Black Orchid

(Series 19, Episodes 17-18)

Summary: Nyssa gets a double, the Doctor plays cricket and there’s an Indian in the cupboard.  An aristocratic family hide a secret in the attic as Agatha Christie meets the Phantom of the Opera.  People are very blasé about bodies in cupboards and it seems any old random policeman can get a lift in the TARDIS these days.  A word of advice - don’t get between Adric and a buffet.

Watch it because: Who doesn’t love a costume party?

Original Air Date:1-2 March 1982.

Doctor:Peter Davison.

Companions:Adric (Matthew Waterhouse), Nyssa (Sarah Sutton) & Tegan Jovanka (Janet Fielding).

Writer:Terence Dudley.

Director:Ron Jones.

Producer:John Nathan-Turner.

The Visitation

(Series 19, Episodes 13-16)

Summary: Tegan is inexplicably still really huffy about not being at Heathrow and Adric bucks stereotypes by tripping and spraining his ankle as the gang meet a gravelly-voiced thespian turned highwayman in 17^th Century England where the peasants are being controlled by androids in bejewelled suits.  Rather worryingly, the Doctor’s response to an attempted beheading by an android brandishing a scythe is “not again.”  And it seems that not only is the Doctor responsible for inspiring Nero to burn Rome but may have accidentally started the Great Fire of London.  What a pyromaniac.

Watch it because: “Why not smile and let me go?”

Original Air Date: 15-23 February 1982.

Doctor: Peter Davison.

Companions: Adric (Matthew Waterhouse), Nyssa (Sarah Sutton) & Tegan Jovanka (Janet Fielding).

Writer: Eric Saward.

Director: Peter Moffatt.

Producer: John Nathan-Turner.