Doctor Who: The Mark of the Rani
(2 episodes, s22e05-e06, 1985)
A peaceful, hard-working existence at a mining village meets a trio of Time Lords.
This story has a fast launch out of the gate. A group of miners head for the relaxation of the local bathhouse, but they are gassed out by an unknown force. On the TARDIS, the Doctor is frustrated as the TARDIS is pulled off course by a mysterious time distortion. Peri, in an odd costume, is displeased at the rural setting.
The gassed miners have an odd mark on their necks, and the chemicals have transformed them into vandals more intent on fighting than working. In fact, they act more like Luddites than anything else, destroying machinery and attacking those who use it. The Doctor and Peri disrupt one of these attacks and find a red mark on one of the vandals, but the attacker runs off.
As the Doctor and Peri make their way into town – intent on meeting George Stephenson, an architect of the Industrial Revolution – the Doctor’s time distortion tracker keys in on the bathhouse. They also fail to notice the shadowy figure skulking in their wake. We soon discover that dark figure is none other than the Master and that the woman who runs the bathhouse is in on the scheme in some way. The Master commands the vandals – who don’t bat an eye at the Master’s advanced technology – to attack the Doctor. Our heroic Time Lord nearly falls into the open mineshaft before being saved by Lord Ravensworth, the landowner. They discuss the mystery of the mining village.
The Master, using a device that works on wood (unlike the typical sonic screwdriver), forces his way into the bathhouse and uncovers the identity of the old woman: She is the Rani, an exiled Time Lord, and a chemist who is distilling sleep-inducing neurochemicals from the miners. The distillation process causes the red marks, and the sleep-inducing chemicals are needed for Miasimia Gora, a planet that the Rani rules. The two Time Lords work together despite their deep distrust of one another and repeated attempts to sabotage one another in their quest to kill the Doctor.
The Doctor follows the clues to the bathhouse, going undercover as a miner to investigate. He succumbs to the gas, but upon awakening, he challenges the Rani’s ethics. She’s been coming to Earth for the neurochemicals for centuries, and their discussion reveals the presence of the Master to the Doctor. The Rani leaves to find the Master, leaving an opening for Peri to sneak in. Unfortunately, her attempt to save the Doctor is interrupted by the other two Time Lords. After some rhetorical back, forth, and trickery, the Master is given leave to deal with the Doctor. He has the Luddites drop the TARDIS down the mining shaft, and after a twist of fate, they find the Doctor and send him in after it.
Luckily, the Doctor is saved just in time by George Stephenson. The inventor spirits the Doctor and Peri to Lord Ravensworth’s home and sends Luke to find the lord with a message. Unfortunately, he is intercepted and enthralled by the Master, forced to kill anyone who might disrupt the upcoming meeting of inventors at Lord Ravensworth’s manor. The Master wants to use the meeting to accelerate the Earth’s technological development so he can harness that power for his own evil means, and he strikes a deal with the Rani so that she can return to Earth at any time if she helps his plans move forward.
The Doctor and Peri return to the bathhouse and investigate the Rani’s TARDIS. After dodging booby traps, they enter the console room, but the Doctor kicks Peri out as the TARDIS dematerializes remotely and moves to the mines where the Rani and the Master are scheming. The pair enter, retrieve some tools and leave, which frees the Doctor to sabotage the control column.
I do like elements of the Rani’s TARDIS console room, but it needs a bit more color and depth. It’s certainly better than redressing the Doctor’s console room once again. The renovated roundels are a nice touch.
The Doctor meets up with Peri at the mine shaft where she takes him back to Lord Ravensworth’s manor. Stephenson is gearing up to rescue one of the incoming inventors, but the Doctor realizes that the message was carried by Luke and that the assistant is acting funny. The Doctor goes in his stead to Redfern Dell, where the Rani and the Master have set landmines (those tools they retrieved earlier) to ambush Stephenson.
As the Doctor ventures out, Peri uses her botanical knowledge to develop a sleeping-draught for the affected miners. Her quest takes her to Redfern Dell with Luke to find the herbs. As everyone converges, the Doctor ambushes the other two Time Lords and holds them at bay with the Master’s Tissue Compression Eliminator. He watches as Luke inadvertently steps on a landmine and is transformed into a tree – a development that comes out of nowhere – then angrily marches his hostages through the dell. The Luke-tree saves Peri from sharing his fate, alerting the Doctor to his companion’s danger. He forces the Rani to save her but leaves Peri to take them to the mines as he tries to save the Luddite horde from the landmines. His captors don’t listen and succumb to their new fates.
The Rani and the Master escape due to the former’s trickery, but their triumph is short-lived as they board the Rani’s TARDIS. The Doctor’s sabotage causes the time capsule to tumble out of control, and the time spillage reaches a jar holding a Tyrannosaurus Rex embryo. The dinosaur begins to grow…
The Doctor and Peri return to Lord Ravensworth, exchanging the vial of neurochemicals (which they pickpocketed from the Master) for the TARDIS (which Ravensworth retrieved from the mines). The travelers board the TARDIS and dematerialize, shocking the inventor and his financier.
Really all I can say is that this was an average story. It was good to see another Time Lord in a large role, nice to see the Master again, and fun to touch on history once again with the first historical figure directly on screen since The Gunfighters. The Rani seems like she could be a good lead-in to the concept of Missy, which debuts nearly thirty years after this point.
It’s especially fun to see the mystery and menace of the Master. We’ve never needed to know how he survives each time, it’s just enough to know that he does and seems unstoppable.
Rating: 3/5 – “Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow.”
UP NEXT – Doctor Who: The Two Doctors
The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.
