270 The Ambassadors of Death: Episode Six

EPISODE: The Ambassadors of Death: Episode Six
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 270
STORY NUMBER: 053
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 25 April 1970
WRITER: David Whitaker (and Malcolm Hulke - Uncredited)
DIRECTOR: Michael Ferguson
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
RATINGS: 6.9 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who-Ambassadors of Death
EPISODE FORMAT: 16mm b&w film recording recoloured using 525 off air video & chroma dot recovery

"It's quite obviously an alien spacecraft. We must attack and destroy it!"

The Doctor is summoned into the alien ship where he meets the three Earth astronauts who have had their minds conditioned to believe they have returned to Earth. Their captor, hidden behind a screen, wishes to know what has happened to the Ambassadors he sent to Earth. The Doctor promises to return them in exchange for the Astronauts and returns to Earth where he is gassed in the decontamination chamber and kidnapped by Reegan. Put in the bunker with Liz they are shocked when the door opens and General Carrington walks in: He has come to kill the Doctor.

Finally the villain of the piece stands unmasked: It is Carrington after all. OK, it's been obvious to the viewers and the Doctor for sometime that something isn't right about him and as the episode goes on The Brigadier and Ralph Cornish start to smell a rat too:

WOMAN: Radio telescope report from Jodrell Bank. Computer analyses as discoid, half a mile in diameter.
BRIGADIER: Half a mile wide? It must be a meteor.
CORNISH: Meteors don't stand still.
CARRINGTON: It's quite obviously an alien spacecraft. We must attack and destroy it.
BRIGADIER: What about the Doctor? If that is a spacecraft, he may be on board.
CARRINGTON: He must be dead by now. We could use missiles with atomic warheads.
CORNISH: Until we know for certain that
CARRINGTON: We do know. I've got a plane to catch. There's an emergency meeting of the Security Council in Geneva in an hour's time.
CORNISH: Security Council?
CARRINGTON: Yes, this object has been spotted by observers all over the world.
BRIGADIER: What are you going to tell the council, sir?
CARRINGTON: I shall recommend an immediate all out attack. We must defend ourselves while there is still time! CORNISH: The man's mad.
BRIGADIER: Not necessarily. We don't know what that thing is there.
CORNISH: Then surely we should find out.
BRIGADIER: Perhaps someone's found out already.
CORNISH: What do you mean?
BRIGADIER: I have a feeling that General Carrington knows a great deal more than he's telling us. He went on a Mars probe himself, remember. Perhaps he discovered something.
CORNISH: Then why doesn't he tell us?
BRIGADIER: I don't know.
CORNISH: Are you supporting his plan to attack blindly?
BRIGADIER: No. I think we should wait. But there's only one hope left to us, that the Doctor is still alive.

Now the Brigadier isn't averse to a nice big explosion. So for him to be saying "hang on a moment" there's obviously something not quite right about Carrington!

Carrington returns to find the Doctor has returned to Earth and been abducted and sets off on what is a familiar spiel of attempting to make the Doctor look suspicious: we'll see similar again several times in the Pertwee era!

CARRINGTON: Are you sure he's been abducted? He could have left of his own accord.
BRIGADIER: There was a gas cylinder linked to the ventilation system.
CARRINGTON: It could be a blind to make us think he'd been kidnapped.
CORNISH: Now why should he do that?
CARRINGTON: Did it occur to you that all these troubles only started when this Doctor came on the scene?
BRIGADIER: With respect, sir, that is simply not true.
CARRINGTON: He insists on going up in Recovery 7, makes contact with the alien vessel, then disappears as soon as he lands. Can you explain that?
CORNISH: Do you really think that the Doctor is one of the people behind all this?
CARRINGTON: What do you know about this Doctor, Mister Cornish?
CORNISH: Oh, only that he's an associate of the Brigadier.
CARRINGTON: Exactly. Well, Brigadier? Where does this man come from?
BRIGADIER: That's difficult to explain, sir.
CARRINGTON: How long have you known him?
BRIGADIER: Several years, on and off.
CARRINGTON: On and off. What's his job exactly?
BRIGADIER: He's given my organisation a great deal of help in the past.
CARRINGTON: You're being deliberately unhelpful, Brigadier. I intend to have this Doctor investigated.
BRIGADIER: We shall have to find him first, sir.
CARRINGTON: The sooner you do that the better. If he has any explanation to offer as to what that object is, we need to know it at once. Contact me as soon as you find him.
CORNISH: General? How did the Security Council meeting in Geneva go?
CARRINGTON: Complete waste of time. They're still debating.
CORNISH: And what do you think they should do?
CARRINGTON: Arm every available missile with atomic warheads and blast that thing out of our skies!
CORNISH: Isn't that a bit extreme?
CARRINGTON: It's our moral duty.
BRIGADIER: I think the General's a bit overwrought.
CORNISH: I think he's insane.

