The Green Death was the fifth and final story of the Doctor Who tenth anniversary season. The story is notable in that it marked the departure of companion Jo Grant, played by Katy Manning.

Contents 1 Synopsis 2 Plot 2.1 Episode 1 2.2 Episode 2 2.3 Episode 3 2.4 Episode 4 2.5 Episode 5 2.6 Episode 6 3 Cast 4 Crew 5 References 6 Story notes 6.1 Ratings 6.2 Myths 6.3 Filming locations 6.4 Production errors 7 Continuity 8 Timeline 8.1 For the the Third Doctor 8.2 For Jo 8.3 For the Brigadier 9 Home video and audio releases 9.1 DVD releases 9.2 Video releases 10 External links

Synopsis

A death at an abandoned coal pit brings UNIT and the Doctor to the South Wales town of Llanfairfach when the body is found glowing bright green. Are pollutants from Global Chemicals responsible? Where are the Giant Maggots coming from? And who is the mysterious BOSS?

Plot

Episode 1

The Welsh mining village of Llanfairfach has little initial interest for the Third Doctor, who prefers a challenging visit to the blue planet of Metebelis III to a trip to South Wales. However, Jo Grant is keen to go to the village to meet the acclaimed environmentalist and Nobel Prize winner Professor Clifford Jones; while Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart is intrigued enough by the death of a bright green miner to drive her down. The miner was found in a disused mine, and the main source of employment in the village is now the Global Chemicals petroleum factory. Its boss, Stevens, promises prosperity for all, but Professor Jones and the other environmentalists at his “Nuthutch” are unconvinced. In light of the protests, Stevens accepts the Brigadier’s offer of additional security at his factory.

Jo is not impressed with the Brigadier’s siding with the corporate giant, and decides to venture down to the mine herself, accompanied by a friendly miner called Bert. One of the Global Chemicals employees cuts the lift cable and they plummet towards the bottom of the mineshaft...

Episode 2

The Doctor reaches Llanfairfach, with a blue crystal to show for his visit to Metebelis 3, and jams the lift in the nick of time. Jo and Bert are not harmed, but they are stranded in the mine. There, they find Dai Evans, one of the other miners, glowing bright green and terribly ill. It seems there is some serious pollution at work in the mine and they head off to find a way out. For anybody to get down to the mine to help them, cutting equipment is needed to cut the cables jamming the lift. Global Chemicals say they don't have any such equipment, but a staff member, Elgin, knows this is not true. When Jones hears about Jo's predicament, he comes to the mine to help.

The Doctor sneaks into Global Chemicals to steal the equipment but he is caught. Fortunately, Stevens chooses to overlook the incident. By chance, the Brigadier finds somebody with cutting equipment in a garage, allowing the Doctor and a few mine workers to go down into the mine shaft. Things get worse when Bert finds a slick of green slime and touches it. He too seems to contract “the green death”. By the time the Doctor finds Dai, the miner is dead, and the Time Lord becomes very worried for Jo’s safety. Increasingly ill, Bert waits behind while Jo looks for a way out alone. The Doctor catches up with Bert, and finds Jo near a vast lake of green slime filled with giant maggots.

Episode 3

The Doctor and Jo are trapped between a cave-in and the pool of maggots. They escape by wheeling a mine cart through the maggots, but they are still trapped in the mine. Back at Global Chemicals, Stevens is behaving very curiously. He is using strange headphones to listen to calming messages and when one of his employees, Ralph Fell, looks helpful to the environmentalists, he is somehow reconditioned with the same headphones and shortly afterward kills himself. Elgin saves the Doctor and Jo from drowning in the green slime when he helps them out of a shaft that links the mine and the factory complex — proving the link between the two. The Brigadier's plan to investigate Global Chemicals further is cut short when he is ordered by the Prime Minister himself to let Stevens get on with it. Stevens evidently enjoys Cabinet support for his factory and its new plastic production process.

