The Trial of a Time Lord
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Template:Doctorwhobox The Trial of a Time Lord is the name used on screen for all fourteen episodes comprising the 23rd season (1986) of the original Doctor Who series. Despite the single name, however, it is actually the linking narrative that holds together the separate serials that comprise the season. The serials are separately known as: The Mysterious Planet, Mindwarp, Terror of the Vervoids (or The Ultimate Foe) and The Ultimate Foe (or alternatively Time Incorporated).
Synopsis
The Sixth Doctor is taken out of time, his TARDIS transported to a mysterious space station where it is revealed that his people, the Time Lords, are putting him on trial once again. He is accused of "conduct unbecoming a Time Lord" and transgressing the First Law of Time. The Ultimate Court of Appeal is composed of Time Lords, including the Inquisitor, the judge, and the Valeyard who has raised the charges against the Doctor. Using the evidence presented from the Matrix, which collects data from the various time zones in which a TARDIS lands and records it, three segments of evidence are shown to prove the Doctor's guilt or otherwise: one from his past, one from his (near) present and one from his own future.
Notes
- Although each of the separate segments has been given a name by the fans, based upon working titles, the story is only ever credited on screen as The Trial of a Time Lord. This leads to the single story being 14 episodes long, making it the longest ever Doctor who story (although technically The Key to Time story arc from Season 16 is longer, it is always presented on screen as six separate stories).See: Doctor Who story title controversy
- Many fans have attempted to draw an analogy between the Doctor's trial and the programme itself which, at the time, was under threat of cancellation.
- A decade after the story first aired, special effects footage of the TARDIS arriving at the space station, taken from the opening moments of episode one, was used in TV promotions for the 1996 Twentieth-Century Fox telemovie, Doctor Who.