"The Age of Steel" is the sixth episode of the second series of the British

science fiction television Science fiction first appeared in television programming in the late 1930s, during what is called the Golden Age of Science Fiction. Special effects and other production techniques allow creators to present a living visual image of an imaginary ...

programme ''

Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series depicts the adventures of a Time Lord called the Doctor, an extraterrestrial being who appears to be human. The Doctor explores the u ...

''. It was first broadcast on

BBC One BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, p ...

on 20 May 2006 and is the second part of a two-part story. The first part, "

Rise of the Cybermen "Rise of the Cybermen" is the fifth episode of the second series of the British science fiction television programme ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast on BBC One on 13 May 2006. The episode introduces a terrestrial reinvention of the Cyb ...

", was broadcast on 13 May. The episode is set in London in a parallel universe. In the episode, the businessman John Lumic (

Roger Lloyd-Pack Roger Anthony Lloyd-Pack (8 February 1944 – 16 January 2014) was an English actor. He is best known for playing Trigger in ''Only Fools and Horses'' from 1981 to 2003, and Owen Newitt in ''The Vicar of Dibley'' from 1994 to 2007. He later star ...

) has overthrown Great Britain's government and taken over London. A human resistance movement seeks to stop Lumic's plan to convert humanity into

Cybermen The Cybermen are a fictional race of cyborgs principally portrayed in the British science fiction television programme '' Doctor Who''. The Cybermen are a species of space-faring cyborgs who often forcefully and painfully convert human beings ...

by destroying Lumic's transmitter controlling London's population.

Plot

The

Tenth Doctor The Tenth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the main protagonist of the BBC science fiction television franchise ''Doctor Who''. He is played by David Tennant in three series as well as nine specials. As with previous incarnations of the ...

incinerates the

surrounding himself,

Rose A rose is either a woody perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred species and tens of thousands of cultivars. They form a group of plants that can be ...

Mickey Mickey is a given name and nickname, almost always masculine and often a short form (hypocorism) of Michael (given name), Michael, and occasionally a surname. Notable people and characters with the name include: People Given name or nickname Men ...

, and the Preachers by using the recharging power cell from the

TARDIS The TARDIS (; acronym for "Time And Relative Dimension In Space") is a fictional hybrid of the time machine and spacecraft that appears in the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'' and its various spin-offs. Its exterior ap ...

. The group escapes with Pete. As they flee, Pete explains to the Preachers that he is "Gemini", the Preachers' secret source of information on John Lumic. From his hovering

zeppelin A Zeppelin is a type of rigid airship named after the German inventor Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin () who pioneered rigid airship development at the beginning of the 20th century. Zeppelin's notions were first formulated in 1874Eckener 1938, pp ...

, moored near the Cyberman factory at

Battersea Power Station Battersea Power Station is a decommissioned Grade II* listed coal-fired power station, located on the south bank of the River Thames, in Nine Elms, Battersea, in the London Borough of Wandsworth. It was built by the London Power Company (LPC) ...

, Lumic activates the EarPod devices and uses them to control the people of London, including Pete's wife Jackie, and bring them in to be upgraded. Ricky is killed by the Cybermen while trying to scale a fence to meet Mickey. Mickey and Jake decide to board the Lumic's zeppelin to destroy the EarPod transmitter on board, Pete and Rose try to find Jackie inside the factory, and the Doctor and Mrs. Moore try to find their way to Lumic. Pete and Rose are captured by the Cybermen and taken to Lumic when a now-upgraded Jackie catches sight of them. The Doctor and Mrs. Moore discover every Cybermen contains an emotional inhibitor. He deduces that if he disables the signal from the inhibitors, the realisation of what they have become will kill the Cybermen. Mrs. Moore is killed by a Cyberman, and the Doctor is taken to Lumic, now upgraded as the Cyber Controller. Mickey and Jake successfully disable the transmitter, causing the humans to flee the factory. The Doctor subtly tells Mickey over a surveillance camera to find the inhibitor code in the Lumic family's database. He finds it and sends it to Rose's phone. The Doctor plugs the phone into the computer systems, causing the inhibitor signal to drop and sending the army of Cybermen into despair. The Cybermen explode, setting the factory on fire, and Rose, the Doctor and Pete escape to the roof, where Mickey and Jake have control of the zeppelin. The enraged Cyber Controller attempts to follow, but Pete causes him to fall when Pete destroys part of the ladder using the Doctor's sonic screwdriver. Cyber controller (25031636812)

The Doctor revives the TARDIS with the power cell. Rose reveals to Pete that she is his daughter from another parallel universe. Overwhelmed, Pete walks away. Mickey, feeling that Rose no longer needs him, decides to stay in the parallel universe to help care for Ricky's elderly grandmother (whose counterpart in Mickey's universe died years earlier) and to help the Preachers stop the remaining Cybermen.

