The Leisure Hive
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| 110 - The Leisure Hive | |
|---|---|
| Doctor | Tom Baker (Fourth Doctor) |
| Writer | David Fisher |
| Director | Lovett Bickford |
| Script editor | Christopher H. Bidmead |
| Producer | John Nathan-Turner |
| Executive producer(s) | Barry Letts |
| Production code | 5N |
| Series | Season 18 |
| Length | 4 episodes, 25 mins each |
| Transmission date | August 30–September 20, 1980 |
| Preceded by | Shada (unbroadcast) The Horns of Nimon (broadcast) |
| Followed by | Meglos |
The Leisure Hive is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from August 30 to September 20, 1980.
Contents |
[edit] Synopsis
The Fourth Doctor and Romana take a holiday at the Leisure Hive on the planet Argolis, which is recovering from the legacy of a nuclear war with the Foamasi. However, when things start going wrong with the Tachyon Recreation Generator, the Doctor fears that a new war might be in the offing.
[edit] Plot
The Doctor and Romana’s holiday in Brighton is brought to a sudden end when K-9 takes in sea-water and explodes. They instead venture to the Leisure Hive of Argolis, a holiday complex built by the surviving Argolin following their devastating war with the Foamasi. As ever, they arrive at a point of crisis in the year 2290. The Leisure Hive is facing bankruptcy and the Argolin’s Earth agent, Brock, arrives with his lawyer Klout, bearing an offer to buy the planet outright. Regrettably the offer is from the Foamasi, the only species that could live on the radiation-infused surface of Argolis, and so the Argolin Board will not consider it. Hit by the shock of events, the ageing Board Chairman Morix succumbs to a rapid death – the Argolin war curse of advanced cellular degradation – and in her absence his consort Mena is declared the new Chairman.
The Doctor is intrigued by the manipulation of the tachyon in the Hive’s Tachyon Regeneration Generator, which is the main tourist attraction and is able to duplicate and manipulate organic matter. He witnesses the Generator kill a human tourist after it has been sabotaged, the latest in a series of acts of wilful damage.
No sooner has Mena returned to Argolis than her own body clock begins to speed up. Her Earth scientist Hardin has been brought to Argolis to help her and her people by using time experiments to rejuvenate a people rendered sterile by the war of forty years earlier. Recognising the value of scientists, she engages the Doctor and Romana to help Hardin with his work. The time travellers know Hardin has been faking his work, but Romana also feels the experiments should have worked.
The death of Hardin’s assistant, Stimson, is pinned on the Doctor and the Time Lord is forced into the Generator as a trial of sorts. After further sabotage he emerges as an ancient old man with flowing white hair. Pangol, Mena’s son, is the most warlike and vindictive of the Argolin and interprets this as proof of guilt, ordering the Doctor and Romana to be confined. Hardin frees them to help him in his experiments.
Foamasi government agents now make themselves apparent on Argolis — and unmask Brock and Klout as doppelgangers in bodysuits. In truth they are of the West Lodge Foamasi, a criminal faction which has made the offer on Argolis and has been sabotaging the Hive to help their negotiations. The agents place them under arrest and prepare to depart.
Pangol now usurps his mother as leader of the Argolin, declaring to Brock and the Board that he is the first of the new Argolin: a product of cloning experiments conducted in the recreation generator. This, he contends, is the future of the Argolin, who will use the Generator to recreate themselves and rise up again. As a skilled tachyon engineer he starts to clone himself in the Generator, creating hundred of Pangols in battle-dress and ready for conflict. The Doctor interferes in the tachyon manipulation with three happy consequences: Pangol’s clones become unstable and disappear, and he is reduced to the age of a baby; Mena is rejuvenated and saved from death; and the Doctor himself loses the added centuries. The only cost is the Randomiser which the Doctor loses in the Generator but had been fitted in the TARDIS to prevent the Black Guardian tracking them.
[edit] Cast
- Doctor Who — Tom Baker
- Romana — Lalla Ward
- Voice of K-9 — John Leeson
- Morix — Laurence Payne
- Mena — Adrienne Corri
- Pangol — David Haig
- Vargos — Martin Fisk
- Guide — Roy Montague
- Hardin — Nigel Lambert
- Stimson — David Allister
- Brock — John Collins
- Klout — Ian Talbot
- Foamsi — Andrew Lane
- Tannoy Voice — Harriet Reynolds
- Generator Voice — Clifford Norgate
[edit] Cast notes
Features a guest appearance by David Haig and Adrienne Corri. See also Celebrity appearances in Doctor Who.
[edit] Continuity
- Every serial between The Leisure Hive and The Five Doctors is linked in some way, either directly leading from one storyline to the next, or through direct reference.
- At the beginning of the story, on Brighton beach out of season, the Doctor grumpily states that this is the second time he has missed the opening of the Brighton Pavilion (by the best part of two centuries, it would appear). The first time was with Leela in Horror of Fang Rock (on that occasion by a few miles as well as some 80 years).
- Although the Randomiser is removed from the TARDIS in this story, the Black Guardian does not catch up with the Doctor until he is in his fifth incarnation in Mawdryn Undead.
- Beginning with this story, the Doctor abandoned his famous multi-colored scarf in favor of a burgundy and purple one. Also, the question mark motif made its first appearance here as a regular element of the Doctor's wardrobe for his next three incarnations.
[edit] Production
- Working titles for this story included The Argolins.
- Writer David Fisher conceived of the Foamasi as a race of organized criminals. "Foamasi" is a near-anagram of "mafioso".
- This was the first Doctor Who story which John Nathan-Turner produced. Nathan-Turner was keen to get away from what he considered the excessive silliness of recent Doctor Who stories, and wanted to increase the series' production values, because he felt that they were poor when compared with glossy American science-fiction series. Among the changes Nathan-Turner instituted was the scaling back of K-9's appearances (the unit is out of commission for most of this serial), eventually writing the character out in Warriors' Gate. Nathan-Turner would produce Doctor Who until its cancellation in 1989.
- This was also the first story to use the Quantel digital image processing system.
- In a further attempt to update the image of the series, the original 1963 Delia Derbyshire arrangement was replaced by a more contemporary-sounding arrangement by Peter Howell, and a new, '80s-styled neon tubing logo replaced the diamond logo most associated with the Fourth Doctor. The updated title sequence is most associated with the Fifth and Sixth Doctors.
[edit] In print
| Doctor Who book | |
 |
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| Doctor Who and the Leisure Hive | |
|---|---|
| Series | Target novelisations |
| Release number | 39 |
| Writer | David Fisher |
| Cover artist | Andrew Skilleter |
| ISBN | 0 426 20147 7 |
| Release date | 22 July 1982 |
| Preceded by | Doctor Who and the Keeper of Traken |
| Followed by | Doctor Who and the Visitation |
A novelisation of this serial, written by David Fisher, was published by Target Books in July 1982.
[edit] Broadcast, VHS, DVD and CD releases
- This serial was released on VHS in January of 1997.
- This story was released on DVD in the United Kingdom on July 5, 2004.
- Peter Howell's incidental music for the serial was released, in 2002, on the compilation album Doctor Who at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop Volume 3: The Leisure Hive.
[edit] External links
- The Leisure Hive episode guide on the BBC website
- The Leisure Hive at Doctor Who: A Brief History Of Time (Travel)
- The Leisure Hive at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
[edit] Reviews
- The Leisure Hive reviews at Outpost Gallifrey
- The Leisure Hive reviews at The Doctor Who Ratings Guide
