Line #23 Recap/DoctorWhoS23E4TheUltimateFoe


1	[[WMG:[[center:[-''[[Series/DoctorWho Doctor Who]]'' [[Recap/DoctorWho recap index]]\
2	'''Sixth Doctor Era'''\
3	'''Season 23:''' [[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E1TheMysteriousPlanet 1]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E2Mindwarp 2]] \| [[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E3TerrorOfTheVervoids 3]] \| '''4'''\
4	'''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS22E1AttackOfTheCybermen <<< Season 22]]''' \| '''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS24E1TimeAndTheRani Season 24 >>>]]''']]-]]]
5	!The Trial of a Time Lord, Part 4: The Ultimate Foe
6	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/dark_colin_3851.jpg]]
7	[[caption-width-right:350: The Doctor gazes into the abyss, and the audience gazes back. [[OverlyLongGag At least we can't see his coat...]] (I think we're done with the coat jokes... [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWhoSpecialTheLastAdventure for now.]])]]
8	->Written by Creator/RobertHolmes,[[note]]part 1[[/note]] Creator/EricSaward,[[note]]part 1, uncredited[[/note]] and Creator/PipAndJaneBaker[[note]]part 2[[/note]]\
9	Directed by Chris Clough\
10	'''Production code:''' 7C\
11	'''Air dates:''' 29 November - 6 December 1986\
12	'''Number of episodes:''' 2
13
14	->''"In all my travels throughout the universe I have battled against evil, against power-mad conspirators. I should have stayed ''here!'' The ''oldest'' civilization: decadent, degenerate, and ''rotten to the core!'' Power mad conspirators? Daleks, Sontarans, '''Cybermen''' — they're still in the nursery compared to us! Ten million years of absolute power: that's what it takes to be '''really''' corrupt!"''
15	-->--'''The Doctor''', finally fed up with the KangarooCourt he's been thrown into, ripping into his own people's despicable acts with a lovely monologue.
16
17	JustForFun/{{The one w\|ith}}here Creator/ColinBaker gets fired, no thanks to Michael Grade. Also the one where The Doctor fights himself, before he [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho001TheSirensOfTime goes off to have more adventures]], Creator/BigFinish style.
18	----
19
20	Picking right up where the previous story left off, ''The Ultimate Foe'' opens up with the Doctor being accused of genocide. The Doctor objects, and both he and the Valeyard get into a well-written argument that suddenly ends when [[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E1TheMysteriousPlanet Sabalom Glitz]] and future companion Melanie show up almost literally out of nowhere. When the Doctor asks how they got there, the Master shows up to torment the Doctor and everyone else-- revealing that [[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E1TheMysteriousPlanet Ravalox]] was really the Earth, thrown out of whack by the Time Lords to cover up the theft of classified info from the Matrix ''([[Film/TheMatrix no, not that one!]] [[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E3TheDeadlyAssassin We've been over this!]])''. The Doctor, realizing that the whole trial was part of the cover-up and ''supremely'' angered by this newly-revealed and unprecedented display of hypocrisy (given that this is his ''second'' trial by the Time Lords for lesser displays of interference, and that [[Recap/DoctorWhoS6E7TheWarGames the first one]] ended in his execution), chews out the court, declaring Gallifrey's eternity of unchecked power a greater evil than any MonsterOfTheWeek he's ever faced. Furthering his gloating, the Master reveals that [[WhamLine the Valeyard is really the Doctor]].
21
22	Well, not exactly. The Valeyard is a piece of the Doctor: specifically, the Doctor's dark side, split off from around the last of his regenerations. Even when being specific, this origin is incredibly abstract.[[note]]Not that it wasn't entirely unprecedented among the production staff, having originally been a twist designed for ''the Master'' in what would've been Creator/RogerDelgado's swan song had he not died in a car crash.[[/note]]
23
24	Either way, the Valeyard flees into the Matrix and the Doctor and Glitz pursue. Inside the Matrix, the Doctor and Glitz are tormented by the Valeyard. The Valeyard continues to gloat in his own way, while Mel and the entire judge and jury stare at the viewscreen.
25
26	Not much later, things go back to the courtroom, where the Doctor is convicted of his so-called crimes and will be executed. Only it's all an illusion, and the Doctor [[ThePlan knows it's an illusion]], but Mel [[GambitPileup doesn't know that he knows]], so she runs into the Matrix to try and stop it all. The Valeyard gets furious about this, deciding to vanish for the time being. Meanwhile, Glitz and the Master decide to steal the records of the Matrix to make some cash in a story that goes nowhere, as a trap ends up paralyzing the two and they don't appear again for the rest of the episode.
