The Twin Dilemma (TV story)

The Twin Dilemma was the seventh and final story of Season 21 of Doctor Who. It was the first full story to feature Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor. It was also the last story to feature half-hour episodes until Season 23.

Synopsis
A race of giant Gastropods has taken over the planet Jaconda. Their leader, Mestor, now intends to cause an enormous explosion in order to spread his people's eggs throughout the galaxy, and he kidnaps juvenile twin geniuses from Earth to work out the necessary mathematical equations. Space fighters led by Lieutenant Hugo Lang are dispatched to get the twins back, but they come under attack and Lang is the sole survivor when his ship crashes on the asteroid Titan III.

A newly regenerated Doctor and Peri become involved and help Jaconda's elderly former ruler Professor Edgeworth, who is really a Time Lord named Azmael, to defeat Mestor and free the planet's bird-like indigenous people from the gastropods' reign of terror. Azmael, however, sacrifices his life in the process.

The danger over, the Doctor tells Peri, "I am the Doctor - whether you like it or not!"

Part one
After his regeneration from The Caves Of Androzani, the new Doctor starts behaving erratically. He goes to the wardrobe and starts looking for a new outfit, finding a glaring, mismatched, brightly coloured coat, to which he immediately takes a shine. Peri tells him that he could not possibly go outside wearing such an awful garb, to which the Doctor takes offence.

The two twins, Romulus and Remus Sylvest, receive a visitation from a mysterious old man called Professor Edgeworth. They question how he managed to get inside their house; he tells them he will return when their father is there, then proceeds to take control of their minds, and the trio disappear. They arrive on a spacecraft in deep space. Edgeworth then communicates with his superior, a slug-like creature called Mestor, who instructs Edgeworth to take the twins to Titan III.

In the console room, the Doctor has a funny turn, quoting a poem about a Peri— a good and beautiful Fairy in Persian mythology, but one which used to be evil. The Doctor then accuses Peri of being evil, and of being an alien spy, before rushing toward her and throttling her. He catches a sight of his own manic face in a mirror and collapses in a heap, releasing Peri. When she tells him that he tried to kill her, he initially denies he could be capable of such an act, but seeing how terrified of him she is, decides he must become a hermit on the desolate asteroid Titan III.

The twins' father contacts the authorities; he found Zanium in their room — a sure sign of intergalactic kidnap. Lieutenant Lang begins the pursuit and soon finds a suspicious ship previously reported missing. He tries to contact it, but it enters Warp drive something that class of ship is not designed to do.

On Titan III, as the Doctor contemplates a thousand years of solitude and Peri expresses her disapproval, they hear the crash landing of a craft. Examining its wreckage, they find the concussed body of Commander Lang. They take him back to the TARDIS where he reveals his whole squadron has been destroyed. Believing the Doctor to be responsible, he points his gun at the Time Lord and threatens to kill him...

Part two
Peri pleads with Lang, telling him that the Doctor had in fact saved him, but he faints away. The Doctor is not keen to treat Lang, more concerned for his own life, but eventually agrees to Peri's persuasion.

Edgeworth argues with Romulus and Remus, making them do Mestor's work. He scolds them for setting up a distress signal, so they are not allowed to use electronic equipment to solve the equations they have been set. An image of Mestor appears and gives the twins a more blunt threat — work for him or have their minds destroyed.

On the TARDIS scanner, the Doctor and Peri see a building — something which has no place on an uninhabited asteroid. Leaving Lang behind, they find a tunnel which may lead to the building, but on exploring find two aliens wielding guns. The Doctor cowers in fear and pleads with them not to shoot him. They are led off and are brought before Edgeworth. The Doctor claims to be a pilgrim to Titan III, but Noma, one of the aliens, says they are spies and should be shot. The Doctor suddenly recognises Edgeworth as an old friend - Azmael, master of Jaconda, whom he last saw during his fourth incarnation. When the Doctor sees Romulus and Remus and discovers it is Azmael who has abducted them, he is disgusted. Azmael teleports away with the twins and the aliens, leaving the Doctor and Peri locked in the building. The Doctor starts to break the lock's combination, but Peri discovers Noma has set the base to self-destruct. The Doctor improvises a solution to teleport them back to the TARDIS. Peri makes a successful return, but the Doctor has not appeared when she sees the base explode on the scanner...

