Frontier in Space

The Third Doctor and Jo arrive on an Earth cargo ship in the 26th century after a near hyperspace collision. In this time the Empire of Earth is on the verge of war with the Draconian Empire, after cargo ships on both sides claim that the other side is raiding said cargo ships. After a piercing noise in the air the crew of the cargo ship are indeed attacked, but while the crew envisions the Draconian forces, they are actually being attacked by the Ogrons who were previously under the employ of the Daleks. They gut the ship of all cargo and steal the TARDIS.

The Doctor and Jo are blamed by the crew of the cargo ship, and are taken into custody. They undergo Interrogation through the mind probe and various escape and rescue attempts by the Draconians at first and then The Ogrons themselves, that all fail. Soon afterwards the Doctor is sent to a prison on Earths Moon without Jo.

Diplomatic relations break down and the Draconian Ambassador is ordered back to Draconia to report to his father The Emperor. Meanwhile a representative of an earth dominion arrives to take Jo into custody with a full criminal record for her and The Doctor, this officer of the law is actually the Master who is the one behind the Ogron attacks with a device that amplifies the fear centers of the mind.

After an unsuccessful attempt by himself to escape the Moon Prison The Doctor is also transffered to the "custody" of The Master who intends to escort The Doctor and Jo to the Ogron planet, but before this is accomplished they are intercepted by a real Draconian ship that diverts their course to Draconia and their Emperor, where the Masters plot has been exposed due to a failed attempt by the Ogrons to rescue the Master and The Doctor. An Ogron is left behind.

With the assistance of the Draconian Ambassador they intend to reveal the Ogron to the President of Earth to reveal the Truth, but The Master intercepts them, rescues the Ogron, and abducts Jo after an Earth ship arrests The Doctor and the Ambassador. Brought before the President of Earth who is not disposed to the idea of an all out war, they along with one General Williams who is responsible for a previous conflict regrettably decides to mount an expedition to the Ogron planet.

Resisting the control of The Master through hypnosis and the fear device, Jo sends a distress signal that The Doctor and the expedition follow to the Ogron Planet. It is revealed that The Ogrons along with The Master are under the employ of The Daleks who are pushing for the war between the two empires before launching an invasion force they've been preparing. The Doctor helps General Willams and the Draconian Ambassador escape the Orgon Planet to inform their respective empires of the Truth.

Jo leads The Doctor to where The Master has kept The TARDIS, but he holds them at gunpoint along with The Ogrons, The Doctor uses the fear device and a dangerous clash of guns between The Master and Ogrons allows them to escape, though The Doctor is injured in the scuffle.

The Doctor, barely conscious, asks Jo to help him into the TARDIS. He staggers over to the console, de-materialising the ship then using the telepathic circuits, sends a message to the Time Lords, in an effort to follow the Daleks.

The titles for Frontier in Space were prepared, alongside the previous serial, Carnival of Monsters, with a new arrangement of the theme music performed by Paddy Kingsland on a synthesiser. Known as the "Delaware" arrangement (the BBC Radiophonic Workshop was based on Delaware Road in west London), it proved unpopular with BBC executives, so the original Delia Derbyshire theme was restored, although an early edit of episode 5 still contains the "Delaware" music and was used for the VHS release. This early edit of episode 5 with the Delaware theme featured a longer reprise at the beginning of the episode compared to the broadcast version of episode 5.

The 3 Daleks which appear in the final episode were the same props which had been used in Day of the Daleks.^[1]

The final sequence in the Master's headquarters was intended to contain the giant Ogron-eating monster, but director Paul Bernard did not like the costume and omitted it, leaving the scene with just frightened Ogrons running away from something unseen. Producer Barry Letts and script editor Terrance Dicks felt the sequence lacked impact and a new ending was filmed in the TARDIS as part of the first production block of the following story, Planet of the Daleks. Frontier in Space was Paul Bernard's last Doctor Who work.