27
28	Finally, the Doctor and Mel find themselves face-to-face with the Valeyard, and his plans to destroy the current government of the Time Lords. Through a brief struggle, the Valeyard spits out technobabble about things not going his way and is seemingly defeated thanks to The Master. The Time Lords are saved! And a random Time Lady presiding over the trial tells the Doctor that Peri survived and is living with [[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E2Mindwarp King Yrcanos]] after his rambling that she would be his queen... for [[BuxomBeautyStandard some reason]]. Mel and the Doctor leave together, presumably for him to drop her off somewhere for his future self to pick up later, so he can eventually meet her for the first time (See the Past Doctor Adventures novel ''Business Unusual''... or maybe the Big Finish Audio "[[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho169TheWrongDoctors The Wrong Doctors]]". Either one works.[[note]]In fact, ''The Wrong Doctors'' goes out of its way to avoid contradicting ''Business Unusual'', so both can exist side-by-side[[/note]]), and the Sixth Doctor [[TheNthDoctor goes on]] to many, many more [[Recap/DoctorWhoS24E1TimeAndTheRani adventures]], where th--
29
30	...
31
32	[[WhatCouldHaveBeen Oh.]]
33
34	...
35
36	[[ExecutiveMeddling Shit.]]
37
38	...
39
40	...Well, on the bright side, at least The Valeyard was defeated, right? I mean, surely the Keeper of the Matrix is able to make sure he doesn't escap--'''[[NotQuiteDead Oh.]]'''
41
42	'''''[[ToBeContinued Double]]''''' '''''[[SequelHook shit.]]'''''
43	----
44	Though few really notice, the two episodes were written by four different people.
45
46
47	Part 1 was written by Creator/RobertHolmes and script editor Creator/EricSaward together; because Holmes [[DiedDuringProduction had died of a sudden disease before finishing Part 2]], Saward finished that by himself and preserved the BolivianArmyEnding intended by Holmes. However, his draft was rejected by Producer Creator/JohnNathanTurner, who felt Holmes's ending was an easy excuse for the BBC to cancel the show[[note]]The BBC had already tried it before, but it led into the eighteen-month hiatus that birthed ''The Trial of a Time Lord''.[[/note]]. Having had one too many CreativeDifferences with Nathan-Turner, Saward quit the show, took the script with him, and threatened to sue if anything resembling his script went to screen.
48
49	The final draft of Part 2 was written by Creator/PipAndJaneBaker[[note]]no relation to Colin, Tom or prolific [=70s=] ''Who'' writer Bob Baker, all of whom are unrelated as well.[[/note]] of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS22E3TheMarkOfTheRani The Mark of the Rani]]" and "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E3TerrorOfTheVervoids Terror of the Vervoids]]"; because of legal problems with Holmes's estate and Saward, the Bakers were prohibited from even knowing about the original script, resulting in a finale with a massively different tone from its direct predecessor's.
50
51	This gap is also where the Franchise/DoctorWhoExpandedUniverse ''really'' takes over the Sixth Doctor. Since this was his last appearance onscreen, Creator/ColinBaker and the writers were left with a blank slate on which they could entirely reinvent the Sixth Doctor, correcting many of the more controversial aspects of his television era, giving him massive amounts of CharacterDevelopment, many more adventures with Mel, and eventually, giving him [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWhoSpecialTheLastAdventure a real finale]] to hand the role over to Creator/SylvesterMcCoy properly.
52	----
53	!!This story provides examples of:
54	* AllJustADream: At the very least a large chunk of Season 23 is revealed to have been an inaccurate reconstruction of what really happened. Of particular note, it turns out that Peri's death never really happened and instead she is happily living with King Yrcanos (despite the fact that he seems to be violently insane, though that may just be more Matrix tampering).
55	* BelatedHappyEnding: Peri, assumed dead after the events of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E2Mindwarp Mindwarp]]," gets one of these.
56	* BewareTheNiceOnes: The Doctor, who is a good (if sharper person) in this incarnation, unleashes one hell of a tirade on the Time Lord's when he finds out just what the hell they've actually been up too.
57	* BigBad: The Valeyard. He started off working for the corrupt Time Lord High Council, but ends up as TheStarscream to them, happy to wipe the other Time Lords out along with the Doctor.
58	* BigNo: The Sixth Doctor screams it when he is beginning to disappear into the quickstand, when hands begin to pull him down in the Matrix.
59	* {{Bizarrchitecture}} with a SteamPunk flavour.
