The Claws of Axos
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{{Doctorwhobox
|number=057
|image=<!-- Deleted image removed: [[Image:AxonsIntroduceThemselves.jpg|250px]] -->
|caption=The "Axons" introduce themselves and the miracle substance Axonite
|serial_name=The Claws of Axos
|show=DW
|type=serial
|show=DW
|type=serial
|doctor=[[Jon Pertwee]] ([[Third Doctor]])
|companion=[[Katy Manning]] ([[Jo Grant]])
|guests=*[[Nicholas Courtney]] — [[Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart]]
*[[Richard Franklin]] — [[Captain Mike Yates]]
*[[John Levene]] — [[Sergeant Benton]]
*[[Roger Delgado]] — [[Master (Doctor Who)|The Master]]
*[[Fernanda Marlowe]] — [[List of Doctor Who UNIT Personnel#Corporal Bell|Corporal Bell]]
*[[Peter Bathurst]] — [[List of Doctor Who UNIT Personnel#Horatio Chinn|Chinn]]
*[[Paul Grist (actor)|Paul Grist]] — [[List of Doctor Who UNIT Personnel#Bill Filer|Bill Filer]]
*[[Donald Hewlett]] — George Hardiman
*[[David Savile]] — Winser
*[[Tim Pigott-Smith]] — Captain Harker
*[[Kenneth Benda]] — The Minister
*[[Derek Ware]] — Pigbin Josh
*[[Michael Walker (actor)|Michael Walker]], [[David G. March]] — Radar Operators
*[[Royston Farrell]] — Technician
*[[Bernard Holley]], [[Patricia Gordino]], [[John Hicks (actor)|John Hicks]], [[Debbie Lee London]] — Axons
|writer=[[Bob Baker]]<br>[[Dave Martin (screenwriter)|Dave Martin]]
|director=[[Michael Ferguson (director)|Michael Ferguson]]
|script_editor=[[Terrance Dicks]]
|producer=[[Barry Letts]]
|executive_producer=None
|production_code=GGG
|series=[[List of Doctor Who serials#Season 8 (1971)|Season 8]]
|length=4 episodes, 25 minutes each
|date=[[March 13]]–[[April 3]], [[1971]]
|preceding=''[[The Mind of Evil]]''
|following=''[[Colony in Space]]''
|}}
'''''The Claws of Axos''''' is a [[list of Doctor Who serials|serial]] in the [[United Kingdom|British]] [[science fiction television]] series ''[[Doctor Who]]'', which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from [[March 13]] to [[April 3]], [[1971]].
==Plot==
The Axons land on Earth, desperately in need of fuel. They propose to exchange the miracle substance they call Axonite for some much needed energy. Axonite is a "thinking" molecule that can replicate any substance... or so they claim. As it turns out, the ship is a single organism called [[List of Doctor Who villains#Axos|Axos]] whose purpose is to feed itself by draining all energy through the Axonite (which is just a part of itself), including the energy of every life form on Earth. The deception about the Axonite's beneficial properties was to facilitate the distribution of Axonite across the globe.
Meanwhile, the Master, who was captured by Axos and used his knowledge of Earth as a bargaining chip for his life and freedom, escapes Axos and makes his way to the Doctor's [[TARDIS]] — his own having been seized by Axos. He plans to repair it to escape from Earth.
Axos itself becomes interested in the Doctor's knowledge of [[time travel]]. It now plans to broaden its feeding base by travelling through time as well as space. The Doctor, realising this, plans to trick Axos into linking up its drive unit to his TARDIS so that he can send Axos into a perpetual [[time loop]]. After tricking the Master into completing the repairs on his TARDIS, the Doctor does just that. This results in every part of Axos dematerialising from Earth, including the Axon automatons and the Axonite.
At the end, with the Master having escaped in his own TARDIS during the confusion aboard Axos, the Doctor returns to Earth, but not of his own volition. Apparently, the [[Time Lord]]s have programmed the TARDIS to always return to Earth, like some "galactic yo-yo".
