Destiny Of The Daleks Episode Four

 Destiny Of The Daleks Episode Four

It was piddling down this morning (finally!) and having got slightly ahead of the housework yesterday, we had some free time to do a new 'Doctor Who' commentary. As always, the actual episode to be covered was chosen by an online random number generator, which was somewhat ironic given that it pointed us in the direction of 'Destiny Of The Daleks' Episode Four.

The final scenes of 'The Armageddon Factor' introduce us to the Randomiser, which is supposed to gives us a TARDIS harking back to the Hartnell days, where we cannot predict the time or place where the next story is to be set.

So, the first landing obviously takes us to Skaro, some time after the events of 'Genesis Of The Daleks', which isn't a very random location, if we're being brutally honest.

But the whole Dalek / Movellan conflict is in a state of stalemate, lacking the true random factor demonstrated by the Scissors/ Paper/ Stone game played by  the Doctor and Romana.

It's 1979 and the random nature of life means that I missed Episode Three as I was at a birthday party in Verwood taking part in a Treasure Hunt in the woods, despite rather wishing I could see what Davros was getting up to.

Also, the green glowsticks on the arms of the Movellan uniforms were something I'd encountered in real life, having picked up a glowing ring thing to wear around the neck, in a high-tech solution to the problem of child road safety in those post-Pertwee/SPLINK days.

To bend our own rules slightly, Episode Three sees Tom Baker playing with a Kaled mutant, that is represented by the then current novelty toy Worms. I had Worms (if you'll pardon the expression) and it was a gooey mass of pinky/purple matter with some black rubber worms as a bonus - if you look closely, you'll notice a couple of worms embedded in the lump that Tom waves about.

I had a friend who met Tom Baker during the filming of 'Destiny' and he sent me a signature, that sadly I've managed to lose in the intervening time.

But in recent years, I've still felt a connection with 'Destiny' as I've done a bit of analytical chemistry with sand from the Binnegar Heath sandpit which was one of the Dorset filming locations. Though I've never been able to detect any trace levels of exploded Daleks in the sand...

Odd isn't it? We all have our own unique connections with certain 'Doctor Who' stories, but random factors in my life mean that nobody in the universe has quite the same memories of this tale. The Randomiser clearly works on a wider scale than was intended at the time...

Our commentary for 'Destiny Of The Daleks' Episode Four can be seen here.

(By Andrew Trowbridge)