Doctor Who/Recap/20th AS the Five Doctors



""No! Not the mind probe.""

- The Castellan is mildly alarmed at his impending mental torture, but the actor just can't handle the lines.

This is a rarity for Doctor Who twofold over. First, it's a multi-Doctor adventure, which had only been done once before and has only been done twice since then... as of this writing, anyhow. Second, this was also the 20th anniversary special for Doctor Who - aired during Children in Need night (though US broadcasting was two days before, on the actual anniversary date of November 23). Finally, this was presented as a Who-movie in one massive part rather than a multi-part adventure (though it didn't stop the BBC from turning it into a 4-parter a few years down the road).

The Fifth Doctor, Tegan and Turlough have a vacation from their last adventure (Kamelion, who joined last time, is ignored) at the Eye of Orion. Things are mighty peaceful, until the Fifth Doctor suddenly is struck by pain and has to be dragged back inside his TARDIS. The Fifth Doctor makes mention of something taking away his older lives.

As it turns out, a villain is taking the Doctor's previous lives out of time and space. The First Doctor (played by Richard Hurndall, as William Hartnell passed away 8 years prior) is stolen away as he meanders around a garden. The Second Doctor is whisked away as he and The Brigadier reminisce about old times. The Third Doctor is kidnapped along with his car Bessie as they drive along the countryside. Sarah Jane Smith is whipped away from her home and robot dog. The Fourth Doctor... well, something unspecified went wrong, and he's stuck somewhere in time with Romana. Meanwhile, the Fifth Doctor and companions are finally dragged off somewhere else inside the TARDIS...

Cut to Gallifrey. The Time Lords are getting worried - someone has kidnapped the Doctor out of time and space, and the Fourth Doctor being stuck in time is a problem... There's only one person they can trust to rescue the Doctor...

The Master, of course!

Lord President Borusa (previously seen throughout many adventures) also promises the Master a new regeneration cycle if he can pull this off - and the Master seems all too happy to help out, taking a teleport recall device to keep in touch with the Time Lords. Hmm...

The First Doctor, wandering through an odd set of hallways, runs into his granddaughter Susan - whom we've not seen since 1964! Quickly, they both run into trouble as a Dalek shows up, albeit one looking like it needs some repair. The Doctor and Susan quickly outwit the Dalek, which explodes... taking out a part of the wall and showing that they have a rather unfortunate problem: outside lies the Tower of Rassilon. The Doctor correctly surmises that not only are they on Gallifrey, but in the evocatively-named Death Zone! As they continue walking on, they notice a familiar blue box off in the distance...

Meanwhile, the Second Doctor and the Brigadier run around and away from Cybermen and also find the Tower of Rassilon - causing the Second Doctor to wonder if they're playing 'the Game of Rassilon' while he recites an old nursery rhyme about the tower (the Nursery Rhyme of Rassilon?). The Third stumbles across Sarah Jane, who has just fallen down a gentle slope horrible cliff face. Sarah Jane tries to figure things out for a few seconds before giving up: as she'd already seen the Third Doctor regenerate into the Fourth, she's confused by Three showing up again, but eventually decides to roll with it. They quickly run into the Master, and the Third Doctor assumes that this is all his doing, steals the Master's proof of working for the Time Lords and drives off, leaving the Master surrounded by a lot of random explosions.

Slowly awakening in his TARDIS, the Fifth Doctor finds himself staring into the face of his first incarnation - and a meeting of the minds happens. Meanwhile, Tegan and Turlough go to everyone tea... but come back with a feast, and absinthe! Let the partying commence! It's finally decided that the Fifth, Tegan and Susan will try to get to the Tower of Rassilon, while the First stays behind to munch on fruit and, presumably, Turlough drinks the absinthe. As the Fifth and companions head out, they quickly run into the Master... who does at least get a little trust from the Doctor before Cybermen show up and blow things up. The Master is knocked unconscious, the Fifth Doctor steals his teleportation device and is whisked back to the high council. Tegan and Susan run off back to the TARDIS, leaving the Master for dead... and Susan sprains her ankle in a tribute to longtime writer Terry Nation.

The Fifth Doctor quickly figures out how badly things are going up at the Capitol, while the First Doctor and Tegan set out to the Tower of Rassilon. The Third Doctor and Sarah Jane are menaced by Cybermen, but are unintentionally saved by a guardian robot that just kills anything that moves. They quickly climb up a mountain through a series of cuts and climb over a massive ravine to reach the roof entrance for the Tower of Rassilon. The Second Doctor and the Brigadier, however, go through a cave system (the Cave System of Rassilon?) beneath, fight off the Yeti of Rassilon, and enter the tower via the Basement Entrance of Rassilon. Back in the Lobby of Rassilon, Tegan and the First Doctor encounter a hopscotch-shaped booby trap. Fortunately, the Master wanders by just in time to smirk and toss off a cryptic hint. Thank goodness for small favors.