Production

According to an interview with Andrew Hayden-Smith, and comments given by Russell T Davies in a press conference, Ricky and Jake were initially intended to be gay lovers. A deleted scene included in the Complete Series Two DVD box set confirms this. This episode, along with "

", was produced in the same production block as the series finale story, "

Army of Ghosts "Army of Ghosts" is the twelfth and penultimate episode in the second series of the British science fiction television programme '' Doctor Who'' which was first broadcast on BBC One on 1 July 2006. It is the first episode of a two-part story; t ...

"/"

Doomsday Doomsday may refer to: * Eschatology, a time period described in the eschatological writings in Abrahamic religions and in doomsday scenarios of non-Abrahamic religions. * Global catastrophic risk, a hypothetical event explored in science and fict ...

". Location shooting took place at the

Coal Exchange The Coal Exchange (also known as the Exchange Building) is an historic building in Cardiff, Wales. It is designed in Renaissance Revival style. Built in 1888 as the Coal and Shipping Exchange to be used as a market floor and office building for ...

and

Mount Stuart Square Mount Stuart Square is a residential and commercial square in Cardiff, Wales. It is located in the Butetown area of the city. Originally developed in the late 1800s as a residential location for nearby dock workers, it quickly became a centre f ...

Cardiff Bay Cardiff Bay ( cy, Bae Caerdydd; historically Tiger Bay; colloquially "The Bay") is an area and freshwater lake in Cardiff, Wales. The site of a former tidal bay and estuary, it serves as the river mouth of the River Taff and Ely. The body of w ...

. Footage from "

" — specifically, the destruction of the

Nestene Consciousness The Autons are an artificial life form from the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'' and adversaries of the Doctor. They were originally created by scriptwriter Robert Holmes for Jon Pertwee's first serial as the Doctor, ' ...

— was reused as part of the destruction of the Battersea Cyber-conversion facility.

Outside references

Pete derisively calls the Preachers "

Scooby-Doo ''Scooby-Doo'' is an American animation, animated media franchise based on an animated television series launched in 1969 and continued through several derivative List of Scooby-Doo media, media. Writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears created the orig ...

and his gang" and compares their van to the Mystery Machine. As noted by Noel Clarke on the commentary, Mickey phones Rose and says "I'm coming to get you!", which echoes the Ninth Doctor's words to her at the climax of "

Bad Wolf "Bad Wolf" is the twelfth episode of the revived first series of the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who''. The episode was first broadcast on BBC One on 11 June 2005. It is the first of a two-part story. The concluding episo ...

Broadcast and reception

The average overnight viewing figure for this episode was 6.85 million (a 36% share), peaking at 7.7 million. The final figure rose to 7.63 million. It received an

Appreciation Index The Audience Appreciation Index (AI) is an indicator measured from 0 to 100 of the public's appreciation for a television or radio programme, or broadcast service, in the United Kingdom. Until 2002, the AI of a programme was calculated by the B ...

of 86. This episode was released together with "

" and "

The Idiot's Lantern "The Idiot's Lantern" is the seventh episode of the second series of the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast on 27 May 2006 on BBC One. It was written by Mark Gatiss and directed by Euros Lyn. Th ...

" as a basic

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...

with no special features. It was also released in the complete series 2 box set and the Doctor Who Cybermen collection.

IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...

's Ahsan Haque gave "The Age of Steel" a rating of 7.9 out of 10, praising the way Mickey became independent. However, he noted that it worked as a "popcorn episode", with the Cybermen story being a "letdown" and "by-the-book", with the conversation between the Doctor and Lumic about emotions something that was commonly covered in science fiction. Nick Setchfield of ''

SFX SFX may refer to: Entertainment * Special effects (usually visual), illusions used in film, television, and entertainment * Sound effects, sounds that are artificially created or enhanced * SFX (magazine), ''SFX'' (magazine), a British magazine c ...

'' gave the two-parter a positive review, highlighting Harper's direction which he felt added imagination and menace to the Cybermen and the parallel universe. However, he felt that Lloyd-Pack's performance was too over-the-top for the current "subtler" incarnation of ''Doctor Who'', which made him come across as "jarringly two-dimensional".

References

External links

Episode commentary by Noel Clarke, Camille Coduri and Shaun Dingwall
(MP3)
"The Age of Steel" episode homepage
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Age of Steel, The Tenth Doctor episodes Cybermen television stories 2006 British television episodes Alternate history television episodes Television episodes about parallel universes Doctor Who stories set on Earth Television episodes set in London