The Doctor, Jo and the Brigadier end the day with a nourishing meal of fungus at the Nuthutch, but the frivolity is cut short when they hear Bert too has died. As the Doctor leaves, a maggot egg he brought back from the mine hatches, and the maggot inside creeps up on Jo, the girl none the wiser.

Episode 4

The maggot kills a Global Chemicals employee, who had come to destroy the egg, and escapes before any analysis can be made of it, leaving the Doctor and Jones to analyse the trail of green slime it left behind. The Brigadier receives orders to seal the mine with explosives and clear the area using UNIT troops. The Doctor realises that this will only make the situation worse, but his plea to Stevens to allow an investigation is ignored. As the Doctor expected, the maggots simply burrow through and are now a threat above ground. Not to be intimidated by Stevens, the Brigadier sends Captain Yates into Global Chemicals, undercover as a Ministry official. The Doctor dons some improbable disguises including a milkman and a cleaning lady to get through the gates and move freely. Jo has meanwhile alienated Cliff, with whom she is falling in love, by ruining one of his slides. Determined to make amends, she heads to the sealed mine in search of a maggot to run some tests on. Having liaised with Yates, the Doctor learns that Stevens takes his instructions from the top floor of the complex, and heads there to find out who is in charge. The BOSS, or Biomorphic Organisational Systems Supervisor, turns out to be a supercomputer with its own megalomaniac personality.

Episode 5

The Doctor speaks with BOSS, and finds out that it runs the company, controls Stevens and other key staff members, and is responsible for the polluting chemical process. The Doctor employs the liar paradox, a conundrum which will keep BOSS busy trying to find a solution, while he escapes. Unfortunately, he runs into Stevens and some guards before he can do so. He rejects the brain-washing technique that Stevens subjects him to – but Mike Yates is more susceptible and is converted into one of the computer’s slaves. After the Doctor escapes, Mike is sent to the Nutchutch to kill the Doctor. His conditioning is deep and only broken by the Doctor’s use of the blue crystal he brought from Metebelis 3. Meanwhile, Jones has worked out that the fungus Jo spilt on the slides is actually a curative and then sets off to stop her, but they are both caught in an RAF bombing raid intended to kill the maggots. Cliff is also infected with a maggot and begins to turn green — before he was able to share his knowledge of the cure. In a delirious state, he utters the word 'serendipity'. Yates re-enters Global Chemicals, pretending to still be under BOSS's control, but he is caught by Stevens.

Episode 6

Sergeant Benton brings an empty maggot chrysalis to the Nuthatch, revealing that the maggots are about to change into something else. The Doctor discovers that another maggot had died after eating Cliff's fungus, meaning that it is deadly to them. The Doctor and Benton drive around the slag heaps and the mine, liberally scattering the fungus which kills all the maggots, and disposing of a deadly giant fly which attacks them. Returning to the Nuthatch, the Doctor discovers Cliff's cure, and uses it to restore him to full health. The Doctor then returns to Global Chemicals to confront BOSS. The computer plans to link up with others and effect a corporate takeover of the human race. However, Stevens, whose conditioning is partially broken by the Doctor using the crystal, tells him to get out while he triggers an explosion which destroys himself, the computer, and the company headquarters.

The menace defeated, UNIT troops and environmentalists gather at the Nuthutch for a celebration made all the more special when Jo and Cliff announce they are getting engaged and then plan to travel the Amazon looking for a rare fungus, and that the United Nations (after Jo contacted her uncle) have decided to fund Wholeweal's research: jobs will return to Llanfairfach after all. The Doctor offers his blessing to the couple and gives Jo the blue crystal as a present, but is evidently very upset by the situation and quietly slips away while the party is in full swing.

