EPISODE: Invasion of the Dinosaurs: Part One
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 360
STORY NUMBER: 071
TRANSMITTED: Saturday 12 January 1974
WRITER: Malcolm Hulke
DIRECTOR: Paddy Russell
SCRIPT EDITOR: Terrance Dicks
PRODUCER: Barry Letts
RATINGS: 11 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD:
Doctor Who - U.N.I.T Files: Invasion of the Dinosaurs and the Android Invasion
EPISODE FORMAT: 16mm b&w film recording recoloured using the chroma dot colour recovery technique
"You've been found guilty of looting. Under the authority vested in me by the Emergency Powers Act, I'm issuing an order that you'll be held in a military detention centre for the duration of the emergency. You will be handed over to the civil authorities for trial and sentence when time permits."
The Doctor & Sarah materialise in a park in a deserted London with the phones cut off. Elsewhere the army are patrolling the streets looking for looters, one of whom nearly mows the Doctor & Sarah down as they wait for a non arriving bus. Following they find the man breaking into a jewellers. He escapes but moments later they here a crash and find him dead with his car crushed. At UNIT HQ sightings are recorded and looters noted as the Brigadier hopes that the Doctor will show up soon. Pursuing a second vehicle the Doctor & Sarah are trapped in a garage where they attacked by a Pterodactyl, escaping by driving a land rover through the doors. The Brigadier's liaison with the regular army, General Finch, is ordering him to shoot looters. The Doctor & Sarah are themselves arrested as looters. On the streets soldiers battle a Tyrannosaur but their report to HQ is subject to radio interference. The Brigadier sees photos of the Doctor & Sarah when they were arrested and arranges to collect them. On the way to the detention centre the land rover they are being carried in is attacked by a Tyrannosaur.....
Oh that's a fabulous episode, with an almost Dalek Invasion of Earth feel to the central London location seen at the start, filmed in a unauthorised covert filming session undertaken by director Paddy Russell, returning for the first time since her debut on 1966's The Massacre. The locations she used were Albert Embankment & Westminster Bridge ....
.... Whitehall & Trafalgar Square, all previously used in a similar sequence in Dalek Invasion of Earth, ....
.... Margaret Street & Haymarket ....
.... Old Billingsgate Market & Covent Garden Market, previously seen in The War Machines, ....
.... Long Lane and Outer Circle, previously seen in The Invasion.
This session earned her a reprimand from BBC bosses but it looks superb on the screen as does the sequence of the Doctor & Sarah landing and finding themselves in a deserted park filled with abandoned everyday items. The Doctor's comment "It's a Sunday, Great Britain always closes on Sundays" is accurate for the time period but isn't recognisably to anyone who lives in any town in the UK now. There's a small bit of escape & recapture padding the episode later on but apart from that, it uses the time wisely setting up the situation as the Brigadier tries to discover why the dinosaurs keep turning up.
Oddly this episode is entitled on screen Invasion part 1, supposedly to keep the appearance of the dinosaurs a secret...... despite a picture appearing in the Radio Times and the Dinosaurs making sporadic appearances during the episode, not being saved till the end. At the time the decision angered story author Malcolm Hulke, for which he later received an apology from producer Barry Letts & the head of serials. This had led to rumours over the years that the videotape for this episode was junked because it was confused with the video for the first episode of the Invasion, the 1968 Cyberman story. However since the videos for the Invasion were junked in 1971, three years before this story was made, this seems unlikely.
At the point that the BBC archives were first audited all six episodes of Invasion of the Dinosaurs were missing. We'll cover the whereabouts of the later episodes later but by 1981 Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 was the only Pertwee episode missing from the Archives. Ian Levine was put in touch with a fan, Roger Stevens, who has provided him with black & white film copies of Abominable Snowman 2 & Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 which he had obtained through a colleague at the BBC. Abominable Snowman 2 was returned to the BBC in February 1982 but Levene held onto Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 till June 1983 to use as a bargaining chip in case any other Doctor Who episodes came to light.
