311 The Curse of Peladon Episode Four

EPISODE: The Curse of Peladon: Episode Four
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 311
STORY NUMBER: 061
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 19 February 1972
WRITER: Brian Hayles
DIRECTOR: Lennie Mayne
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
RATINGS: 8.4 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Peladon Tales: Curse of Peladon & Monster of Peladon
EPISODE FORMAT: 525 video RSC

"Surrender, or the King will die!"

Ssorg shoots Arcturus killing him and saving the Doctor's life. Hepesh leads a revolution against King Peladon to keep his planet out of the federation but is slain by the Royal Beast when the Doctor brings Aggedor to the throne room. Jo refuses an offer of marriage from the King. The Doctor & Jo prepare to stay for the King's coronation but are forced to retreat when the real Earth delegate arrives. The Doctor realises he has been used again as an agent of the Time Lords.

Compared to the rest of the serial this episode falls a little flat. We open with a large amount of exposition:

PELADON: But what about the attack on Arcturus?
DOCTOR: Faked, your Majesty. He told Hepesh what to do.
IZLYR: That is what I suspected.
JO: And the things I found on the balcony and in Izlyr's room?
DOCTOR: Planted by Hepesh, or one of his agents.
PELADON: And the manifestation of Aggedor?
DOCTOR: Well, that's simple, your Majesty. Hepesh found that on a high mountain a few still existed. So he captured one, trained it and kept it hidden in the tunnels beneath the citadel, ready to pop out whenever he needed a bit of haunting.
PELADON: But why did he do all this? What did he hope to gain?
DOCTOR: The entire planet of Peladon, or effective control of it, which comes to the same thing.
PELADON: And Arcturus?
IZLYR: His planet lacks mineral deposits. Peladon has them in abundance.
DOCTOR: That's why he wanted to make sure that Peladon did not enter the Galactic Federation. You see, he'd already made a private secret alliance with Hepesh.
ALPHA: Extremely unethical! Fortunately the scheme has been foiled, so all is well.
DOCTOR: Ah, but is it?
JO: Yes. Arcturus is dead.
DOCTOR: But Hepesh is still very much alive. You see, Hepesh believed everything that Arcturus told him. He still does. He firmly believes that entering the Galactic Federation would mean slavery and he'd go to any lengths to stop you joining.
JO: But what can he do?
DOCTOR: Accuse the Ice Warriors of murdering Arcturus.
IZLYR: Yes, Mars and the world of Arcturus are old enemies. That would mean war.
DOCTOR: Exactly. And then all the rest of the Galactic Federation would take sides and
ALPHA: The Federation will be ripped! There will be interplanetary conflict!
DOCTOR: And Peladon would become the first battlefield. Blasted and sterile.
PELADON: What shall I do, Doctor?
DOCTOR: Replace Hepesh with someone you can trust, your Majesty. Now!

With the traitor amongst the Federation delegates been revealed we're now trusting the Ice Warriors and with Arcturus out the way the threat shifts to Hepesh, who remains at large. It's been obvious from the word go that Hepesh isn't keen on the Federation so his actions here don't remotely come as a surprise. His attempted coup lasts no time at all before he meets his end courtesy of the best he used as a pawn.

Hepesh is assisted in his plot by the Guard Captain played by George Giles: you can see him in Doomwatch as the Policeman in The Inquest. He's assisted/opposed by a number of stunt guards used in this episode mos of whom have worked on the show in other capacities: Peter Brace, Billy Horrigan, Mike Horsburgh, Dinny Powell, Roy Street & Rocky Taylor.

Appearing right at the end of the story for some light comic relief is Amazonia, the real chairman delegate from Earth, played by Wendy Danvers. You can hear her interviewed on Toby Hadoke's Who's Round 188.

Having looked at who IS in the story it's important to mention someone who ISN'T: this is the first Jon Pertwee story not to feature Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart: He's been in every Third Doctor story so far, even the Doctor's previous jaunt off Earth, The Colony in Space, where he's only in the start of episode one and the end of episode 6. Here he doesn't even get that.

But it's not this episode the story will be remembered for: it's the large number of non human species and the way our & the Doctor's experience of the Ice Warriors works against us. Of the four Ice Warrior stories this is probably my favourite and I'm pretty certain it the "using a monster in a completely different way to what the viewer and Doctor are expecting" aspect of the story that makes it.

Alpha Centauri is somewhat memorable too, if a trifle annoying at times, and it comes as no surprise to discover we return to Peladon for a sequel with Alpha Centauri and the Ice Warriors a few years later in Monster of Peladon. Both the Peladon stories are reflective of real life during the 70s: Curse of Peladon is meant to represent British entry into the European Common Market while Monster of Peladon is supposedly inspired by an early 1970s miners strike.

Curse of Peladon was, as we've seen, repeated in July 1982 as the first story in the Doctor Who and The Monsters season. It was novelised by Brian Hayles in 1975, released on video in 1993 and on DVD in 2010, as part of Doctor Who - Peladon Tales, along with it's sequel the Monster of Peladon.