History Recap / DoctorWhoS14E6TheTalonsOfWengChiang

* ConquerorFromTheFuture: Downplayed; Greel only hoped to escape capture by traveling into the past, and declares his intention to leave this primitive century as soon as he gets his Time Cabinet back.

* TheatrePhantom: Magnus Greel is a disfigured genius dwelling the cellars of a theatre; his mangled face concealed by a mask. He also uses holographic ghosts to keep the stagehands away from the hidden opening leading to his hideout, which leads to rumors that the theater is haunted.

** Interestingly enough, NOT Leela. As [[http://www.avclub.com/tvclub/doctor-who-classic-the-talons-of-weng-chiang-63742 the AV Club]] noted, Jago and Litefoot fulfill the role of Watson - Jago behaves as the traditional film depiction of Watson being a pompous, boisterous, easily puzzled sleaze while Litefoot behaves as literature's Watson being a quiet, calm, observant gentleman.

* {{BFG}}: Lightfoot's elephant gun is the period equivalent.

* WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong: The Doctor says this to Lightfoot before hunting the rat in the sewers. Lightfoot replies the elephant gun.

* AIIsACrapshoot: Mister Sin is so AxCrazy he ends up gunning down the Tong [[NiceJobFixingItVillain just when they've got our heroes caught in a crossfire]], and [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters shooting at his own master]].

* ChangedMyJumper: 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 VictorianLondon in skins, you'd frighten the horses." Then [[HypocriticalHumor he himself emerges in the stereotypical Sherlock Holmes outfit -- only more colorful --]] and says, "We don't want to be conspicuous, do we?"

* {{Expy}}:
** The original draft of the serial actually had the Master as the villain, but he was vetoed. Magnus Greel is also a black-cloaked, physically-decayed villain with a time machine trying to stave off his own death, as the Master was in [[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E3TheDeadlyAssassin "The Deadly Assassin".]] As "Minister of Justice" for the Supreme Alliance and a mad scientist who experiments on humans Greel also combines traits of Heinrich Himmler and Josef Mengele.
** Li H'sen Chang was clearly based on ''Literature/FuManchu''.

* DarkerAndEdgier: Heavily implied underage prostitutes. Leela in completely soaked clothes. A guy getting his leg ripped off and dragged through the water, and subsequently smoking opium ''on screen'' to dull the pain before he dies in the Doctor's arms. Producer Philip Hinchcliffe had been axed for excessive horrific content and in this, his final serial, had nothing to lose.

* EndOfAnEra: This story marked the GrandFinale of Phillip Hinchcliffe's tenure as producer. Knowing this, he decided to end his era with a bang.

* GrandFinale: For producer Phillip Hinchcliffe. This was his last serial because he was fired due to complaints that the program was too scary for children, so he pulled out all the stops for this story with a higher budget than normal.

Another episode by Creator/RobertHolmes, this episode is markedly DarkerAndEdgier, HotterAndSexier, as well as BloodierAndGorier than most of classic ''Series/DoctorWho''.

* EvilLaugh: Greel gets an amazing one in the episode 4 cliffhanger.

* TheXOfY: One of the over 100 ''Doctor Who'' episode titles to be this.

* SelfPlagiarism: Creator/RobertHolmes rehashed the plot of "[[Recap/TheTimeWarrior The Time Warrior]]" - an alien criminal hides out in the past and allies himself with a human in order to fix his machine via kidnapping people.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar:
** The "wretched girls" who are taken from the streets wear layers of makeup and red clothing, and it's remarked that they can't be older than 16.
** Leela has a SexySoakedShirt moment just after the giant rat sequence that apparently has not been edited out in over 30 years.

** Litefoot's landlady is named [[Literature/SherlockHolmes Mrs. Hudson]].

** The Doctor quotes from the monologue ''The Green Eye Of The Yellow God'', incorrectly attributing it to Henry Champion.

* ConcealmentEqualsCover: A [[NoBudget flimsy wooden table]] is enough to shield the protagonists from FrickingLaserBeams. The laser beams at least start punching holes through the table, though.

* {{Adorkable}}: Jago isn't nearly as brave as he pretends and Litefoot acts very awkwardly around Leela.

* CreatorCameo: Composer Dudley Simpson has a cameo as the conductor of Jago's theatre orchestra.

** Magnus Greel's lair beneath the theatre, his deformed face, the mask he uses to hide it, and the climactic scene in which the mask is torn off to reveal his true face, all derive from ''Literature/ThePhantomOfTheOpera''.

** And, of course, the idea of a [[Literature/ThePhantomOfTheOpera disfigured maniac hiding under a theatre]].

** The giant rat is also reminiscent of animals grown to enormous size in ''Food Of The Gods''.

* IdenticalLookingAsians: Chang sarcastically says, "I understand we all look alike," when the Doctor asks if they've met before.

''Doctor Who'' goes all ''Literature/SherlockHolmes''[[JustForFun/XMeetsY -Meets-]] Film/HammerHorror in this tale set in VictorianLondon. Police pathologist Professor George 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. Also, Leela has to wear period clothing and learn table manners.

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Greel ends up killed by his own life-extraction chamber. Even better, he ends up finished off by the utterly psychotic Mr. Sin who guns him down with the [[EyeBeams Eyes of the Dragon]].

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Greel ends up killed by his own life-extraction chamber.

* ActorAllusion: This is not the first time that Creator/TomBaker faced a homunculus. In ''Film/TheGoldenVoyageOfSinbad'', his character, Kouras, is the villain that creates the homunculus to further his evil schemes and become all powerful.

** Though the trope is lampshaded when Leela sardonically comments that the Doctor has only asked her a question about a piece of 51st Century technology that she obviously wouldn't know about to give him an excuse to answer it.

* LifeDrain: Greel has Chang kidnap young women so Greel can drain their life essence to improve his own failing health after the time machine malfunction.
* LifeDrinker: Magnus Greel attempts to stay alive by draining the life essence out of young women. Leela only just avoids suffering this fate.

* NoodleIncident: We gets hints of a vastly changed world from what the Doctor mentions of the 51st Century. An Ice Age in which the murder of the Commissioner of the Icelandic Alliance triggered World War Six, and the Doctor was with a Filipino army at the final advance on Reykjavik.

* DisappearingBox: Li H'sen Chang uses this in his act and [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident tries to murder the Doctor with it]]. The Doctor walks out of the back of the cabinet, forcing Chang to proceed with his normal act. When he opens the box however a dead stagehand falls out, having been put there by Greel to humiliate his underling.

* ConcealmentEqualsCover: A flimsy wooden table is enough to shield the protagonists from FrickingLaserBeams. The laser beams at least start punching holes through the table, though.

* AIIsACrapshoot: Mister Sin is so AxCrazy he ends up gunning down the Tong [[NiceJobFixingItVillain just when they've got our heroes caught in a crossfire]], and [[TurnedAgainstTheMasters shooting at his own master]].

** Though the trope is lampshaded when Leela sardonically notes that the Doctor has only asked a question (about a piece of 51st Century technology that she obviously wouldn't know about) to give him an excuse to answer it.

* {{Yellowface}}: A particularly noteworthy example, especially within the annals of Who.

* YouHaveFailedMe: Averted. TheDragon is simply fired, and sets out to save face on his own.