Quite how this episode comes to exist as a black & white film, and then not a terribly good quality copy, and what happened to the original videotape is something of a mystery. The Time Warrior was the last complete story to have a black & white telerecording made of it, but the first three episodes of Invasion of the Dinosaurs are known to have been recorded and were believed to have later been destroyed. When it was passed through the chroma dot recovery process to recover the colour information to use on the Invasion of the Dinosaurs DVD it was discovered that the blue part of the signal could not be recovered, I presume due to the blue chroma dots being absent, and a manual recolour of certain blue elements, like the Tardis and the River Thames on the map, became necessary.
When I was young I wanted to see the town were I lived, Kingston Upon Thames on TV. After all it was the most important place in the entire world. In particular I wanted Doctor Who to film there. Little did I know that it had in the year I was born! This episode features several locations from my home town.
Firstly near the end of the opening sequence is a shot of an abandoned Milk Float. This was filmed in Wilmer Close. The trees you can see in the background of the shot are the edge of Richmond Park. This sequence was filmed 26th September 1973 along with another nearby from episode 3 which actually shows the entrance to Wilmer Close. Six years later my parents bought a house in nearby Woodcote Close. I've walked past this road many a time without ever realising Doctor Who was filmed there. (I went to a rather good garage sale in Wilmer Close once leaving with a load of early Star Wars weeklys that still sit in my long boxes today)
Footage was shot here of a man played by Leslie Noyes being attacked but this part of the scene was excised from the final broadcast. Incredibly though this footage survives in Black & White and can be found on the DVD!
The sequence where the Tardis materialises was filmed on 27th September 1973 at Canbury Gardens which runs alongside the River Thames. Shooting here without capturing the river or the Power Station which once dominated one end of the site is some achievement.
Along the other side of Canbury Gardens to the river runs Lower Ham Road which forms the location where Sarah & The Doctor try to call UNIT, wait for a bus and nearly get run down by a car. This road is now a dead end at the south but when this story was filmed it was possible to drive through Kingston from the Portsmouth Road (near to the Meat Market Location bellow), through the Market Place, along Thames Street, under the railway line by Bentalls and along Lower Ham Road emerging as you do now by the former British Aerospace Site which in turn is close to a third location used later in the story! I can place where the telephone box is, roughly at the footpath entrance to the gardens, but the bus stop I'm less sure about. My memory is a route used to use the road on occasions, a Sunday service or similar, but I've not been able to prove it and there's certainly not a bus stop there anymore!
Palmer Crescent, where the Doctor & Sarah see a van, is to the south of the town centre near to Kingston University and the GPO Sorting Office location, used very briefly as a substitute for a police station. Both sequences were also filmed on 26th September 1973.
The Doctor & Sarah are mistaken for looters and captured at Kingston Meat Market, a site which the majority of is no longer there. Several shots filmed nearby close to this location are used in the next episode and these were filmed on the 26th & 27th September 1973.
If you decide to visit it we can heartily recommend the Riverside Vegetaria for a meal.
Many other locations are used in the episode: as the deserted London sequence nears it's conclusion we see an abandoned car and damaged house on Burford Road/Clayponds Avenue in Brentford, shot on 27th September 1973. I would love to know what damaged that house in real life, it looks far too recent for World War II bomb damage!
Phillips is looting at Southall Gas Works - we'll see adjoining roads later in the story. It was previous used in Ambassadors of Death as the fueling area a nearby street features in later episodes. The crew were there 23rd September 1973.
The shops are located in Moorfields, which we'll see more of later, and Phillips crashed car in the adjoining New Union Street, both recorded 23rd September 1973.
The land rover used by looters is stored at Pickfords Depositories, West Ealing which is now West London Islamic Centre.
The Doctor & Sarah try to escape from detention at what was Northfields School, now Clementine Close in West Ealing
Finally the Land Rover they're driven away in is seen on Chamberlain Road, also in West Ealing. All the West Ealing material was recorded 24th September 1973.
Lots of the cast only appear in this episode, with just one of the main guest cast for the rest of the series making a brief appearance:
Gordon Reid, who played Phillips, has a somewhat notable end to his life: He collapsed and died on stage at the Finborough Theatre at Earls Court, London on the evening of 26 November 2003 halfway through Act Two of a performance of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot in the role of Vladimir, aged 64.
Trevor Lawrence, who plays looter Lodge, was in the Doomwatch episode The Human Time Bomb as a Passer-by and shows up in the 1979 Quatermass as th Catskin Man in Ringstone Round.
The Looter in the Warehouse, who we fail to get a good look at, is series regular stuntman Terry Walsh.
