Doctor Who/The Deadly Assassin

The Deadly Assassin
Season 14, Serial 3
Airdate	October 30, 1976
Production Number	4P
by	Robert Holmes
Directed by	David Maloney
← 14x02 The Hand of Fear	14x04 → The Face of Evil
Doctor Who — Season Fourteen

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The Deadly Assassin is the third serial of the fourteenth season of Doctor Who, and the eighty-eighth serial overall.

Part One: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), Llewellyn Rees (The President), Bernard Horsfall (Chancellor Goth), George Pravda (Castellan Spandrell), Angus MacKay (Cardinal Borusa), Peter Pratt (The Master), Hugh Walters (Commentator Runcible), Erik Chitty (Co-ordinator Engin), Derek Seaton (Commander Hilred), Maurice Quick (Gold Usher), John Dawson, Michael Bilton (Time Lords)

Uncredited: Helen Blatch (Voice)

Part Two: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), Bernard Horsfall (Chancellor Goth), George Pravda (Castellan Spandrell), Erik Chitty (Co-ordinator Engin), Derek Seaton (Commander Hilred), Hugh Walters (Commentator Runcible), Angus MacKay (Cardinal Borusa), Peter Pratt (The Master), Llewellyn Rees (The President), John Dawson (Time Lord)

Part Three: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), Bernard Horsfall (Chancellor Goth), George Pravda (Castellan Spandrell), Erik Chitty (Co-ordinator Engin), Peter Pratt (The Master), Peter Mayock (Solis)

Part Four: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), George Pravda (Castellan Spandrell), Bernard Horsfall (Chancellor Goth), Peter Pratt (The Master), Angus MacKay (Cardinal Borusa), Erik Chitty (Co-ordinator Engin), Derek Seaton (Commander Hilred), Terry Walsh (Fight Arranger), Helen Blatch (Voice)

Plot Overview

The Doctor is framed for the assassination of the President of Gallifrey and races to clear his name. He soon learns it's part of a larger plot by the Master.

Arc Advancement

Happenings

• It's established that Time Lords are limited to a 12 regeneration cycle, allowing for them to have only 13 lives before facing a permanent death.

Characters

• It's revealed that the Master has reached the end of his regeneration cycle. It later seems he falls to his death before it's discovered that he survived.

Trivia

The Show

• The only serial in the classic era to not feature a companion.

• This serial features an exclusively male cast with the sole exception of the female computer voice provided by Helen Blatch.

• This is the first story in the series set entirely on Gallifrey, as well as the first whose cast is entirely made up of Time Lords, making it also the first to feature no human characters.

• First story to begin with an opening narration.

• The portrayal of the Time Lords receives a significant overhaul. Robert Holmes disliked the previous portrayal of the Time Lords as omnipotent god-like beings, so he reinvented them as corrupt bureaucrats. Additionally, the distinct attire of their headdresses and robes would become the standard and be featured in later stories.

• This serial also introduces the Matrix, which would be used as a plot point in subsequent serials and episodes.

Behind the Scenes

• Part three's cliffhanger of the Doctor being drowned caught the attention of media watchdog Mary Whitehouse. Because of intense negative reactions from the public, Philip Hinchcliffe was replaced as producer the following season and the BBC wiped the offending cliffhanger from the master 625 line PAL colour videotape, one of only a small amount of post-1974 Doctor Who footage to be affected in such a way. However, off-air U-matic videotape recordings of the uncensored broadcast were still left intact and it was from these that footage of the infamous cliffhanger was sourced when the scene was restored for home media releases.

• Part of the disturbing nature of said drowning scene came from the fact that Tom Baker suffers from hydrophobia and therefore was experiencing a real fear of drowning during filming. Baker was reportedly so worried of the cliffhanger scaring kids that he visited a random family to watch part three with them and hear their responses.