Changing Time (2006)

Changing Time: Living and Leaving Doctor Who (2006)

50 minutes

This documentary opens with some of the cast and crew talking about how they got started working in television. Actors Rex Robinson, Glenn Huston, and Elisabeth Sladen plus co-writer Bob Baker and Visual Effects Designer Colun Mapson all share their stories on this subject.

There are a number of chapters that follow this

• Casting Sarah Jane - how Elisabeth Sladen came to work on the show
• Changing Doctors - the transition from Jon Pertwee to Tom Baker
• Playing the Doctor - how Tom Baker's approach to the character differed from Jon Pertwee's and where it came from
• A Special Relationship -  Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen talk separately about their working relationship
• Hand of Fear - the origins of the story
• On Location - shooting the show at the power station and the quarry
• In Studio - special effects and other in studio work
• Breaking Apart - Sarah Jane's departure from the show
• Endings

Other people interviewed for the documentary include Tom Baker, Barry Letts (producer 1970-74), Philip Hinchcliffe (producer 1975-77), Stephen Thorne (2nd incarnation of Eldrad), and Terrance Dicks (script editor). 

I enjoyed this documentary very much. I thought it was going to be focused just on Sarah Jane, since this was her last episode. There is some focus on her but it is more about Hand of Fear than it is specifically about Sarah Jane or Elisabeth Sladen.

Doctor Who (1963) 14.02.04

The Hand of Fear - Part 4

Eldrad pulls the bolt from her chest. The Doctor and Sarah help her get on to the elevator. They take it down to level 306. They encounter another trap on the way but the Doctor manages to disarm it. They get Eldrad to the regeneration chamber before she expires.

Eldrad regenerates as a male silicon based lifeform. The Doctor and Sarah learn that Eldrad withheld some information from them. Eldrad wanted to rule Kastria and now with the help he received from the Doctor he will. He quickly learns that all the Kastrians are dead and gone. Eldrad has other ideas but the Doctor puts an end to that and Eldrad falls into an abyss.

Sarah and the Doctor return to the TARDIS. The Doctor receives a telepathic summons from Gallifrey. He can't take Sarah so he drops her off back on Earth.

Doctor Who (1963) 14.02.03

The Hand of Fear - Part 3

The Doctor and Sarah arrive at the reactor room too late. Driscoll has already entered with the hand. The Doctor considers sticking around but decides to leave after Professor Watson announces that the RAF who will be hitting the facility with tactical nuclear weapons in less than 10 minutes.

The RAF fires missiles at the facility but Eldrad absorbs the energy of the weapons and there is no explosion.

Eldrad emerges from the reactor core. Eldrad has assumed a human form. The Doctor, Sarah, and Professor Watson return to the reactor room after they witness what happened to the RAF strike. The Doctor has a chat with Eldrad who uses her power to confirm that he is telling the truth and to ascertain that he is not human. She knows of the time lords and asks the Doctor to help her.

Eldrad explains that she came from Kastria. She restored the planet, which was once a barren world, but then it got caught in the middle of a war between two other planets. She learns from the Doctor that it has been 150 million years since she arrived on Earth. Ekdrad asks the Doctor to take her back in time to the time she left Kastria so that she can get her revenge.

The Doctor agrees to take Eldrad back to Kastria but in the present. Professor Watson doesn't trust Eldrad and tries to kill her with a gun. Eldrad almost kills the professor but stops when the Doctor threatens to break his promise (to take her back to Kastria) if she kills Professor Watson.

The Doctor, Sarah Jane, and Eldrad return to the TARDIS. They travel to Kastria. Eldrad is happy but then she gets shot with a bolt in the chest.

Doctor Who (1963) 14.02.02

The Hand of Fear - Part 2

Sirens start to go off at the nuclear power station. The Doctor and Dr. Carter escape from the guards in the confusion and make their way to the control room. Professor Watson, the top man at the power station, asks them to leave but they stick around.

Sarah has sealed the door to the room where whe is holed up with the hand that is now wiggling and regenerating. Professor Watson and the Doctor try talking some sense into Sarah but she is under the sway of Eldrad and won't listen. Dr. Carter is also under the sway of Eldrad but that isn't apparent to the Doctor just yet

The Doctor heads down to the room in which Sarah has locked herself and the hand. Dr. Carter goes with him. He tries to kill the Doctor. Dr. Carter falls to his death off from a great height when he tries taking a swing at the Doctor.

Doctor Who (1963) 14.02.01

The Hand of Fear - Part 1

A creature, possibly humanoid, wrapped in protective garb mans a post on an extremely cold planet and in the distant past. It is given orders which it follows to blow up a spaceship, which it does.

The TARDIS materializes on Earth in a quarry. The Doctor and Sarah Jane emerge and start walking around. They are caught in an explosion which levels a wall of rock. The Doctor emerges from the explosion relatively uninjured but Sarah is buried under some rubble. The Doctor and men who were working at the quarry dig her out.

Sarah is taken to a hospital. She is holding a stone hand which must be much be older than mankind, based on where it was found. There is a ring on the hand which Sarah takes. The hand is examined by Dr. Carter at the hospital while Sarah is unconscious. The Doctor checks in first on Sarah and then on Dr. Carter. The Doctor decides to return to the quarry to have a look around to see if he can find anything related to the hand.

The Doctor returns empty handed from the quarry but by then Sarah is gone. She awoke while he was at the quarry and went to see Dr. Carter. She took the hand and knocked out Dr. Carter using a ray beam that the ring emits. She heads to the nearest nuclear reactor, Nunton Experimental Complex. She uses the ring again a few more times at Nunton.