Douglas Camfield, “Doctor Who: The Invasion” (1968)
This eight-part serial featuring Patrick Troughton as the second incarnation of the beloved British sci-fi hero Doctor Who is a significant one in the TV show’s history. Firstly, it laid the ground for later seasons of adventures in which the eminent Time Lord in his third incarnation battles several alien species beyond (and even within) Earth as a member of a global intelligence taskforce, known as UNIT, to defend the planet from exoteric threats; the organisation makes its first appearance in this serial, with the trusty Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney), who would go on to appear in 20+ stories on the show, at the helm along with a fair few other future regulars. As a result, the serial takes on the feel of an action / military thriller with an emphasis on people from different backgrounds, social levels, societies and cultures – and even nations with opposed political ideologies and systems of government – thrown together and co-operating to thwart an invasion force from outer space
Second, “The Invasion” received considerable support from the UK Ministry of Defence, with a number of actual military personnel appearing as extras in the serial and some scenes featuring Lockheed C-130 Hercules aircraft filmed. As such, the serial can be considered military propaganda showing the British Army in a positive light, though later seasons would portray the British political establishment and the history of British imperialism in much less glowing fashion. Unusually for the show, several scenes were shot on location, including the famous scene in which regular Doctor Who enemies the Cybermen are walking in front of St Paul’s Cathedral in London. Fourth, “The Invasion” is invested with stereotypes that were popular in 1960s films and TV shows, in particular the James Bond movies, the Quatermass TV sci-fi series, and various TV spy shows.
The Doctor and his crew, Jamie (Frazer Hines) and Zoe (Wendy Padbury), are mooching past the dark side of the moon in their TARDIS spaceship when it is hit by a missile from just that part of the satellite. The TARDIS is forced to land in a field of cows and the Doctor figures they have landed somewhere in England in the 1960s. He realises the TARDIS needs some new spare parts and a Professor Travers in London is just the fellow who can supply the travellers with these parts. The trio hitchhike to London and call at Travers’s house; they discover instead that Travers is in the US and has rented the house out to Professor Watkins and his niece Isobel (Sally Faulkner). Watkins is working at a company called International Electromatics (hereafter referred to as IE) and has not been seen for weeks, so, after trying to call him and getting nowhere, the Doctor and Jamie travel to the company’s headquarters in London.
From then on, the story becomes rather complicated, with the Doctor and Jamie being given the run-around by the mysterious and sinister IE head Tobias Vaughan (Kevin Stoney) and his thuggish sidekick Packer (Peter Halliday), and Zoe and Isobel themselves falling foul of Vaughan and Packer when they decide to look for the Doctor and Jamie after the two fail to come back. The Doctor is able to meet with Professor Watkins (Edward Burnham) who tells him of his suspicions that Vaughan is planning a takeover of the global electronics / computer industry with an unknown ally; the Doctor suspects that Vaughan’s ambitions far exceed dominating one entire industry. Fortunately, the Doctor, Jamie, Zoe and Sally are rescued by the Brigadier and UNIT, though the rescue involves an off-screen car chase and a dramatic helicopter dash in which Sally and Jamie are shot at by Packer’s minions while climbing the rope ladder. At UNIT, the Doctor and his friends study the information the UNIT officers have received regarding suspicious alien activity in the skies and deduce that the aliens are Cybermen – and that they are working with Vaughan and IE, with the intent to invade and take over Earth.
The Brigadier is initially sceptical, so Isobel, Jamie and Zoe risk their lives to gather the evidence that Cybermen are not only working with Vaughan in planning an invasion of Earth, but that IE has managed to reanimate individual Cybermen. In the meantime, the Doctor works on deciphering mystery circuits in the transistor radio Jamie received from Vaughan, eventually discovering that they are part of a network of circuits that the Cybermen plan to use to send signals to Earth that will hypnotise humans and render them psychologically defenceless against Cybermen attack – and eventual conversion into new Cybermen. He and Zoe then start to work on producing depolarisers that will protect UNIT forces from Cyberman-generated hypnosis and unconsciousness.
Vaughan then brings forward the Cyberman invasion, and a ringing sound comes out that fells the entire population of London into mass unconsciousness. Cybermen come out of underground sewers through manholes to walk the now barren streets. The Brigadier and UNIT forces take the Doctor’s friends to Geneva while the Doctor himself meets again with Vaughan to persuade him that the Cybermen are using him.
At this point, the action becomes more focused with UNIT forces battling the Cybermen in London. Zoe helps UNIT personnel in Geneva to predict the Cyberfleet forces massing in space and UNIT is able to destroy their spaceships. Furious, the Cyberfleet commanders turn on Vaughan himself and send a megatron bomb to destroy Earth. His ambitions and life work in ruins, Vaughan agrees to help the Doctor to locate the homing signal in London. UNIT forces finish off the Cybermen guards protecting the beacon, though Vaughan ends up being killed and the Doctor barely escapes with his own life. The megatron missile is destroyed by an anti-missile interceptor and (off-screen) Russian defences destroy the Cyberfleet command ship sending out the signal to the London beacon.
For a family-oriented TV show, “The Invasion” can be quite convoluted for viewers to follow, not least because many details occur off-screen and viewers need to fill in plot gaps with their imaginations. Due to the famously low budget of “Doctor Who”, many special effects look amateurish and much of the plot also occurs through dialogue as well as off-screen. The actors do a credible job (with the odd line or two being fumbled, mis-remembered or forgotten entirely) with their characters, limited as they are, though Stoney does chew the scenery with his character Vaughan’s megalomania and eye-fluttering habit in the manner of Bond-style villains. Even when the fellow realises the Cybermen have betrayed him and he decides to help the Doctor, Vaughan does so purely out of self-interest and desire for vengeance, not out of a newfound (and unconvincing) soul-searching turnaround – now that’s what I call being in character! Troughton as always is a delight to watch in deliberately playing the Doctor as a whimsical, even bumbling fool, behind which façade lies a cunning, even devious mind. The music soundtrack composed by Australian jazz musician Don Harper (and supplemented with music by John Baker and Henry Hall along with some library music) is a significant feature of the entire serial, to the extent that it helps this adventure along with all its other features and action-oriented style to stand out and apart from other Doctor Who stories with Troughton.
After the failed invasion, the Cybermen were wise to give the Doctor in his second and third incarnations a very wide berth and the Time Lord traveller did not cross swords – or rather, his sonic screwdriver – again with this silver nemesis until well into his fourth incarnation.