Doctor Who: The Dæmons

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The Dæmons is the fifth and final serial of Doctor Who Season 8, first broadcast in five weekly parts on BBC1 from 22 May to 19 June 1971. It was written by Guy Leopold (Barry Letts and Robert Sloman) and directed by Christopher Barry. It stars Jon Pertwee as the Third Doctor, Katy Manning as Jo Grant, Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, and Roger Delgado as the Master.

In the village of Devil’s End, an archaeological dig at an ancient barrow triggers strange storms, living gargoyles, and panic, while the Master uses occult trappings to control an alien power. The Doctor and Jo join UNIT to separate superstition from science, protect the villagers, and stop the Master from seizing the Dæmon Azal’s strength.

Episode 1

In the village of Devil’s End, TV cameras gather at an ancient barrow where Professor Horner plans to open the tomb at midnight. In UNIT HQ, the Doctor sees occult symbols on the broadcast and goes rigid with alarm; he and Jo race to the site in Bessie. The village vicar, the Master in disguise as “Reverend Magister,” conducts secret rites beneath the church, coaxing a colossal power to wake.

Horner breaks the seal; a shock of freezing wind blasts from the barrow and the Doctor is struck down, seemingly dead, before reviving with sudden warmth. All power flickers. In the morning, a glassy, invisible wall now rings the village: a heat barrier that scorches anyone trying to cross. The Brigadier and UNIT are stranded outside; the Doctor and Jo are trapped within. Strange hoof-prints scar the soil; a stone gargoyle on the church seems to have moved.

The locals whisper about the Devil. The Doctor insists there is science under the superstition: something vast that can shrink or enlarge matter and swap heat like currency. In the crypt, the Master’s coven chants as instruments swell and the church trembles. Deep under the barrow, an ancient craft stirs, and a horned shadow looms in firelight.

Episode 2

The heat barrier holds, burning engines and melting treads as the Brigadier tests it to no avail. Inside Devil’s End, the Doctor follows disturbed earth from the barrow to a buried chamber where he glimpses metallic skin and crystalline conduits: an alien ship grown small, now swelling as energy flows. He names the force behind it: the Dæmons of Dæmos, beings that have nudged human history by masquerading as gods.

The Master, using village loyalties and hypnosis, summons a manifestation that ripples reality. The church gargoyle, Bok, stirs to life, capers on clawed feet, and hurls energy bolts at anyone who defies Magister. Jo helps the white witch Miss Hawthorne rally a handful of villagers who refuse the coven’s fear. When the Master calls again, thunder claws at the sky and a giant figure appears outside the barrow, Azal, only to vanish with a promise to return twice more and then judge.

The Doctor explains the pattern: three probings, then a final decision to bestow power or erase a failed experiment. He warns Jo that the Master wants that power. Outside the barrier, the Brigadier drafts a plan to punch a hole with a hastily-built projector, while Sergeant Benton runs supplies along risky back lanes.

Episode 3

Bok prowls the lanes, knocking out phones and scaring men rigid as the Master cements his rule with rituals and smooth threats. The Doctor maps the barrier’s harmonics and builds a cobbled resonator to thin it from within, timing his effort with the Brigadier’s projector outside. Miss Hawthorne saves Sergeant Benton from the coven with a theatrical “exorcism” that buys seconds.

The Doctor scatters villagers with a flash-bang mix and hauls Benton clear. In the cavern, the Master tries a second summoning. Azal’s appearance shakes the church to its bones; heat surges and the barrier flares. The Doctor forces a parley and argues that humanity must not be handed like a toy to one ambitious priest. Azal withdraws again, more curious than convinced. Outside, Captain Yates runs a diversion in a helicopter while Osgood, a fretful technician, tunes the projector.

The Brigadier finally claws open a smouldering gap and UNIT vehicles nose through, paint blistering. Bok bounds to meet them; the Brigadier fixes him in his sights and snaps the order that will become a legend: five rounds, rapid. The bolts barely slow the gargoyle. The Master, smiling thinly, announces a village fête for Beltane: cover for a final rite that will crown him lord.

Episode 4

Under bunting and Maypole ribbons, the coven readies a sacrifice in the crypt; Jo slips into the church and is grabbed as leverage. The Doctor and the Brigadier clear the square with a bluff about explosives, then split: soldiers to hold Bok at bay with grenades and cold fire extinguishers, the Doctor to try reason one last time.

Azal’s third manifestation floods the nave with furnace heat. He towers, horned and implacable, scanning the minds before him. The Master kneels and petitions for power to rule the Earth “for its own good.” The Doctor answers with fierce humility: mankind is flawed and brilliant, progress born from struggle, not dominion. Azal weighs the arguments and declares that the planet is an experiment gone wrong; he will cleanse it: unless one champion proves otherwise.

The Master demands the gift; Bok drives UNIT back; Osgood’s projector fails in sparks. The Doctor is hurled against a pillar, winded and singed. Jo shouts over the roar that there is one thing the Dæmons cannot quantify: selfless choice. She declares her life for the Doctor’s, freely given. For a heartbeat, the furnace falters. Azal, made of ruthless logic, reels at the contradiction and hesitates on the edge of annihilating mercy.

Episode 5

Azal grants power, then overloads. Jo’s self-sacrifice scrambles his decision tree; energy whips around the chancel like a living storm. The Master howls for control and is ignored. The Doctor drags Jo clear as Azal convulses, surges, and collapses into searing light that races down into the barrow. The alien ship implodes, drawing heat with it; the barrier snaps off; spring air rushes through shattered windows.

Deprived of its animating field, Bok stiffens mid-leap and crumbles to chalk. UNIT pour into the church; villagers blink free of hypnosis and coven theatrics. The Master bolts for Bessie, finds her immobiliser circuit engaged, and is tackled by Benton and Hawthorne amid scattered hymnals. Outside, the Brigadier surveys scorched turf and a village green already knitting itself back to ordinary. The Doctor explains softly: the Dæmons were scientists with godlike tools, not devils; their experiment ended because a human chose compassion without calculation.

The Master, cuffed and still venomous, vows revenge as he is bundled away. Jo laughs shakily and claims a dance at the fête reclaimed for joy. The Doctor, muddy and singed, smiles at ordinary life resuming (bells, scones, a repaired Maypole) and at the improbable arithmetic that saved a world: courage plus kindness, carried to the sum.

Themes

As a finale to Season 8, The Dæmons is the UNIT era at its most confident: folk-horror atmosphere wrapped around brisk action and sharp character beats. It unites the pop menace of Terror of the Autons with the adult bite of The Mind of Evil, and delivers a climax as satisfying as anything since Inferno while standing shoulder to shoulder with later high points like The Green Death.

If The Claws of Axos is the season’s wild card and Colony in Space its moral spine, The Dæmons is the crown: stylish, witty, and unusually cohesive.

It also ties the era’s threads into the future. By concluding the Season 8 Master arc (running from Terror of the Autons through The Mind of Evil, The Claws of Axos, and Colony in Space) with his capture, it points directly to his imprisonment in The Sea Devils and the rematch in The Time Monster. Jo Grant’s courage here foreshadows the convictions that carry her to her farewell in The Green Death, while the Doctor’s ongoing exile keeps the path open to The Three Doctors.

The show’s blend of superstition and science echoes back to The Ambassadors of Death and forward to occult-tinged classics like Image of the Fendahl and The Stones of Blood, proving that Devil’s End is more than a detour: it’s a blueprint.

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This is a chapter from Craig Hill’s book “Doctor Who – The Third Doctor”, chronicling every episode featuring the Third Doctor. It is available on Amazon.

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