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Doctor Who (season 16)
The sixteenth season of British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', known collectively as ''The Key to Time'', began on 2 September 1978 with ''The Ribos Operation'', and ended with ''The Armageddon Factor''. The arc was originally conceived by producer Graham Williams, who had proposed it as part of his application for the producer's job in 1976. The name refers to the powerful artefact, the segments of which are what the Fourth Doctor and his companions, Romana and K9, search for during the season. Anthony Read was the script editor until the final story, when Douglas Adams became the new script editor. Synopsis A figure calling himself the White Guardian commissions the Doctor and K9, assisted by a new companion, the Time Lady Romana, to find the six segments of the Key to Time, a cosmic artefact resembling a perfect cube that maintains the equilibrium of the universe. Since it is too powerful for any single being to possess, it has been split into six diffe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
DVD Region Codes
DVD region codes are a digital rights management technique introduced in 1997. It is designed to allow rights holders to control the international distribution of a DVD release, including its content, release date, and price, all according to the appropriate region. This is achieved by way of region-locked DVD players, which will play back only DVDs encoded to their region (plus those without any region code). The American DVD Copy Control Association also requires that DVD player manufacturers incorporate the regional-playback control (RPC) system. However, region-free DVD players, which ignore region coding, are also commercially available, and many DVD players can be modified to be region-free, allowing playback of all discs. DVDs may use one code, multiple codes (multi-region), or all codes (region free). Region codes and countries Any combination of regions can be applied to a single disc. For example, a DVD designated Region 2/4 is suitable for playback in Europe, L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Douglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adams (11 March 1952 – 11 May 2001) was an English author and screenwriter, best known for ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy''. Originally a 1978 BBC radio comedy, ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' developed into a "trilogy" of five books that sold more than 15 million copies in his lifetime. It was further developed into a television series, several stage plays, comics, a video game, and a 2005 feature film. Adams's contribution to UK radio is commemorated in The Radio Academy's Hall of Fame. Adams also wrote ''Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency'' (1987) and ''The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul'' (1988), and co-wrote ''The Meaning of Liff'' (1983), ''The Deeper Meaning of Liff'' (1990), and ''Last Chance to See'' (1990). He wrote two stories for the television series ''Doctor Who'', co-wrote ''City of Death'' (1979), and served as script editor for its seventeenth season. He co-wrote the sketch "Patient Abuse" for the final episode of ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Pirate Planet
''The Pirate Planet'' is the second serial of the Doctor Who (season 16), 16th season in the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in four weekly parts on BBC One, BBC1 from 30 September to 21 October 1978. It forms the second serial of the ''Key to Time'' story arc. It was written by Douglas Adams and features some of his humour. The tyrant Queen Xanxia (Rosalind Lloyd) and the Captain (Bruce Purchase) use the hollow planet Zanak as a spaceship that surrounds smaller planets, including Calufrax, the second segment of the powerful Key to Time in disguise, to plunder the planets' resources that help keep Xanxia alive. Plot The Key to Time tracer points the Fourth Doctor and Romana (Doctor Who), Romana to the cold and boring planet of Calufrax, but when they arrive they find an unusual civilisation that lives in perpetual prosperity. A strange band of people with mysterious powers known as the Mentiads are feared by the society, but the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Confidence Trick
A confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group after first gaining their trust. Confidence tricks exploit victims using their credulity, naïveté, compassion, vanity, confidence, irresponsibility, and greed. Researchers have defined confidence tricks as "a distinctive species of fraudulent conduct ..intending to further voluntary exchanges that are not mutually beneficial", as they "benefit con operators ('con men') at the expense of their victims (the 'marks')". Terminology Synonyms include con, confidence game, confidence scheme, ripoff, scam, and stratagem. The perpetrator of a confidence trick (or "con trick") is often referred to as a confidence (or "con") man, con-artist, or a "grifter". The shell game dates back at least to Ancient Greece. Samuel Thompson (1821–1856) was the original "confidence man". Thompson was a clumsy swindler who asked his victims to express confidence in him by giving him money or their watch rather than gaining their confidenc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Doctor (Doctor Who)
The Doctor is the title character in the long-running BBC science fiction television programme '' Doctor Who''. Since the show's inception in 1963, the character has been portrayed by thirteen lead actors. In the programme, "the Doctor" is the alias assumed by a millennia-old humanoid alien, a Time Lord who travels through space and time in the TARDIS, frequently with companions. The transition to each succeeding actor is explained within the show's narrative through the plot device of "regeneration", a biological function of the Time Lord race that allows a change of cellular structure and appearance with recovery following a fatal injury. A number of other actors have played the character in stage and audio plays, as well as in various film and television productions. The Doctor has been well-received by the public, with an enduring popularity leading ''The Daily Telegraph'' to dub the character "Britain's favourite alien", while abroad the character has come to be seen as a B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Holmes (scriptwriter)