Part three
A glimpse of the Doctor is seen appearing in the TARDIS; he was delayed returning because he was using Peri's watch to synchronise their arrival, but the watch had stopped. The Doctor is surprised at Peri's compassion when she thought he had died.

On Jaconda, Mestor is seen putting one of the bird-like Jacondans to death for the petty offence of stealing a few vegetables. Soon, the TARDIS arrives, but instead of the expected beautiful planet the Doctor is expecting, he, Peri and Lang find a desolate wasteland covered with giant Gastropod trails. The Doctor is reluctant to go to the palace, scared for his own life, but is persuaded to take Lang there in the TARDIS. In the palace corridors they see murals depicting Jaconda's history, depicting the slugs of myth - but it appears that they are now all too real. After avoiding some Gastropods, Lang gets stuck in their slime trail.

Azmael takes the twins to his laboratory and shows them a store room full of Gastropod eggs. Mestor arrives and tries to persuade them that his aims are benevolent. Azmael begs him to stop reading his thoughts and stop Noma watching his every move. He agrees and leaves. Azmael explains to the Twins that Mestor usurped him as leader of Jaconda and outlines a plan to draw two outlying planets into the same orbit as Jaconda. The Twins' genius is required to stabilise those planets in their new orbit. The Doctor, leaving Peri and Lang behind, finds Azmael's lab. In a manic fit of pique, he attacks Azmael, but is restrained by a Jacondan and the Twins. The Doctor apologises to Azmael but demands to know what is going on.

Meanwhile, Peri is captured by Jacondan guards and brought before Mestor. When Lang escapes to Azmael's lab and informs them what has happened, the Doctor finally shows compassion for her when he thinks she might die...

Part four
Mestor refrains from killing Peri immediately, finding her appearance pleasing. Jacondan guards arrive in Azmael's lab and seize the Doctor. The Doctor tells Mestor that he ought to allow him to assist with the dangerous operation of moving the planets, as a single mistake could blow a hole in that corner of the universe. Back in the laboratory, Azmael informs the Doctor the details of the plan to bring the planets into the same orbit — they will be placed in different time zones using time travel technology that Mestor stole from Azmael. The Doctor realises that, as the other planets are smaller than Jaconda, bringing them closer to Jaconda's sun will lead to catastrophe. The Doctor enters the egg storeroom, and is disturbed that they have no nutritional mucus. He tries to cut one open with a laser cutter; the shell is impenetrable, but the egg reacts slightly to the heat. The Doctor realises they have been designed to withstand the heat of an exploding sun — the explosion of the Jacondan sun will scatter the eggs throughout the universe. When they hatch, the Gastropods will conquer the universe.

The one remaining Jacondan in the lab collapses dead, his mind burnt out. Mestor had been using him as a monitor, and knows the full details of what has been discussed. Peri, Lang and the Twins return to the TARDIS, whilst the Doctor and Azmael go to confront Mestor. When Mestor refuses to abandon his plans, the Doctor hurls a vial of acid taken from the lab at him, but a force field protects Mestor from any harm. Mestor threatens to possess the Doctor's mind and body, and demonstrates by taking control of Azmael's body. Azmael tells him to destroy Mestor's body before he can return to it, which he does with a further vial. Then Azmael, in his last regeneration, forces himself to regenerate — killing himself — and in doing so destroys Mestor. Dying, Azmael says he has no regrets and that one of his fondest memories was a time spent with the Doctor by a fountain.

The Doctor and Peri return to the TARDIS. Lang decides to stay behind on Jaconda to assist with their rebuilding. When Peri tells the Doctor off for being rude, he reminds her that he is an alien, with alien sensibilities: "I am the Doctor whether you like it or not!"

Cast

 * The Doctor - Colin Baker
 * Peri - Nicola Bryant
 * Edgworth / Azmael - Maurice Denham
 * Hugo Lang - Kevin McNally
 * Mestor - Edwin Richfield
 * Romulus - Gavin Conrad
 * Remus - Andrew Conrad
 * Sylvest - Dennis Chinnery
 * Noma - Barry Stanton
 * Drak - Oliver Smith
 * Fabian - Helen Blatch
 * Elena - Dione Inman
 * Chamberlain - Seymour Green
 * Prisoner - Roger Nott
 * Jocondan Guard - John Wilson

