The Keys Around Martinus

The Keys Around Martinus

The Complete And Utter History Of Dr WHO? (Part Six)

With Doctorwho having somehow fallen into a regular production schedule (as opposed to just filming the odd scene when enough of the crew had wandered in unannounced, as had previously occurred) it was time for an old writer to make a return. Nerry National's Dales had proven to be mildly popular, so he was invited to bring them back. Unfortunately, all the actual Dale props had been auctioned off the previous week to pay for Donald Bovversticks' new bobble hat, so instead National rummaged around in his attic and found a box of faulty TV aerials. WHICH GAVE HIM AN IDEA!

Nerry's new monster The Alien Vworp was to be led by the terrifying 'Fatty' Yarbuckle, whose distinctive headgear have been interpreted by some as a metaphor for National's objection to the BBC TV Corporation Licence Tax, hence his wet suit and flipsters.

'The Keys Inside Martinus' was inspired by National's dairy entries about the time he went on holiday to Crimpton-on-Sea with a hole in his pocket and dropped all his house keys in a verity of different exotic locations, including a glass recycling bin at the beach when he was sucking on some acid drops, a tatty old man's greenhouse (exhausted research has yet to detemine whether it was the old man or the greenhose that was actually tatty), a nice cave (National's spidery handwriting led to the production team slightly misinterpreting this when it come to building the set) and the local combined Mace Museum and Magistrates' Court, which is traditionally always in the same building.

The cereal showcased some innovative models work as we see the TARDIST land on The Beach Of Glasses (as Episode One was called). How this was done remains a mystery to this day and even more mysterious is the way they done a giant pyramid in the studio, as records indicate that the BBC did not have access to thousands and thousands of slaves in that financial year with which to build it with. Plus they done it in the studio every week, regular as clockwork and pyramids generally take at least a couple of months to put up, even little ones.

Episode Two is also new in that it shows its title over a back blackground and nothing else. This was to happen in the future also, but this is the first time they done it. This Episode is about how Barbabarb sees cloths and fashion and truffles and dirty mugs different to what her close fiends does. This is probably also a metaphor for consumerism or something. It usually is, apparently (see 'Dr Who And The Unfolded Texts' by Tulloch Moore and Manuel Alvar-Lidell).

Joining the casts was veterinarian actor Gorge Colourist (as The Great Zarbitan) who had worked abroad in Wells (Somerset) with H B Wells in his plays 'The Wall Of The Words' and 'Pathways To Space'. He was also in 'Citizen Smith' in 1941, which considering it was not invented until 1977, shows the impressive range of his acting ability.

Now available on Digitalis Versailles Dicks , 'The Keys Up Marinus' stands up as an exiting DOCTORWHO adventure, though the lack of William Hartley-Hare is noticeable during the last two episodes, when he suddely went camping in the Gorbals without written permission from either the BBC or Glasgow City Council. For his briefs scenes in the conclusive episodes, he is replaced by Richmond Hurndsale who makes such a good job of it, only 4.6 million people wrote to the production office to complain.

Luckily, he was evicted from his pitch and come back in time for the next story, which would see the production team filming overseas for the first time in the BBC's history!

Next Episode:

"I need some fresh air."

(By Andrew Trowbridge)