The Talons of Weng-Chiang

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091 - The Talons of Weng-Chiang <tr><th>Doctor</th> <td>Tom Baker (Fourth Doctor)</td></tr><tr><th>Writer</th> <td>Robert Holmes</td></tr><tr><th>Director</th> <td>David Maloney</td></tr><tr><th>Script Editor</th> <td>Robert Holmes</td></tr><tr><th>Producer</th> <td>Philip Hinchcliffe</td></tr><tr><th>Executive producer(s)</th> <td>None</td></tr><tr><th>Production code</th> <td>4S</td></tr><tr><th>Series</th> <td>Season 14</td></tr><tr><th>Length</th> <td>6 episodes, 25 mins each</td></tr><tr><th>Transmission date</th> <td>February 26–April 2, 1977</td></tr><tr><th>Preceded by</th> <td>The Robots of Death</td></tr><tr><th>Followed by</th> <td>Horror of Fang Rock</td></tr>

The Talons of Weng-Chiang is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from February 26 to April 2, 1977.

1 Synopsis
2 Plot
3 Cast
4 In print
5 Trivia
6 External links
- 6.1 Reviews
- 6.2 Target novelisation

[edit] Synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The Doctor brings Leela to Victorian London to see how her ancestors lived, but is rapidly drawn into a fiendish plot involving Chinese tongs, disappearing women, an Oriental stage magician, a murderous ventriloquist's dummy and giant rats in the sewers.

[edit] Plot

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The Doctor confronts Magnus Greel with the key to Greel's Time Cabinet

The Doctor and Leela arrive in London so that Leela can learn about the customs of her ancestors, specifically the musical theatre of Victorian England. Performing at the Palace Theatre on an extended run is the stage magician Li H'sen Chang, although the Doctor did hope to catch Little Tich. On their way to the Palace Theatre, the Doctor and Leela encounter a group of Chinese men who have apparently killed a cab driver. They attempt to silence the Doctor and Leela but are frightened away by the distant whistle of an approaching peeler. All but one escape, and he and 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 and he secretly gives the captive henchman a pill of concentrated scorpion venom which he takes immediately and dies. The Doctor, upon a brief examination of the body finds a scorpion tattoo – the symbol of the Tong of the Black Scorpion, devout followers of an ancient god Weng-Chiang.

The body is taken to the local mortuary, along with the body of the cabbie which had just been found floating in the river. 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. Chang, knowing the truth, 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. The technology of the cabinet is based on "zygma energy," which is unstable and has disrupted Greel's own DNA. 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, taken from him by Chinese Imperial soldiers, and which in turn had been given by the Imperial Court to Professor Litefoot's parents as a gift. Mr Sin is also from the future but is a robotic toy constructed with the cerebral cortex of a pig. It is better known as the Peking Homunculus, a vile thing that almost caused World War Six when its organic pig part took over the toy's functions.

Greel tracks down the time cabinet and steals it, whilst concurrently the Doctor tracks Greel to the sewers underneath the Palace Theatre, aided (rather clumsily) by the theatre's owner, Henry Gordon Jago. However, Greel has already fled his lair, abandoning Chang to the police. Chang escapes but only to be mauled by one of the giant rats – products of Greel's experiments which were then used to guard his sewer hideout.

While the Doctor and Leela try to find Greel's new hideout, Jago comes across a bag of future technological artefacts, among which is the key to the time cabinet. He takes it to Professor Litefoot's house, and there, after leaving the artefacts and a note for the Doctor, the Professor and Jago set out to follow anyone coming around the Palace Theatre in search of the bag. However, they are captured for their efforts. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Leela happen upon Chang in an opium den; there, he tells them that Greel can be found in the House of the Dragon, but dies before telling them its 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 Lightfoot's and Jago's release. Instead, Greel overpowers the Doctor and locks him in with the two amateur sleuths.

Leela, who had been left at Litefoot's house at the Doctor's behest, has followed them and confronts Greel. She is captured and set in his life-essence extraction machine, a catalytic extraction chamber, but before her life essence is drained in order to feed Greel, 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 catalytic extraction chamber thus damaging it and causing it to overload, and the Doctor defeats the Peking Homunculus by ripping its cerebral cortex from its toy-body...just in time for the coming dawn and the muffin man.

