The Android Invasion

“Invasion of the Androids”, “The Androids Invade”, “Doctor Who and the Invasion by Androids”

“The One with the Freshly Minted Coins”, “Docteur Qui et les Doppelgangers”

Doctor Who and Sarah Jane stop robot duplicates of Doctor Who and Sarah Jane from helping some aliens from invading Earth by means of a cunning plan involving a country village and a cheaper military officer.

*** - It is less surprising than you might think to find that Elisabeth Sladen’s face isn’t real.

Doctor: "You know, look, I've got a suggestion, my arms are beginning to ache. Why not call Lethbridge-Stewart and get him to identify me?"

Crayford: "Lethbridge-Stewart is feeling typcast. Colonel Faraday is in command."

"The pants will disseminate a virus. It will cause a contagion so lethal, the Earth will be rid of its human population within three weeks."

One of the show’s most famous pranks occurred when Milton Johns turned round on set and discovered that everyone else had donned eye patches. Johns, a method actor since birth, quipped “How can you be so cruel to mock my disability?” and cried until he was reminded that, like his character, he actually had two fully competent eyes.

The freshly minted coins used during the serial were specially made by the BBC props unit and resulted in the head - Charles Styggron - being convicted of running a counterfeit money racket. A character was hastily renamed in his honour as is traditional when someone makes the supreme sacrifice for the BBC.

Terry Nation got the idea for using identical copies as the basis for a story from his past Dalek scripts.

Amongst the celebrity extras appearing as villagers in this story were Nicholas Parsons, Clement Freud, Derek Nimmo and Maureen Lipman, all of whom were in town to record the thirtieth anniversary Just a Minute special.

Kenneth Williams, who missed the JAM special due to a rash he picked up in Morocco, famously remarked “Doctor Who gets sillier every week” in response to an episode of the Android Invasion. Enraged, Tom Baker’s own diary bitterly proclaims “Carry On Behind was the cinematic equivalent of making love to your own stomach.”

...is that an empty pub is always a portent of danger.

Si Hunt

"I once read a review of Story 4J which stated that the atmosphere of the deserted village reminded him of the television series "The Avengers". I mulled this suggestion over a small glass of Rectalade (a new beverage patented by Doctor Flapjack which claims to be both fruit flavoured and beneficial to my a-n-u-s). I then wrote the reviewer a letter to politely disagree with his suggestion.

"Dear Sir," I began.

"Don't be pathetically stupid. The differences between Story 4J and "The Avengers" television series are too innumerable to list in a brief letter such as this but I would draw your attention to ten huge points of differentiation. Namely, that it stars Tom Baker and not Patrick Macnee, it co-stars Elisabeth Sladen and not Diana Rigg, it is a mix of video and film recordings and not entirely shot on film, it is an episodic serial and not a single hour long story, it appeared on the British Broadcasting Corporation and not Independent Television, it was broadcast in the 1970s and not the 1960s, it was part of a six story season which the Avengers never was, it involved aliens which the Avengers never did, it included time travel which the Avengers never could but the most significant different between "Doctor Who" and "The Avengers" is that their principle telehistorian chooses to call himself "Dave". David is a perfectly respectable telehistorical name and yet Mr Rogers chooses to shorten it in a most vulgar manner. Would people take me seriously if I published under the name Den Brent? I think not."

Well-to-do fan magazine "Build High for Happiness" offered three copies of "The Android Invasion" to readers who supplied the best answer to 'I want a copy of The Android Invasion because...' The third place entry was 'I want a copy of The Android Invasion because... I would like to own every Doctor Who story on video', second place went to 'I want a copy of The Android Invasion because... I want to own every Doctor Who story on video' and the winning entry was 'I want a copy of The Android Invasion because... I need to own every Doctor Who story on video'.