Cast

• The Doctor - Jon Pertwee
• Jo Grant - Katy Manning
• Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart - Nicholas Courtney
• Sergeant Benton - John Levene
• Captain Mike Yates - Richard Franklin
• Cliff Jones - Stewart Bevan
• Stevens - Jerome Willis
• Elgin - Tony Adams
• Hinks - Ben Howard
• Dai Evans - Mostyn Evans
• Dave - Talfryn Thomas
• Bert - Roy Evans
• Nancy - Mitzi McKenzie
• Milkman - Ray Handy
• Hughes - John Scott Martin
• Fell - John Rolfe
• Voice of BOSS - John Dearth
• Minister of Ecology - Richard Beale
• Cleaner - Jean Burgess
• Yate's Guard - Brian Justice
• Guard - Terry Walsh
• James - Roy Skelton

Crew

• Assistant Floor Manager - Karilyn Collier
• Costumes - Barbara Kidd
• Designer - John Burrowes
• Fight Arranger - Terry Walsh
• Film Cameraman - Bill Matthews, Ken Lowe
• Film Editor - Alastair Mackay
• Incidental Music - Dudley Simpson
• Make-Up - Ann Rayment
• Producer - Barry Letts
• Production Assistant - John Harris, Michael McDermott
• Script Editor - Terrance Dicks
• Special Sounds - Dick Mills
• Studio Lighting - Mike Jefferies
• Studio Sound - Richard Chubb
• Theme Arrangement - Delia Derbyshire
• Title Music - Ron Grainer
• Visual Effects Designer - Ron Oates

References

• The Doctor gets to Metebelis III and takes a blue crystal.
• The BOSS is the computer running Global Chemicals.

Story notes

• This is the last story to use the 'Pertwee Logo' until the 1996 movie. It would be used from then as the default logo for Doctor Who until the programme's return to television in 2005.
• This is the last story to have its individual segments titled as "Episode -". After this story they were titled as "Part -".
• This is Katy Manning's final story. However she would reprise her role thirty-seven years later in SJA : Death of the Doctor. In that episode, she shows disappointment that the Doctor is now travelling with a married couple in the TARDIS, saying that she only left the Doctor because she got married, suggesting that she would have continued to travel with the Doctor if he had allowed her to bring Professor Jones.
• Stewart Bevan (who plays Cliff Jones, Jo Grant's 'love interest') was Katy Manning's boyfriend at the time of shooting.
• During the celebration of Jo and Cliff's engagement (during which the Doctor slips away), the music in the background is an instrumental track by The Electric Banana, which was an alias for the famed (and infamous) British band The Pretty Things.
• The Brigadier takes a phone call from the Prime Minister, who is named as 'Jeremy'. This was a joke by the production team intended to suggest that the Liberal Party, then led by Jeremy Thorpe, could win the next General Election; Thorpe, of course, was never Prime Minister.
• Some of the giant maggots were created from inflated condoms.
• For Episodes Two, Five and Six, the title sequence film over which the closing credits were superimposed was played backwards and upside-down (a result of the film being played backwards through the projector to save time during recording).
• The function (and lines) of Elgin is taken up by James in Episode 5. The actor who plays Elgin was taken to hospital during production.^{[source needed]}

Ratings

• Episode 1 - 9.2 million viewers
• Episode 2 - 7.2 million viewers
• Episode 3 - 7.8 million viewers
• Episode 4 - 6.8 million viewers
• Episode 5 - 8.3 million viewers
• Episode 6 - 7.0 million viewers

Myths

• Katy Manning left the series because of the death of Roger Delgado (The Master). Delgado died June 1973 - after Manning's final episode was filmed (April 1973).

Filming locations

• Ogilvie Colliery, Deri, near Bargoed, Glamorgan
• Troed-y-Rhiw Jestyn, Deri, near Bargoed, Glamorgan
• Colliery Quarry, Deri, near Bargoed, Glamorgan
• RCA International factory, Brynmawr, Powys
• BBC Television Centre (Studio 3), Shepherd's Bush, London