Jon Pertwee considered the Draconians to be his favourite monster as the rubber and latex masks used allowed the actors playing them to employ a full range of facial expressions.^[2] Recalling the production of this story he noted that filming near the Hayward Gallery at the South Bank was made difficult due to a number of "homeless people and drunks" lying around the area. According to Pertwee, Paul Bernard asked the stuntmen and actors who were on location in costume as Ogrons to ask these people to move to allow filming to proceed.^[3]

When the wiping of episodes ended in 1978 it was discovered that episodes 1, 2, 3 & 6 had only survived as black and white telerecordings for overseas sales. In 1983, PAL copies were returned from ABC Television in Australia.^[4]

This would be the last appearance of Roger Delgado as the Master, his final scene being the confusion outside the TARDIS with his shooting the Doctor, perhaps accidentally, then disappearing with the panicking Ogrons. Roger Delgado was killed in a car crash in Turkey less than three months after this episode's UK broadcast.^[5]

John Woodnutt had previously played Hibbert in Spearhead from Space (1970) and would later play the dual roles of Broton and the Duke of Forgill in Terror of the Zygons (1975) as well as Seron in The Keeper of Traken (1981). Luan Peters had previously appeared in The Macra Terror (1967) under her stage name Karol Keyes. Caroline Hunt previously appeared in The Reign of Terror (1964). Louis Mahoney later appeared as Ponti in Planet of Evil (1975) and as Billy Shipton in Blink (2007).

Harold Goldblatt had previously appeared with Jon Pertwee in a 1938 radio production in Belfast entitled Lillibullero, which was one of Pertwee's earliest radio performances.^[3]

According to the BBC's Audience Research Report, Frontier in Space was well received by viewers at the time of broadcast.^[8] Paul Cornell, Martin Day, and Keith Topping wrote of the serial in The Discontinuity Guide (1995), "Worthy, very well directed and designed to the hilt with a solid costuming policy for both empires. However, it's obviously padded in parts."^[9] In The Television Companion (1998), David J. Howe and Stephen James Walker stated that the story worked "brilliantly", with the production design "[putting] the whole thing on a suitably grand scale".^[8]

In 2010, Patrick Mulkern of Radio Times awarded it four stars out of five and recalled that it was "surprising and exciting" on first viewing, though in retrospect it seemed to be "a lumbering wannabe-epic with screeds of padding, duff cliffhangers and endless scenes of the Doctor and Jo banged up". He praised the Draconians and Ogrons, but felt that "the fact that the heroes spend perhaps two-thirds of the story locked up is tiresome and cannot be overlooked".^[10] DVD Talk's John Sinnott noted that the story was "talky" and had a lot of padding, but that it got "much better" when the Master was revealed.^[11] In the book Doctor Who: The Episode Guide, Mark Campbell awarded it four out of ten, describing it as "an overlong and uninteresting space opera—a genre Doctor Who has never done well. Delgado's exit is particularly badly handled."^[12]

Peter Capaldi, who played the Twelfth Doctor, has said it is one of his favourite serials of the classic seasons.^[13]

Doctor Who and the Space War

Author	Malcolm Hulke
Cover artist	Chris Achilleos[14]
Series	Doctor Who book: Target novelisations
Release number	57
Publisher	Target Books
Publication date	23 September 1976
ISBN	0-426-11033-1

A novelisation of this serial, written by Malcolm Hulke, was published by Target Books in September 1976 under the title Doctor Who and the Space War. This was the last time Target would give a novelisation a substantially different title than that of the serial on which it was based. The novel abandons the cliffhanger ending of the televised program and has the Doctor simply leaving the Master on the Ogron world to pursue the Daleks. An unabridged reading of the novelisation by actor Geoffrey Beevers was released on CD in February 2008 by BBC Audiobooks.

The story was released on VHS in August 1995. Episode 5 uses the "Delaware" music mentioned above. The final episode of this story was also issued on The Pertwee Years VHS release, along with the final episodes of both Inferno (1970) and The Dæmons (1971). The serial was released on DVD on 5 October 2009 as part of the box set "Dalek War", alongside Planet of the Daleks.^[15] It was released on Blu-ray as part of "The Collection - Season 10" boxed set in July 2019.

 

Wikiquote has quotations related to Third Doctor.

• Frontier in Space at BBC Online

• Doctor Who and the Space War title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• On Target — Doctor Who and the Space War