Robert Colin Holmes (2 April 1926 – 24 May 1986) was a British television scriptwriter. For over 25 years he contributed to some of the most popular programmes screened in the UK. He is particularly remembered for his work on science fiction on television, science fiction programmes, most notably his extensive contributions to ''Doctor Who'', which included working as its script editor from 1974 to 1977. Holmes suffered ill health from the early 1980s. He died in May 1986 while working on scripts for the second and final Sixth Doctor season ''The Trial of a Time Lord''. Early career In 1944, at the age of 18, Holmes joined the army, fighting with the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders regiment in Burma. He rapidly earned a commission, and as such became the youngest commissioned officer in the entire British army during the Second World War. The fact that he lied about his age to get into the army was discovered at his commissioning, but apparently the only reaction was by a gene ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Spenton-Foster
George Spenton-Foster (11 November 1926 – 26 December 1993) was a British television director and television producer. For the BBC, Spenton-Foster directed two '' Doctor Who'' stories: ''Image of the Fendahl'' (1977) and '' The Ribos Operation'' (1978). He also directed four ''Blake's 7'' episodes from its second series in 1978: ''Weapon'', ''Pressure Point'', ''Voice from the Past'' and ''Gambit''. In late 1982, Spenton-Foster left the Liverpool-based soap opera ''Brookside Brookside may refer to: Geography Canada * Brookside, Edmonton * Brookside, Newfoundland and Labrador * Brookside, Nova Scotia United Kingdom * Brookside, Berkshire, England * Brookside, Telford, an area of Telford, England United States * Br ...'' four days before it aired because of a disagreement over bad language in the dialogue. References External links * BBC television producers British television directors 1926 births 1993 deaths Alcohol-related deaths in England {{BBC-tv- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Destiny Of The Daleks
''Destiny of the Daleks'' is the first serial of the 17th season of the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in four weekly parts on BBC1 from 1 September to 22 September 1979. The story introduces Lalla Ward as the newly regenerated Romana. It is set on the planet Skaro centuries after events of the 1975 serial ''Genesis of the Daleks''. The Daleks arrive on Skaro to find their creator Davros (David Gooderson) in suspended animation. They seek his guidance to help them beat the Movellan race with whom the Daleks are in a stalemated war. Plot K9 has lost his voice, and the Fourth Doctor is confused as to why a robot would have laryngitis. Romana, for reasons unknown, regenerates, choosing the form of Princess Astra of the planet Atrios, in spite of the Doctor's initial disapproval of it. The TARDIS lands on a rocky planet. The Doctor and Romana see a group of ragged-looking humans burying one of their dead, followed by a spa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lalla Ward
Sarah Jill "Lalla" Ward (born 28 June 1951) is an English actress, voice artist and author. She is best known for playing the role of Romana II in the BBC television series ''Doctor Who'' from 1979 to 1981. Career Early career Ward's stage name, "Lalla", originates from her attempts as a toddler to pronounce her own name. She left school at age 14 because she "loathed every single minute of it", and took her O-levels on her own. Ward studied at the Central School of Speech and Drama from 1968 to 1971. After spending a few years painting, she auditioned at London drama schools "as a sort of dare" to herself: Ward began her acting career in the Hammer horror film ''Vampire Circus'' (1972), and played Lottie, the teenage daughter of Louisa Trotter (Gemma Jones) in ''The Duchess of Duke Street'', the BBC drama series of the mid-1970s. She appeared in the films '' England Made Me'' (1973), ''Matushka'' (1973), ''Rosebud'' (1975), and '' Crossed Swords'' (or ''The Prince and the P ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Fourth Doctor
The Fourth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the BBC science fiction television series '' Doctor Who''. He is portrayed by Tom Baker. Within the series' narrative, the Doctor is a centuries-old alien Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey who travels in time and space in the TARDIS, frequently with companions. At the end of life, the Doctor regenerates; as a result, the physical appearance and personality of the Doctor changes. Baker portrays the Fourth Doctor as a whimsical and sometimes brooding individual whose enormous personal warmth is at times tempered by his capacity for righteous anger. His initial companions were intrepid journalist Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen), who had travelled alongside his previous incarnation, and Surgeon-Lieutenant Harry Sullivan (Ian Marter) of UNIT. His later companions were savage warrior Leela (Louise Jameson), robotic dog K9 (John Leeson and David Brierly), Time Lady Romana (Mary Tamm and Lalla Ward), t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Valentine Dyall
Valentine Dyall (7 May 1908 – 24 June 1985) was an English character actor. He worked regularly as a voice actor, and was known for many years as "The Man in Black", the narrator of the BBC Radio horror series '' Appointment with Fear''. He was the son of the actor Franklin Dyall and the actress and author Mary Phyllis Joan Logan, who acted and wrote as Concordia Merrel. 1930s to 1950s In 1934, Dyall appeared with his father, actor Franklin Dyall, at the Manchester Hippodrome in Sir Oswald Stoll's presentation of Shakespeare's ''Henry V'', playing the roles of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Captain Gower, and a cardinal of France. He also appeared in one movie with his father, the 1943 spy thriller ''Yellow Canary''; Dyall's part was that of a German U-boat commander attempting to kidnap a British agent from a ship in the Atlantic, while his father played the ship's captain. In the same year he had a small role as a German officer in ''The Life and Death of Colonel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