Finally, the first three Doctors are together in the Hall of Rassilon and begin to work out exactly what the Rassilon is going on. Sarah Jane, the Brigadier and Tegan are happy to see one another; most have encountered one another before. The Master shows up, revealing that... contrary to the Doctors' collective expectations, he's not the architect of mayhem this time around. But, as long as he's here in the Tomb of Rassilon, he still plans to steal the immortality-granting Ring of Rassilon from off the Corpse of Rassilon that's lying in state over there in the Casket of Rassilon... until the Brigadier whacks him upside the head and he's forgotten about for the rest of the story.

Off in the High Council of Rassilon Time Lords, the Fifth Doctor plays the Harp of Rassilon, which trips a hidden door to the Secret Tree Fort of Rassilon, which means he finally finds out who is behind all of this: Lord President Rassilon Borusa! We're not really told why, but it's pretty apparent that Borusa has gone mad and wants that Ring of Rassilon to rule Gallifrey utterly forever. He then uses the Coronet of Rassilon to brainwash the Fifth into helping him out, and goes off with him to the Tower to confront the other three Doctors...

The TARDIS finally shows up at the Tower. This allows Turlough and Susan to finally leave the TARDIS ... only to be frozen in place by Borusa when he shows up with the zombified Fifth Doctor. The other three Doctors do some mental struggling and free the Fifth Doctor from his possessed form - but they're unable to stop Borusa from finishing off the Game of Rassilon and claiming the Ring of Rassilon from Rassilon himself (who is apparently not as dead as we thought, as they even have a conversation!).

However, the so-called immortality (of Rassilon) is not as it appears. Borusa is instantly sucked into the Exposed Casket of Rassilon - forever to be a fully-aware chunk of stone, unable to move. Rassilon sends the other three Doctors and their companions off on their merry ways and frees the Fourth Doctor from whatever the Rassilon was wrong with him and Romana. The other Time Lords show up in quick succession, after the action is over, and offer the Fifth Doctor the Presidency of Rassilon Gallifrey. The Fifth Doctor... accepts and orders his companions into the TARDIS, where he'll take them home and show up on Gallifrey later - naming the one who offered him rule his replacement in the meantime.

Once inside the TARDIS, however, the Doctor grins and says he utterly lied about taking the Presidency and that he's going on the run from his own people again. After all, he explains with a grin, "That's how it all started."

This is it - one of the best tales of Doctor Who. The cast and crew loved working on it, the fans loved it... what's more to say? Well, aside from the fact that this story actually went through several iterations. One was that there was to be a story called 'the Six Doctors', featuring an android version of the First Doctor called 'Doctor Wil.' Another was a full story featuring Tom Baker alongside the other Doctors... but it had a heavy focus on him (author Terrance Dicks would explain that he felt Tom's Doctor was the most likely to fall to evil, thus having the meat of the story). This was changed into the final version, with most of Tom's role going to then-current Doctor Peter Davison. A few of Tom's lines have snuck into Peter's lines, though...

This story has had two DVD releases; the 25th anniversary release (an anniversary of an anniversary?) is the one to get. Not only does it have the original release, it contains two versions of the story and three DVD Commentary tracks... one with Peter Davison and writer Terrance Dicks; one with most of the rest of the actors; and, as an Easter Egg, a warm-hearted geekfest with 10th Doctor David Tennant, New Series script editor Helen Raynor, and New Series producer Phil Collinson. There are even a handful of documentaries for the era that long outstrip the actual length of the special - one narrated by 6th Doctor Colin Baker and the other narrated by 8th Doctor Paul McGann.

