Doctor Who The Curse of Fenric: Part One (1963–1989) Online

1963–1989 Sylvester McCoy Sophie Aldred Dinsdale Landen Nicholas Mallett

Original Title :: The Curse of Fenric: Part One
Genre :: TV Episode / Adventure / Drama / Family / Sci-Fi
Year :: 1963–1989
Directror :: Nicholas Mallett
Cast :: Sylvester McCoy,Sophie Aldred,Dinsdale Landen
Writer :: Ian Briggs
Type :: TV Episode
Time :: 25min
Rating :: 8.3/10

Doctor Who The Curse of Fenric: Part One (1963–1989) Online

The Doctor and Ace arrive at a Naval base on the cost of Northumerland towards the end of World War II. The Time lord and his young companion pretend to be from the war office. The purpose of which is that the Doctor wishes to meet the wheelchair bound Dr. Judson who's work at breaking German Cyphers is very important to the war effort. This is achieved through the use of the Ultima machine. An invention of the crippled genius's. Unknown however to the Doctor, Ace and Judson. A platoon of Russian soldiers lead by Captain Sorin have secretly arrived on the coast of Northumberland. Their goal: To steal the Ultima Machine. But unknown to the Doctor. The theft of the Ultima Machine has been partly devised by Commander Millington. The bases supreme commanding officer. A ruthless, military man who is unnaturally obsessed with Norse Mythology. For centuries ago a Viking ship moored on the very shores, next to where the base stands. Carrying with it an evil curse. The Time Lord soon realize ...

Episode cast overview, first billed only:
	Sylvester McCoy	-	The Doctor
	Sophie Aldred	-	Ace
	Dinsdale Landen	-	Dr. Judson
	Alfred Lynch	-	Commander Millington
	Nicholas Parsons	-	The Rev. Mr. Wainwright
	Janet Henfrey	-	Miss Hardaker
	Tomasz Borkowy	-	Captain Sorin (as Tomek Bork)
	Peter Czajowski	-	Sgt. Prozorov (as Peter Czajkowski)
	Marek Anton	-	Vershinin
	Mark Conrad	-	Petrossian
	Joann Kenny	-	Jean
	Joanne Bell	-	Phyllis
	Anne Reid	-	Nurse Crane
	Cory Pulman	-	Kathleen Dudman
	Aaron Handley	-	Baby (as Aaron Hanley)

This serial was released by the BBC on video cassette in the UK in February 1991, containing extra material not originally broadcast.

Ken Trew had a small budget for the costume department to work with on this story, despite having the 1940's period to deal with, a monster outfit for 'The Ancient One' and military costumes too. The costumes for the monsters came from BBC Stock. They included Edwardian sailor outfits, a maid, a naval uniform, viking too name a few. They were washed with a green sock to 'dirty them down' and latex was dribbled over them. The Russian soldiers costumes again came from BBC Costume stock. They had been made for the BBC adaptation of Crime and Punishment ten years before. Captain Sorin's leather coat was actually a Danish Navy coat cut down to three-quarter length. It was bought from outdoor/army and navy surplus store SILVERMAN's, at that time in the Old Kent road.

Joann Kenny and Joanne Bell's shoes were specially made as multiple pairs of 1940's period shoes would be needed as they walk into the sea. Their cardigans came from Marks and Spencer, who were having a 40's revival at the time.Sylvester McCoy wore a darker version of his regular cream jacket for this season and it was first shown here. Although made first, the story would be shown later in the season so it's screen debut actually came in 'Battlefield'. The duffel coat worn by the doctor in this story was one that had been given to the actor to keep warm on location but it was decided to be use it during the story. The Ancient One was designed by Costume and built by outside manufacturers, Sue Moore and Steven Mansfield.

Sylvia Syms was offered the cameo role of Miss Hardacre.

This episode was watched by 4.3 million viewers on its original transmission.

Although there are several references in the story to the Norse belief in a final battle at the end of the world, the word Ragnarok was removed from the script to avoid confusion with the Gods of Ragnarok from the previous season's The Greatest Show in the Galaxy.

A line of dialogue referring to Ace losing her virginity was removed from the script.

The ULTIMA machine was based on the Enigma machine.

The score was recorded onto analogue stereo master tapes. The score was recorded between May and August 1989. It was produced and engineered by Mark Ayres. Even though the music was going to be created on synthesizers, director Nicholas Mallett asked composer Mark Ayres to take a fairly orchestral approach to early scenes and synthetic sounds as the bizarre and horrific started to encroach on the action.

