Doctor Who/Recap/S14/E06 The Talons of Weng Chiang: Difference between revisions

Doctor Who goes all ''[[Sherlock Holmes]]''[[X Meets Y|-Meets-]][[Hammer Horror]] in this tale set in [[Victorian London]]. Police pathologist Professor Litefoot is investigating a body found floating in the Thames, and, with help from the Doctor, determines that hairs found on the body come from a giant rat.

 

 

Greel's "Time Cabinet" was lost in London and has been found by Litefoot, so Greel sends Chang's ventriloquist's doll, "Mr Sin" - a computerised homonculus with a pig's brain - to infiltrate Litefoot's house and retrieve it. Mr Sin succeeds, but the Doctor and friends manage to intervene before Greel can escape. He falls into his own lifeforce-extracting machine and is disintegrated, before the Doctor manages to deactivate Mr Sin.

=== Tropes ===

 

* [[Absurdly Spacious Sewer]]

* [[Affably Evil]]: Li H'sen Chang.

* [[Black Comedy]]: On being introduced to Li H'sen Chang the Doctor asks to see a trick. Tong member promptly drops dead from the suicide pill. The Doctor applauds.

* [[The Butcher]] (of Brisbane): Magnus Greel.

* [[Changed My Jumper]]: When the TARDIS first materializes, Leela steps out complaining about having to wear appropriate clothes. The Doctor's voice from inside the TARDIS tells her, "You can't go around [[Victorian London]] in skins, you'd frighten the horses." Then [[Hypocritical Humor|he himself emerges in the stereotypical Sherlock Holmes outfit -- only more colorful --]] and says, "We don't want to be conspicuous, do we?"

* [[Chinese Launderer]]

* [[Disposable Sex Worker]]/[[Disposable Vagrant]]: Greel identifies his victims as "a few contemptible slatterns who will never be missed"; Chang protests that they ''are'' being missed and it's getting people's attention.

* [[Evil Laugh]]: Greel gets an amazing one in the episode 4 cliffhanger.

{{quote|"When we are both in the Great Hereafter, I will hunt you down, Bent-Face! And put you through my agonies a thousand times!" }}

* [[Filipinos With Firearms]]: Apparently the Philippines is a world power in the 51st century as the Doctor mentions marching with the Filipino Army as they advanced on a Supreme Alliance stronghold of Reykjavik. This is endlessly amusing to the few Filipinos who've heard about this episode (or this show, for that matter).

* [[Spin-Off]]: Jago & Litefoot were so popular that a spinoff was briefly discussed; 30 years later, [[Big Finish]] gave them [http://bigfinish.com/311-Doctor-Who-The-Companion-Chronicles-The-Mahogany-Murderers their own story] and, in 2010, [http://bigfinish.com/Jago-and-Litefoot their own series.]

* [[Title Drop]]

* [[The Triads and the Tongs]]: Greel's mooks are members of the Tong of the Black Scorpion.

* [[Victorian London]]

* [[Yellow Peril]]

* [[You Have Failed Me]]

* [[You Rebel Scum]]: Magnus Greel repeatedly refers to his Tong hatchetmen mooks as "opium-addicted scum".