An Unearthly Child
- Episode aired Nov 23, 1963
- TV-G
- 23m
IMDb RATING
8.1/10
2.2K
YOUR RATING
Two schoolteachers investigate the personal life of one of their brilliant students and her mysterious grandfather.Two schoolteachers investigate the personal life of one of their brilliant students and her mysterious grandfather.Two schoolteachers investigate the personal life of one of their brilliant students and her mysterious grandfather.
Leslie Bates
- Shadow
- (uncredited)
Francesca Bertorelli
- Schoolgirl
- (uncredited)
Reg Cranfield
- Policeman
- (uncredited)
Heather Lyons
- Schoolgirl
- (uncredited)
Mavis Ranson
- Schoolgirl
- (uncredited)
Frederick Rawlings
- Policeman
- (uncredited)
Peter Sallis
- Policeman
- (uncredited)
Brian Thomas
- Schoolboy
- (uncredited)
- Directors
- Waris Hussein
- Douglas Camfield(film inserts) (uncredited)
- Writers
- Anthony Coburn
- David Whitaker
- Sydney Newman(uncredited)
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaWhen this episode was first aired, parts of Britain were suffering a power failure. It was also the day after President Kennedy was assassinated. Both of these factors meant the program was only seen by a disappointing 4.4 million people. When repeated a week later, it was watched by 6 million.
- GoofsAfter entering the TARDIS the top of the set is visible above and behind Ian as he says "you can't keep us here."
- Quotes
The Doctor: We are not of this race. We are not of this earth. Susan and I are wanderers in the fourth dimension of space and time, cut off from our own people by distances beyond the reach of your most advanced science.
- Alternate versionsFour versions of this episode exist. Besides the final broadcast version there was also a trial pilot run-through that was not broadcast initially due to technical problems. The 2006 DVD release "Doctor Who: The Beginning" contains an unedited version of this pilot, with several different takes of the TARDIS sequence. A specially made re-edited version of the pilot is included for the first time in this set, using the best takes and digitally manipulating others to remove errors. Previously, an alternate edit of the pilot -- which included dialogue and prop errors -- was broadcast on the BBC and released on VHS.
- ConnectionsFeatured in The Lively Arts: Whose Dr. Who (1977)
- SoundtracksThree Guitars Mood 2
(uncredited)
Composed by Derek Nelson and Arthur Raymond
Performed by The Arthur Nelson Group
(playing on Susan's radio)
Featured review
A Flying Start
23rd November 1963 was not, perhaps, the most auspicious day to launch a ground-breaking television series. Much of the country was affected by a power cut, and President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated the previous day, which meant that people could talk about little else. And yet, despite these disadvantages, "Doctor Who" went on to become one of the greatest success stories in British TV history, still going strong more than half a century later.
The first few seconds of "An Unearthly Child" introduce some of the series' most iconic elements. We hear that famous electronic music against that strange, psychedelic title sequence. And then we see a policeman looking round a London junkyard where he spots a police box which, unknown to him, is of course the Doctor's TARDIS. This is the serial in which it is explained that the TARDIS is, or should be, capable of disguising itself to blend in with its surroundings. Owing to a malfunction, however, it has remained a police box ever since. Evidently, despite the Time Lords' mastery of time-travel, none of the various manifestations of the Doctor has ever had time to repair the fault.
We do not, however, immediately meet the Doctor himself. Instead, the scene shifts to a London secondary school where two teachers, Barbara Wright and Ian Chesterton, are discussing one of their pupils, fifteen- year-old Susan Foreman. Susan is precocious, but seems to be curiously ignorant of many aspects of British society. Believing that Susan lives with her elderly grandfather, Barbara and Ian decide to investigate by visiting the address she has given. The grandfather turns out to be the Doctor himself, and a series of events leads to all four travelling back in time to the Stone Age, where they become embroiled in a power struggle between two rival factions of cavemen. Hence the serial's alternative title "100,000 BC". Strictly speaking, the only human inhabitants of Britain during this year would have been Neanderthals rather than the modern humans shown here, although I won't claim this as a goof as the date is not actually mentioned in the script.
(My own childhood recollections of "Doctor Who" generally date from the Pertwee/Baker era of the seventies, when most of the stories seemed to be set either in contemporary Britain or on an alien planet, but in the sixties part of the programme's educational remit was to teach children about history, so stories set during the earth's past were quite common).
One thing we learn about the Doctor in this serial is that "Who" is not his surname. The title derives from an incident when Ian and Barbara address him as "Doctor Foreman"- Susan has appropriated that surname from the owner of the junkyard- and he replies "Doctor who?" We also learn that he and Susan are members of an alien race- the expression "Time Lord" is never actually mentioned- who have mastered the science of travel through time and space.
