dominic Glynn
occupation
chronology

←  Predecessor
Planet of the Dead

Successor  →
Mindwarp

The enigmatic planet (The Mysterious Planet) is the first part of the 143rd story arc entitled The Judgment (The Trial of a Time Lord) of the British science fiction - television series Doctor Who . It consists of 4 episodes that aired from September 6-27, 1986.

action

The TARDIS is forced by an unknown force to land on a Gallifrey space station, where the doctor is accused of unnecessarily interfering with the lives of other species and thereby threatening their very existence. As a first evidence, the Prosecutor (originally Valeyard) shows the High Court Records of the Doctor's interference on the planet Ravolox.

On Ravalox, the doctor tries to find out why the planet still exists, since it should have been destroyed by a gigantic fireball 500 years in the past. Peri repeatedly mentions how similar Ravalox is to Earth, and they also discover an entrance to an old subway station in the middle of the forest, which is apparently the Marble Arch Station . While the doctor decides to go further underground, Peri remains on the surface where she is captured by wild humans.

The whole thing is watched by the two mercenaries Sabalom Glitz and Dibber, who came to Ravalox to destroy the L3 robot, which is hidden deep inside the planet. They too are captured by the wild people. The two have to answer before Katryca, the leader of the tribe of wild people, but when she does not believe her story, the mercenaries are disarmed and locked in a cell, where they meet the captured Peri.

Inside the planet, the doctor discovers a vast network of a gigantic and progressive city ruled by the immortal. The immortal is the L3 robot Drathro, who built the underground network to ensure the continued existence of the human race on the planet, as he said the surface of the planet is still shrouded in fire. Drathro wants to use the doctor to repair some of the city's systems as the city is losing more and more energy and is on the verge of self-destruction, but when the doctor manages to escape from Drathro, he sends an L3 service robot to get the doctor back.

When the doctor comes back to the surface, he is also caught by the tribe of wild people and arrested. He tries to warn Katryca about Drathro, but she doesn't believe the doctor either and throws him into the same cell as Peri and the mercenaries. Reunited, the doctor and the other prisoners begin to devise an escape plan, but are surprised by the L3 service robot, who simply breaks through a wall of the cell to capture the doctor. When he wants to bring his prisoner back to Dathro, he is surprised by Katryca and her warriors and destroyed.

Full of activity, Katryca and her warriors set out into the interior of the planet, believing that they have destroyed the immortal in order to free the other people who live in the underground city. Once there, she is surprised and killed by Drathro. Shortly afterwards, the doctor, Peri, Sabalom Glutz and Dibber make it back to the underground city and face Drathro. This time the Doctor offers Drathro his help to fix the city's systems before it can destroy himself and everyone on the planet. But Drathro refuses and orders Sabalom Glitz and his partner Dibber to use their spaceships to bring him off the planet before it is destroyed. On the way to the spaceship, however, Glitz and Dibber manage to outsmart Drathro and destroy him.

After Drathro and the mercenaries leave town, the Doctor tries to fix the town's systems. When it turns out that it is indeed too late, the doctor manages to contain the self-destruction so that only the underground city is destroyed, and evacuates all the people of the city to the surface, where they can live him peace. After several conversations with the residents of the underground city, the doctor finds out that Ravalox is actually Earth. On the way back to the TARDIS, he and Peri are still wondering who transported the earth from its place in the Milky Way here into deep space and why it was disguised as the long-destroyed planet Ravalox.

Back on the Gallifrey's space station, the Doctor confirms his innocence by proving that he saved all the people on the planet from extinction, but the prosecutor only sees that the Doctor broke the law of the Time Lords, never getting into the matter interfering in other worlds, and demands the death penalty for the doctor from the high council.

production

After the BBC canceled the series in February 1985, it was saved by protests from the press and fans and so the BBC announced in 1986 that the series would return with a 23rd season in September of the same year. As the budget was cut, the broadcast format of the last season was discarded and the episodes were again 25 minutes instead of the 45 minutes of the last season. As a result, all scripts that were prepared for the original 23rd season were discarded and new ones were written. The screenplay was the last work by author Robert Holmes, who died before the 4 episodes were broadcast in May 1986.

