Warriors of the Deep (novelisation)

 was a novelisation based on the 1984 television serial Warriors of the Deep.

1984 edition
When the TARDIS materialises on Earth in the year 2084, the Doctor meets an old enemy – the Sea Devils. Once the masters of this planet, they are now forced to live in the murky depths of the sea. But their intention is to reclaim their position of domination…

This will entail the infiltration of Earth’s defence systems and the provocation of another World War, more terrible than any yet experienced, to bring about the complete annihilation of the human race.

Not only is the first stage of the Sea Devil’s attack successful, their associates in this dastardly plan are the sinister Silurians, also known to the Doctor of old.

Chapter titles

 * 1) The Intruder
 * 2) The Traitors
 * 3) Hunted
 * 4) The Sea Devils Awake
 * 5) The Attack
 * 6) The Myrka
 * 7) The Breakthrough
 * 8) Sabotage
 * 9) The Hostage
 * 10) Captured
 * 11) Counterattack
 * 12) Sacrifice

Deviations from televised story

 * In the televised version it is implied the Sea Devils are hibernating in a bunker beneath the ocean floor. In the novelisation they are hibernating in the lower depths of the Silurian craft.
 * Terrance Dicks in his novelisation makes no implication regarding the two sides in the human conflict, clearly referring to them as "East Block" and "West Block".
 * The novelisation explains that Tegan's foot is undamaged when trapped under the heavy door "by a kind of freak accident".
 * Terrance Dicks paints Doctor Solow as a sympathetic character, persuaded by Nilson that the "East Block" had the solution to banish suffering and injustice from the world.
 * Icthar's reference to twice having offered the hand of friendship does not fit with shown continuity (possibly explained in the Virgin Missing Adventures novel The Scales of Injustice), and is rewritten as the Doctor having twice tried in vain to make peace.
 * Icthar is clearly identified as the unnamed Silurian previously encountered by the Third Doctor in the televised Doctor Who and the Silurians.
 * Terrance Dicks retains in his novel an attempted rescue of the Doctor by Turlough and Preston, cut from the televised version to emphasise Turlough's cowardice and selfishness.
 * On television the Sea Devils had been hibernating for hundreds of years. In the novelisation Terrance Dicks changes this to thousands, but it is likely to have been around forty million years.
 * When Nilson takes Tegan hostage, the Doctor follows them to the Solar weapon. In the novelisation, when the Doctor follows, he grabs a base rifle for protection, but is forced to abandon it when Nilson threatens Tegan with his blaster.

British publication history
First publication:
 * Hardback
 * W.H. Allen & Co. Ltd. UK


 * Paperback
 * Target

Audiobook
In June 1995, BBC Audio released an abridged audio book version of the novel, read by Peter Davison. It was later reissued on Tales from the TARDIS Volume 2.