The Age of Steel (TV story)

The Age of Steel was the seventh story of Season 28. It was the second part of a two-part story, the first part being "Rise of the Cybermen." The episode was first broadcast on 20 May, 2006.

Synopsis
The plans of John Lumic to convert the world into Cybermen are now in full force. The Doctor, Rose, Mickey and the Preachers must find a way to stop him from enforcing his "ultimate upgrade".

Plot
As the Cybermen close in, the Doctor uses the charging TARDIS power cell hidden in his hand, sending tendrils of energy which disintegrate the cyborgs. Mrs Moore drives up in the Preachers' van, the Doctor and the others climbing aboard. Pete wants to go back for Jackie, but the Doctor tells him she is dead and they need to get away or she will have died in vain.

In the van, the Doctor tells Mickey that the power cell will recharge in about four hours. Jake suggests they execute Pete for working for Lumic, but Pete reveals that he is actually "Gemini", the source of the Preachers' inside information on Lumic. He only joined up with Lumic to feed information to the Security Services, but instead he got the Preachers. Ricky is indeed London's "most wanted" — but for parking tickets. The Doctor suggests Pete take off his EarPods in case Lumic is listening, and tells the Preachers that they need to get to the city and tell the authorities about Lumic. He promises them grimly that this ends tonight.

Lumic broadcasts a signal via the EarPods throughout London, taking hypnotic control of most of the population. Those affected, including Jackie, begin walking towards the Battersea Power Station factory to be upgraded. The rejected stock are to be incinerated. Lumic's henchman Crane, however, feels the signal coming through and takes his EarPods off. Cybermen begin stalking the streets as the city is sealed off; Rose suggests removing the EarPods from the entranced, but the Doctor warns that this would be too dangerous as it would cause a "brain storm".

Rose recognises the Cybermen from the head she saw in Henry van Statten's museum. The Doctor confirms that the Cybermen in their universe began on a small planet like this, and then swarmed across the galaxy. The group decides to split up to increase their chances of getting out of the city. However, in the process of fleeing, the Cybermen catch up with Ricky while he is climbing a fence. They kill him as Mickey watches helplessly from the other side.

Crane is brought before Lumic for his seeming treachery, but Crane requests for an upgrade. This is only a ruse to get him close to Lumic's wheelchair, and Crane manages to damage Lumic's vital breathing apparatus but the Cybermen quickly kill him. Despite the gasping Lumic's protests, the Cybermen determine that he should be upgraded. Lumic says that he will only upgrade with his last breath. The Cybermen coldly reply that he will breathe no more, and take him away.

Meeting up with the others, Mickey tells them of Ricky's demise; Jake reacts with a mixture of grief and anger, turning on Mickey. The Doctor says that they can mourn Ricky when London is safe. They go to view Battersea from across the river, and see Lumic's zeppelin moored on the roof. Mrs Moore calls up a schematic of the factory, which shows old cooling tunnels that lead beneath it. Pete suggests another way in: through the front door, using dummy EarPods. Rose demands to go with Pete, even though to successfully infiltrate the building neither of them must show any emotion. The Doctor relents, and thinks of a third way, to sabotage the EarPod transmissions so the people do not walk to their deaths like sheep. He tells Jake to take out the transmitter, which the Doctor, using the sonic screwdriver, determines is on the zeppelin. The Doctor and Mrs Moore will enter the factory from below, through the cooling tunnels.

The group then are about to set off, when Mickey realises that, once again, he has not been assigned a role, and complains about being the "tin dog". Mickey says he will go along with Jake, despite Jake's resentment at his survival. Ultimately, however, Jake lets Mickey go with him, and the Doctor wishes him luck.

The Doctor and Mrs Moore enter the cooling tunnels, which are filled with hundreds of unactivated Cybermen. He tells Mrs Moore to move carefully and keep an eye out for any trip devices. Meanwhile, Rose and Pete successfully join the line of humans entering the factory, while Mickey and Jake make it to the mooring station on the roof. The zeppelin is guarded by two hypnotised guards, which Jake and Mickey render unconscious with knock-out drops. They climb into the airship.