The Brigadier is still being tactful, after all the General is still his superior officer. Ralph Cornish however says what we've all been thinking.

But even now there's still the slight thought that the General might be just reaching the wrong conclusions: the last few moments of the show dispel that impression entirely!

LIZ: General Carrington!
CARRINGTON: Miss Shaw.
LIZ: How on Earth did you find us?
DOCTOR: I think the General knew all along.
CARRINGTON: You're not surprised to see me?
DOCTOR: Not particularly, no.
CARRINGTON: I'm surprised to see you, Doctor. My instructions were that you were to be killed.
DOCTOR: Then somebody disobeyed your instructions, didn't they.
CARRINGTON: I shall have to attend to the matter myself. I'm sorry, Doctor. It's my moral duty.

I asked my wife Liz at the top of the episode who she thought the villain was, She said "who?" I told her and she replied "That's obvious - I thought for a minute there was someone above him!"

With this episode Doctor Who finally cracks open the CSO big time to provide the odd backdrop inside the alien ship and the effect of the Doctor sinking from the capsule to the floor.

Lovely bit of design for the alien spaceship too, giving it an almost organic feel.

Inside the spaceship the Astronauts are kept in the reused quarantine area set seen in episode 5.

It's lit differently but is the same set, which is somewhat appropriate as that seems to be where they believe they are

VAN LYDEN: Oh, hello. Come on in.
LEFEE: Oh, do you happen to know how long we're going to be kept here?
DOCTOR: What are you talking about?
MICHAELS: Hey, did you see this? Look, you're missing the game.
LEFEE: Never mind that. Turn it off.
VAN LYDEN: What do you mean turn it off?
MICHAELS: Turn it off? No.
LEFEE: We were losing anyway.
VAN LYDEN: Oh, come on.
MICHAELS: Okay. But we still might have
LEFEE: No chance.
VAN LYDEN: I say, any idea when we're going to see our families?
DOCTOR: Do you know where you are?
VAN LYDEN: Why, you ought to know.
DOCTOR: Please, do you know where you are?
VAN LYDEN: Yes, of course. I brought these two fellows back from Mars Probe 7. They slapped us in extended quarantine.
DOCTOR: You think you're on Earth, at the Space Centre?
LEFEE: What do you think that is?

We saw Ric Felgate as astronaut Van Lyden in episode 1, and Felgate, Steve Peters & Neville Simons appear as the alien versions of the astronauts in the following episodes but this is the first time we see Steve Peters & Neville Simons as the human Mars Probe 7 astronauts Lefee & Michaels

Peter Noel Cook plays the shrouded Alien Space Captain. He was in the now missing second series Out of the Unknown episode The Eye as the Caller.