The Doctor & Sarah are arrested by Corporal Norton who is played by Martin Taylor, previously a Skybase Guard in The Mutants.
The Army Patrol with Norton contains some familiar names. Cy Town was an Auton in Spearhead from Space returning as a Technician in Doctor Who and the Silurians, a technician in Inferno, a Prisoner, Audience Member & Medical Orderly in The Mind of Evil and a Gel Guard in Three Doctors. He made his debut as a Dalek Operator in Frontier in Space and fulfils the same role in the remaining Daleks stories appearing in Planet of the Daleks, Death to the Daleks, Genesis of the Daleks, Destiny of the Daleks, Resurrection of the Daleks, Revelation of the Daleks and Remembrance of the Daleks.
In addition to being inside a Dalek he later plays a Vogan in Revenge of the Cybermen part one, an Android Villager in Android Invasion, a Brother in The Masque of Mandragora, an Bi-Al member in The Invisible Enemy, a Guard in The Sun Makers, a Castrovalvan Warrior in Castrovalva, a Guest Gambler in Enlightenment, a Passer-by in Attack of the Cybermen, Execution Victim Harold L/drone in The Happiness Patrol and a Haemovore in The Curse of Fenric.
Outside of Doctor Who appears in the Monty Python's Flying Circus episodes Spam as a Surfer and - The Money Programme as a Trumpeter plus the film Monty Python's The Meaning of Life as a Restaurant Diner. In Doomwatch he's a Man in Flood, he's a Technician in all six episodes of Moonbase 3, a Security Guard in The Sweeney Golden Boy, in Quadrophenia he's a hairdresser, in Blake's 7 he's a Rebel Technician / Federation Trooper in Blake, he's a Coach Passenger in Miss Marple: Nemesis and in Jeeves and Wooster he's the Vicar in Wooster with a Wife (or, Jeeves the Matchmaker). And if you want to know what he looks like outside of his Dalek shell then there's some screencaps of him on his Aveleyman page.
The DVD subtitles tell me the third member of the patrol is Kelly Varney. He'd been a Spiridon in Planet of the Daleks,
and returns as a Megro Guard in The Sun Makers. He's in the Blake's 7 episodes Project Avalon as a Prisoner and Horizon as a Native, plays Tom Walter in the Survivors episode Bridgehead, is in Moonbase 3 as a Technician in Castor and Pollux and was an extra in Star Wars.
Their driver is Colin Hamilton who returns as a UNIT Driver in Robot.
We spot Who regular Dave Carter as Sergeant Duffy: Katy Manning takes great pleasure in pointing out on DVD commentaries every time she spots him! He's already been a Male Rebel in The Power of the Daleks, an IE guard in The Invasion, The Old Silurian plus other unidentified Silurians and an Ambulance Man in The Silurians, a Primord in Inferno, a Museum Attendant in Terror of the Autons, a Prison Officer in The Mind of Evil, a Skybase Gurard in The Mutants and a Roundhead Officer in The Time Monster,
He'll be back for The Android Invasion as Grierson. There's an Adam Adamant Lives! on his CV where he plays a Partygoer / Tourist in Death Has a Thousand Faces and an episode of The Tomorrow People, The Living Skins: Cold War where he's a Guard.
Lieutenant Shears, the officer staging the looters' trials, is played by Ben Aris a man with two major comedy roles to his name. From 1980 to 1981 he played Mr Spalding in To the Manor Born, and then from 1982 onwards, he played ballroom dancer Julian Dalrymple-Sykes in Hi-de-Hi!. My University friends will be pleased to hear that he was in Me, You and Him as the Headmaster in Crime and Punishment.
The detention centre Photographer is Stuart Myers who had been
a plague victim, UNIT soldier & technician in Doctor Who and the Silurians, a UNIT Soldier in Ambassadors of Death, an Axon Glob Claws of Axos and a Draconian in Frontier in Space.
He returns as a Titan base Crewman in Invisible Enemy, a Member of the Pangol Army in The Leisure Hive, a Foster in Keeper of Traken, a Cricketer in Black Orchid, a Buccaneer Officer in Enlightenment, a itizen/Unbeliever in Planet of Fire, a Resistance Fighter/Alphan in Trial of a Timelord: Mindwarp and a Customer/Mercenary in Dragonfire. In Blake's 7 he was a crewman in Space Fall, in Moonbase 3 he was a Technician in Outsiders & Castor and Pollux and he's an extra in Star Wars.
