Doctor Who: The Web of Fear

"Maybe I didn't want to be a scientist after all..."

Just when Johnny thought he was old enough to ride the Tube alone...

Season Five, Story 5 (Story Code QQ)

Starring Patrick Troughton as the Doctor
with Frazer Hines (Jamie) and Deborah Watling (Victoria)

Written by Mervyn Haisman & Henry Lincoln
Directed by Douglas Camfield
Produced by Peter Bryant
Script Editor - Derrick Sherwin

Broadcast Dates, Viewership, Appreciation Figures

• Episode one – 3 Feb 1968 (7.2m, 54%)
• Episode two – 10 Feb 1968 (6.8m, 53%)
• Episode three – 17 Feb 1968 (7.0m, 51%) ** MISSING **
• Episode four – 24 Feb 1968 (8.5m, 55%)
• Episode five – 2 Mar 1968 (8.0m, 55%)
• Episode six – 9 Mar 1968 (8.3m, 55%)

According to Philip Morris who made the discovery, all six episodes of "The Web of Fear" were among the canisters discovered in the Nigerian vault (along with all of "The Enemy of the World"), but somewhere between discovery and shipment episode three disappeared. Its current whereabouts are unknown, but rumored to have been sold to a private collector.

How To Watch

• Streamable on demand on Britbox (episode three uses the 2014 recon with stills and audio).
• Not currently on rotation on Pluto.tv nor included on the Doctor Who Classic YouTube channel (as of July 2025).
• 2014 DVD release shortly after the announcement of the recovery of episodes two, and four-six. Episode three recreated with telesnap images and audio.
• 2021 re-release on DVD/Blu-Ray (episode three recreated with animation).
• Episode one – at the time the only episode in the BBC archive – was included on the 2004 Lost In Time DVD compilation, and as a bonus on the 2003 VHS release of "Reign of Terror."

Synopsis

Central London has been evacuated as new model of robot Yeti are plaguing the London Underground, flooding the tunnels with a deadly, pulsing weblike material, and covering the downtown in a mysterious mist. The TARDIS materializes on a closed tube station; our heroes walk along the tracks and encounter an army team using one of the few remaining tube stations as a headquarters, assisted by the now-elderly Professor Travers and his scientist daughter Anne, to try to find a solution. The Doctor becomes aware that one of the crew is likely to be a human host for the Great Intelligence, and with the help of Anne, manages to modify a control sphere to be able to control a Yeti.

A solitary officer, Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart, arrives and assumes command of the base as the web closes in, though the Doctor includes him as potential host. Eventually the Intelligence takes control of Travers to reveal that the Yeti invasion was a means to trap the Doctor, and wants to drain the knowledge from his brain. Under duress, the Doctor agrees. Jamie and the converted Yeti manage to destroy the Intelligence's machinery, much to the Doctor's chagrin; he had secretly managed to reverse the programming so that he would've destroyed the Intelligence, instead it was merely dispersed back into space. The TARDIS departs.

Blather

The strength of this story lies not in its plotting, which is more or less paper-thin, but in the menace that might lurk around every bend in the track, and the suspicion of just who the possessed person may be.

This tension pervades the script, and nobody can relax. Jamie and Victoria are immediately regarded with suspicion by the soldiers, they keep the Doctor's presence a secret not realizing the peril that it puts him in. Anne doesn't trust them at first either, despite her father's blustering defense. And why would she? They claim to be the same people who met her father forty years earlier and haven't aged a day. Yeti may lurk around any corner, and indeed do eventually come bursting into the base. Lethbridge-Stewart enigmatically arrives with no prior notice and assumes command. The sniveling driver Evans, the anxious and self-important journalist Chorley, or any of the everyday soldiers or officers could be the eyes and ears of the Intelligence.

What happens at the Furry con stays at the Furry con.

As strong as that tension and terror is upon first viewing, it doesn't necessarily reward repeated watching; we know this person's about to die and that person is not, and we know whose body the Intelligence was using as its host. This of course wasn't an issue at the time, as these stories were intended to be viewed one time only, and the notion that these stories would be regularly watched on demand decades later was inconceivable. But at the time it scared the crap out of the kiddies, and they grew up with the memory of hiding behind the sofa in terror.

Some have noted the writing leaning on anti-Semitic stereotypes/tropes with the character of Julius Silverstein in episode one, the money-obsessed owner of the deactivated Yeti. They could definitely have gone in a better direction there. Maybe he's only German. Still...