The Alien Voices are provided by Peter Halliday. He was in The Invasion as Packer and we heard as the Silurian voices in the previous story. He returns in Carnival of Monsters as Pletrac, City of Death as Captain Tancredi's guard, and Remembrance of the Daleks as the Vicar. He appeared in two of the earliest television science fiction series A for Andromeda and The Andromeda Breakthrough as Doctor John Fleming. He in Out of the Unknown appearing in the sole completely surviving third season episode The Last Lonely Man, directed by Douglas Camfield where he played Patrick Wilson which you can see on Out of the Unknown DVD Set. He appears in UFO as Dr. Segal in A Question of Priorities, the missing third season Doomwatch episode Say Knife, Fat Man as Rafael Dominguez, The Sweeney episode I Want the Man as Chief Insp. Gordon and the last first season episode of The Tripods as the Interrogator

Having seen the actual Astronauts we also get to see one of the alien without a helmet on too and it's a somewhat horrific sight, implying a being that suffered from an illness of some sort and reminding me a little of what little we see of the Chameleons in The Faceless Ones:

First there was Masters. Then there was Flynn. Now Reegan's got yet another henchman, this time unnamed. He's played by Barry Kennington had been a German & Roman soldier, an Alien Technician & a Resistance Man in The War Games, the Regular Army Officer in Spearhead from Space and a UNIT Soldier in The Silurians. In Doomwatch he was a Man in Hear No Evil and The Islanders and in Monty Python's Flying Circus he played a Pantomime Animal in Blood, Devastation, Death, War and Horror.

Control Room Assistants this week: returning we have Lindsey Scott, who played the role in episode 1 & 4 and is back again for episode 7. She's alongside Keith Simon, previously a Control Room Assistant in episode 2. They're joined by Diana Holt, making her only Doctor Who appearance but you can see her in Fawlty Towers as a Hotel Guest in The Germans, and Les Conrad who'd been a UNIT Soldier in episode 1 - see there for his credits - and returns as a Policeman in episode 7.

The UNIT Soldiers this week are all on location. Max Faulkner, who'd been in episode 4, is visible as the guard on the gate. Also returning is Doug Roe who had been in episodes 1,3 & 5. Keith Goodman is joining them this episode: he'd been a Guard in The Savages, an English Soldier in The Highlanders, a Cyberman in The Moonbase, a Security Guard in Seeds of Death and a Technician in Doctor Who and the Silurians.

During the Doctor's stay on Earth we see several deviations from history as we know it and one of the more obvious ones involves the UK space program. In this story the UK is mounting a manned mission to Mars not that long after the Americans got to the Moon in real life. At the time the intention was to set these episodes in the near future and indeed the Doctor's third companion from this era, Sarah Jane Smith, will later claim to be from 1980. But even at that time the Americans were struggling to get their Space Shuttle launched and showed no sign of getting anywhere near Mars. So how did the UK, who don't have a great real world track record with space flight, manage such a feat, and then beat it by sending an astronaut to Jupiter in The Android Invasion? The obvious answer can be found in a previous Doctor Who story: the technology has been salvaged from the failed Cyberman Invasion and from the wreckage of craft destroyed in that story. Perhaps some were even captured whole on the ground at International Electromatics plants?

Which brings us onto the thorny issue of when this story is set. The intention is that this story, and the whole UNIT era should be set in the near future (present day plus 5 to 10 years). Most of the evidence on screen does point very much to it being set in the early seventies when the episodes were shown. The only things against it are some technological advances and Sarah's claim in 1975's Pyramids of Mars that she's from the 1980s. However I think that can be explained away and the technological advances put down to improvements made using technology recovered from the failed Cyberman Invasion. So the view I will take is that the UNIT stories are happening in the seventies when they were first shown.

Two day after this episode was broadcast the twelfth Doomwatch episode Hear No Evil was shown on BBC1.

269 The Ambassadors of Death: Episode Five

EPISODE: The Ambassadors of Death: Episode Five
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 269
STORY NUMBER: 053
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 18 April 1970
WRITER: David Whitaker (and Malcolm Hulke - Uncredited)
DIRECTOR: Michael Ferguson
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
RATINGS: 7.1 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who-Ambassadors of Death
EPISODE FORMAT: 16mm b&w film recording recoloured using 525 off air video & chroma dot recovery

"Doctor, a large unidentified object is approaching you on collision course!"