[edit] Cast

Doctor Who — Tom Baker
Leela — Louise Jameson
Henry Gordon Jago — Christopher Benjamin
Professor Litefoot — Trevor Baxter
Li H'sen Chang — John Bennett
Mr Sin — Deep Roy
Magnus Greel — Michael Spice
Casey — Chris Gannon
Buller — Alan Butler
Lee — Tony Then
Ho — Vincent Wong
Coolie — John Wu
Sergeant — David McKail
PC Quick — Conrad Asquith
Teresa — Judith Lloyd
Cleaning Woman — Vaune Craig-Raymond
Singer — Penny Lister
Conductor — Dudley Simpson
Ghoul — Patsy Smart

[edit] In print

Image:Doctor Who and the Talons of Weng-Chiang.jpg A novelisation of this serial, written by Terrance Dicks, was published by Target Books in November 1977.

[edit] Trivia

Working titles for this story included The Talons of Greel.
This was the final Doctor Who story produced by Philip Hinchcliffe, who went on to further television successes. The Hinchcliffe era has been hailed by many fans to have been "the Golden Age of Doctor Who". Hinchcliffe was succeeded by Graham Williams as the series producer, who sat in on this story's production.
This story featured the first Doctor Who work by John Nathan-Turner in the role of series production unit manager. Nathan-Turner would eventually succeed Williams as the show's producer from 1979 to 1989.
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.
Deep Roy, who played Mr. Sin, guest starred later in The Trial of a Time Lord: Mindwarp. He also played all the Oompa Loompas in the 2005 film of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and has had a number of other American film roles. He has also appeared in several episodes of another prominent British 70s science fiction show, Blake's 7.
Dudley Simpson, who composed much of the music for Doctor Who in the 60s and 70s, has a cameo as a conductor.
When Chang calls the Doctor to the stage, there is a short musical excerpt from Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado.
Jago's colourful descriptions of the Doctor liken him to Sherlock Holmes.
The Virgin Missing Adventures spin off novel The Shadow of Weng-Chiang by David A. McIntee is a sequel to this story, and again features Mr Sin.
The Doctor encounters Professor Litefoot again in the Eighth Doctor Adventures novel The Bodysnatchers by Mark Morris. The Time Agents who pursue Greel are featured in the Eighth Doctor Adventures Eater of Wasps and Emotional Chemistry. The Ninth Doctor's companion Jack Harkness identified himself as a Time Agent also from the 51st century.
The production team briefly considered giving Jago and Litefoot their own spin-off series.
John Bennett makes a guest appearance as Chang. Bennett had previously appeared in Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1974).
Michael Spice appears in this story as the main villain, Magnus Greel. He also provided the voice of Morbius in the previous season's The Brain of Morbius.
Leela, who had been considered to be merely a recurring character at this point, was made a regular companion despite objections by Tom Baker who wanted to continue without an assistant.
This story was released as a compilation on VHS in the UK in 1988. In order to obtain a PG rating from the BBFC, shots involving nunchukas were removed from the fight scene involving the Doctor and the Tong of the Black Scorpion. Over the next decade and a half the BBFC's guidelines were relaxed, but the story was one of only three released as a compilation to never have an episodic rerelease.
The story was released completely unedited on DVD in April 2003 in a two-disc set as part of the Doctor Who 40th Anniversary Celebration releases, representing the Tom Baker years, with many extra features.
This story was voted the best Doctor Who story ever in the 2003 Outpost Gallifrey Poll to mark the series' 40th anniversary.
This story has aroused some controversy because of its alleged racism. Some of the English characters display racist attitudes towards the Chinese characters, while the Chinese immigrants themselves are portrayed in a stereotypical fashion — other than Li H'sen Chang (a major villain who is himself a Fu Manchu-esque character, portrayed by a white actor), all of the Chinese characters are coolies or members of Tong gangs. As a result of a complaint to TV Ontario following the initial broadcast of the story the Canadian channel chose not to rebroadcast it when that year's season was rerun.