As they move through the tunnels, Mrs Moore tells the Doctor that she used to work for Cybus Industries, until one day she read a file that she was not supposed to. As a result she was hunted by Lumic and went on the run, eventually finding the Preachers. She also reveals that her husband and two children think her dead and that her name is not really "Mrs Moore". She took that from a book, assuming the alias to bolster the impression that she had died and protect her family. Her real name is Angela Price, but she makes the Doctor promise not to tell a soul.

However, they do not notice a red light flashing at their passing. Above, an alarm alerts the Cybermen to something in the tunnels. They activate the stored Cybermen to remove the intruders; the Doctor and Mrs Moore escape just in time through a hatch which the Doctor seals behind them. In the factory, Pete and Rose move towards the conversion chambers, keeping an eye out for Jackie. Suddenly a Cyberman approaches them, identifying Pete. To Pete and Rose's horror it reveals that it was once Jackie. Rose and Pete are captured and taken to Cyber Control as the Cyberman that was once Jackie fades back into the mass of identical steel creatures.

On the bridge of the zeppelin, Jake and Mickey search for the transmitter controls, and find what seems to be an empty Cyberman shell. They dismiss it and continue to look. In the tunnels, the Doctor and Mrs Moore meet a Cyberman, which she deactivates with an EMP bomb. The Doctor opens the chest of the downed Cyberman, finding bits of an organic nervous system and an emotional inhibitor. The Doctor explains that if the Cybermen realised what they had become, they would go insane. The Cyberman stirs, and with its inhibitor broken, it remembers that it was once a bride-to-be named Sally Phelan. The Doctor apologises, and eases her into death with the sonic screwdriver.

The Doctor realises this is the solution: if they could find the cancellation code for the inhibitor and feed it throughout the system, the shock of realising what they are would probably kill them. He hesitates at the thought of this, but Mrs Moore convinces him that they have to do this before they kill anyone else. Suddenly a Cyberman appears from behind and kills Mrs Moore. The Doctor is outraged but the Cyberman's only response is to note his alien biology; his binary vascular system registers as an "unknown upgrade." The Doctor is to be taken to the factory's central command to be studied further.

On the zeppelin, Mickey finds the transmitter control behind a steel plate, but with no way to cut through it. Jake suggests setting the autopilot of the ship to crash and then escaping. Mickey begins to hack into the ship's systems, but activates a silent alarm in the process.

The Doctor is brought to Cyber Control where he meets Pete and Rose. The Doctor asks where Lumic is, and a Cybermen tells him that Lumic has been upgraded into the Cyber-Controller. A wall slides back and reveals the former Lumic, now a specialised Cyberman with glowing eyes and a transparent brain case, seated upon a mechanical throne.

The Cyberman on the zeppelin comes to life in response to the silent alarm and tries to kill Mickey and Jake. Mickey goads the Cyberman into punching him, ducking out of the way at the last second so it punches through the steel plate protecting the transmitter control instead. Electricity crackles through the Cyberman's body and it falls at the same time the transmission is cut off. The humans in the factory snap out of their trances and begin to flee, screaming, flooding past the Cybermen trying to stop them.

The Doctor hears the cries and realises that his friends have succeeded. Lumic refuses to admit defeat, saying that he has factories around the world, and if he cannot use the EarPods, the conversions will take place by force. Somehow knowing that Jake and Mickey are observing through a monitor in the zeppelin, the Doctor stalls Lumic, challenging his assertions of an emotionless utopia. The Doctor points out that Lumic is creating a world without imagination, emotion and creativity and that with such thinking humanity will cease to progress. Lumic may have an army, but he is forgetting about the ordinary people, and even an ordinary person — some "idiot" — can save the world.

