Planet of Giants was the ninth serial and the first
of the second season of Doctor Who. It was originally broadcast in three
episodes between October and November 1964. The story stars William Hartnell as
the Doctor, Carole Ann Ford as Susan, William Russell as Ian, and Jacqueline
Hill as Barbara.
It features the Tardis crew being shrunk to an inch in
height after a malfunction during landing causes the doors to open mid-flight.
While travelling through a land of gigantic matchboxes and enormous insects,
the crew come under threat from a dangerous new insecticide, DN6, which is
fatal to all life.
The interesting thing about this story is that it was
originally going to be a four part serial (made up of Planet of Giants,
Dangerous Journey, Crisis and The Urge to Live). However, it was felt by Donald
Wilson (the then BBC Head of Serials) and Sydney Newman (then Head of Drama),
that the episode lacked the punch required for the opening of season two. They
would have preferred to have started the season with Terry Nation’s “Dalek
Invasion of Earth” but because this serial featured the departure of series
regular Carole Ann Ford, it could not be broadcast before Planet of Giants.
Eventually the decision came to edit the material from the final two episodes
into a single part, so that Nation's story could be broadcast as soon as
possible. This left a single episode gap in the season, which would
later be filled with the Doctor-Lite story “Mission to the Unknown". The “missing” episode has since been recreated on the 2012
DVD release of this story.
So join us on Wednesday and tweet along. Bar opens at 7.30pm
and we press play at 8.00pm. Hope to see you there.
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