Ronald Gough is the soldier the Doctor imobilises at the Detention
Centre. He had been an Atlantean Guard in Underwater Menace, a Technician in Doctor Who and the Silurians, a Technician in Inferno, a Skybase Guard in The Mutants and a Spiridon in Planet of the Daleks.
He returns as a Zygon in Terror of the Zygons and a Marine & The Krynoid in Seeds of Doom.
In Patrol 1 we have Pat Milner who was
a Foot Soldier, Resistance Man & German Soldier in The War Games,
a Unit Soldier in Spearhead from Space,
a Security Guard in The Silurians
and
a Unit Corporal in The Daemons.
He returns
as an Android Unit Soldier in The Android Invasion
and
a Marine in Seeds of Doom, for which he also supplied a dog!
You can also see him in Fawlty Towers as a CID Officer in A Touch of Class. There's a picture from that on his Avelyman entry from which we can conclude he's also the moustachioed soldier in the detention centre!
Described as Army Corporal - Patrol 1 is Leslie Bates.
Previously he cast the shadow that falls across the Tardis at the end of the first episode, An Unearthly Child and then played a Tribesman in the second, The Cave of Skulls. He's a Man at Lop, Mongol Warrior and Mongol Bandit in Marco Polo, a Guard in The Massacre, a Villager at Inn / Pirate in The Smugglers, an English Soldier in The Highlanders, anIE Guard in The Invasion, an 1862 soldier, Confederate Soldier, foot soldier in The War Games, a Waxworks Visitor/Auton in Spearhead from Space, a BBC3 TV Crewmember in The Dæmons, a UNIT soldier in The Three Doctors, a Lunar Guard, Draconian & Williams Guard in Frontier in Space and a Security Guard & UNIT Soldier in The Green Death.
He returns as an Exxilon in Death to the Daleks, a Guard in Planet of the Spiders, a Time Lord in Deadly Asssasin and a Bi-Al Member in Invisible Enemy. In the The Andromeda Breakthrough he was a British Soldier in Gale Warning, in Doomwatch he was a man in Hear No Evil, The Islanders & Flood and in Moonbase 3 he's a Technician in Castor and Pollux. He's also in our favourite Adam Adamant Lives! episode D for Destruction as a TA Soldier.
Patrol 1's driver is Ted Heath who was also a Driver/Motorcyclist Day of the Daleks. He worked for Kinmgsbury Motors who supplied the vehicles for the story.
In Patrol 1 is Steve Ismay, who I can recognise usually!
He had been a BBC3 TV Crewmember in The Dæmons, a Guerilla & Stills Cameraman in Day of the Daleks, Sea Devil in The Sea Devils, Varan's Bodyguard in The Mutants a Presidential Guard in Frontier in Space and a Security Guard in The Green Death.
He's in every story this season starting with playing a UNIT Soldier in The Time Warrior,
and after this continuing as an Exxilon & Exxilon Zombie in Death to the Daleks, a Guard in The Monster of Peladon & a Metebelis 3 Guard in Planet of the Spiders! He then returns as a Guard in The Deadly Assassin, a Leviathan Guard in Ribos Operation, a Gracht Guard & one of Zadek's Guards in The Androids of Tara, would have been a "Space Monster" in Shada, possibly a Cyberman, then plays a Citizen in Full Circle, a Cyberman in Earthshock and a Security Guard in Time Flight. He had been Man in the Doomwatch episode The Islanders & Flood, and then appears in The Sweeney as a Policeman in Cover Story, a Driver in Golden Boy and a Villain in Stoppo Driver. In Porridge he played a Prison Warden in A Night In and a Gardener in Happy Release while in The Tomorrow People he was in a Vesh Rebel in Worlds Away and an SIS Sergeant in The Dirtiest Business. In Blake's 7 he plays a Scavenger in Deliverance, a Guard in Dawn of the Gods, a Convict in Moloch and a Hommik in Power.
