"Doctor Who" scriptwriters could be prone to self-plagiarism, and "Doctor Who and the Silurians" is a case in point as it contains two plot elements which would be recycled in later serials during Jon Pertwee's tenure as the Doctor. The idea of a race of prehistoric reptiles emerging from a long hibernation was to be revived in "The Sea Devils" from two years later. (The Sea Devils themselves are explicitly stated to be aquatic relatives of the Silurians). The idea of scientists working on developing a cheap, plentiful power supply was to be reused even more rapidly, reappearing in "Inferno" from later in the seventh season. The character of Dr Lawrence here is very similar to that of Dr Stahlmann in the later series; both men are scientists who are obsessive about their work and will brook no interference with it, even when it becomes clear that that work is putting humanity in danger.
In this case the power source is an experimental nuclear power research centre which is suffering unexplained power drains. Sabotage is suspected, and UNIT is called in to investigate. The truth, however, is far stranger. The activities of the centre have revived a hibernating race of intelligent reptiles, the Silurians of the title, and it is they who have been abstracting power from the plant. (When the serial was first broadcast in 1970 the BBC were bombarded with letters from scientists who pointed out that "Silurian" was an inappropriate name for a reptilian race as reptiles did not exist in the Silurian era. They were not the only ones to spot this error; my ten-year-old classmate Ian, who had a lively interest in all things scientific, made the same point in one of our regular playground discussions about the programme. Exactly when the Silurians first evolved is never made clear; at times it is suggested that they are dinosaurs, but they state that they once co-existed with the humans' ape ancestors, which would make them much more recent).
The idea of confining the Third Doctor to twentieth-century Earth as a sort of Quatermass figure rather than allowing him to range freely through space and time as his two predecessors had done was not welcomed by all the writing team. Malcolm Hulke, the writer of "The Silurians", is said to have grumbled that this would limit the number of possible plot lines to two, "alien invasions and mad scientists". The plot he came up with here seems to combine elements of both story lines, but with variations. Humanity finds itself under attack from an alien race, but one which originates not from outer space but from the Earth's own past. Some of the scientists working at the plant, notably Lawrence and his deputy Dr Quinn, are, if not exactly mad, at least grossly irresponsible in their attitude to public safety.
As in "The Sea Devils", the programme's normal moral boundaries are blurred. It is normally taken for granted that the Doctor's enemies, such as the Daleks or the Cybermen, are the villains of the piece and that anyone fighting against them must be on the side of right and virtue. Here things are not so simple. The Silurians are divided between those who wish to co-exist with the humans and those who wish to destroy them; similar divisions also exist on the human side. The Doctor, as he was to do in "The Sea Devils", tries to act as peacemaker to prevent a devastating war from breaking out. Both serials were first broadcast in the early seventies, the period when the word "detente" was being much used in political discourse, and there may have been a deliberate Cold War analogy, with the Doctor and the Old Silurian representing the "Doves" and the more militant elements on either side the "Hawks".
The serial has a few faults. The Silurians (men in rubber suits) are not very convincing, and that dinosaur which they use as a sort of watchdog is even less so. Carey Blyton's incidental music is pretty irritating, and the pace of the story in the early episodes is perhaps too slow. (There were not many "Doctor Who" adventures which really needed seven episodes to tell their story, and this was not one of them).
On the other hand, the pluses far outweigh the minuses. Jon Pertwee had already made his mark on the series, establishing the Third Doctor's character as a mixture of lovable eccentricity- this story marks the first appearance of his yellow vintage car, "Bessie"- and genuine moral concern. He receives good support from Caroline John as Liz Shaw, who plays a vital role in defeating the Silurians' plans and Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, here playing a morally ambivalent role. The Brigadier is the Doctor's ally against Lawrence and his ilk, and at one point saves his life, but is far less liberal when it comes to the Silurians whom he can only see as an enemy to be fought, unlike the Doctor who sees them as an intelligent race with as much right to live as the humans.
The serial may have started slowly, but it gathers pace, and by the end it has become one of the most thrilling of the Doctor's adventures. Watching it again recently, for the first time in many years, reinforced my view that the early seventies were something of a Golden Age in the history of the programme.
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