Production errors

• In episode one, when Dai Evans is on the telephone in the mine, an arm appears to the bottom right, giving him his cue to speak.
• In episode five, the Doctor escapes from Global during the day. When Yates is caught it's dark, but the next scene, on the slag heap, is in daylight again.
• The CSO used in episode three results in the cart bottom vanishing.
• When Jo is helping Bert around a corner, she knocks a support strut out of position.
• When Jo sits up in the cable car, her helmet doesn't have a lamp. Switch to the medium shot and it suddenly does.
• When the Doctor picks up the green egg, it squeaks, revealing it to be a painted balloon.
• When Jones is looking through his microscope, the objective is rotated so that none of the lenses actually point at the slide.
• The Doctor mispronounces "chitinous." It should have a hard "k" sound. This is not really an error; the Doctor is allowed to pronounce words differently; he may have said it right and WE may be saying it wrong. There's no true way to know.
• When Yates breaks James' conditioning, the latter falls against the wall, which shakes.
• When Benton rescues Cliff and Jo, the ground shakes and flexes.
• The Doctor resists BOSS's programming by calculating Pi. He recites the first five numbers and continues silently. If he is meant to be reciting Pi further, he gets it wrong, giving the first five digits as 3.1416. This is only correct if Pi is rounded off after five digits. The correct sequence would be 3.14159265...
• In the climax, not one but two heavy consoles move as Stevens frantically operates the controls.
• A shot of the brown fungus rolling between two maggots is repeated.
• The supposedly RAF helicopter has a prominent label on the side of the fuel tank which reads Twyford Moors Helicopters - The Heliport, Southampton.

Continuity

• The consequences of the Doctor's journey to Metebelis III are followed up in DW: Planet of the Spiders.
• Jo Grant reappears in EDA: Genocide in the books, BFA: Find and Replace in the audios, and then SJA: Death of the Doctor on television.
• BOSS is mentioned in passing in NA: Original Sin.
• The Doctor meets a parallel version of Jo Grant (and UNIT) in NA: Blood Heat.

Timeline

For the the Third Doctor

• This story takes place after ST: Hide and Seek.
• VG: Destiny of the Doctors takes place during this story.
• This story takes place before ST: She Knew.

For Jo

• This story takes place after ST: Hide and Seek.
• This story takes place before SJA: Death of the Doctor.

For the Brigadier

• This story takes place after DW: The Three Doctors.
• This story takes place before DW: The Time Warrior.

Home video and audio releases

DVD releases

This story was released as Doctor Who: The Green Death.

Released:

• Region 2 10 May 2004

PAL - BBC DVD BBCDVD1142

• Region 4 5 August 2004
• Region 1 1 March 2005

NTSC - Warner Video E2156

Contents:

• Stewart Bevan - An interview with the actor about the story.
• Robert Sloman - An interview with the writer about the writing of the story.
• Global Conspiracy - A short sketch about what went on in 1973.
• Visual Effects - Colin Mapson talks about the effect in the story and how to build a Giant Maggot.
• Photo Gallery
• Production Subtitles
• Easter Egg
• Commentary: Katy Manning, Barry Letts, and Terrance Dicks

Notes:

• Editing for the DVD release was completed by the Doctor Who Restoration Team.

Video releases

Released as Doctor Who: The Green Death, the two cassette video release was rushed out in memory of the death of Jon Pertwee earlier in the year.

Released:

• UK August 1996

PAL - BBC Video BBCV5816

• US April 1997

NTSC - Warner Video E1349

External links

• The Green Death at the BBC's official site
• Detailed synopsis of The Green Death at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
• The Green Death at Shannon Sullivan's A Brief History of Time (Travel)
• The Green Death at The Locations Guide