Anna Reid (Nurse Crane) would appear later as the Plasmavore vs the Tenth Doctor (David Tennant).

Winner of Doctor Who Magazine Season Poll.

According to interviews with the scriptwriter Ian Briggs, Doctor Judson was based on pioneering computer scientist Alan Turing, who worked on the Enigma codes during the Second World War. Briggs originally wanted Judson to be gay like Alan Turing. Producer John Nathan-Turner vetoed this as he didn't consider it appropriate to depict a character's struggle with homosexuality in a family programme. Instead, they changed Turing's frustration at being unable to express his true sexual identity into Judson's frustration at being crippled. Briggs had also wanted to suggest that both Judson and Millington were gay and had a shared past, although this was not realised in the finished programme.

This was intended to be the opening to Season 26. Ace telling Kathleen about her fear of haunted houses was to foreshadow Ghost Light and The Doctor removing his overcoat to reveal his modified costume (a brown jacket instead of a cream-coloured one) was supposed to be a surprise.

Working titles for this story included The Wolves of Fenric and Wolf-Time.

Shooting on the serial went over-length to such a degree that consideration was briefly given to editing the story into five rather than four episodes. However, Ian Briggs strongly opposed this, feeling that the narrative flow would be badly disrupted.

Ian Briggs originally suggested a 1970s setting. Andrew Cartmel dismissed this as being too recent.

Because the episode overran, the information about the British troops' code was cut. This explains the extant reference to "the House Guests" in part three.

The story has a number of 'Firsts'. The first story of Sylvester McCoy to be released on video. The first story to be released on video in expanded form. The first time a complete incidental music score for an individual Doctor Who adventure to be released on home media. The score was released on CD by Silva Screen Records in 1991. It contained the original story score plus the extra cues written for the VHS extended version.

Christopher Eccleston and Peter Calpdadi - both future Doctor Whos - were considered for Wainwright.

This is the only Docteur Who (1963) serial from its 26-year run to be set during the Second World War, although themes from the war had influenced earlier storylines.

According to production manager Ian Fraser, the budget for all the episodes was 24,000 pounds per episode. The 21st century series is said to be one million pounds plus per episode.

Edward Hardwicke and David McCallum were Considred for Judson.

James Warwick was considered for Millington.

Jonthan Morris and Christopher Villiers was considered for wainwright. .

Martin Jarvis was considered for Judson.

Fans voted this number 14 in a countdown of the 163 Docteur Who (1963) stories in Outpost Gallifrey's 40th anniversary poll in 2003.

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Amhirishes

(Note: This is a review of all four episodes of the story.)

There is a saying about going out on top. Sylvester McCoy (and indeed Doctor Who itself) found itself coming to an unexpected end in 1989 with some of the original series best stories. Of those the best of them would be The Curse Of Fenric. The result is what I consider to be the second best Doctor Who story ever.

Any good production must have a good cast and this one has one of the best of the series. The performances start with the regulars: Sylvester McCoy as the Doctor and Sophie Aldred as Ace. McCoy gives his single best Doctor Who performance in this story as he strikes just the right balance between his more comedic Doctor of season 24 and the more serious Doctor of season 25 and earlier in season 26. Just look at the final episode to see McCoy at his best. Sophie Aldred also gives one of her best performances as Ace. This was the middle story of what has become known to fans as the "Ace Trilogy" (the other two stories being Ghost Light and Survival) due to their heavy focus on Ace and giving Aldred a chance to show off her skills as an actress. Aldred doesn't disappoint with a strong disappointment with a strong performance as the companion who discovers that her past is interlinked with the events unfolding around her. Despite their excellent performances, McCoy and Aldred is just the tip of the cast.

There is also an excellent supporting cast as well. There's Dinsdale Landen as Dr. Judson, the crippled computer scientist who unleashes the title and effectively embodies it. Alfred Lynch gives an excellent performance the obsessive Commander Millington who grows more and more paranoid as the story unfolds. There are also excellent performances from Tomek Bork as Soviet Captain Sorin plus Joann Kenny and Joanne Belll as the two teenagers Jean and Phyllis. Even the smaller roles are filled with good actors and actress like Anne Reid (Nurse Crane), Steven Rimkus (Captain Bates), Janet Henfrey (Mrs. Hardaker) and Raymond Trickett (the Ancient One). The true highlight of the supporting cast is Nicholas Parsons as Reverend Wainwright. Parsons, who apparently is better known in the UK for his more comedic roles and game show hosting, gives one of the best performances of the McCoy era as the priest who lost his faith and pays for it. There is a wonderful scene in the church where he is giving a sermon to an empty church that illustrates this beautifully and gives Parsons his best moment in the story. All together they form one of the show's best casts.

