Doctor Who - Invasion of the Dinosaurs [12/01-16/02/74
BBC1 TV version]
|
| In this 1974 story, Jon Pertwee's incarnation of the errant
Time Lord returns to 20th century London to find the capital evacuated following
the sudden materialisation of dinosaurs around the city. At one point he
tracks down the temporal disturbances that accompany the appearances to an
Underground station, in which he find a lift disguised as a cleaners' store
cupboard. The lift leads down to a secret government bunker, where
- inevitably - the bad guys are holed up. The exterior used in the
location filming was "Moorgate" station - although the name is not visible
- but the studio sets of the interior do offer a brief glimpse of a roundel
with a name beginning with "TRAF..." At the time this story was recorded,
the only station this could have been was "Trafalgar Square", which was the
original name for the Bakerloo part of what is now Charing Cross, over 5km
from "Moorgate." Elsewhere in the story, however, another entrance to the
bunker is revealed to be in a government building on Whitehall, the northern
end of which being where "Trafalgar Square" was.
As a side-note, in the contemporary novelisation of the story, the Underground
station is given the fictitious name of "Winchester," which doesn't even
make the remotest sense, there being no district or street similarly named
remotely near Whitehall! |
 |
 |
| Just before pulling up outside the Tube station, the Doctor checks
his map - clearly showing Buckingham Palace on the left and Whitehall
on the right. |
The vehicle is the gadget-obsessed Pertwee's own "Whomobile," although
at the time of filming it was not quite finished, hence the jury-rigged
windshield. Based on a 3-wheeler Bond Bug chassis, the car was
actually street-legal, and also appeared in Pertwee's last story, The
Planet of the Spiders. |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
The Underground diagram on the wall is bang up-to-date, even showing
the Brixton extension of the Victoria line, then under-construction. |
 |
 |
|
In this brief enhanced shot, it can be seen that the station name on
the roundel begins with "TRAF..." |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| After all the efforts of the location footage to avoid showing it
was actually "Moorgate" used for the exteriors, the model-makers give
the game away with the "METROPOLITAN AND CIRCLE LINES" detail on the facade! |
"I never thought I'd find myself blowing a Tube station. If you're wrong,
Doctor, I could have a job explaining this to London Transport!"
Short memory, Brigadier.... [see Doctor
Who:The Web of Fear]. |
 |
 |
| As the Doctor and the Brigadier prepare to blow their way into the bunker,
something slow and unconvincing lurks on the platform.... |
Hopelessly out-of-scale, the live-action Brigadier is overlaid on the
model set! |
The London Underground in Films & TV
| PAGE HISTORY: |
| 11/04/04 |
First upload |
| 22/10/17 |
Hosting transfer & amendments |
|