Doctor Who/Horror of Fang Rock

Horror of Fang Rock
Season 15, Serial 1
Airdate	September 3, 1977
Production Number	4V
by	Terrance Dicks
Directed by	Paddy Russell
← 14x06 The Talons of Weng-Chiang	15x02 → The Invisible Enemy
Doctor Who — Season Fifteen

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Horror of Fang Rock is the first serial of the fifteenth season of Doctor Who, and the ninety-second serial overall.

Part One: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), Louise Jameson (Leela), Colin Douglas (Reuben), John Abbott (Vince), Ralph Watson (Ben)

Part Two: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), Louise Jameson (Leela), Colin Douglas (Reuben), John Abbott (Vince), Sean Caffrey (Lord Palmerdale), Alan Rowe (Skinsale), Rio Fanning (Harker), Annette Woolett (Adelaide)

Part Three: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), Louise Jameson (Leela), Colin Douglas (Reuben), John Abbott (Vince), Sean Caffrey (Lord Palmerdale), Alan Rowe (Skinsale), Rio Fanning (Harker), Annette Woolett (Adelaide)

Part Four: Tom Baker (Doctor Who), Louise Jameson (Leela), Colin Douglas (Reuben), Alan Rowe (Skinsale), Annette Woolett (Adelaide), [John Abbott]] (Vince), Sean Caffrey (Lord Palmerdale)

Trivia

The Show

• A rebroadcast of the first episode on November 22nd, 1987 on a PBS affiliate WTTW in Chicago, Illinois was interrupted by unknown individuals who managed to hijack the broadcast feed for about 90 seconds. The footage featured one of the two wearing a Max Headroom mask, spouting gibberish and advertising catchphrases including those at the time associated with Max Headroom and Coca-Cola, and humming music before a second individual is seen spanking the first with a flyswatter. It was the second such interruption with the first being during highlights from a football game on a newscast on the then-independent commercial station WGN-TV, but appeared to be partially unsuccessful as those responsible were unable to properly broadcast sound, only managing to provide electronic buzzing and screeches in the signal's audio channels, and were quickly cut off by WGN-TV. The Doctor Who interruption had proper sound, albeit distorted, and ran in its entirety. Representatives for WTTW later admitted that they were powerless to stop the broadcast because the engineers were not on duty at the Sears Tower transmitters. To date, those responsible have never been identified or apprehended.

• Despite being referenced in several other stories, particularly those featuring their enemies, the Sontarans, this is, to date, the only appearance of the Rutans in the series.

• This was the final televised story in which every character other than the Doctor and his companions are is killed until "The Doctor's Wife" in 2011. In early drafts of the story, Adelaide and Skinsale survived, but this was changed to make the story more resonant with the poem "Flannan Isle".

Behind the Scenes

• The "pigment dispersal" scene at the end of the story when Leela's eyes change from brown to blue was so Louise Jameson didn't have to continue wearing brown contact lenses. This was done to keep her as a member of the cast, as she found wearing the lenses uncomfortable and seriously considered leaving the show. Horror of Fang Rock was actually filmed second after The Invisible Enemy, so when the time came to don the contacts for this story, Jameson's eyes had had a rest for several weeks and she was better able to cope.

• Tom Baker began an on-off relationship with Sue Jerrard, who was working as an editor on this serial. He broke it off to marry Lalla Ward. After divorcing Ward, he rekindled his relationship with Sue and married her the two have been married ever since.

Allusions and References

• The story has elements in common with the 1912 Wilfred Gibson poem "Flannan Isle", which the Doctor quotes in the serial. The poem was in turn based upon true events, which occurred in 1900, when a supply ship discovered that the lighthouse crew on the Flannan Isles in the Outer Hebrides had vanished without a trace.