Doctor Who: Snakedance

Snakedance is the second serial of the 20th season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four twice-weekly parts on BBC1 from 18 to 26 January 1983.

The arrival of the TARDIS on Manussa triggers nightmares in Tegan, who dreams of a snake-shaped cave mouth. When she and The Fifth Doctor find the cave from her dream, Tegan runs away. Alone and confused, Tegan lapses under the control of the Mara once more.

Manussa is in the grip of a festival of celebration of the banishment of the Mara from the civilisation five hundred years earlier. In the absence of the Federator, who rules over the three-planet Federation, his indolent son Lon is to have a major role in the celebration, supported by his mother the Lady Tanha and the archaeologist Ambril.

Lon believes the Mara might one day return as prophesied, but Ambril is unconvinced. The young deputy curator Chela is more sympathetic and gives the Doctor a small blue crystal called a Little Mind’s Eye, which is used by the Snakedancers, a mystical cult, in their ceremonies to repel the Mara. The Doctor realises the small crystal and its large counterpart, the Great Mind’s Eye, can be used as focal points for mental energy and can turn thought into matter. This, he determines, is how the Mara will transfer from Tegan’s mind to corporeal existence.

Tegan and Lon visit the cave from Tegan’s dream, where Lon notices a wall pattern which could accommodate the Great Mind’s Eye. Lon is sent back to the Palace while she causes more havoc and takes control of a showman, Dugdale. Lon tries to persuade Ambril to use the Great Mind’s Eye in the ceremony, placing it in a position that will enable the Mara to return.

The Doctor uses the Little Mind’s Eye to contact Ambril’s predecessor Dojjen, who lives in sandy dunes beyond the city. They venture there and the Doctor communes with Dojjen by opening his mind after being bitten by a poisonous snake. He is told by the wise old snakedancer that the Mara may only be defeated by finding a still point in the mind.

All three head back to the city to prevent the ceremony of defeating the Mara using the real Great Mind’s Eye. The festivities are now at a peak, with a procession taking place which culminates in a ceremony at the cave. Lon plays the role of his ancestor Federator in rejecting the Mara. After a series of verbal challenges he seizes the real Great Mind’s Eye and places it in the appropriate place on the wall.

Tegan and Dugdale arrive and she displays the Mara mark on her arm, which is now becoming flesh having fed on the fear in Dugdale’s mind. With the crystal in place, the Mara is able to create itself in the cave, becoming a vast and deadly snake. However, the Doctor arrives in time and refuses to look at the snake or recognise its evil, relying instead on the still place he finds through mental commune with Dojjen via the Little Mind’s Eye.

This resistance interrupts the manifestation of the Mara and its three slaves are freed while the snake itself dies and rots. The Doctor comforts a distraught Tegan, sure that the Mara has at last been destroyed.

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