The Tropes of Rassilon

 * Actor Allusion Of Rassilon: Three insults Two by calling him a scarecrow. Three had gone on to play Worzel Gummidge.
 * And Rassilon Must Scream: Borusa's fate
 * Author Appeal of Rassilon: Script Editor Eric Saward demanded Cybermen, writer Terrance Dicks hated them. Notice that scene of the Raston Warrior Robot slaughtering the Cybermen, much less the Master making sure many, many more Cybermen died? Yeah...
 * Rassilonic Badass: The Raston Warrior Robot. Sliced apart an entire platoon of Cybermen.
 * Be Careful What Rassilon Wishes For: Oh, Borusa...
 * Black Cloak of Rassilon: the Master looks like he's cosplaying Dracula.
 * Rassilon Broke The Pedestal: Borusa's Face Heel Turn.
 * The Bus of Rassilon Came Back
 * Can Only Move the Eyes of Rassilon: The captured Time Lords in the Tomb of Rassilon.
 * Curb Stomp of Rassilon: Raston Warrior Robot vs Cybermen. It rips roughly a dozen of them apart in seconds!
 * Rassilon Ex Machina: Rassilon. However, considering he's alive even after death, this is understandable that he would have so much power.
 * Dull Surprise Of Rassilon: The Castellan's blind panic mild alarm at the Mind Probe of Rassillon.
 * Evil Tower of Rassilon
 * Fake Rassilon: The Fourth Doctor and Romana were portrayed using clips from the unaired Shada.
 * As seen above, the Fourth Doctor was played in all publicity still by Tom Baker's waxwork from Madame Tussauds. How realistic it looks is up to you, although in a few shots the other actors are
 * To be fair, Tom had originally agreed to appear in the story until JNT rescheduled the shooting dates to fit in with Pat's plans.
 * Fan Service of Rassilon: Justified, since this was the 20th anniversary. Daleks, Cybermen, the Master, all five incarnations of the Doctor (more or less) and the lovely female companions were put on screen for the loyal viewers.
 * Fate Worse Than Rassilon: Good ol' Borusa.
 * Four Rassilons All Waiting: There's quite a few subplots to keep track of. Let's see, Turlough and Sarah are Trapped By Mountain Rassilons, there's the Master's Heel Face Revolving Rassilon, Mindcontrolled!Five and Borusa, and finally all the Doctors gathering at the Tower.
 * Future Rassilon Scares Rassilon: Devolved into a minor bitching match between Doctor-incarnations.
 * Game Within a Game of Rassilon: Trope name even invoked by Lord President Borusa
 * Ham to Ham Combat of Rassilon: All five Doctors, the Master, Rassilon, Borusa... it's a miracle any scenery was left for filming!
 * Heel Face Revolving Door of Rassilon: The Master
 * Hey You Haymaker of Rassilon: The Brig sneaks up behind the Master, quips "Nice to see you again!", and knocks him out.
 * Rassilon Doesn't Like The Sound of That Place!: The Death Zone!
 * Rassilon Hates Past Rassilon: As One through Four are heading back to their respective times, Five states, "I'm definitely not the man I was. Thank goodness!"
 * Jerkass Of Rassilon: Seriously, Doctors, the Master was actually trying to help (mostly) this time.
 * Kneel Before Rassilon: Well, Borusa.
 * Large Ham of Rassilon: Try to name just one.
 * Logo Joke of Rassilon: As if the 90's BBC Video ident didn't sound ominous enough, the 1995 VHS release began with it being time scooped after doing its schtick.
 * Easter Egg of Rassilon: It was also included on the 25th Anniversary DVD release as such.
 * Magic Music of Rassilon
 * The Rassilon
 * Milestone Celebration of Rassilon
 * Mind Probe of Rassilon: No, not the mind... probe.
 * Not Rassilon This Time: Poor Master. He really was just trying to help.
 * The Nth Rassilon : In spades!
 * Old Fashioned Rowboat Date of Rassilon: The Fourth Doctor and Romana on the Cam in a punt.
 * One Scene Wonder of Rassilon: Tom Baker and Lalla Ward, punting down the Cam.
 * The Other Rassilon: Richard Hurndall does a wonderful job trying to fill in the shoes of the late William Hartnell. It does help that he looks quite a bit like the previous actor, but it didn't stop some from lovingly nicknaming the special Three Doctors and a Bloke in a Wig during the DVD Commentaries of Rassilon.
 * Phantom Zone Picture of Rassilon: Though the CGI special edition DVD changes this to a weird swirly-cone effect.
 * Prepositional Phrase of Rassilon Equals Coolness (of Rassilon)
 * Put On The Bus of Rassilon: What happened to the Fourth Doctor. Tom Baker would later come to regret not appearing in the special.
 * Self Demonstrating Article Of Rassilon: ...Need we say more?
 * Some Kind Of Forcefield of Rassilon:
 * Songs In The Key Of Rassilon: The door to Borusa's hidden chamber is opened by playing a specific melody on the Harp of Rassilon.
 * Taken For Granite By Rassilon: Poor Borusa.
 * The X Of Rassilon: Oh, for Rassilon's sake, you don't really need this explained, do you?
 * Vanilla DVD Release Of Rassilon: In 1999, the BBC launched their DVD range, choosing this story to represent Doctor Who in the first batch of BBC dvds. The 1999 release of this story only contained the 1995 Special Edition edit (chosen to take advantage of the Dolby Digital sound), CGI TARDIS console menus, and an isolated music soundtrack (which was low-pitched and out of sync). The US 2001 release of the vanilla DVD added a commentary to it. In 2008, an updated DVD with tons of special features and the option of the original edition and special edition.