Mickey, listening, realises the Doctor is referring to him and is dropping hints about finding a code that will shut down the emotional inhibitors. Mickey picks up on this, and searches the Lumic database to decrypt the code, which he sends to Rose's mobile phone. The Doctor points out to Lumic that in his drive for technological dominance, he made his systems able to interface with anything. The Doctor proves this by plugging Rose's phone into the console, sending the code across the Cyber system.

All over the factory, the Cybermen's inhibitors shut down; they see each other and realise what they have become, overloading from the emotions they start to feel. The Cybermen begin to malfunction and collapse, some even exploding. The Doctor, Rose and Pete run out of the control room as the factory begins to be consumed in fire. In the midst of the flames and seemingly unaffected by the transmitted code, Lumic frees himself from the chair.

Despite Jake's urgings, Mickey refuses to leave the others behind. He calls Rose and tells her to make for the roof, lowering a ladder from the zeppelin for them. As the Doctor, Rose and Pete climb upward, the ladder is suddenly jerked by a great weight — the Cyber-Controller climbing up after them. The Doctor throws Pete his sonic screwdriver and tells him to use it on the rope. Pete says that this is for Jackie Tyler and cuts the ladder, sending the Cyber-Controller tumbling to his apparent death in the burning factory below.

The Doctor returns to the TARDIS with the fully charged power cell and restores power to the ship. Outside, Rose tries to persuade Pete into boarding the TARDIS but he refuses. She tries to explain about parallel universes and that she is his daughter, but Pete is unable to handle this information and leaves to tell the authorities about Lumic and the other factories.

The Doctor says they have only five minutes of power and have to leave. He tells Jake Mrs Moore's real name, asking him to find her family and tell them how she died saving the world. However, Mickey announces he is staying. This world lost its Ricky, and there are other Cybermen factories to destroy, as well as his blind grandmother who needs looking after. Rose promises that they will come back and see him, but the Doctor reminds her that they only arrived in this parallel universe by accident, and when they leave they must repair the hole in time, meaning they can never come back. The Doctor gives Mickey Rose's mobile phone, telling him to get the code out there and wishes "Mickey the Idiot" luck.

Rose and Mickey reminisce about their childhood and how they wondered what they would do with their lives, never imagining they would be travelling to the stars. They share an emotional farewell, and Rose tearfully returns to the TARDIS, which dematerialises before Jake's astonished eyes.

The TARDIS rematerialises in Jackie Tyler's flat. Rose breaks down on seeing her mother alive, and hugs her tightly. Jackie wonders where they went, and asks the Doctor where Mickey is. The Doctor simply responds that Mickey has "gone home."

On the parallel Earth, Mickey tells Jake that he does not intend to replace Ricky but be his own man. They can remember him by fighting in his name. Mickey wonders if there is a Cyber-factory in Paris, and suggests they go liberate the city. Jake is sceptical that they can do that with the two of them in a van. Mickey tells him there is nothing wrong with a van. After all, he once saved the universe with a big yellow truck…

Cast

 * The Doctor - David Tennant
 * Rose Tyler - Billie Piper
 * Mickey Smith, Ricky Smith - Noel Clarke
 * Jackie Tyler - Camille Coduri
 * Pete Tyler - Shaun Dingwall
 * John Lumic - Roger Lloyd-Pack
 * Jake Simmonds - Andrew Hayden-Smith
 * The President - Don Warrington
 * Rita-Anee - Mona Hammond
 * Mrs. Moore - Helen Griffin
 * Mr. Crane - Colin Spaull
 * Dr. Kendrick - Paul Antony-Barber
 * Morris - Adam Shaw
 * Soldier - Andrew Ufondo
 * Newsreader - Duncan Duff
 * Cyber-Leader - Paul Kasey
 * Cybermen's voice - Nicholas Briggs
 * Cybermen - Gethin Jones (uncredited), Kevin Wickenden (uncredited)

Ratings
The average overnight viewing figure for this episode was 6.85 million (a 36% share), peaking at 7.7. million.