The Brigadier shoots at the alien but the bullets have no effect and it escapes. Liz Shaw helps Lennox to escape and sends him to the Brigadier, where he's put into protective custody by Sgt Benton. With all the astronauts suddenly unavailable, The Doctor decides to pilot Cornish's planned flight back to Mars Probe 7. Reegan infiltrates the Space Centre sabotaging the fuel mix to the rocket and Lennox is killed with a Radioactive isotope. Carrington forcibly objects to the rocket's flight but Cornish reminds him he has no power to stop it. On launch the Doctor experiences difficulties but brings the capsule under control. He docks with the Mars Probe, but the ship is then approached by a much larger alien ship.

The last episode opened with the Doctor disagreeing with General Charrington and there's more of the same here:

CARRINGTON: I understand you're going ahead with launching this rocket.
CORNISH: Yes.
CARRINGTON: I absolutely forbid it.
CORNISH: You haven't the authority to forbid it, General.
DOCTOR: What have you got against it?
CARRINGTON: Sir James Quinlan murdered, alien creatures attacking the Space Centre, the sudden death of Doctor Taltalian. This is obviously just the beginning.
CORNISH: The beginning of what?
CARRINGTON: An alien invasion with the collaboration of a foreign power.
DOCTOR: All the more reason for me to go up in that rocket and find out what's happened up there.
CARRINGTON: Are you a trained astronaut, sir?
CORNISH: He's perfectly capable of making the trip. I have his medical report here.
CARRINGTON: You haven't answered my question, Doctor.
DOCTOR: You haven't answered mine. Why are you opposed to this launch?
CARRINGTON: Could this rocket carry a nuclear warhead?
CORNISH: Yes.
CARRINGTON: Then that's what it should be used for.
DOCTOR: Since we don't know what's up there, wouldn't it be more intelligent to carry a man rather than a bomb?
CARRINGTON: I might remind you, gentlemen, that I am responsible for Space Security.
CORNISH: And I am responsible for this Space Centre.
CARRINGTON: This launch was against the expressed wishes of Sir James Quinlan.
DOCTOR: Then I suggest you take the matter up with his successor, when he's been appointed.
CARRINGTON: I shall go to the highest authority to have you stopped.
CORNISH: Then you'd better get on with it, General. We blast off in two hours time.

Just before the Doctor leaves there's a lovely scene between him & The Brigadier:

DOCTOR: Hello, Brigadier. What are you doing here?
BRIGADIER: I thought I'd see you off. They told me to wait here.
DOCTOR: What is this place?
BRIGADIER: Some sort of waiting room, I imagine, in case there's any hold-up for the astronauts.
DOCTOR: Not very impressive for one's last sight of Earth, is it?

WOMAN: Astronaut to proceed now to capsule.
BRIGADIER: Well, goodbye, Doctor. Good luck.
DOCTOR: Goodbye, Brigadier. And thank you.

They've had some differences recently, notably when the Brigadier destroyed the Silurian base but they seem to be settling into a real friendship here which in turn nicely sets up what follows next story.

There's some nice location filming here, shot at Southall Gas Works which very effectively substitutes for the Space Centre Fuel Plant.

We saw the nearby road White Street in Southall during episode 1 that's part of accommodation for workers built round the gas works.

Doctor Who returns here in Invasion of the Dinosaurs but it's also used in The New Avengers: The Midas Touch, Blake's 7: Death-Watch, and several episodes of The Sweeney & The Professionals.

James Clayton appears in this episode only as Private Parker, the UNIT soldier who tries to check Reegan's pass. It's his only Doctor Who appearance. All his other credits on IMDB are Policemen!

Roy Scammell is credited as a Technician in this episode. He was a stunt man, specialising in falls, and a member of the HAVOK stunt agency, so I think we can be sure he's the technician that Reegan pushes off the gantry at the Fuel Plant. He plays an SF Sentry in the next story Inferno, and gets a far bigger fall. Much later he was also the Stunt Arranger for Delta and the Bannermen.

