History Recap / DoctorWhoS6E1TheDominators

JustForFun/{{The one w|ith}}here the Doctor eats some jelly babies. Bet you ''those'' won't be showing up again [[Recap/DoctorWhoS5E6FuryFromTheDeep either]]!

->Written by Norman Ashby[[note]][[AlanSmithee Pseudonym]] for Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln[[/note]]\\

'''Production code:''' TT

Written by Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln ([[AlanSmithee under the pseudonym Norman Ashby]]). This five-episode serial first aired from August 10 to September 7, 1968.

** The story begins with a little PlotParallel that does some {{Foreshadowing}} for the eventual direction of the season. Instead of the Doctor, we follow an anarchic adventurer and traveller named Cully (a RebelliousSpirit at odds with his repressive but highly advanced CrystalSpiresAndTogas society - something that hadn't been revealed about the Doctor at this point) is piloting his craft to a holiday destination that he hopes will yield things to explore and terrifying scientific thrills. His gaggle of adorable, bantering teen companions test the radiation levels, tease him about his bad driving, step out onto the beach to find out where they are and are ''suddenly shot dead''. Season 6 concludes with a BolivianArmyEnding.

* InnocuouslyImportantEpisode: The first episode introduces us to Cully, an ageing ManChild from an alien species with two hearts, whose disgruntlement with his people makes him crave adventure and go travelling in his ship with a bunch of awkward teenagers. He lands and his entire crew gets murdered. This is an innocuous opening for a filler story at the time, but takes on a new meaning when you compare it to the last episode of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS6E7TheWarGames The War Games]]", in which the Doctor is confirmed to be a Time Lord on the run from his boring civilisation and his crew get sent back to where they were from by the other Time Lords (including the implicit death of Jamie).

** The "Number 9" pill that the Doctor uses to create a bomb. Anyone who served in the British army would know [[{{Fartillery}} that the No. 9 pill is a laxative.]]

DOCTOR: What?! ''(The Doctor tosses the vial away and everyone ducks as it goes bang!)'' It works!

* OhCrap: The Doctor manages to get two of these. The first is when Jamie points out that he's just set the Dulcians' travel capsule to take them to the survey base, where there's a Quark waiting for them. The second is at the climax of the serial, when the Doctor casually observes that he's saved the planet and only the island will be devastated and Jamie reminds him that [[FailedASpotCheck that's where they are]].

JustForFun/{{The one w|ith}}here the Doctor eats some jelly babies. Bet you ''those'' won't be showing up again either.

-> ''" An unintelligent enemy is far less dangerous than an intelligent one, Jamie. Just act stupid. Do you think you can manage that?"''

The one where the Doctor eats some jelly babies. Bet you ''those'' won't be showing up again either.

* BBCQuarry: {{Justified}}, as most of the action is set on an island used as a nuclear testing site, which had been too radioactive to clean up until recently.

-> ''" [[ObfuscatingStupidity An unintelligent enemy is far less dangerous than an intelligent one, Jamie. Just act stupid.]] Do you think you can manage that?"''
-->-- '''The Doctor'''

Season Six kicks off with "The Dominators", which sees the TARDIS arrive on a peaceful planet of fashion disasters named Dulkis. The Doctor has visited the planet before, but didn't expect to accidentally land on an island that once served as a nuclear test site--especially considering that the last time he was here, the planet was uniformly peaceful. He's also puzzled by the fact that there seems to be no radioactivity present on this nuclear test site. Two alien invaders called Dominators, hailing from another planet of fashion disasters, also land on the island and promptly use their box-shaped robots (Quarks) to turn the pacifist Dulcians into slaves.

Written by Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln ([[AlanSmithee under the pseudonym Norman Ashby]]). This serial first aired August 10-September 7, 1968.

[[caption-width-right:350:Behold: The ''first'' failed attempt at replacing the Daleks.]]

* SmolderingShoes: What's left when a Quark gets blown up.

Season six kicks off with "The Dominators", which sees the TARDIS arrive on a peaceful planet of fashion disasters named Dulkis. The Doctor has visited the planet before, but didn't expect to accidentally land on an island that once served as a nuclear test site--especially considering that the last time he was here, the planet was uniformly peaceful. He's also puzzled by the fact that there seems to be no radioactivity present on this nuclear test site. Two alien invaders called Dominators, hailing from another planet of fashion disasters, also land on the island and promptly use their box-shaped robots (Quarks) to turn the pacifist Dulcians into slaves.