==Cast==
*[[Doctor (Doctor Who)|Doctor Who]] — [[Jon Pertwee]]
*[[Jo Grant]] — [[Katy Manning]]
*[[Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart]] — [[Nicholas Courtney]]
*[[Captain Mike Yates]] — [[Richard Franklin]]
*[[Sergeant Benton]] — [[John Levene]]
*[[Master (Doctor Who)|The Master]] — [[Roger Delgado]]
*[[List of Doctor Who UNIT Personnel#Corporal Bell|Corporal Bell]] — [[Fernanda Marlowe]]
*[[List of Doctor Who UNIT Personnel#Horatio Chinn|Chinn]] — [[Peter Bathurst]]
*[[List of Doctor Who UNIT Personnel#Bill Filer|Bill Filer]] — [[Paul Grist (actor)|Paul Grist]]
*George Hardiman — [[Donald Hewlett]]
*Winser — [[David Savile]]
*Captain Harker — [[Tim Pigott-Smith]]
*The Minister — [[Kenneth Benda]]
*Pigbin Josh — [[Derek Ware]]
*Radar Operators — [[Michael Walker (actor)|Michael Walker]], [[David G. March]]
*Technician — [[Royston Farrell]]
*Elderly Jo Grant — [[Mildred Brown (actress)|Mildred Brown]]
*Axons — [[Bernard Holley]], [[Patricia Gordino]], [[John Hicks (actor)|John Hicks]], [[Debbie Lee London]]
===Cast notes===
*This serial marks the first television appearance of Tim Pigott-Smith. He would later play Marco in ''[[The Masque of Mandragora]]'' ([[1976]]).
==Continuity==
*The serial features a famous shot of Jo Grant's [[undergarments|purple knickers]]. [http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/classic/episodeguide/clawsofaxos/detail.shtml]
*Bernard Holley had been last seen in Doctor Who in the [[Patrick Troughton]] episode, ''[[Tomb of the Cybermen]]'' ([[1967]]).
*Both the Doctor and the Master refer to the events of this serial in "[[Last of the Time Lords]]".
==Production==
{{DoctorWhoEpisodeHead
|Archive=Y
|
{{DoctorWhoEpisodeBody|Episode 1|13 Mar 1971|23'51|7.3|PAL 2" color videotape<br>16mm B&W t/r|Archive=y}}<!--57-->
{{DoctorWhoEpisodeBody|Episode 2|20 Mar 1971|24'00"|8.0|PAL 2" color videotape<br>16mm B&W t/r|Archive=y}}<!--57-->
{{DoctorWhoEpisodeBody|Episode 3|27 Mar 1971|24'05"|6.4|PAL 2" color videotape<br>16mm B&W t/r|Archive=y}}<!--57-->
{{DoctorWhoEpisodeBody|Episode 4|3 Apr 1971|25'16"|7.8|PAL 2" color videotape<br>16mm B&W t/r|Archive=y}}<!--57-->
}}
*Working titles for this story included ''Doctor Who and the Gift'', ''The Friendly Invasion'', ''The Axons'', and ''The Vampire from Space''. The last title was used through the production of the first two episodes, and was only changed by the time filming began on the third. The DVD release contains unused footage and cuts from the story that are packaged with the original title sequence – naming the story as ''The Vampire from Space''. The serial was envisaged to be a six-parter, but the concept of the storyline changed as development progressed<ref>[[Andrew Pixley|Pixley, Andrew]], "In Production, Season 7: Instant Karma," pp. 13-14, "In Production, Season 8: Something Old, Something New," pp. 23-24, & "''The Claws of Axos'' Archive Update," p. 29, ''[[Doctor Who Magazine#Special Editions|Doctor Who Magazine Special Edition]]'', #2 [''The Complete Third Doctor''], 5 September 2002, [[Panini Comics]].</ref>.
