History Recap / DoctorWhoS11E2InvasionOfTheDinosaurs

* WhamEpisode: The suspenseful tone of the first episode as well as the morally ambiguous villains and Phillips' bloody death heralded the darker tone the series would take in the Creator/RobertHolmes era. However probably the most devastating event in the story is Yates's betrayal, not only marking the first time one of his allies had outright turned on the Doctor but also shattering the secure, cosy feeling of the UNIT family and heralding the series' return to the Doctor's more nomadic lifestyle. It's also a bit of a [[BookEnds book-end]], being the last Creator/MalcolmHulke script, one of the defining GreyAndGreyMorality writers and of the Pertwee era.

'''Production code:''' WWW

Written by Creator/MalcolmHulke. This six-episode serial first aired from January 12 to February 16, 1974.

* DarkerAndEdgier: Between the GreyAndGreyMorality between the heroes and villains as well as Yates defecting being the ultimate slap in the face to the otherwise cosy atmosphere of UNIT-era Dr Who.

* AntiVillain: Yates, Grover and the chosen in Operation Golden Age.

* [[YouSaidYouWouldLetThemGo You Said You Would Let Him Live]]: The Golden Age nutjobs try to pull this on Yates concerning the Doctor.

-> ''"Good grief, it's a triceratops! Look, Brigadier, try and keep it occupied while I'm finishing this off, will you?"''

JustForFun/TheOneWith the dodgy dinosaurs.

* {{Foreshadowing}}: The Doctor is still moving and behaving normally when time is affected and the stegosaurus that the Doctor attempts to study disappears. [[spoiler:This foreshadows the Doctor being unaffected by the Timescoop technology at the climax of the story, and being able to foil Grover's plan.]]

* Foreshadowing: The Doctor is still moving and behaving normally when time is affected and the stegosaurus that the Doctor attempts to study disappears. [[spoiler:This foreshadows the Doctor being unaffected by the Timescoop technology at the climax of the story, and being able to foil Grover's plan.]]

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

Episode 1 only existed for many years as a black and white film recording. For the DVD release a colour restoration was attempted; unlike other Third Doctor stories which only survived in black and white, the result was only a partial success, and the disc includes a high quality monochrome version and a "best efforts" unrestored colour version. This is also the last serial by broadcast order to have been affected by the BBC's wiping policy before its termination in 1978; every story after this point survives via the original master tapes.

[[Recap/DoctorWhoS11E1TheTimeWarrior The Doctor brings Sarah Jane back to 20th Century London]], only to find it deserted. They're soon arrested as looters and, after a very nice photo session at the police station, duly try to escape. Although their attempt to run away fails rather miserably, the Brigadier is soon handed the files of all captured criminals of the day and fixes the "typical, ''absolutely typical''" situation as soon as he can. Back with UNIT, the Brigadier explains that the city has been evacuated due to the sudden, random and unexplained appearances of dinosaurs.

The one with the dodgy dinosaurs.

* PteroSoarer: The Doctor is attacked by one. It looks more like a muppet than anything else, really.

* CuffsOffRubWrists: The Doctor and Sarah Jane rub their wrists when they get them off after they escape deportation. Later on, Sarah rubs her wrists after she'd been tied up on the fake spaceship.

* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs

Note: Episode 1 only existed for many years as a black and white film recording. For the DVD release a colour restoration was attempted; unlike other Third Doctor stories which only survived in black and white, the result was only a partial success, and the disc includes a high quality monochrome version and a "best efforts" unrestored colour version.

Written by Creator/MalcolmHulke. This serial first aired January 12-February 16, 1974.

* ScrewThisIm

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Once she realizes she's not in space, Sarah Jane walks out of the mock-spaceship, goes upstairs and rejoins the main plot.
* SleeperStarship: Faked.
* SpoilerTitle: Aversion: Part One was simply titled "Invasion". However, as always ''Radio Times'' printed the full title and spoiled the twist.
* SpotlightStealingTitle: The serial's really about Operation Golden Age's schemes. The dinosaurs are secondary to the plot. Creator/MalcolmHulke and Creator/TerranceDicks had wanted to name the story ''Timescoop'', but the higher powers vetoed it.
* StiffUpperLip: The Brigadier ''has no fear''. Giant triceratops? Fine, he'll go stand in front of it waving a flare around for a few minutes.
* TapOnTheHead: Sarah Jane is briefly knocked silly while trapped in a room when a wooden cross-beam falls on her head. The Doctor shows up shortly after and gets her out.
* TemptingFate: In Part Two, the Doctor has built a stun gun to use on a dinosaur. He wants a docile and rather low-watt test subject, remarking, "Mind you, I wouldn't like to try it on a Tyrannosaurus Rex." Guess what pops up at the cliffhanger?
** Also true of the Brigadier boasting that the chains used to restrain said ''T. rex'' were unbreakable.
* TokenEvilTeammate: Project Golden Age may not be good guys by any standard, but Whitaker probably qualifies as it's strongly implied he's only interested in advancing his research in contrast to his well-meaning accomplices, and he's much more willing and quick to use lethal force than they are.
* TreacherousAdvisor: Sarah falls victim to this trope ''twice''. First, the man she sees for help finding the villains' base turns out to be the one who helped them set it up. Then, after she escapes from him, she takes what she knows to the general who is coordinating the state of emergency, not knowing that, while she was away, he had ''also'' been revealed as a member of the conspiracy.
* UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans: Operation Golden Age, believing that the environment could not be saved, sent a shipload of volunteers on a FauxtasticVoyage to "another world", to disembark after time had been reversed back to the Mesozoic and the rest of humanity written out of history.
* WellIntentionedExtremist: Operation Golden Age. Desperate to save the planet, they mean to move back time and RetGone everyone save their chosen few.
* WhamEpisode: The suspenseful tone of the first episode as well as the morally ambiguous villains and Phillips' bloody death heralded the darker tone the series would take in the Creator/RobertHolmes era. However probably the most devastating event in the story is Yates's betrayal, not only marking the first time one of his allies had outright turned on the Doctor but also shattering the secure, cosy feeling of the UNIT family and heralding the series' return to the Doctor's more nomadic lifestyle. It's also a bit of a [[BookEnds book-end]], being the last Creator/MalcolmHulke script, one of the defining GreyAndGreyMorality writers and of the Pertwee era.
* WhamLine: "We left Earth three months ago." It turns out to be a RedHerring.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: The stegosaurus which briefly appears just before the Doctor's arrest isn't shown to vanish back to the past ''or'' be killed or captured by UNIT's forces. For all we know, it could still be standing there in the warehouse at the end of the story.
* TheXOfY
* YouHaveToBelieveMe: When Sarah Jane tries to convince the colonists that their spaceship is a fake and they've never left Earth, the leaders dismiss her as a deranged troublemaker. She starts to desperately shout about the danger the world is in from Whitaker's time machine, which doesn't do anything to make herself or her story more credible.
* [[YouSaidYouWouldLetThemGo You Said You Would Let Him Live]]: The Golden Age nutjobs try to pull this on Yates concerning the Doctor.
----

* GhostCity: Central London has been evacuated entirely. That's eight million people. The first episode in particular plays almost like someone decided to make ''Film/28DaysLater'' forty years early, until a dinosaur shows up instead of rage zombies.

* GhostCity: Central London has been evacuated entirely. That's eight million people.

* TheOneWith: The "making of" feature on the DVD describes this as "the one with the dodgy dinosaurs," referencing the fact that the terrible special effects are generally the first thing anyone talks about when discussing it.