Doctor Who: Season 21

1984 · 24 episodes · ★ 6.7

What Season 21 of Doctor Who

Season 21 of Doctor Who opens with the Sixth Doctor, played by Colin Baker, who travels with Peri, a new companion. The Doctor encounters reptiles and humans at odds in an undersea base in 2084, an English village in 1984 where a re-enactment of the civil war hides an evil presence, and the colony of Frontios, battered by bombings of unknown origin. Later, the Daleks of Davros, the Master on Sarn, and a war over spectrox on Androzani Minor arrive. In almost every story, the protagonist must negotiate with rival factions and decide whom to save.

24episodes

Jan 5, 1984premiered

Mar 30, 1984Latest episode

10.8 hrtotal runtime

Season 21 Episodes

21x01 Warriors of the Deep (1)
Jan 5, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 5.1
Earth's ocean floor, 2084. With two superpowers poised on the brink of a devastating photonic war, a missile base comes under attack from the reptilian Sea Devils and Silurians, intent on eradicating the upstart human race and reclaiming the planet…
Directing: Pennant Roberts · Writer: Johnny Byrne · Cast: Nitza Shaul, Nigel Humphreys, Ian McCulloch, Ingrid Pitt
21x02 Warriors of the Deep (2)
Jan 6, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 5.3
Just as the Doctor gains a tentative trust from the humans, a Silurian battle cruiser approaches. The Doctor warns Commander Vorsha to hold his fire and find out what they want, but is the level-headed commander one who'll listen?
Directing: Pennant Roberts · Writer: Johnny Byrne · Cast: Nitza Shaul, Nigel Humphreys, Ian McCulloch, Ingrid Pitt
21x03 Warriors of the Deep (3)
Jan 12, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 5.5
As Vorshak's crew are cut down by Sauvix's Sea Devil Warriors, the Doctor is running out of ways to broker a peace between the opposing species.
Directing: Pennant Roberts · Writing: Johnny Byrne · Starring: Ingrid Pitt, Tom Adams, Stuart Blake
21x04 Warriors of the Deep (4)
Jan 13, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 5.3
With Silurians in control of the base, Icthar reveals his plan for a final solution to Earth's human problem, which presents the Doctor a great moral dilemma.
Directing: Pennant Roberts · Writer: Johnny Byrne · Cast: Tom Adams, Stuart Blake
21x05 The Awakening (1)
Jan 19, 1984 · 26 min · ★ 6.6
The sleepy English village of Little Hodcombe, 1984. The village re-enactment of the English Civil War is in full swing, but a malign alien presence intends the mock-battles to be rather more realistic than planned...
Directing: Michael Owen Morris · Writer: Eric Pringle · Cast: Polly James, Glyn Houston, Denis Lill, Jack Galloway
21x06 The Awakening (2)
Jan 20, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 5.8
The Malus, an alien that's purely evil, needs the civil war re-enactments to become authentic so it can feed off the psychic energy of dying and embattled men and fully revive. Not if the Doctor can derail things, of course.
Directing: Michael Owen Morris · Writing: Eric Pringle · Starring: Polly James, Glyn Houston, Denis Lill, Keith Jayne
21x07 Frontios (1)
Jan 26, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 6.8
The planet Frontios, in the distant future. Following Earth's destruction, a tiny colony struggles to eke out a life on this desolate world. But where do the bombardments that threaten them originate from? Little does the Doctor suspect that somewhere nearby lurks a power capable of ripping even the TARDIS apart…
Directing: Ron Jones · Writing: Christopher H. Bidmead · Starring: William Lucas
21x08 Frontios (2)
Jan 27, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 7.1
Following the destruction of the TARDIS, the only part of it left is the hat stand. So Turlough uses it as a weapon! Plantagenet gets swallowed by the earth, and Norna and Turlough discover the Tractators.
Directing: Ron Jones · Writing: Christopher H. Bidmead · Starring: William Lucas
21x09 Frontios (3)
Feb 2, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 7.1
Trying to rescue the Doctor from the Tractator's trap, Tegan lands them both in even more trouble. Turlough goes a bit mad, and reckons he knows the evil of the Tractators from old.
Directing: Ron Jones · Writer: Christopher H. Bidmead · Cast: Lesley Dunlop, William Lucas, Peter Gilmore, Jeff Rawle
21x10 Frontios (4)
Feb 3, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 7.1
The Doctor tries to deal with the Tractator's cunning plan, despite Turlough's best intervention. They discover the splintered TARDIS in the tunnels beneath the planet's surface, but how will they put it together again?
Directing: Ron Jones · Writing: Christopher H. Bidmead · Starring: William Lucas
21x11 Resurrection of the Daleks (1)
Feb 8, 1984 · 46 min · ★ 8.3
London's Docklands, 1984. Why are uniformed policemen gunning down strangely-dressed vagrants in broad daylight? A prison ship in the far future - who is the sole prisoner aboard the craft? And why are these two locations linked by the time corridor the TARDIS has been sucked into?
Directing: Matthew Robinson · Writing: Eric Saward · Starring: Rula Lenska, Rodney Bewes, Terry Molloy, Maurice Colbourne
21x12 Resurrection of the Daleks (2)
Feb 15, 1984 · 46 min · ★ 8.0
As the surviving station crew work to destroy the space station, Davros consolidates his power and the Daleks launch a fiendish scheme to use the Doctor against the Time Lords.
Directing: Matthew Robinson · Writing: Eric Saward · Starring: Rula Lenska, Rodney Bewes, Terry Molloy, Maurice Colbourne