John Caesar, who plays the Soldier seen using the Radio Telephone, had been in several previous stories: The Dalek Invasion of Earth as a Roboman, The Romans as a Man in Market, The Daleks' Master Plan as an Egyptian Soldier, The Ark as a Monoid, The Gunfighters as a Cowboy, The Macra Terror as a Guard, The Space Pirates as a Spacesuited Pirate & Pirate Guard, Colony in Space as a Colonist, & The Sea Devils as C.P.O. Myers. He was also in
Paul of Tarsus, which starred Patrick Troughton as Paul, as a Soldier in Herod the King and A for Andromeda as the MP Corporal in The Monster.
There's two UNIT Soldiers fighting with him: Brian Nolan
had already been an IE Guard in The Invasion, a Confederate Soldier & Resistance Man in The War Games, a UNIT Soldier in Spearhead from Space & the Silurians, a Sea Devil in The Sea Devil, a Solos Guard in the Mutants and an Earth Guard in Frontier in Space.
He later plays a Guard in The Seeds of Doom and the TV Cameraman in The Deadly Assassin. He was also in Doomwatch as a Man in Flood.
Geoffrey Witherick
was a Cricketer & Male Reveller in Dalek Masterplan, a Guard in The Massacre, a Worker in The War Machines, an Airport Policeman in The Faceless Ones, a Villager/Coven Member the Daemons, a Sea Devil in the Sea Devils. a Solos Guard in The Mutants, a Prison Guard & Earth Guard in Frontier in Space and a Spiridon in Planet of the Daleks.
He returns as a Guard in Planet of the Spiders, a SRS Bouncer/Officers/Audience member in Robot, a Time Lord in Deadly Assassin and a Security Guard in Image of the Fendahl.
He's also in Doomwatch as a Man in the missing Burial at Sea.
George Bryson plays UNIT radio operator Private Ogden. He should have played the solider named Private Bryson in later episodes: I assume he proved unavailable as Ogden, a similar situation to Elgin/Tony Adams in The Green Death perhaps, and the replacement character was renamed after him!
UNIT Soldier Typist Richard King had previously been a Monk in Abominable Snowmen, a Cyberman in The Invasion, an Alien Technician in The War Games, Passengers/Plague Victims/Passersby/Ambulance Men/Policemen & a Technician in The Silurians, a Technician in Inferno and several Guards in Frontier in Space.
He returns as a Technician in Android Invasion and a Time Lord in Deadly Assassin. In Doomwatch he's a Man in In the Dark and in Moonbase 3 he's a Technician in Castor and Pollux & View of a Dead Planet
Patrol 1 is the group of soldiers that Philips sees approaching in a Land Rover.
The DWAS Production File has Ken Tracey, who is on his Doctor Who debut, down as a Dispatch Rider: he briefly appears putting some papers on a desk in UNIT HQ. He reappears later in the story as a Golden Age man, then is a Villager in Planet of the Spiders, a Kaled Prisoner in Genesis of the Daleks, and a Soldier & Brethren member in The Masque of Mandragora. Annoyingly his Avelyman entry has another actor's photo attached Richard Reeves who is also in Genesis of the Daleks. If IMDB is correct Tracey is also in Moonbase 3 as a Technician in Castor and Pollux and Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em as a Parent at Toy Fair in Learning to Drive.
Roy Pearce was a Guard in The Massacre, a Soldier in Snow Camouflage / Engineer in The Tenth Planet, a Chameleon & Airport Policeman in The Faceless Ones, a Technician/Guard in Fury from the Deep, a UNIT Soldier in The Invasion, the Cyberman in The War Games episode ten, a Passenger/Plague Victims/Passers-by/Ambulance Men/Policemen in Doctor Who and the Silurians, a Villager in The Dæmons, a Submarine Rating/Naval Base sailor in The Sea Devils and a Solos Guard in The Mutants.
He returns as an Exxilon in Death to the Daleks, a Guard in Planet of Spiders, an Android in The Android Invasion, a Pikeman/Brother in The Masque of Mandragora and a Security Guard in Image of the Fendahl.
In Blake's 7 he was an Armed Crewman in Space Fall, a Federation Trooper in Time Squad and a Scientist in Project Avalon while in Doomwatch he was a man in Invasion & Flood.
Finally Army Driver Bruce Cox was a UNIT Soldier/Policeman in The Silurians, a Driver of Jeeps in Ambassadors of Death and a Driver in Inferno.
