Cat's Cradle (unproduced TV story)

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Cat's Cradle was a proposed television story for Season 22, submitted by Marc Platt to Eric Saward in 1984. It was rejected for being too ambitious for the show's budget.

Platt had submitted numerous stories before this, including Fires of the Starmind, The Werelings, and Warmongers, but Cat's Cradle was the script which eventually led to Platt writing an actually televised story. Having read this script, Andrew Cartmel encouraged Platt to send in another one, leading to Platt writing Shrine.

The original storyline had featured the Sixth Doctor and Mel, and a silver cat that would've been the cat from the Doctor's lapel and was supposed to be the spirit of the TARDIS. Platt had intended to show a darker side to the Sixth Doctor and make him frightening again. (DWM 305) Unlike the novel, the storyline did not involve Gallifreyans at all, with the Chronauts instead being less-lore-burdened pioneers of time travel. (DWM 184)

Platt later adapted the story as a novel in the Virgin New Adventures, instead featuring the Seventh Doctor and Ace. Editor Peter Darvill-Evans thought it was such a wonderful title that he decided to use it as an umbrella for a three-volume series, though the trilogy idea was never developed beyond the odd cross-reference before deciding to focus on the silver cat. (DWM 305)

Platt's audio story Time Reef also echoed aspects of the original Cat's Cradle, featuring Greek-Hero-inspired pioneers of time travel trapped in a strange location outside time.