* PeopleOfHairColor: See HairOfGoldHeartOfGold.

* JerkassHasAPoint: Toba always goes for the more violent option and repeatedly urges Rago to kill the natives (which they both think includes the Doctor). Rago says they need the natives for manual labor. It's easy to agree with Rago, since he doesn't want to kill our heroes and Toba is such a malicious bastard, but Toba is ultimately proved correct; if they'd killed the Doctor early on they would have succeeded in everything they were trying to do.

* WeWillUseManualLaborInTheFuture: But only because the Quarks are low on power.

[[caption-width-right:350:They march on, continuing on their quest for hugs...]]

* RummageSaleReject: The Dulcians' outfits have to be seen to be believed. {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d by Zoe, when she has to wear one: "[[RealWomenDontWearDresses They're not very efficient garments, are they?]] ... They feel impractical!" Though Cully tries to invoke SheCleansUpNicely, saying she looks "more like a girl now".

* EstablishingSeriesMoment: The story begins with a little PlotParallel that does some {{Foreshadowing}} for the eventual direction of the season. Instead of the Doctor, we follow an anarchic adventurer and traveller named Cully (a RebelliousSpirit at odds with his repressive but highly advanced CrystalSpiresAndTogas society - something that hadn't been revealed about the Doctor at this point) is piloting his craft to a holiday destination that he hopes will yield things to explore and terrifying scientific thrills. His gaggle of adorable, bantering teen companions test the radiation levels, tease him about his bad driving, step out onto the beach to find out where they are and are ''suddenly shot dead''. Season 6 concludes with a BolivianArmyEnding.

* SuicidalPacifist: The older Dulcians are convinced that they can negotiate with, and shouldn't use violence against, a couple of invaders who kill people at the slightest provocation and intend to destroy the whole planet.

The one where the Doctor eats some jelly babies.

* OutOfCharacterMoment: The Doctor trying to get a peaceful civilisation to take up guns against alien invaders without even considering any diplomacy or ScienceHero methods — partly why Creator/PatrickTroughton decides to play his part with lots of HamAndCheese. He even does a LampshadeHanging on it in an obvious adlib: The Doctor tells a Dulcian that the Dominators are aliens and therefore don't understand the meaning of pacifism, the Dulcian retorts that the Doctor is also an alien, and the Doctor quickly adds "You got me there!" ''just'' before the edit cuts into it.

* SillyRabbitIdealismIsForKids: The intended Aesop is about the naivety of pacifism. Except that, because of the particular story choices, the story can more easily be read as An AccidentalAesop ''supporting'' activist students, encouraging them to reject rote learning and the irrational laws of the older generation, and take direct action against injustice.

* HairOfGoldHeartOfGold: The Dulcians have golden hair to indicate their innocence and naiveté, with Kando being the most obvious example.
** [[SpecialEffectsFailure Although it shows up almost not at all in black and white]], according to the production subtitles on the DVD the Dulcian characters were given gold makeup to emphasize this as well.

--> '''Doctor:''' But Jamie, it's a brilliant idea! It's so simple, only you could have thought of it!
--> '''Jamie:''' Ohh! ''*clearly pleased, then cottons on*'' ... Hey!

* MadeASlave: The Dominators enslave the Doctor and Jamie and intend to do so to everyone else.

* MechaMooks: The Quarks for the planet conquering Dominators.

* NoOneGetsLeftBehind

* OutOfCharacterMoment: The Doctor trying to get a peaceful civilisation to take up guns against alien invaders without even considering any diplomacy or ScienceHero methods - partly why Creator/PatrickTroughton decides to play his part with lots of HamAndCheese. He even does a LampshadeHanging on it in an obvious adlib: The Doctor tells a Dulcian that the Dominators are aliens and therefore don't understand the meaning of pacifism, the Dulcian retorts that the Doctor is also an alien, and the Doctor quickly adds "You got me there!" ''just'' before the edit cuts into it.
* PeopleOfHairColor
* PerfectPacifistPeople: The Dulcians. Not portrayed in a complimentary way.