Crew

 * Assistant Floor Manager - Stephen Jeffery-Poulter, Beth Millward
 * Costumes - Pat Godfrey
 * Designer - Valerie Warrender
 * Film Cameraman - John Baker, John Walker
 * Film Editor - Ian McKendrick
 * Incidental Music - Malcolm Clarke
 * Make-Up - Denise Baron
 * Producer - John Nathan-Turner
 * Production Assistant - Christine Fawcett
 * Production Associate - June Collins
 * Script Editor - Eric Saward
 * Special Sounds - Dick Mills
 * Studio Lighting - Don Babbage
 * Studio Sound - Scott Talbott
 * Theme Arrangement - Peter Howell
 * Title Music - Ron Grainer
 * Title Sequence - Sid Sutton and Terry Handley
 * Visual Effects - Stuart Brisdon

Story notes

 * This story had working titles of; A Stitch In Time, A Switch In Time.
 * New opening and closing title sequences make their debut a more colourful version than the previous one, incorporating Colin Baker's face rather than Peter Davison's designed by Sid Sutton and Terry Handley.
 * The cat badge worn by the Doctor in his lapel for this story was hand-made and painted by Suzie Trevor, and purchased for the programme from a specialist badge shop in central London.
 * Fabian was originally envisaged as a male character, and the Jocondan Chamberlain as a female one.
 * The Doctor attempting to strangle Peri marks the first (and to date only) time on television that the Doctor has intentionally attempted to kill a companion (his destruction of Kamelion doesn't count as that was a robot).
 * When in 2009 readers of Doctor Who Magazine readers voted on their favourite story The Twin Dilemma came in at 200 making it reader's least favourite Doctor Who story. Ironically, this dubious honour was achieved at about the same time the story was released to DVD in the UK, completing the DVD releases of the Sixth Doctor era.

Ratings

 * Part 1 - 7.6 million viewers
 * Part 2 - 7.4 million viewers
 * Part 3 - 7.0 million viewers
 * Part 4 - 6.3 million viewers

Myths

 * The Edgeworth character was originally intended to be the first Doctor. (He wasn't.)

Filming locations

 * Springwell Quarry, Springwell Lane, Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire
 * Gerrards Cross Sand and Gravel Quarry, Gerrards Cross
 * BBC Television Centre (TC3 &amp; TC8), Shepherd's Bush, London

Production errors

 * The uncredited person providing the service of wardrobe continuity makes an error in the first bit of episode one. After the Doctor regenerates, a smudge of mud disappeared from his sweater.


 * The director commits a sin of blocking. Because of where he has Gavin and Andrew Conrad sit in one scene, the actors must be awkwardly repositioned in another. When the twins are playing equations, they suddenly move about a metre apart so that they have room to turn around and face each other.


 * The silver computer terminal in the safe house on Titan 3 is prone to wobbling - most obviously when Peri spots the bomb and the Doctor walks away to have a look.


 * In Part Three, when the TARDIS arrives on the supposedley decimated Jaconda, grass and trees can be seen in the background.

Continuity

 * The transmat beam leaves behind a dusty residue, an effect also produced by the transmat used in DW: Bad Wolf.

Timeline

 * This story takes place after DW: The Caves of Androzani
 * This story takes place before DW: Attack of the Cybermen

Home video and audio releases

 * The Twin Dilemma was released on VHS video in May 1992.


 * The Twin Dilemma was released on DVD on September 7th, 2009 in the UK, 3rd December 2009 in Australia, and 5th January 2010 in North America. This was the last Colin Baker story to be released on DVD.

DVD special features

 * Audio commentary by Colin Baker, Nicola Bryant, Kevin McNally
 * The Star Man - discussion with Sid Sutton about the making of the revised opening credits
 * Looking 100 Years Younger - Colin Baker discusses the Doctor's choice of fashion over the years with comedian Amy Lame, ending with a digitally altered image of what the Sixth Doctor could have looked like had they followed Baker's original idea.
 * Stripped for Action: The Sixth Doctor - retrospective about the Sixth Doctor comic strips
 * Breakfast Time: March 1984 TV interview with Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant
 * Blue Peter: 1984 appearance by Colin Baker
 * BBC continuity announcements
 * Easter Egg: "film trims"
 * Radio Times listings (PDF)

Novelisation and its audiobook

 * Main article: The Twin Dilemma (novelisation)


 * Novelised as The Twin Dilemma in 1985 by Eric Saward.