Reegan's latest heavy is Tony Flynn - what happened to John Lord's Masters from episode 4? Flynn is played by Tony Harwood had a long history of being a monster in Doctor Who starting with a Cyberman in The Tomb of the Cybermen, a Yeti in The Abominable Snowmen, Rintan, an Ice Warrior in The Ice Warriors, as well as doubling for Varga in the same story, anther Cyberman in Wheel in Space and another Ice Warrior in The Seeds of Death, Director Michael Ferguson's immediately previous Doctor Who story. He's also the Ice Warrior seen briefly in The War Games. This is the only time he's seen outside an alien's costume!

Carl Conway, the speaking male Control Room Assistant, had appeared as the US Correspondent in The War Machines which was a previous Doctor Who story directed directed by Michael Ferguson. Ferguson also used him on one of his Z-Cars episodes, where Conway plays a Norwegian Sailor in Sheena: Part 1, again on one of his Out of the Unknown episodes, The Yellow Pill, where Conway is the Radio voice, and again on Pegasus where Conway is a Sailor in Devon in The Safety of This Nation.

Conway's female counterpart in the same scene is Joanna Ross is rather odd, delivering her lines in a flat monotone during a stressful situation! There's cool under pressure but that's maybe taking it a bit too far. Ferguson uses her again in his fourth season Out of the Unknown The Last Witness where she plays Barbara. She also appears in the Moonbase 3 episode Achilles Heel playing Jane and seems to have been almost a regular in Up Pompeii! appearing in all 7 episodes of the first series albeit in different roles!

They're joined by a number of Control Room Assistants. Sally Avory, from episode 2, returns alongside Barbara Faye, who doesn't reappear in Doctor Who, Paul Gilman, who also doesn't reappear and has no IMDB entry that I can find, and Dennis Hayward. He was a Scotsmen in Hold/Highlander in The Highlanders and an Auton/Display Mannequin in Spearhead from Space. He returns as one of the Peasants in the Village Centre in State of Decay. He's in Blake's 7 as a Federation Trooper in Warlord and Doomwatch as a Man in The Islanders.

Alan Chuntz, previously one of the Stuntmen/Collinson's Men in episode 1 has swapped sides and now is a Stuntman/UNIT Soldier! Also appearing as a UNIT Soldier this episode, and in episode 7 is David Aldridge who returns as a Humanoid Axon Man in Claws of Axos. In Monty Python's Flying Circus he was a Deviant / Cricketer in The Attila the Hun Show. The other UNIT soldiers in this episode, Doug Roe, Clive Rogers, Keith Simon and Geoff Brighty were all in episode 1:

There's some more Pertwee gurning during this episode as he's trapped in the out of control space capsule:

This is the second time the Doctor has taken a rocket into space after the Second Doctor's efforts in Seeds of Death, also directed by Michael Ferguson.

The big casting highlight here can be found near the start of the episode: Liz and I cheered when he turned up! Rejoining the cast in this episode is John Levene as the promoted Sergeant Benton! Levene had been a Yeti in The Web of Fear before playing Benton, then a Corporal, in the Invasion. He had reprised his Yeti role in The War Games part 10.

In the planning stages for the following story Inferno the director of that story Douglas Camfield decided to employ John Levene as the same character he played in Camfield's previous story The Invasion. Once that decision was made the production team decided to replace the role of the scripted sergeant, whose surname was apparently West, with John Levene's character which provides a nice bit of continuity for the following story and helps to strengthen it's themes. Levene would appear in every Earth bound UNIT story from here till The Android Invasion.

Which brings us to one of the big mysteries of Doctor Who which casts a shadow over one of it's longest serving characters. Only Benton seems to know where Lennox was being held. Surely it isn't him who delivers Lennox's radioactive dinner? And if it wasn't, who did?

This is the only episode of this story that was completely recoloured for the VHS release.

Two day after this episode was broadcast the eleventh Doomwatch episode The Battery People was shown on BBC1.