* RummageSaleReject: The Dulcians' outfits have to be seen to be believed.
** {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d by Zoe, when she has to wear one: "[[RealWomenDontWearDresses They're not very efficient garments, are they?]] ... They feel impractical!" Though Cully tries to invoke SheCleansUpNicely, saying she looks "more like a girl now".
*** To be fair, Zoe and Kando's (the only Dulcian girl we see) floaty little see-through dresses do actually look relatively good on them, but the heavy, pleated dresses made from miles of cloth that are worn by the men are not flattering...
*** For that matter, everyone on Dulkis also seems to wear flimsy open leather sandals, in spite of all the outdoor areas shown on camera consisting entirely of [[AddedAlliterativeAppeal rough rocky rubbly]] quarry-type terrain, which could easily be painful on such barely-protected feet.
* SillyRabbitIdealismIsForKids: The intended Aesop about the naivety of pacifism.
** AccidentalAesop: Except that, because of the particular story choices, the story can more easily be read as ''supporting'' activist students, encouraging them to reject rote learning and the irrational laws of the older generation, and take direct action against injustice.
* SimilarSquad: The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe encounter two-hearted thrill-seeking ManChild explorer Cully, his protective but a little bit thick young male student and his young female student with perfect fact recall.

* VillainousBreakdown: After talking in a CreepyMonotone for the rest of the serial, Rago suddenly loses it on discovering the bomb he intended to destroy the planet is just a few feet away and is told the countdown can't be stopped.

* ViolenceReallyIsTheAnswer: Because else the Dominators will destroy the whole planet.

* BrokenAesop: Two.
** [[invoked]] WordOfGod is that the aim was an allegory about how the hippie movement was bad because they would have got their arses kicked if they'd been in control when the Nazis had invaded. However, the oppressed, pacifistic Dulcians don't work as a hippie allegory, as they're characterised either as elderly politicians or as attractive young people who unthinkingly repeat the elders' lessons by rote until the Doctor and companions turn them against their racist, fascist oppressors, while the old Dulcians get slaughtered through trying to negotiate with Always ChaoticEvil aliens. The result comes off as an allegory about how student activism is the future because the apathetic old politicians are only concerned with keeping superficial comforts and not with fixing big societal problems, and have engineered their own destruction.
** The second is in the B-plot: The villains have an internal conflict, between Rago, who favours caution and condemns meaningless destruction, and Toba, a PsychoForHire who just loves destroying things. The problem is that everything Toba says is right — if he just had blown everyone up on sight (including the Doctor and Jamie) the Dominators would have succeeded in their plan. The result of this is that the story is simultaneously far more left-wing than intended and far more right-wing than intended.

* ChekhovsVolcano

--> '''Jamie:''' C'mon! The whole place is going to blow up!
--> '''Second Doctor''' No, it's quite all right, Jamie. The planet is quite safe. There's only going to be a ''localized'' volcanic eruption. It'll only affect the island.
--> '''Jamie:''' Maybe so, but ''we'' happen to be ''on'' the island.
--> '''Second Doctor:''' [[OhCrap Oh, my word!]]

--> '''Cully''': Well, here we are everyone, the Island of Death! Uninhabited for one hundred and seventy years. Nothing can live on this poisonous plot of soil.
--> '''Wahed''': You're being melodramatic again, Cully, as usual. You know perfectly well there's a permanent survey unit there to monitor the radiation.
--> '''Etnin''': And there's a weekly visit by parties of students to show them the horror of atomic radiation.
--> '''Cully''': All right, all right, I know.

* BrokenAesop: Two. The WordOfGod aim was an allegory about how the hippie movement is bad because they would have got their arses kicked if they'd been in control when the Nazis had invaded. However, the oppressed, pacifistic Dulcians don't work as a hippie allegory, as they're characterised either as elderly politicians or as attractive young people who unthinkingly repeat the elders' lessons by rote until the Doctor and companions turn them against their racist, fascist oppressors, while the old Dulcians get slaughtered through trying to negotiate with Always ChaoticEvil aliens. The result is that it comes off as an allegory about how student activism is the future because the apathetic old politicians are only concerned with keeping superficial comfort and not with fixing big societal problems, and have engineered their own destruction. The second is in the B-plot: The villains have an internal conflict, between Rago, who favours caution and condemns meaningless destruction, and Toba, a Psycho for Hire who just loves destroying things. The problem is that everything Toba says is right - if he just had blown everyone up on sight (including the Doctor and Jamie) the Dominators would have succeeded in their plan. The result of this is that the story is simultaneously far more left-wing than intended and far more right-wing than intended.