The story also has some strong production values as well. From the outset we get a rather well-done recreation of a WWII era army camp complete with trappings of the era (including a well done 1940's computer). Then there's the Haemovore's: the vampire possible future evolution of humanity brought back to the past. The Haemovore's, especially the Ancient One, are amongst the best monsters ever designed for the show as they are incredibly spooky and convincing. Couple this with the underwater filming and excellent location work and the result is a story that proves that under the right conditions a low budget can be overcome.

Then there's the heart of it all: the script. This is a story with many threads and layers. It is a story about war and faith that explores the nature of evil plus the lengths one must go to fight it. On top of all that there is the obvious horror aspect in the form of the Haemovores. Ian Briggs also manages to tie together stories from the McCoy era (Silver Nemesis, Dragonfire) to explore the background and character of Ace. Above all, this story is a sort of chess game between the Doctor and is ancient enemy named here as Fenric in which all the other characters act as their pawns. This is a story where one must watch to get everything that is going on making this not only a action story but one of the show's most cerebral as well.

The Curse Of Fenric is Doctor Who at its finest or close to it. It is defiantly the best story of the McCoy era at any rate with its strong performances, good production values and a strong script. Believe what you've heard because it is true. The Curse Of Fenric is excellent.

Ienekan

During my childhood and teenage years, and even during my time at university, I was an avid fan of "Doctor Who", but my enthusiasm for the series began to wane in the late eighties, by which time I was in my twenties. Part of the reason was the decision to move the programme from Saturday to a Wednesday timeslot, as work commitments meant that I could not always get home in time to watch it. This difficulty could no doubt have been overcome by the purchase of a video recorder, but another reason was that I disliked Sylvester McCoy's interpretation of the role. I therefore gave up watching, and when the BBC cancelled the series at the end of the 26th season I greeted their decision with indifference rather than the fury which would have been my reaction a few years earlier.

"The Curse of Fenric" was one of a number of serials which I missed because of my anti-McCoy boycott of the programme, and I had never seen it until it was recently broadcast on the "Horror" channel. It was the penultimate serial in that fateful 26th season; the very last "classic" Doctor Who adventure was the ironically inappropriately named "Survival".

The Doctor and his companion Ace arrive at a British military base in Northumberland during World War II. The base, he main purpose of which is to intercept and decipher German coded messages, is loosely based upon the real-life Bletchley Park, but whereas Bletchley had a vast team of cryptanalysts, all the work at this installation seems to be done by only two men with the aid of a computer. Trying to explain the plot in any more detail would be a vain endeavour. Suffice it to say that it involves Viking inscriptions, a group of Russian soldiers who are carrying out an invasion of Britain despite the fact that they were supposed to be our allies at the time, an insane British naval officer who seems far madder than any Nazi, a wheelchair-bound professor, an unbelieving parson, poison gas, a race of aquatic vampires known as Haemovores, an Oriental vase, a baby, a game of chess and some revelations about Ace's family background. Have you got all that?

Despite the wartime setting the villains are not the Nazis, who are conspicuous by their absence. Behind the mayhem which engulfs the base and the surrounding area is a being called Fenric, who, like The Mara which featured in some earlier episodes, is a disembodied evil entity from the dawn of time. Just as The Mara was derived from Hindu/Buddhist mythology, so Fenric is loosely based upon Norse myths; the name is derived from Fenrir, the monstrous wolf which fought against the Norse gods. (The original title for the serial was "The Wolves of Fenric").

Unfortunately, there is little in "The Curse of Fenric" to alter my view that McCoy was the George Lazenby of the series. I think that the problem was that he was originally a comic actor who tried to play the Doctor as a clown. When this proved unpopular with both the producers and the viewing public, the scriptwriters tried to make his character darker- the Seventh Doctor is for this reason sometimes referred to as the "dark clown"- but McCoy never really seemed able to convey this. I was never a great admirer, either, of Sophie Aldred's Ace, a surly, bolshie young woman who seemed to have a perpetual chip on her shoulder. Aldred also struck me as a rather wooden actress.

The acting is not, however, the only reason why I regard this serial as a failure. As might be apparent from my above list of all the many plot elements, the story is unnecessarily complex, difficult to follow and does not make a lot of sense. "The Curse of Fenric" is, unfortunately, not the only below-par adventure from the late eighties and while watching it I could easily understand just why the BBC executives decided not to bring "Doctor Who" back for a twenty-seventh season.