60	* CallBack: When the hands grab the Doctor and try to drag him under the sand he tries to counteract the illusion by yelling "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E3TheDeadlyAssassin I DENY IT!]]". Promptly {{lampshaded}} by the Valeyard:
61	-->'''Valeyard:''' Not this time, Doctor!
62	* CharacterTics: As the Valeyard notes, he still displays some of the Doctor's habits and eccentricities.
63	* CreepyChildrenSinging: As the Doctor explores the Valeyard's Dickensian private world, Creepy Children sing "Ring-a-Ring-o-Roses" in the background; it isn't clear if he can hear them or not.
64	* DefectorFromDecadence: The Doctor's experiences in this season kill any shred of respect he still had for Time Lord society. After this, he only misses Gallifrey once there's no going back.
65	* DoubleMeaningTitle: "Ultimate" can be taken to mean several different things in the context of the Valeyard: as the Doctor's ''greatest'' foe, as the head of this specific plot, or "final", which fits with what we can tell about the Valeyard's origins, confusing though they are.
66	* TheEndOrIsIt: After the Doctor and Mel depart, the Inquisitor starts organizing the surviving Time Lords with the intent of restoring order to Gallifrey. She gives an order to the Keeper of the Matrix, who then turns to the screen to reveal the Valeyard himself. Cue end credits.
67	* EnemyWithin: The Master's ambiguous wording when describing the Valeyard infers that he's either the Doctor himself, after all his evil took over him in a potential future, or...
68	* EnemyWithout: The Doctor's evil split from him.
69	* EvenEvilHasStandards: The Master wants the Doctor dead, but he hates the Valeyard ''more'', so he interferes to prove that the Matrix can, in fact, be meddled with just to prove that the Doctor does actually have a point.
70	* EvilMeScaresMe: The Doctor's reaction to the Valeyard's true nature is one of abject horror. It's been argued that the Doctor is petrified of him returning in ''any'' form. The ExpandedUniverse went further on this, to the point that an entire incarnation's personality was locked away for a time because of that fear. Hell, even ''the Master'' fears him.
71	* ExactWords: The Master's description of the Valeyard as originating from somewhere between the Doctor's "twelfth" and "final" incarnations was retroactively made into this a long time later (well, either that or the Master was just lying). At the time, it was assumed that the Doctor's thirteenth incarnation would ''be'' his final one (or just that the show was unlikely to reach the point where it would be a problem), and thus the assumption is clearly that the Valeyard - whatever exactly he is -- would be created somehow when the twelfth incarnation of the Doctor regenerated into the thirteenth. [[Recap/DoctorWhoS33E13TheNameOfTheDoctor Later]] [[Recap/DoctorWho2013CSTheTimeOfTheDoctor stories]] made it so that we've now ''already seen'' more than twelve incarnations of the Doctor, with [[Recap/DoctorWho2017CSTwiceUponATime still more to come]], and no clear idea any more of which number of incarnation (if ''any'') we can expect to be the "final" one. If we assume that the Master was correct, then "between twelfth and final" is now retroactively just a fancy way of saying "some point after Creator/MattSmith but before the BBC finally cancels Series/DoctorWho for good".
72	* ExtraLongEpisode: Part Two clocks in at 30 minutes instead of the usual 25; Creator/JohnNathanTurner found himself unable to truncate it even after cutting down the even longer first draft.
73	* FieryCoverup: The Time Lords are revealed to have engaged in this on a planetary scale, nearly wiping out the Earth and moving it across the galaxy, and then willing to execute the Doctor, who accidentally stumbled across the evidence without even realizing it in order to hide their own embarrassing indiscretions.
74	* GovernmentConspiracy: Committed by the Time Lord High Council.
75	* HamToHamCombat: Creator/ColinBaker vs Creator/MichaelJayston!
76	* HijackedByGanon: Subverted -- the Master turns out to have caused most of the events of the "Trial" season, but then the Valeyard took advantage of his actions to become the real "Ultimate Foe".
77	* HypnoPendulum: PlayedForLaughs. The Master has a criminal named Sabalom Glitz in his grasp and is trying to hypnotize him with a pocket watch. Glitz ''appears'' to be in a trance, but says that he's only wondering how much it cost the Master.
78	* {{Infodump}}: The first fifteen minutes of Part One are basically one long courtroom infodump courtesy of the Master, who reveals the answers to almost all of the questions that have been building throughout the entire Trial of a Time Lord story arc.
79	* KangarooCourt: After the revelation of the Valeyard's true identity, the Doctor says that the trial clearly can't continue when the prosecutor has such a major conflict of interest. The Inquisitor promptly dismisses this as an unimportant technicality and tries to continue with the trial, only to discover that the Valeyard fled the courtroom while she and the Doctor were arguing.
