| The following article is written from an Out of Universe perspective. |
Evil of the Gaians was the ninth and final serial of Season 48 of Doctor Who. It was written by Robert Shearman & Ronald D. Moore, directed by Rachel Talalay and featured David Suchet as the Thirteenth Doctor, Juliet Landau as Zenla, Dougray Scott as Chris Parsons and Emer Kenny as Gemma Legato.
Synopsis
The Doctor, Zenla, Chris and Gemma land on the Space Station Nerva, except at the earliest point the Doctor has visited. The station is manned and armed and brand new and controlled by the fascist Earth Government known as the Gaians. The Doctor and his companions are immediately arrested and taken to the prison quarters. Something must be done, this is humanity at its worst. The Doctor smells a rebellion in the making…
Plot
Part I
To be added.
Part II
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Cast
- The Doctor - David Suchet
- Zenla - Juliet Landau
- Chris Parsons - Dougray Scott
- Gemma Legato - Emer Kenny
- Veronica Latimer - Glenn Close
- Dr. Armstrong - Anthony Rapp
- Marlen - Philip Olivier
- Omar - Shane Zaza
- Ana - Ruth Bradley
- Sonia - Alexandra Moen
- Irene - Gugu Mbatha-Raw
- Ivan - Travis Oliver
- Lotte - Daisy Haggard
- Rodriquez - Daniele Favilli
- Lucas - Owen Donovan
- Waterman - Anatole Taubman
- Stirling - Tony Curran
- Reilly - Dervla Kirwan
- Dr. Cabrera - Christopher Good
- Dr. Maki - Elize du Toit
- Dr. Van Laar - Kelly Hunter
- D'amore - Sarah Lancashire
- Quaranta - Lucian Msamati
- Hetisha - Terrance Hardiman
Crew
- Created by Sydney Newman, Donald Wilson and C.E. Webber
- Executive Producers - Ira Steven Behr, Faith Penhale and Martin Campbell
- Co-Executive Producers - Ronald D. Moore, Joseph Lidster, Marc Platt and Nicholas Briggs
- Producer - Gary Russell
- Script Editor - Robert Shearman
- Director of Photography - Stephen Pehesso
- Production Designer - Michael Pickwoad
- Visual Effects - ZOIC Studios
- Make-Up - Barbara Southcott
- Casting Director - Andy Pryor
- Music - David Arnold
- Costume Designer - Ray Holman
- Edited by - Matt Newman
- Special Effects - Real SFX
- Original Theme Music - Ron Grainer
- Title Sequence - Framestore VFX
- Title Sequenced designed by Bernard Lodge
- With thanks to the BBC National Orchestra of Wales
- Conducted and orchestrated by Ben Foster
- Music mixed by Jake Jackson
- Music recorded by Gerry O'Riordan
Memorable Quotes
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Background Information
Production History
- First Draft Script - 17 April 2011
- Final Draft Script - 25 June 2011
- Filming started - 27 June 2011
- Filming completed - 29 July 2011
- Part I Broadcast - 15 October 2011
- Part II Broadcast - 22 October 2011
Development
- Writer and co-executive producer, Ronald D. Moore initially wrote up a storyline for the serial, with no intention of actually writing it himself.
- The storyline was quite different to what eventually ended up on screen with the story being more angled from Veronica Latimer’s point of view, who was originally named Ms Richter. Additionally, the Nerva Beacon wasn’t in the story at all, with all the prison stuff taking place on Earth, and the Gaians weren’t the Gaians, they were simply the Earth Command Force.
- Robert Shearman had also intended to write the final serial of Suchet’s era, so took Moore’s story outline and wrote the first episode’s script, however, during this time, he was also working on not just the season opener, Checkmate, alongside Joseph Lidster, but also on the screenplay for the fourth Doctor Who feature film.
- He asked Ronald D. Moore to take over the scripting process for Evil of the Gaians, which, after persuasion, he did, especially since he was keen to now write the idea he had come up with.
- Moore finished Part I, working from Shearman’s initial uncompleted draft, and then wrote a draft of the entirety of Part II. It was during this time, that several of the changes to the story happened.
- After this, which was now early 2011, as time had begun to really roll on due to Moore writing it, in his free time, as he additionally was showrunning Panopticon, and filming was due to begin in June for the finale, Shearman came back to the script, as the script editor.
- He made several changes, as he had done with all the episodes in the season but decided there were more extensive changes he felt needed doing. With Moore really quite busy now, wrapped up in Panopticon, Shearman decided to redraft the episodes, once more, making a lot of changes to the third act of the second part, especially in regard to Gemma’s exit.
- Shearman managed to deliver, what he saw as final drafts, in May, but after Ira Steven Behr forwarded them up to ‘the powers that be’, they were sent back with numerous notes asking for the story to be more ‘action heavy’ and ‘grander in scale’. Considering this was a whole three hours long, and the final TV story for David Suchet.
- Shearman redrafted, adding in several action scenes, and heightening the stakes, and eventually, just a few days before filming began, he delivered the final version of the script right up to the wire, which indeed caused grave problems for producer, Gary Russell, but over a period of two months, at the end of the gruelling Season 48 filming schedule, which led straight into even more filming on Doctor Who: Endgame, the two episodes of Evil of the Gaians were completed, before in October, they reached broadcast and went down in history as one of the best Doctor Who stories ever.
- On the subject of the story being the first 'two-parter' since the format change in Season 41, Shearman explained, "We wanted David's era to end with a bang, and not just like any other season. Lets not forget that it wasn't just David's end on TV but also Gary's, mine, Doug's, Juliet's and Emer's too, and it was also the end of Chapter Three, so it had to be epic. We'd already experimented with doing multi-part stories in this format, with the First Game/Hark!/Checkmate three-parter but that wasn't a three-parter in the true sense - it was a two-parter with a side-adventure stuck in the middle for Christmas. Evil of the Gaians had to have scale, and it had to feel like a movie, which was really difficult as we were also doing a movie at the same time and it had to be distinctly different to that; it had to match it's scale but not overshadow it."
Pre-Production
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Production
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Post-Production
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Reaction
- The ratings were very strong throughout all of Season 48, with it being heavily promoted as the 'Final Chapter' of Doctor Who by both BBC One and CBS. "Evil of the Gaians" was the highest rated of the season.
- Part I received a 7-Day Viewing Figure from BARB of 10.80m viewers. It ranked at 1st over the week.
- Part II received a 7-Day Viewing Figure from BARB of 11.50m viewers. It ranked at 1st over the week.
- In 2014, Doctor Who: Magazine ran a poll consisting of every broadcast Doctor Who story at the time, and "Evil of the Gaians" was voted 13th out of 323 stories.
- Of the story, Ira Steven Behr stated: "I was really happy with how that show turned out. I saw the finished think for the first time in a screening with myself, Rob, Gary, Faith and the rest of the co-executive producers, and we all applauded when it finished and had huge smiles on our faces. We crammed everything we could into those 180 minutes of television and it sure paid off, as Evil might be one of my favourites that we've ever done!"
Story Notes
To be added.
Continuity
- Veronica Latimer states that she knows Gemma is from the future. However, Gemma is actually from the (relative) past, living in the 31st Century where as Evil of the Gaians takes place in the 33rd. (TV: Broken Shackles)
- The Doctor, Zenla, Chris and Gemma, land on the Nerva Beacon, not long after it's construction, (TV: The Ark in Space, Revenge of the Cybermen)
Home Video Releases
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