v • e Doctor Who television stories   Seasons 1-4: First Doctor Season 1 1963 1964 An Unearthly Child • The Daleks • The Edge of Destruction • Marco Polo • The Keys of Marinus • The Aztecs • The Sensorites • The Reign of Terror Season 2 1964 1965 Planet of the Giants • The Dalek Invasion of Earth • The Rescue • The Romans • The Web Planet • The Crusade • The Space Museum • The Chase • The Time Meddler Season 3 1965 1966 Galaxy 4 • Mission to the Unknown • The Myth Makers • The Daleks' Master Plan • The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve • The Ark • The Celestial Toymaker • The Gunfighters • The Savages • The War Machines Season 4 1966 The Smugglers • The Tenth Planet   Seasons 4-6: Second Doctor Season 4 1966 1967 The Power of the Daleks • The Highlanders • The Underwater Menace • The Moonbase • The Macra Terror • The Faceless Ones • The Evil of the Daleks Season 5 1967 1968 The Tomb of the Cybermen • The Abominable Snowmen • The Ice Warriors • The Enemy of the World • The Web of Fear • Fury from the Deep • The Wheel in Space Season 6 1968 1969 The Dominators • The Mind Robber • The Invasion • The Krotons • The Seeds of Death • The Space Pirates • The War Games   Seasons 7-11: Third Doctor Season 7 1970 Spearhead from Space • Doctor Who and the Silurians • The Ambassadors of Death • Inferno Season 8 1971 Terror of the Autons • The Mind of Evil • The Claws of Axos • Colony in Space • The Dæmons Season 9 1972 Day of the Daleks • The Curse of Peladon • The Sea Devils • The Mutants • The Time Monster Season 10 1972 1973 The Three Doctors • Carnival of Monsters • Frontier in Space • Planet of the Daleks • The Green Death Season 11 1973 1974 The Time Warrior • Invasion of the Dinosaurs • Death to the Daleks • The Monster of Peladon • Planet of the Spiders   Seasons 12-18: Fourth Doctor Season 12 1974 1975 Robot • The Ark in Space • The Sontaran Experiment • Genesis of the Daleks • Revenge of the Cybermen Season 13 1975 1976 Terror of the Zygons • Planet of Evil • Pyramids of Mars • The Android Invasion • The Brain of Morbius • The Seeds of Doom Season 14 1976 1977 The Masque of Mandragora • The Hand of Fear • The Deadly Assassin • The Face of Evil • The Robots of Death • The Talons of Weng-Chiang Season 15 1977 1978 Horror of Fang Rock • The Invisible Enemy • Image of the Fendahl • The Sun Makers • Underworld • The Invasion of Time Season 16 1978 1979 The Key to Time: The Ribos Operation • The Pirate Planet • The Stones of Blood • The Androids of Tara • The Power of Kroll • The Armageddon Factor Season 17 1979 1980 Destiny of the Daleks • City of Death • The Creature from the Pit • Nightmare of Eden • The Horns of Nimon • Shada (unbroadcast) Season 18 1980 1981 The Leisure Hive • Meglos • Full Circle • State of Decay • Warriors' Gate • The Keeper of Traken • Logopolis   Seasons 19-21: Fifth Doctor Season 19 1982 Castrovalva • Four to Doomsday • Kinda • The Visitation • Black Orchid • Earthshock • Time-Flight Season 20 1983 Arc of Infinity • Snakedance • Mawdryn Undead • Terminus • Enlightenment • The King's Demons Children in Need 1983 The Five Doctors Season 21 1984 Warriors of the Deep • The Awakening • Frontios • Resurrection of the Daleks • Planet of Fire • The Caves of Androzani   Seasons 21-23: Sixth Doctor Season 21 1984 The Twin Dilemma Season 22 1985 Attack of the Cybermen • Vengeance on Varos • The Mark of the Rani • The Two Doctors • Timelash • Revelation of the Daleks Season 23 1986 The Trial of a Time Lord: The Mysterious Planet • Mindwarp • Terror of the Vervoids • The Ultimate Foe   Seasons 24-26: Seventh Doctor Season 24 1987 Time and the Rani • Paradise Towers • Delta and the Bannermen • Dragonfire Season 25 1988 1989 Remembrance of the Daleks • The Happiness Patrol • Silver Nemesis • The Greatest Show in the Galaxy Season 26 1989 Battlefield • Ghost Light • The Curse of Fenric • Survival   TV Movie: Eighth Doctor TV Movie 1996 Doctor Who   Series 1: Ninth Doctor Series 1 2005 Rose • The End of the World • The Unquiet Dead • Aliens of London / World War Three • Dalek • The Long Game • Father's Day • The Empty Child / The Doctor