I do appreciate the unique aspects of this story. This is the first time we re-visit a non-recurring character, when time has passed for him but not the regulars. Then there's the resolution. I can't immediately think of another classic story where our heroes only partially win the day because the well-meaning companion inadvertently sabotages the Doctor's plan that would've destroyed the Great Intelligence, and instead only repels it.

Dinna worry, wee lassie, I'm about te bollocks it all up!

And although he wasn't necessarily conceived to be a regular recurring character, this is the Doctor's first meeting with then-Colonel, later Brigadier, Lethbridge-Stewart. Except that we don't see it! We see feet approaching the Doctor's prone body in episode two, then he appears in episode three, presumably already having introduced himself, and where that episode wound up is anyone's guess.

Poor Victoria again has the arduous task of always being placed in situations of peril; somehow always seemingly walking down a subway tunnel all alone, then suddenly around the corner is a terrible sight and she SCREAMS, etc etc.

I appreciate how the script throws in a meta-comment once they realize where they are:

DOCTOR: Funny, isn't it?
JAMIE: What?
DOCTOR: How we keep landing on your Earth!

Tina Packer gives such a lovely performance as Anne, and her character is so sharply written that it compounds the frustration of how rare a strong, multi-dimensional female character was in the show. It's a justifiably iconic moment when she puts the flirty soldier in his place:

KNIGHT: What's a girl like you doing in a job like this?
ANNE: Well, when I was a little girl I thought I'd like to be a scientist, so I became a scientist.
KNIGHT: Just like that?
ANNE: Just like that.

Unfortunately, she also gets the short straw and has to do the Explanation For The Kiddies at the end: "You mean, all we've done is cut off its contact with Earth? It's still out there in space somewhere, flying around?"

Ms. Packer felt very faint after reading her lines in episode six.

Tidbits

A special trailer was recorded and broadcast following Ep 6 of "Enemy of the World," in which the Doctor suggests that parents might find the next adventure particularly frightening, so children might need to watch it with their parents to reassure them. The audio survived, and someone added some animation here.

Famously, David Myerscough-Jones' sets were so realistic that the BBC got an angry letter from London Transport accusing them of illicitly filming on the tracks.

Troughton was granted a week's vacation during the making of this story, and the scripts were crafted so that he was not needed for episode two.

David Langton was originally cast as Lethbridge-Stewart, but dropped out when he apparently got a more lucrative opportunity. After offering the role to Nicholas Selby (who was about to play Egeus in Peter Brooks' iconic production of Midsummer Night's Dream), Nic Courtney was eventually cast.

Professor Travers and Anne were originally intended to re-appear in season six's "The Invasion," and are referenced in episode one, but writers Haisman and Lincoln (having fallen out with the production team over "The Dominators") would not allow them to use the characters, leading to the creation of Professor Watkins and his daughter Isobel.

Haven't I Seen You Somewhere In The Future?

• Nicholas Courtney (Col. Lethbridge-Stewart) had previously appeared as Bret Vyon in "The Daleks' Master Plan." Later promoted to Brigadier and assigned to UNIT, Lethbridge-Stewart would be a fixture of the Third Doctor's earthbound stories and pop up regularly through the classic series and in multiple audio adventures. I bet you all knew that already.
• John Levene (Yeti) would likewise become a regular character as Sgt Benton of UNIT.
• Jack Watling (Travers) reprises his role from "The Abominable Snowmen."
• Derek Pollitt (Evans) would return as Pvt Wright in "The Silurians" and Professor Caldera in "Shada."
• Richardson Morgan (Blake) would return as Rogin in "Ark in Space."
• Ralph Watson (Captain Knight) would return as Ettis in "Monster of Peladon" and Ben in "Horror of Fang Rock."
• This is Tina Packer's (Anne) only appearance on Doctor Who, but she is beloved among American classical actors as the founder and longtime artistic director of Shakespeare & Co in Lenox, Massachusetts.

Does the BIPOC character survive? n/a

Sausage Factor: 94.7% (18 out of 19 credited actors are male)

Rating: Two and a Half out of Four Tube Stations
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John Geoffrion is a semi-retired semi-professional thespian, a professional data guy, and a Dad. He usually falls asleep to the Classic Doctor Who channel on Pluto.tv

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