268 The Ambassadors of Death: Episode Four

EPISODE: The Ambassadors of Death: Episode Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 268
STORY NUMBER: 053
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 11 April 1970
WRITER: David Whitaker (and Malcolm Hulke - Uncredited)
DIRECTOR: Michael Ferguson
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
RATINGS: 9.3 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who-Ambassadors of Death
EPISODE FORMAT: 16mm b&w film recording recoloured using 525 off air video & chroma dot recovery

"General, how many times must I tell you, your astronauts are still in orbit. My objective is to find out what these aliens are trying to say to us!"

Liz is saved by those chasing her and brought to where Reegan is keeping the aliens where she's forced to help Lennox. Doctor Taltalian returns to the space centre revealing he was acting under General Carrington's orders. The Doctor, working to decode the alien transmissions, receives a phone call threatening Liz's life. Liz, with help from Lennox, escapes from where the aliens are being kept but is immediately recaptured by Doctor Taltalian who has come too see Reegan. Taltalian gives Reegan a device to allow him to communicate with the aliens, and in return is given a time bomb to kill the Doctor. When he returns to the space centre, the bomb goes off when set, killing Taltalian. The Doctor determines this wasn't a fault and finds the device for deciphering the alien communication. One of the aliens is brought to the Space Centre where it kills Sir James Quinlan. Finding the body the Doctor does not see the alien, which was hiding in the room, now leaning over him.

Not bad this episode!

The Doctor really has no time for General Carrington. Having been deceived in the first three episodes by the General, he's seems very reluctant to trust him now!

BRIGADIER: I've issued Miss Shaw's description to every police force in the country.
CARRINGTON: Why? Do you expect her to be wandering the streets?
BRIGADIER: No, sir, just a formality.
CARRINGTON: I took the liberty of examining the things found on the bodies of those two men.
BRIGADIER: They should have gone to Forensics, sir, untouched.
CARRINGTON: No need for that. Forensics can't tell us anything we can't see for ourselves. Look. Newspaper cutting in a foreign language.
DOCTOR: Anyone can buy a foreign newspaper, General.
CARRINGTON: What about this comb then, with the makers imprint on it in the same language?
DOCTOR: Let me look.

DOCTOR: Very remiss of them, keeping this.
BRIGADIER: They could have been planted, sir.
CARRINGTON: No. The only people who could set up an organisation of this size would be foreign agents with enormous resources behind them.
DOCTOR: And hair combs.
CARRINGTON: They want to use the radiated astronauts as a weapon.
DOCTOR: I've told you where your astronauts are, General. They're still in orbit.
CARRINGTON: That's ridiculous.
DOCTOR: Is it? When your Professor Heldorf had the aliens in his care, he started to record some sort of radio communication impulses.
CARRINGTON: Astronauts do have walkie-talkies in their helmets, you know.
DOCTOR: Then why didn't Heldorf talk to them?
CARRINGTON: Yes, well, perhaps he was recording the level of radioactivity in their bodies.
DOCTOR: Yes, well, I don't think so. Well, I'm going down to the Space Centre, use the computer. I trust your man Taltalian won't hold a gun on me this time?
CARRINGTON: Doctor, nothing is to be gained by deciphering these impulses. Our objective should be to find the missing astronauts.
DOCTOR: General, how many times must I tell you, your astronauts are still in orbit. My objective is to find out what these aliens are trying to say to us.

Taltalian's loss of accent in his one location scene is obvious: at the time it was filmed they hadn't decided to give the character an accent!

When you see this episode there's enough information there for you to join the dots and work out who's behind the alien's second kidnapping... if you hadn't guessed already! The why is perhaps a little less obvious. Liz escaping and being recaptured filled five minutes giving us some shots of her running across a field but it's an obvious time waster especially when she's recaptured so quickly.

On the VHS version there was no colour at all in this episode but by comparison the DVD version is the best looking of the recoloured episodes so far!

John Lord, Masters, was previously a Yeti in The Web of Fear and one of the Warehouseman in The Invasion alongside Gordon Stothard, who was in episode 2 as a Heavy. He appears as a man in the Doomwatch episode The Battery People.