Dances • Boom Town • Bad Wolf / The Parting of the Ways   Series 2-4: Tenth Doctor Series 2 2005 2006 Mini-episode Children in Need Special Christmas special The Christmas Invasion Regular episodes New Earth • Tooth and Claw • School Reunion • The Girl in the Fireplace • Rise of the Cybermen / The Age of Steel • The Idiot's Lantern • The Impossible Planet / The Satan Pit • Love & Monsters • Fear Her • Army of Ghosts / Doomsday Series 3 2006 2007 Christmas special The Runaway Bride Regular episodes Smith and Jones • The Shakespeare Code • Gridlock • Daleks in Manhatten / Evolution of the Daleks • The Lazarus Experiment • 42 • Human Nature / The Family of Blood • Blink • Utopia / The Sound of Drums / Last of the Time Lords Animation The Infinite Quest Series 4 2007 2008 2009 2010 Mini-episode Time Crash Christmas special Voyage of the Damned Regular episodes Partners in Crime • The Fires of Pompeii • Planet of the Ood • The Sontaran Stratagem / The Poison Sky • The Doctor's Daughter • The Unicorn and the Wasp • Silence in the Library / Forest of the Dead • Midnight • Turn Left • The Stolen Earth / Journey's End • The Next Doctor • Planet of the Dead • The Waters of Mars • The End of Time Mini-episode Music of the Spheres Animation Dreamland For the purposes of this list, "series 4" is considered to be the production series 4, which ran all the way from Time Crash to The End of Time.   Series 5-present: Eleventh Doctor Series 5 2010 Regular episodes The Eleventh Hour • The Beast Below • Victory of the Daleks • The Time of Angels / Flesh and Stone • The Vampires of Venice • Amy's Choice • The Hungry Earth / Cold Blood • Vincent and the Doctor • The Lodger • The Pandorica Opens / The Big Bang Series 6 2010 2011 Christmas special A Christmas Carol Mini-episodes Space / Time Regular episodes Spring Half: The Impossible Astronaut / Day of the Moon • The Curse of the Black Spot • The Doctor's Wife • The Rebel Flesh / The Almost People • A Good Man Goes to War Autumn Half: Let's Kill Hitler • Night Terrors • The Girl Who Waited • The God Complex • Closing Time • The Wedding of River Song Mini-episodes Death Is the Only Answer Series 7 2011 2012 2013 Christmas special The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe Mini-episode Good as Gold Regular episodes Autumn Half: Asylum of the Daleks • Dinosaurs on a Spaceship • A Town Called Mercy • The Power of Three • The Angels Take Manhattan Mini-episode The Great Detective Christmas special The Snowmen Regular episodes Spring Half: The Bells of Saint John • The Rings of Ahkaten • Cold War • Hide • Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS • The Crimson Horror • Nightmare in Silver • The Name of the Doctor Despite marketing language by the BBC, The Adventure Games are not televised episodes, and therefore are not included on this list. Deliberately not included are some stories which this wiki does not consider valid — such as the so-called "Pilot Episode", Dimensions in Time, A Fix with Sontarans, Search Out Space, The Curse of Fatal Death and the National Television Awards Sketch 2011.

v • e UNIT television stories Doctor Who Major The Invasion • Spearhead from Space • Doctor Who and the Silurians • The Ambassadors of Death • Inferno • Terror of the Autons • The Mind of Evil • The Claws of Axos • The Dæmons • Day of the Daleks • The Time Monster • The Three Doctors • The Green Death • Invasion of the Dinosaurs • Planet of the Spiders • Robot • Terror of the Zygons • The Android Invasion • Battlefield • The Christmas Invasion • The Sontaran Stratagem / The Poison Sky • Turn Left • The Stolen Earth / Journey's End • Planet of the Dead • The Power of Three Minor Colony in Space • The Time Warrior • The Seeds of Doom • Mawdryn Undead • The Five Doctors • Aliens of London / World War Three • The Sound of Drums / Last of the Time Lords • The End of Time • The Bells of Saint John Torchwood Fragments • Children of Earth: Day One • Children of Earth: Day Three • Children of Earth: Day Five SJA Enemy of the Bane • Death of the Doctor Complete list of appearances

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