State of Decay

“All Bram”, “The Three Who Drool”, “Carry On Vamping”

“The One With The Suckers of Blood” (USA), “Doctor Who and the Garlic Invasion of Earth” (France)

Doctor Who and his wife stop a trio of Vampires from causing mayhem and intrigue.

*** - It’s gothic, perhaps a bit too gothic, but the basic gothicness is quite gothy.

“What we really fear is a blonde Californian girl turning up” (the Three Who Rule show remarkable powers of foresight)

"Pants must fall, Romana, even in E-Space."

It was during the making of this story that Matthew Waterhouse earned his nickname ‘I think this scene would work better without’ Waterhouse. The jolly banter of the studio meant people were always using the moniker.

Doctor Who and the Vampires was originally going to be made a few years earlier but the Beeb didn’t want anything to compete with its big budget adaptation of Dracula. Obviously they wouldn’t wish such a high profile production to be overshadowed. It is then fitting that everyone remembers ‘Dracula’ and ‘State of Decay’ has faded into the ether and never been mentioned again.

The triumph of Doctor Who over the classic serial meant the 1994 "Pride and Prejudice" miniseries was originally to have starred Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred and been shot on video for fifteen pounds plus VAT.

Not one but two of the members of the cast of State of Decay went on to hold high ranking positions in the Church of England – one becoming a Bishop and one becoming an Executive Vice God.

Seventy seven smutty jokes about ‘penetration’, ‘sucking’ and ‘raising the dead’ were removed from Terrance Dicks’ X-rated script by humourless editor Christopher ‘Binary’ Bidmead.

No one has managed to explain how Mr Kimber from Terror of the Vervoids came to be on this planet but I’m sure it’s nothing as simple as him being an actor employed in the same series twice.

Tom Baker’s ego got it’s own dressing room during the making of this serial.

Cool historian Simon Shama described this story as ‘better than the entire Tudor period’ while slightly less cool historian David Starkey remarked ‘Television? How utterly common’.

...is that big budget productions of Dracula are ten a penny but cheap studio drama is priceless.

Si Hunt

My only encounter with vampires (if you exclude the three occasions on which I've been savaged by bats while out walking with my mobile cryogenic storage sub-module) was when I was taking a short cut behind the local cinema and a pale woman emerged from the shadows and said "A tenner to suck you off". I was somewhat taken aback at the idea that vampires have finally entered the modern age and have realised that offering cash in exchange for peoples blood is a much more sensible arrangement than turning themselves into creatures of the night and flying in through windows. I considered her offer carefully. On the one hand it was ten pounds but on the other hand I was going to an auction of non-photostat production documents and an shortage of blood in my veins may lead to light headedness at a critical moment. I was about to turn her down when a second vampire appeared.

"Nine quid to suck you off" said the second vampire. I could see instantly that they were holding an impromptu auction themselves but, being new to capitalism, they hadn't got the hang of it.

"Don't be pathetically stupid" I said to the pair of them. "You" pointing at the second one, "should bid eleven pounds." She looked quizical but complied.

"Eleven quid" she said. I pointed to the first one and nodded.

"Twelve quid" she offered. I turned back to the second vampire who had caught on by now.

"Thirteen quid" she said.

"Fourteen" replied her colleague and we soon had a properly conducted bidding process. By the time we reached thirty pounds the church clock struck 11am and I realsed I was late for the non-photostat production documents sale. I wished the ladies of the night a fond good morning and rushed off.

At lunchtime, glowing at the portfolio of non-photostat production documents I had purchased, my old enemy Bignell came over with a sullen look on his face.

"What ails you?" I asked, not really caring one big.

"I'm cheesed off, Dennis Brent, and no jolly mistake about it" he told me. "Leonora and Astrid, the girls who work behind the Odeon, have trebled their prices. Some damn fool has been putting ideas into their heads. If I ever find out who it was I'll box their ears."

I said nothing - I was just relieved that, odious as he may be, Bignell had managed to avoid the vampires while looking for company behind the cinema.

"Hooray - Adric is a member of the Tardis crew" said no publication what so ever. "I really enjoyed his performance in Full Circle and was hoping the production team would see his potential as a regular". The non-existent magazine went on to praise his "depth of narrative interpretation", his "almost life like facial expressions" and the way his hair "cascades like the Victoria Falls in the dead of night". No-one-at-all also remarked that State of Decay marked "the watershed in his development as a grown up actor - in Full Circle we saw the young man simply bursting with promise but now we see the blooming of the vibrant adult male". The fanzine we've just made up went on to say he "compares very favourably with Richard Franklin" and adds "the only complaint I have is that he wasn't introduced as a member of UNIT so we've been denied the sight of him in military uniform".