Some Goofs. Officers in the Royal Navy (unlike the Army and RAF) are required either to be clean-shaven or to wear a full beard. A moustache like Commander Millington's would not be permitted. Whoever came up with the name "haemovore" seems to have got his Greek confused with his Latin. The Greek form of "blood-eater" would be "haematophage" and the Latin "sanguivore".

Wafi

Doctor Who: The Curse of Fenric: Part One is set towards the the end of World War II & starts as the TARDIS materialises on a secret British Naval base off the coast of Northumberland near Whitby in Yorkshire. The Doctor (Sylvester McCoy) & Ace (Sophie Aldred) head straight for wheelchair bound scientist Dr. Judson (Dinsdale Landen) who has invented the Ultima Machine, a device used to break complex German codes. While there the Doctor notices that everyone seems preoccupied with local Viking legends, or more specifically The Curse of Fenric. Sensing something is wrong the Doctor decides to try & get to the bottom of the mystery...

Episode 8 from season 26 this originally aired here in the UK during October 1989, The Curse of Fenric has the distinction of so far (until Battlefield (1989) is released on DVD anyway) of being the only Doctor Who serial available in three different versions. First there is the originally transmitted four part version which is what I am basing my comments on & can be found on the DVD, a second version was put together for it's initial 1991 VHS release which still retained the four episode format but reinstated several deleted scenes in various episodes to increase the overall running time by around six minutes & then in 2003 for it's DVD release a third 'movie' style version was put together without any cliffhangers or breaks, added CGI special effects & even more deleted footage was edited back in increasing the running by twelve minutes over the original broadcast version & significantly longer than the previous 'extended' cut. The script was originally called The Wolves of Fenric & as far as Doctor Who opening episodes go this is actually really rather dull, not that much happens & there's a distinct lack of interest or excitement as far as I was concerned. I always thought the opening episode to a serial should really grab you & draw you into the story but here I found myself becoming quite bored with it if I am honest. The other thing that stood out for me in this episode is why on Earth is a top Government scientist like Dr. Judson doing working on ancient Nordic curses when he has enough to do trying to help us win the bloody war! I think all of his efforts should be going towards his Ultima Machine & decoding the German codes rather than spend time on amateur archaeology!

The Curse of Fenric has possibly the worst looking subtitles I have ever seen, ever. They look like they were created on some late 70's Spectrum & the letters have this basic horrible jagged edge that just looks so cheap. There's nothing in the way of special effects in this episode, there's a monsters 'claw' & a couple of dead Russian soldiers but otherwise there's little here to get excited about. Having said that the location work & period World War II production design is nice enough but then us Brits have always been great at convincing period pieces, certainly better than Sci-Fi. The Fenric of the title was actually based on the real Norse legend Fenrir, the son of a Norse God, who was a Wolf which is where the original title The Wolf of Fenric came from. Meanwhile the Ultima Machine was obviously influenced by the real life Enigma Machine which was a device used to decode message during war time. There's a little homage to Jaws (1975) in this episode while there are some terrible Russian accents which seem to come & go at random. Also during the war road signs such as the great big Maidens' Point one were actually taken down to stop & confuse any potential enemy invasion so that sign wouldn't have been there.

The Curse of Fenric: Part One is an episode that I don't actually have much love for, nothing that great happens & the seventh Doctor & the annoying Ace aren't one of my favourite Doctor companion partnerships which doesn't help. A strangely very empty & forgettable episode.

funike

Doctor Who was coming to the end of its original long run in 1989, and Sylvester McCoy would be the last to play the Time Lord for some time. Stories from the last series would be a little patchy, but this one - perhaps because of its supporting cast (Nicholas Parsons, Alfred Lynch, Dinsdale Landen, Anne Reid) - doesn't disappoint.

There are aliens, a war plot, a fiendish chess game, a computer encryptor, a priest who has lost faith in God, and - a common theme in the series - men in the armed forces who may not be all they seem. This story has a reputation of being one of the best, and it is certainly clever and slightly scary. McCoy himself was a good Doctor, giving the character a bit of vulnerability and charm alongside the eccentricity, while Sophie Aldred as Ace was a good sidekick.

Comparing 'The Curse of Fenric' with some more recent stories from the new era is interesting as it comes out rather well; and perhaps that bit more convincing.

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Doctor Who The Curse of Fenric: Part One (1963–1989) Online

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