The Beast Below

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PRODUCTION INFO

Name

The Beast Below

Series 5

Episode 2

First Transmitted

10 April 2010

Final Ratings

7.90m

BOXSET RELEASE

Series 5 Set

DVD RELEASE

Series 5 Volume 1

GALLERY

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CAST

Regular Cast

Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy)

Guest Cast

Sophie Okonedo (Liz 10), Terrence Hardiman (Hawthorne), Hannah Sharp (Mandy), Alfie Field (Timmy), Christopher Good (Morgan), David Ajala (Peter), Catrin Richards (Poem Girl), Jonathan Battersby (Winder), Chris Porter (Voice of Smilers/Winder), Ian McNeice (Churchill).

CREW

Written by Steven Moffat
Directed by Andrew Gunn
Produced by Peter Bennett

SYPNOSIS

Amy Pond takes her first trip in the TARDIS when The Doctor whisks her away to the distant future and they discover Britain in space.

Starship UK houses the future of the British people as they search the stars for a new home. But when Amy explores she encounters the terrifying Smilers and learns a deadly truth inside the Voting Booth

NOTES

  • This episode was incorrectly entitled Meddling Monks by the BBC.
  • Like The End of the World, this episode featured The Doctor taking a new companion into the distant future for her first trip in the TARDIS.
  • Also like The Doctor Dances, the resolution to the main problem of the plot is solved by the way people have at first believed to have caused another effect and so previously tried to avoid (Nancy tried to avoid her son Jamie of fear of becoming a Gas-Masked Zombie whilst Liz 10 always chose to forget since she believed that by releasing the Star Whale it would destroy Starship UK).
  • This story leads directly into the next.
  • Another crack could be seen at the very end of the story, in roughly the same shape as the crack on Amy’s wall and the TARDIS monitor in The Eleventh Hour, continuing the Series 5 theme of cracks appearing throughout the universe. Amy stopping The Doctor from killing the star whale echo Donna Nobles pleas for Tenth Doctor to stop in The Runaway Bride. This is the first average length Doctor Who episode (45 minutes) since The Stolen Earth, the intervening episodes all being specials or extended not including the amalgamated Dreamland.
  • If Amy Pond’s age is said to be 1306 years old, and she was 21 in 2010, then the year is most likely 3295. A red telephone box, exactly the same as the one destroyed by the sonic screwdriver in Leadworth, appears early in the episode in the background.
  • There are several references and similarities between this episode and Star Wars. Liz 10 says to The Doctor, “Help us, Doctor. You’re ouronly hope.” echoing Princess Leia’s holographic message in Episode IV. The Doctor and Amy are shunted down into a pile of refuse echoing another scene in Episode IV. The scenes inside the star whale and when they look outward through the jaws are reminiscent of the sequence in Episode V with the space slug. Lastly, near the end, the scene change between the climax and the denouement features a vertical transitional wipe similar to Lucas’ wipe style.
  • This episode aired on the same day as the K9 episode, Sirens of Ceres.
  • MEDIA CLIP

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