The Gallifrey's model of space station was the most expensive model ever built for the series, at over £ 8,000. From this season both indoor and outdoor shots were filmed on video, previously outdoor shots were filmed.

Roger Brierley, who lent his voice to the L3 robot Drathro, was originally supposed to play the role in costume. Since the pre-made costume didn't suit him, Paul McGuinness stepped in and played the robot on set, while Brierley's voice was later dubbed. For this season, a new version of the Doctor Who theme, composed by Dominic Glynn, was recorded.

Audience ratings

  1. The Trial of a Time Lord - Part 1: 4.9 million viewers
  2. The Trial of a Time Lord - Part 2: 4.9 million viewers
  3. The Trial of a Time Lord - Part 3: 3.9 million viewers
  4. The Trial of a Time Lord - Part 4: 3.7 million viewers

Cast and dubbing

The dubbing of the story was done by HW Film in Munich, directed by Hendrik Wiethase , who also wrote the dialogue book.

role actor Voice actor
The (6th) doctor Colin Baker Michael Schwarzmaier
Perpugilliam "Peri" Brown Nicola Bryant Maria Boehme
Prosecutor (Valeyard) Michael Jayston Fred Maire
Chairperson (Inquisitor) Lynda Bellingham Marion Hartmann
Katryca Joan Sims Anita Höfer
Sabalom Glitz Tony Selby Holger Schwiers
Drathro Roger Brierley (voice)
Paul McGuinness (actor) 		Klaus Kessler
Merdeen Tom Chadbon Erhard Hartmann
Broken Tooth David Rodigan Andreas Neumann
Dibber Glen Murphy Hans-Georg Panczak
Balazar Adam Blackwood Florian Halm
Humker Billy McColl
Tandrell Sion Tudor Owen Philipp Brammer
Garish Timothy Walker Manou Lubowski

publication

In England, a novel version of the story , written by Terrance Dicks , was published by Target Books in November 1987. The title The Mysterious Planet was used for the 4 episodes . In 1993 it was released on VHS , along with the other 10 parts of the storyline, as The Trial of a Time Lord Box Set and on September 29, 2008 a DVD box of all 14 episodes followed under the same title.

In Germany, the 4 episodes were shown in German for the first time from February 7th to 10th, 1995. The episodes were released on DVD on July 29, 2016 as part of the Doctor Who DVD set - The Sixth Doctor: Volume 3 . They received the title The Enigmatic Planet .

Trivia

  • When broadcasting the 4 episodes, only the title The Trial of a Time Lord was used, the addition The Mysterious Planet came from the novel version that was published at the end of 1987. This was later adopted by the BBC itself when the episodes were released on DVD. In Germany, too, only the title The Judgment was used for the broadcast . A German single title was also used for the DVD release.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ https://www.synchronkartei.de/serie/17557
Doctor Who Serials and Episodes
First doctor

The Child of the Stars  (1963)  • The Daleks  (1963/1964)  • The Daleks' Master Plan  (1965)  • The Tenth Planet (1966)

Second doctor

The Power of the Daleks  (1966)  • The Tomb of the Cybermen (1967) 

Third doctor

The Three Doctors (1972/73) 

Fourth doctor

City of Death (1979) 

Fifth doctor

The Five Doctors (1983)  • The Androzani Caves (1984)

Sixth doctor

Attack of the Cybermans (1985)  • Planet of the Dead (1985)  • The Judgment: The Enigmatic Planet (1986)  • The Judgment: Mindwarp (1986)  • The Judgment: Vervoid Terror (1986)  • The Judgment: The Worst Enemy (1986)

Seventh doctor

The Hand of Omega (1988)

Eighth doctor

Doctor Who: The Movie (1996)

Ninth doctor

Rose  (2005) 

Tenth doctor

The girl in the fireplace  (2006)  • The nature of man  (2007)  • Blood ties  (2007)  • Don't blink  (2007)  • The red garden (2009)  • The end of time (2009/2010)

Eleventh doctor

Doctor's Day (2013)

Twelfth doctor

Fallen Out of Time (2017)

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