*During the location shooting of the scenes with the tramp, an overnight snow storm necessitated the creation of a line of dialogue in the programme to explain that the variations of weather from shot to shot in these scenes (filmed on various days but supposedly taking place within minutes of each other) are "freak weather conditions" as a result of Axos' arrival.<ref>[[Nicholas Briggs|Briggs, Nick]], "The Nick of Time," ''[[Doctor Who Magazine]]'', #227, 5 July 1995, [[Marvel UK|Marvel Comics UK Ltd.]], p. 40 (interview with [[Nicholas Courtney]])</ref>
*A common [[urban legend|myth]] about this story is that the [[colour-separation overlay]] (CSO) backgrounds were accidentally omitted in some of the car interior scenes, leaving the blue screen behind the characters. In reality, the blue is supposed to represent the sky. The differing shades of blue compared to the location exterior footage is the result of the shots' separate origins.
*For reasons unexplained, the opening titles for this serial use the [[Second Doctor]]'s version of the [[Doctor Who theme music]] as opposed to the [[Third Doctor]]'s, as do ''[[The Mind of Evil]]'' and ''[[Terror of the Autons]]''. After this serial however, the theme reverts to the Jon Pertwee standard.
==Outside references==
*''[[List of Nebulous episodes#First series|The Lovely Invasion]]'', an episode of the [[BBC Radio 4]] series ''[[Nebulous]]'', parodies this story: the world falls in love with the Lovely, a naked alien trio offering to "Lovelify" the Earth until they are [[nuclear bomb|nuked]] by Professor Nebulous.
*In [[David Tennant]]'s video diaries included on the 2006 series boxset, during the filming of "[[Rise of the Cybermen]]", [[Nicholas Briggs]] says to the viewer that a "Claws of Axos" style rewrite almost had to be done on the episode due to the unexpected snowstorm that was happening.
==In print==
{{Doctorwhobook|
|title=Doctor Who and the Claws of Axos
|series=[[List of Doctor Who novelisations|Target novelisations]]
|number=10
|featuring=
|cover=Doctor Who and the Claws of Axos.jpg
|writer=[[Terrance Dicks]]
|publisher=[[Target Books]]
|coverartist=[[Chris Achilleos]]
|isbn=0 426 11703 4
|set_between=
|pages=
|date=21 April 1977
|preceding=[[The Dalek Invasion of Earth#In print|Doctor Who and the Dalek Invasion of Earth]]
|following=[[The Ark in Space#In print|Doctor Who and the Ark in Space]]
|}}
A novelisation of this serial, written by [[Terrance Dicks]], was published by [[Target Books]] in April 1977.
==Broadcast, VHS, and DVD releases==
*Episodes two and three's [[PAL]]1 master copies in the UK were destroyed, but in 1985, the episodes turned up in Canada, in [[NTSC]] form.
*The story was released on [[VHS]] in May 1992. The quality was poor, as the episodes two and three had not been formatted back from [[NTSC]] into [[PAL]].
*This story was released on [[DVD]] in the United Kingdom on [[April 25]], [[2005]] and was released in North America on [[November 8]], [[2005]]. The picture quality of the central two episodes had been markedly enhanced through the use of the '[[Reverse Standards Conversion]]' procedure (see also [[Inferno (Doctor Who)|''Inferno'']]).
==References==
{{Reflist}}
==External links==
*{{BBCCDW|id=clawsofaxos|title=The Claws of Axos}}
*{{Brief |id=ggg | title=The Claws of Axos}}
*{{Doctor Who RG | id=who_3g | title=The Claws of Axos}}
*[http://www.purpleville.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/rtwebsite/claws_of_axos.htm The Restoration of ''The Claws of Axos'']
===Reviews===
*{{OG review | id=3g | title=The Claws of Axos}}
*{{DWRG | id=claw | title=The Claws of Axos}}
===Target novelisation===
*{{DWRG | id=clawnov | title=Doctor Who and the Claws of Axos}}
*[http://www.personal.leeds.ac.uk/~ecl6nb/OnTarget/1977/claws/77claws.htm On Target — ''Doctor Who and the Claws of Axos'']
{{Doctor Who (season 8)}}
{{Master Stories}}
{{UNIT Stories}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Claws of Axos, The}}
[[Category:Third Doctor serials]]
[[Category:Doctor Who serials novelised by Terrance Dicks]]
[[Category:The Master television stories]]
[[Category:1971 television episodes]]
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