Making his credited Doctor Who debut here is Max Faulkner as a UNIT Soldier. He'll be back as a UNIT Soldier in episode 6, a Stuntman/Exxilon in Death to the Daleks, a Miner & Stuntman/Miner in Monster of Peladon, the Guard Captain in Planet of Spiders, a Thal Guard & Stuntman/Thal Soldier in Genesis of the Daleks, a Stuntman/Astronaut in Planet of Evil, Corporal Adams in The Android Invasion, the Stunt Double for Dr Carter and Fight Arranger on Hand of Fear, a Horda Pit Guard on Face of Evil, a Stuntmen/Coolie, the Double for Weng-Chiang and a Policeman in Talons of Weng-Chiang, a Stuntman/Other in The Sunmakers, Nesbin in Invasion of Time, and a Stuntman/Guard in Creature from the Pit. You can also see him in two episodes of The Prisoner as the First Horseman in Living in Harmony and the Scots Napoleon in The Girl Who Was Death, Space: 1999 as Ted Clifford in Ring Around the Moon, Survivors as Phil in Mad Dog, Blake's 7 as a Death Squad Trooper in Powerplay, The Day of the Triffids as Jo's Attacker in the second episode, the James Bond film GoldenEye as a Guard at Helicopter Show and many, many more.

Also making his Doctor Who debut is Nick Hobbs as one of the Technicians: I'm pretty sure he's the one who the astronaut attacks first and we get a decent look at. He returns as an SF Soldier in Inferno, a Daffodil Man in Terror of the Autons, one of the UNIT Staff & an American Aide in Mind of Evil the Nuton Driver, Stunt Double for Axon Man, a Stuntman/Army Soldier & one of the Doubles for Captain Mike Yates and Sergeant Benton in Claws of Axos, a UNIT Man in Day of the Daleks, Aggedor in Curse of Peladon, a UNIT Troop & Guard in The Time Monster, Aggedor in Monster of Peladon, and a Wirrn Operator in Ark in Space. He appears in Space: 1999 as a Security Guard in Space Warp, Blake's 7 as the Hooded Figure in Cygnus Alpha, the Roger Moore James Bond film Octopussy as a South American Soldier, Inspector Morse as Night Hawk 2 in The Day of the Devil and the modern Doctor Who as Mr Nainby in Amy's Choice as well as performing stunt work on many productions over the years.

According to my copy of the Doctor Who Production Guide the other technician is Max Diamond who is a Military Policeman outside of Space Control in the first and final episodes of the story.

Liz Shaw's escape was filmed on Beacon Hill in Hampshire and her recapture on the nearby Beacon Hill Road with the scenes recorded 2nd Febuary 1970. Both locations are near the locations used in episode 2.

Back to our friends the tape spool computer banks and this episode it all changes again! The same lights/door covered tape spools unit is still behind the door from Out of the Unknown Lambda 1/The Prisoner Arrival.

And the meters/red tape spools with doors is still to the right of that.

But next to that there's a unit with meters in the top half and uncovered white tape spools in the bottom half now. Again charitably this could be the same one on the right in Adam Adamant D for Destruction/The Avengers Mission: Highly Improbable if they've changed the tape spools, but there's definitely two with meters now. Against the far wall we can also see the he analogue digital converter from episode two:

Episode 3 shows several of the doors and panels open after Taltalian's device goes off: Above the far right unit and below the middle unit:

The unit behind the door in episode one is completely missing here, presumably out of shot on the third wall if it was there at all!

So..... where is the Space Centre? The map on the wall of the Brigadier's office might offer a clue:

The river, running from top left towards the centre is obviously the Avon which would make Bristol the rough centre of the map. So you think it's in Bristol. But in episode three Liz was lured away by a message asking her to come to Hertfordshire to look at the bodies and the Brigadier took an hour to get back so that would place it more in London.... in which case why is there a map of Bristol on the wall?

Two day after this episode was broadcast the tenth Doomwatch episode Train and De-Train was shown on BBC1.