80	* KarmaHoudini: The Valeyard, who never reappeared in the show after this serial's final shot showed him smirking into the camera. Although this depends on if you take expanded universe material as canon or not.
81	** KarmaHoudiniWarranty: If you take [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWhoSpecialTheLastAdventure "The Last Adventure"]] into canon, however, Valeyard [[spoiler:does indeed get stuck in suspended time after nearly winning against the Sixth Doctor]]. Therefore, it is possible he gets punished for his actions in the long-term. Regardless, his fate is [[spoiler:also left ambiguous in the audio story]].
82	* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: The Valeyard does this at the very end upon revealing himself to be The Keeper of The Matrix, by sinisterly laughing at the viewer.
83	* MeaninglessMeaningfulWords: Perhaps the most famous example from the series' half-century run: "'''There's nothing you can do to prevent the catharsis of spurious morality!'''" [[note]]A very roundabout way of saying "If your morals are phony, you'll get your comeuppance." Now was that so hard to say?[[/note]] The accompanying scene doesn't make it clear if "the catharsis of spurious morality" refers to the particle disseminator that the Doctor is trying to defuse at the moment or the Time Lords' newly-exposed crimes against humanity.
84	* MuggedForDisguise: If the final moments are anything to go by, the Valeyard seems to have robbed the Keeper of the Matrix of his robes.
85	* NoodleIncident: Glitz claims that he and the Master have had "quite a few nicks together".
86	* NotSoAboveItAll: There is a golden moment where the Valeyard in lecturing the Doctor in his typical dour manner, even explicitly stating that he "wishes not to be contaminated by [the Doctor's] whims and idiosyncracies." ...when Glitz tries to participate in the conversation, the Valeyard teleports directly behind him for the explicit purpose of insulting him in a rather comedic way. Then again, his compulsion to out-cool adult male companions and recurring characters was always one of the Doctor's character flaws...
87	* ObstructiveBureaucrat: Mr. Popplewick is a Victorian clerk who pops up numerous times to obfuscate, torment and hold up the Doctor whilst he's trying to locate the Valeyard in the Matrix. Popplewick is a disguise used by the Valeyard.
88	* OhCrap: The Doctor's reaction when the Master reveals that the Valeyard is actually the embodiment of the Doctor's dark side, taken from a point after his twelfth incarnation. The look on the Doctor's face shows he knows full well what he's capable of--and this is long before the final events of the Time War.
89	* TheOnlyOneAllowedToDefeatYou: Stated by the Master in Part Two as to why he's helping the Doctor. He cannot stand the idea of the Valeyard being the one to do him in.
90	* PurpleProse: The Valeyard is prone to overly-verbose language, because his dialogue was penned by Creator/PipAndJaneBaker.
91	* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: After having put up with the KangarooCourt of the previous season and the numerous pompous and self-righteous condemnation of his character from the Time Lords, when he learns that the whole thing was orchestrated as part of a cover-up of a theft of Time Lord secrets that also resulted in the destruction of the Earth, the Doctor takes the opportunity to tell the assembled Time Lords exactly what he thinks of them; from here on in, the only time he will ever look at Gallifrey with any sort of fondness is after it's gone.
92	* {{Retcon}}: Peri's death in "Mindwarp" was meant to be real. However, between the filming of Nicola Bryant's final scenes and the end of production, John Nathan-Turner got cold feet about killing her off (given that the previous season's heavy violence was a big factor in BBC controller Michael Grade's crusade against the show) and decided to reveal in this story that it was a fabrication, seemingly without checking if it tallied with the rest of the story. Some Big Finish stories deal with these events, but pretty much everyone has deemed this CanonDiscontinuity as a result of how last-minute it was. While there are very few people who actually believe Peri was killed, there are several different versions of what actually happened to her.
93	* RevisedEnding: Part Two originally ended on a {{cliffhanger}} with the Doctor and the Valeyard trapped in the Matrix, locked in a seemingly endless battle. However, Creator/JohnNathanTurner felt that the ending would've given Creator/TheBBC an excuse to cancel the show (having already tried to do so after the previous season, which became an 18-month hiatus) and rejected it, resulting in writer and script editor Creator/EricSaward walking out and legally prohibiting the show's staff from using any of his material. As a result, the serial's last episode was rewritten from the ground up by Creator/PipAndJaneBaker, with a new ending where the Doctor triumphs over the Valeyard and returns to the TARDIS with Mel.