What struck me when I first saw "An Unearthly Child" was William Hartnell's characterisation of the Doctor. Having grown up with Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker, I always thought of Doctor Who as a kindly, if occasionally eccentric, uncle. There is, however, nothing avuncular about Hartnell's Doctor, although he is certainly eccentric. He is also suspicious, cranky and hostile, and surprisingly callous and amoral during the "caveman" episodes. It is the human characters Barbara and Ian who show far more compassion and morality than does the alien Doctor, although it must be said that Susan generally sides with them against him. This characterisation has always struck me as a weakness in the early part of the series, just as the generally sympathetic characterisation of most of the later Doctors has been one of its strengths, and so it is not surprising that his character was very much softened later in Hartnell's tenure.
The Doctor may be an exception, but the serial as a whole does show evidence of the BBC's traditional social liberalism, especially during the scenes where Ian and Barbara, as didactic in 100,000 BC as they were in 1963 AD, try to teach the prehistoric tribe about kindness, friendship and compassion, all virtues previously unknown to them, and even socialist democracy. ("A tyrant is not as strong as the whole tribe acting collectively").
I won't award "An Unearthly Child" a mark out of ten. Certainly the whole "Doctor Who" concept in itself is a ten- if not an eleven- in my eyes, but few of the individual serials or episodes would in themselves merit this mark. This is a case where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Hartnell's character in his serial is not one I can warm to, but the story itself is surprisingly dramatic and exciting, despite the low budgets for which the series was later to become notorious. It did enough to get the series off to a flying start.
The first few seconds of "An Unearthly Child" introduce some of the series' most iconic elements. We hear that famous electronic music against that strange, psychedelic title sequence. And then we see a policeman looking round a London junkyard where he spots a police box which, unknown to him, is of course the Doctor's TARDIS. This is the serial in which it is explained that the TARDIS is, or should be, capable of disguising itself to blend in with its surroundings. Owing to a malfunction, however, it has remained a police box ever since. Evidently, despite the Time Lords' mastery of time-travel, none of the various manifestations of the Doctor has ever had time to repair the fault.
We do not, however, immediately meet the Doctor himself. Instead, the scene shifts to a London secondary school where two teachers, Barbara Wright and Ian Chesterton, are discussing one of their pupils, fifteen- year-old Susan Foreman. Susan is precocious, but seems to be curiously ignorant of many aspects of British society. Believing that Susan lives with her elderly grandfather, Barbara and Ian decide to investigate by visiting the address she has given. The grandfather turns out to be the Doctor himself, and a series of events leads to all four travelling back in time to the Stone Age, where they become embroiled in a power struggle between two rival factions of cavemen. Hence the serial's alternative title "100,000 BC". Strictly speaking, the only human inhabitants of Britain during this year would have been Neanderthals rather than the modern humans shown here, although I won't claim this as a goof as the date is not actually mentioned in the script.
(My own childhood recollections of "Doctor Who" generally date from the Pertwee/Baker era of the seventies, when most of the stories seemed to be set either in contemporary Britain or on an alien planet, but in the sixties part of the programme's educational remit was to teach children about history, so stories set during the earth's past were quite common).
One thing we learn about the Doctor in this serial is that "Who" is not his surname. The title derives from an incident when Ian and Barbara address him as "Doctor Foreman"- Susan has appropriated that surname from the owner of the junkyard- and he replies "Doctor who?" We also learn that he and Susan are members of an alien race- the expression "Time Lord" is never actually mentioned- who have mastered the science of travel through time and space.
What struck me when I first saw "An Unearthly Child" was William Hartnell's characterisation of the Doctor. Having grown up with Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker, I always thought of Doctor Who as a kindly, if occasionally eccentric, uncle. There is, however, nothing avuncular about Hartnell's Doctor, although he is certainly eccentric. He is also suspicious, cranky and hostile, and surprisingly callous and amoral during the "caveman" episodes. It is the human characters Barbara and Ian who show far more compassion and morality than does the alien Doctor, although it must be said that Susan generally sides with them against him. This characterisation has always struck me as a weakness in the early part of the series, just as the generally sympathetic characterisation of most of the later Doctors has been one of its strengths, and so it is not surprising that his character was very much softened later in Hartnell's tenure.
The Doctor may be an exception, but the serial as a whole does show evidence of the BBC's traditional social liberalism, especially during the scenes where Ian and Barbara, as didactic in 100,000 BC as they were in 1963 AD, try to teach the prehistoric tribe about kindness, friendship and compassion, all virtues previously unknown to them, and even socialist democracy. ("A tyrant is not as strong as the whole tribe acting collectively").
I won't award "An Unearthly Child" a mark out of ten. Certainly the whole "Doctor Who" concept in itself is a ten- if not an eleven- in my eyes, but few of the individual serials or episodes would in themselves merit this mark. This is a case where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Hartnell's character in his serial is not one I can warm to, but the story itself is surprisingly dramatic and exciting, despite the low budgets for which the series was later to become notorious. It did enough to get the series off to a flying start.
helpful•40
- JamesHitchcock
- Jun 19, 2014
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Official site
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- Also known as
- An Unearthly Child (Pilot)
- Filming locations
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
- Runtime23 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1
- 4:3
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