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Episode Two, 9 January 1971
Episode Three, 16 January 1971
Episode Four, 23 January 1971
Written by Robert Holmes
Script editor: Terrance Dicks
Produced by Barry Letts
Jon Pertwee as the Doctor
Roger Delgado as the Master (first appearance)
Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart
Katy Manning as Jo Grant (first appearance)
Richard Franklin as Captain Yates (first appearance)
John Levene as Sergeant Benton
What we've got here for the season eight opener is pretty much a remake of the season seven opener, "Spearhead From Space": the Nestene Consciousness, a disembodied species who take on corporeal form by possessing and animating objects made of plastic, plan to land in force on Earth and wipe out humanity, aided by an ally who runs a plastics factory, and the Doctor must stop them by jamming the radio signals by which they transmit themselves across space and inhabit our plastic goods. In fact, it's not even an exact remake, plotwise, as the Nestene Autons (human-shaped warriors) have been made less interesting: there's now only one type of them, the drones that are essentially lethal, walking shop dummies. The second, fascinating type from "Spearhead From Space" has disappeared: the replicas of real human beings that were so convincingly done with such a simple special effect.
But it's not the plot of "Terror" that matters, because that's not the purpose of the story--rather, "Terror" is here to serve as a platform, introducing us for the first time to the Doctor's nemesis.
The Master.
He's portrayed here by his originator, Roger Delgado, and from the first time he appears onscreen--in the first episode's first scene--he's the most compulsively watchable character from amongst the entire very large cast who were a part of the programme during the Pertwee years. (The Pertwee era had the largest regular cast of any period of Classic Who.) He's charming, urbane, always already aware of whatever new gambit his opponents will try, a scientific genius and a complete psychopath of an individual, without any care for the life or death of any other being in the universe except himself--and the Doctor.
What Lisa thought
Lisa is of the opinion shared by most Who fans, that the Delgado Master is by far the most successful Master. As such, she enjoyed this one, though she did notice it was a rehash of "Spearhead From Space". Myself, I find it difficult to choose between Delgado and Simm, but in a pinch I would probably plump for Delgado. But I think the reason that the Delgado and Simm Masters both work better than, say, the Ainley or Roberts incarnations of the role is that the Master works best, as a character, when he's a dark mirror of the Doctor.
And Delgado manages that consummately. Pertwee's interpretation of the Doctor is a distinctive one--he's an aristocrat, instantly at home hobnobbing with royalty and government ministers; he even has a membership (as this story establishes) in a London gentlemen's club. (It's the third Doctor's adulation of the privileged that's the biggest reason he's my least favourite Doctor.) And the Delgado Master complements that perfectly--their conversations together* are what scenes would look like in Downton Abbey if Downton Abbey ever dealt with a madman bent on enslaving the whole world.
It's a good thing Delgado's so good, too--since we're going to be seeing so much of him.
The next story in our rewatch will be "The Mind of Evil".
*And that's another thing--Pertwee and Delgado actually talk to each other, in a way Ainley never does with Davison, Colin Baker or McCoy.