21x13 Planet of Fire (1)
Feb 23, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 6.6
Lanzarote, 1985. Archaeologist Howard Foster raises a strange metal artefact from the sea floor. But how is it linked to the signal the TARDIS received? Why is Turlough suddenly so worried? And why is Kamelion acting so erratically?
Directing: Fiona Cumming · Writer: Peter Grimwade · Cast: Edward Highmore, Peter Wyngarde, Dallas Adams, Barbara Shelley
21x14 Planet of Fire (2)
Feb 24, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 6.8
While the Master, victim of his own attempt to improve his TCE weapon, seeks restoration through Sarn's numismaton gas, the truth of Turlough's past comes out at last, though to guarantee the safety of his brother and the Sarn people, Turlough must consider a great personal sacrifice.
Directing: Fiona Cumming · Writer: Peter Grimwade · Cast: Edward Highmore, Peter Wyngarde, Dallas Adams, Barbara Shelley
21x15 Planet of Fire (3)
Mar 1, 1984 · 24 min · ★ 6.7
Sarn prophesy foretells of an outsider who will come to aid the people. It's a role the Master is more than delighted to fill, which finally presents Timanov, the Sarn religious leader, the unbridled support he's sought in his campaign to cull the faithless from among his people. Turlough's secret past, however, is somehow intricately involved in all this, and the reluctance of its disclosure is enough to threaten all friendly ties with the Doctor.
Directing: Fiona Cumming · Writer: Peter Grimwade · Cast: Edward Highmore, Dallas Adams, Barbara Shelley, Anthony Ainley
21x16 Planet of Fire (4)
Mar 2, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 6.5
While the Master, victim of his own attempt to improve his TCE weapon, seeks restoration through Sarn's numismaton gas, the truth of Turlough's past comes out at last, though to guarantee the safety of his brother and the Sarn people, Turlough must consider a great personal sacrifice.
Directing: Fiona Cumming · Writer: Peter Grimwade · Cast: Edward Highmore, Peter Wyngarde, Dallas Adams, Barbara Shelley
21x17 The Caves of Androzani (1)
Mar 8, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 8.5
The planet Androzani Minor, the distant future. In the planet's caves war rages between government troops and the android warriors of the mysterious Sharaz Jek. But what makes spectrox, the substance they battle to control, so valuable? And how far will the Doctor go to protect his companion?
Directing: Graeme Harper · Writing: Robert Holmes · Starring: Christopher Gable, Robert Glenister, John Normington, Maurice Roëves
21x18 The Caves of Androzani (2)
Mar 9, 1984 · 26 min · ★ 8.6
The Doctor and Peri have been rescued from the firing squad by the mysterious Sharaz Jek. But he has his own plans for them. And why are they suddenly feeling ill?
Directing: Graeme Harper · Writing: Robert Holmes · Starring: Christopher Gable, Robert Glenister, John Normington, Maurice Roëves
21x19 The Caves of Androzani (3)
Mar 15, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 8.6
The situation on Androzani Minor is building toward a violent confrontation, and the Doctor and Peri are slowly succumbing to spectrox toxemia.
Directing: Graeme Harper · Writing: Robert Holmes · Starring: Christopher Gable, Robert Glenister, John Normington, Maurice Roëves
21x20 The Caves of Androzani (4)
Mar 16, 1984 · 26 min · ★ 8.8
Events on Androzani reach a bloody climax. Will the Doctor and Peri survive the carnage? And at what cost?
Directing: Graeme Harper · Writer: Robert Holmes · Cast: Colin Baker, Mark Strickson, Matthew Waterhouse, Sarah Sutton
21x21 The Twin Dilemma (1)
Mar 22, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 4.9
Earth, the future. The genius Sylvest twins, child prodigies, are kidnapped by the mysterious Professor Edgeworth and taken to the planet Jaconda. But who is Edgeworth? Why does he serve the giant slug Mestor? And what is Mestor's plan?
Directing: Peter Moffatt · Writer: Anthony Steven · Cast: Kevin McNally, Maurice Denham, Edwin Richfield, Helen Blatch
21x22 The Twin Dilemma (2)
Mar 23, 1984 · 26 min · ★ 5.7
The Doctor takes Peri to Titan 3, a desolate hunk of rock in space where he hopes to find some solitude for a while. Instead he finds the lone but unconscious survivor of a recent spaceship crash in sight of a mound-shaped complex where no formalised structure should exist.
Directing: Peter Moffatt · Writer: Anthony Steven · Cast: Kevin McNally, Maurice Denham, Edwin Richfield, Dennis Chinnery
21x23 The Twin Dilemma (3)
Mar 29, 1984 · 25 min · ★ 5.2
The Doctor arrives on Jaconda, once lush and green, to find it completely devastated by giant gastropods. Old legends about the planet's half-human/half-slugs weren't just myths after all. With or without help from the Doctor and his unpredictable mood swings, Lt. Lang is up for rescuing the twins, who are finally informed of the grand purpose they've been brought to Jaconda to accomplish.
Directing: Peter Moffatt · Writer: Anthony Steven · Cast: Kevin McNally, Maurice Denham, Edwin Richfield, Seymour Green
21x24 The Twin Dilemma (4) Season Finale
Mar 30, 1984 · 26 min · ★ 5.1
The Doctor and Edgeworth deduce that the real plan of Mestor, the gastropod ruler of Jaconda, will not only destroy Jaconda but lead to the devastation of other planets. Together they hope to thwart him despite his formidable ability at slipping into people's minds and controlling them.
Directing: Peter Moffatt · Writing: Anthony Steven · Starring: Colin Baker, Kevin McNally, Maurice Denham, Edwin Richfield