The Talons of Weng Chiang

''The Talons of Weng-Chiang'' is the sixth and final serial of the 14th season of the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in six weekly parts on BBC1 from 26 February to 2 April 1977. In the serial, which is set in 19th-century London, the 51st century criminal Magnus Greel ( Michael Spice) travels to the city and poses as an ancient Chinese god to find his missing time machine.

Written by script editor Robert Holmes and directed by David Maloney, ''The Talons of Weng-Chiang'' was also the final serial to be produced by Philip Hinchcliffe, who had worked on the series for three seasons. One of the most popular serials from the series' original run on television, ''The Talons of Weng-Chiang'' has continued to receive acclaim from reviewers and it has been repeatedly voted one of the best stories by fans. Despite this, criticism has been directed towards the serial's stereotypical representation of Chinese characters and an unconvincing giant rat featured in the story.

Plot

The Doctor and Leela arrive in London so that Leela can learn about the customs of her ancestors. Performing at the Palace Theatre is the stage magician Li H'sen Chang. On their way to the theatre, the Doctor and Leela encounter a group of Chinese men who have apparently killed a cab driver. All but one escape, and he, the Doctor and Leela are taken to the local police station.

At the station, Li H'sen Chang is called in to act as an interpreter, but unbeknownst to everyone else he is the leader of the group – the Tong of the Black Scorpion, followers of the god Weng-Chiang. He stealthily gives the captive henchman a pill of concentrated scorpion venom, which the henchman takes and dies.

The body is taken to the local mortuary, along with the body of the cabbie. There they meet Professor Litefoot, who is performing the autopsies. The cabbie is Joseph Buller, who had been looking for his wife Emma, the latest in a string of missing women in the area. Buller had gone down to the Palace Theatre where he had confronted Chang about his wife's disappearance. Afterwards, Chang had sent his men, including the diminutive Mr Sin, to kill Buller. Chang is in the service of Magnus Greel, a despot from the 51st century who had fled from the authorities in a time cabinet, now masquerading as the Chinese god Weng-Chiang. The technology of the cabinet is unstable and has disrupted Greel's own DNA, deforming him horribly. This forces him to drain the life essences from young women to keep himself alive. At the same time, Greel is in search of his cabinet, which is now in the possession of Professor Litefoot. Mr Sin is also from the future but is a robotic toy constructed with the cerebral cortex of a pig.

Greel tracks down the time cabinet and steals it, whilst concurrently the Doctor tracks Greel to the sewers underneath the theatre, aided by the theatre's owner, Henry Gordon Jago. However, Greel has already fled, abandoning Chang to the police. Chang escapes into the sewers, only to be mauled by one of Greel's giant rats.

While the Doctor and Leela try to find Greel's new hideout, Jago comes across the key to the time cabinet. He takes it to Professor Litefoot's house, and there, after leaving the key and a note for the Doctor, the Professor and Jago set out to follow anyone coming around the theatre in search of the bag. However, they are captured. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Leela find Chang in an opium den, dying from his injury. The Doctor and Leela ask where Greel can be found, and Chang tells them he can be found in the House of the Dragon, but dies before he can give them the exact location.

The Doctor and Leela return to Professor Litefoot's house. There they find the note and the key to the time cabinet. They decide to wait for Greel and his henchmen. When they arrive, the Doctor uses the key, a fragile crystal, as a bargaining chip. He asks to be taken to the House of the Dragon, offering the key in exchange for Litefoot and Jago's release. Instead, Greel overpowers the Doctor and locks him in with the two.

Leela, who had been left at Litefoot's house, has followed them and confronts Greel. She is captured by Greel, but before her life essence is drained, the Doctor, Jago and Litefoot escape and rescue her. In a final confrontation, Mr Sin turns on Greel as the Doctor convinces it that Greel escaping in his time cabinet will create a catastrophic implosion. The Doctor defeats Greel by forcibly pushing him into his own extraction machine, causing it to overload and Greel to disintegrate. The Doctor then captures and deactivates Mr Sin.

Production

A Robert Banks Stewart story outline called ''The Foe from the Future'' inspired elements of this serial. ''The Foe from the Future'' was adapted by Big Finish Productions as an audio play in 2012. Working titles for this story included ''The Talons of Greel''. This was the final ''Doctor Who'' story produced by Philip Hinchcliffe. His successor, Graham Williams, sat in on this story's production. This story featured John Nathan-Turner's first work as an uncredited production unit manager on the series, with the credit going to Chris D'Oyly-John. Nathan-Turner would become the series' regular production unit manager under Williams and succeed Williams as the show's producer from 1980 to 1989.

''The Talons of Weng-Chiang'' featured two separate blocks of location shooting. As planned, the serial was to have a week of location filming for the exterior footage, which took place at various locations in London, with the majority in the area around Wapping, in mid-December 1976, followed by three studio recording sessions. Producer Philip Hinchcliffe was able to negotiate the swapping of one of the planned studio sessions for the use of an outside broadcast video crew, which led to the second block of location shooting in early January 1977, encompassing a week in Northampton, the majority of which was spent at the Royal Theatre.

A large pile of straw seen in one scene was placed there to cover a modern car that had not been moved off the street. The production team briefly considered giving Jago and Litefoot their own spin-off series.

The production of this serial featured in a BBC 2 documentary, ''Whose Doctor Who'' (1977), presented by Melvyn Bragg, which was part of the arts series ''The Lively Arts''. Including interviews with Tom Baker, Philip Hinchcliffe and fans of the series, it was the first in-depth documentary made by the BBC
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