Terror of the Autons

"I have come to destroy you Doctor, once and for all . . ."

The Earth is in terrible danger! The Master is back with an evil scheme to destroy humanity and silence the Doctor forever. His plan? To awaken the awesome power of the Nestene - a ruthlessly aggressive alien life form. Once mixed with plastic, they will form into faceless automatons, a willing army of destruction easily controlled by the evil Time Lord himself. This is the terrible threat now facing the Earth - the terror of the Autons.

Aided by the Brigadier and his enthusiastic new assistant Jo Grant, only the Doctor can combat their evil power, but first he must defeat the Master . . .

Originally transmitted in color from January 2nd - January 23rd, 1971, this four part adventure starring Jon Pertwee was lost in its original form. Only a black and white version and an edited color American NTSC standard version remained, until now when technology worthy of the Doctor himself has reconciled the two, synchronizing them into one full color version.

• While "Terror of the Autons" is little more than a rehash of the previous year's "Spearhead from Space" it is noteworthy in its introduction of the most successful villain that Doctor Who has ever had to face, The Master (portrayed by Roger Delgado).

• The entire 8th season has The Master as the main villain (sort of an introductory season rather than a story).

• The original color master tapes of this story were wiped in the mid to late 1980's.  When the junking was halted and an inventory done, it was discovered that this story did still exist in a 16mm black and white film recording (used for overseas sales).  As luck would have it, a fan with an early videotape machine recorded these episodes in color when they originally aired in the U.S.  Similar color recordings of junked Pertwee episodes exist for "Doctor Who and the Silurians," "The Ambassadors of Death" and "The Daemons" but sadly not for "The Mind of Evil" or episode 3 of "Planet of the Daleks" or episode 1 of "Invasion of the Dinosaurs."

• The Doctor Who Restoration Team did extensive work on this video release by taking existing black and white footage and incorporating it with 1970's off air recordings to restore it to a high quality color version.

• Actor Roy Stewart (Circus Strong Man) appeared several years earlier in Doctor Who in the Patrick Troughton adventure "Tomb of the Cybermen."  He played the character of Toberman.

• The actor playing Rex Farrel is none other than Michael Wisher.  He appeared frequently in Doctor Who over the years.  His first role in Doctor Who occurred only a year prior in "The Ambassadors of Death" where he played news reporter John Wakefield.  He played Kalik in "Carnival of Monsters" did the voice of the Daleks in both "Planet of the Daleks" and "Death to the Daleks" and most notably, played Davros (their creator) in "Genesis of the Daleks."  He also appeared in "Revenge of the Cybermen" as Magrik and the following year as Morelli in "The Planet of Evil."

• The producer of Doctor Who came under fire for his decision to include a scene where a plastic "troll doll" toy that came alive and attacked a person.