94	* SequelHook: The serial ends with the Valeyard FakingTheDead, and would allow him to eventually return to get his revenge on the Doctor. Keyword: '''''[[TheResolutionWillNotBeTelevised eventually.]]''''' Big Finish would go on to make a direct sequel to "Trial of a Time Lord" in the Valeyard's own point-of-view, before finally giving him one more go with Sixth in "The Last Adventure".
95	* SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: In Part Two, as is pretty much par for the course in Creator/PipAndJaneBaker scripts. Key example: "there's nothing you can do to prevent the catharsis of spurious morality."
96	* ShoutOut:
97	** The Doctor quotes ''Literature/ATaleOfTwoCities'':
98	--->It is a far, far better thing that I do than I have ever done. It is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.
99	** The Valeyard quotes ''Theatre/{{Hamlet}}'':
100	--->The undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns.
101	* SpannerInTheWorks: TheMaster, of all people, derails the whole plot against the Doctor. Not out of any sense of altruism, naturally, but for both the chance to [[PlayingBothSides pit two aspects of the Doctor against himself]] and topple the High Council of Time Lords. For bonus points, he makes himself this as literally as he possibly can, by revealing the plot from within the Time Matrix viewing screen.
102	* TeleportSpam: The Valeyard.
103	* {{Troll}}: The Doctor has pursued the Valeyard into a computerized micro-universe where the only logic is that there is no logic and where the Valeyard is already adept at manipulating his surroundings. Does the Valeyard create an utterly deadly environment where his foe couldn’t possibly survive? ... Actually, he delays their confrontation by creating an [[ObstructiveBureaucrat Obstructive Bureaucrat]] who has to fill in an interminable number of forms before he can allow the two enemies to meet, just to annoy the Doctor.
104	* UncertainDoom: The original ending would have seen the Doctor and the Valeyard subject to this, trapped within a "time vent" within the Matrix eternally battling with each other, with it unclear whether one, the other or both would eventually prevail and escape. It was vetoed by the producer on the grounds that such a cliffhanger would likely give the BBC higher-ups [[CutShort a gift-wrapped excuse to cancel the show like they were clearly desperate to]].
105	* VictorianLondon: Part of the story takes place in a simulation of VictorianLondon.
106	* VillainDecay: The Master is not the title character, and had his plot hijacked by him.
107	* VillainousRescue: The Master rescues the Doctor when he's on the verge of being gassed by the Valeyard because he considers the Valeyard the bigger threat...although he promptly uses the Doctor as live bait to ambush the Valeyard.
108	* WhamEpisode: The Valeyard is really a corrupted future incarnation of the Doctor, employed by the Time Lord High Council to destroy the Doctor to prevent him from revealing their role in the attempted genocide of the human race. The Doctor's only ally in this is the Master, who obviously cannot be trusted.
109	* WhamLine:
110	-->'''The Master''': They made a deal with the Valeyard, or as I've always known him, the Doctor...
111	%%* XanatosSpeedChess (Zero-Context Example)
112	----
113	Hey, don't be sad ol' Sawbones Hex got drummed out of the series after only eleven stories. He was rescued by Big Finish! [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho Take some spare time to look at the overwhelming collection of Sixth Doctor audios.]] And if you want to see (well, ''hear'') more of him, you can continue the Sixth Doctor's adventures by starting right [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho001TheSirensOfTime HERE]]. Or, if you ''really'' want to find out what happened to both Sixth ''and'' Mel, you can start off [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho169TheWrongDoctors HERE]] as well [[note]](unless you don't want a whole season or two's worth of audio story related spoilers, as it '''also''' takes place later down the line)[[/note]]. Sadly (or perhaps mercifully is a better word), you won't be able to witness his "iconic" rainbow coat in action as you listen to his stories; while audio can broadcast the dulcet tones of the Sixth Doctor, it doesn't do so hot where the visual department is concerned, let alone visualizing a coat that is a certified cornucopia of clashing colour hues. (That being said, he manages to regain his proper sense of fashion later on, ditching the rainbow coat for a much more cooler royal-TARDIS-blue coat.)
114
115	And if you '''''REALLY''''' want to know how the Sixth Doctor regenerated, have no fear! [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWhoSpecialTheLastAdventure Big Finish released an audio series in August 2015 to deal with his regeneration story, as well as giving us fans a proper rematch between Sixth Doc and The Valeyard.]]
116	----
117	->''Carrot juice, carrot juice, carrot juice...''
118	-->-- (The last words of '''the Sixth Doctor''' on TV, at least...)

Context Recap / DoctorWhoS23E4TheUltimateFoe