Doctor Who Rewind - Colony In Space

Someone has stolen the plans to The Doomsday Weapon and the Time Lords realise there is only one man who can find out where they are.

At last the Doctor leaves the confines of Earth in his TARDIS controlled remotely by the Time Lords and arrives with Jo Grant on the desert planet Uxarieus in the year 2472. There he finds a group of colonists trying to survive as farmers, having left Earth due to over population. However conditions on the planet are not good, they are being attacked by ferocious prehistoric beasts and are being forced to vacate the planet by the the newly arrived International Mining Corporation (IMC).

The original inhabitants of Uxarieus, known as the primitives, live in a cave system nearby and have a truce with the colonists. When the IMC (who want to gain control of the planet for its precious minerals) get there operative Norton to try and blame the primitives for murdering two colonists under the guise of giant reptiles, the Doctor and Jo are caught in between.

Things get even more complicated when The Master arrives as the Adjudicator, sent to decide who has ultimate claim over the planet.

After examining the primitives cave art the Doctor deduces that they were once an advanced civilisation , having created the Doomsday weapon that the Master wants to utilise to control the galaxy.

My small viewing companion on Doctor Who Rewind found this six part story a little hard going and frequently lost concentration. I have to admit that in parts I would have to agree with him that the story did plod along somewhat.

The giant robots that the IMC use to attack the colonists with have ridiculous claws stuck on the arms just look extremely silly.

The primitive priest type characters have these strange weird wrinkled brain faces that also look quite comical and the little puppet type guardian primitive is like a curious mutant being. Definitely one of the more bizarre monsters of classic Doctor Who.

Towards the end of the story it's worth mentioning there is a great fist fight between colonist Winton and the IMC security man Rogers (played by stuntman Terry Walsh) which takes place in the knee deep sludge of a quarry where the whole story was shot. It looks great and you can really appreciate that both actors were putting everything into it and look physically knackered by the end.

For a first off Earth story for Pertwee's Doctor this ain't bad, it's got The Master showing up as a surprise half way through, it's got the battle for the planet, and it's got some strange aliens who live under ground. What more could you want?

Next time on Doctor Who Rewind it's that old black magic as things turn very dark indeed.