Director: Joe Ahearne
Show Stars: John Barrowman (Captain Jack Harkness), Billie Piper (Rose Tyler), Christopher Eccleston (The Ninth Doctor)
Recurring Role: Nicholas Pegg (Dalek Operator), Barnaby Edwards (Dalek Operator), David Hankinson (Dalek Operator), Alan Ruscoe (Android), Paul Kasey (Android)
Guest Stars: Susannah Constantine (Voice of Zu-Zana) , Trinny Woodall (Voice of Trine-E) , Jo Stone-Fewings (Male Programmer) , Jenna Russell (Floor Manager) , Paterson Joseph (Rodrick) , Davina McCall (Voice of Davinadroid) , Abi Eniola (Crosbie) , Dominic Burgess (Agorax) , Jamie Bradley (Strood) , Nisha Nayar (Female Programmer) , Karren Winchester (Fitch) , Kate Loustau (Colleen) , Sebastian Armesto (Broff) , Martha Cope (Controller) , Sam Callis (Security Guard) , Anne Robinson (Anne Droid) , Jo Joyner (Lynda Moss)
Production Code: NCFR039P
100 Years Later (after the events of “The Long Game”)
The Doctor wakes up in a cupboard. He staggers out where a young woman, Lynda Ross helps him up and tells him he’s shook up and suffering partial amnesia from the effects of the transmat. Lynda tells him he’s the newest housemate on Big Brother and a voice directs him to the Diary Room.
Rose wakes up in a darkened room where a man, Rodrick, reassures her it’s the effects of transmat and she should do what the android says, its word is law. A floor manager directs her, Rodrick, and the others to their positions at podiums, including one with Rose’s name. They are in some kind of contest…and the host is “Anne-Droid.” She is welcomed to The Weakest Link.
Jack wakes up with two gynoids, Trine-e and Zu-Zana, who are preparing him for a makeover. They use a defabricator to strip him naked, and send his image out to millions of viewers, much to his enjoyment.
The Doctor tries to escape the house without success, and Lynda asks him for reassurance about her popularity with the viewers. The Doctor lies to her then notices a wall where a garden should be. The Doctor remembers how they were in transit when there was a bright light that swallowed him, Jack, and Rose up, and then he was there. The Doctor realizes no ordinary transmat beam could have penetrated the TARDIS and the Doctor speaks to the cameras warning that he’ll escape and find his friends. In a programming room, two editors wonder what’s going on.
In Rose’s game, the Anne-Droid begins a round of questions and Rose starts laughing, unconcerned, once she realizes she doesn’t know any of the more futuristic questions. The programmers believe that the game is running itself since Rose appeared out of nowhere.
Jack is working with the two gynoids to come up with a new costume but they decide that he needs some face work and start hauling out some cutting tools.
Fitch, one of the contestants in Rose’s game is voted out and Anne-Droid disintegrates her with a mounted beam and then destroys another player when he tries to escape. Rodrick warns her that she must play…or die.
The Doctor is still trying to escape and Lynda warns that if he doesn’t participate they’ll all be punished. They are informed that Crosbie has been voted out and she then exists into the departure corridor. Once the door closes behind her, they are shown a televised image of her being disintegrated and the Doctor realizes it’s no game.
The two programmers wonder if something is hidden under the transmissions and wonder about the Controller, speculating she hasn’t been human for years.
The Doctor discovers that contestants are chosen at random from Earth’s population and there are sixty different Big Brother houses. The Doctor destroys one of the cameras to earn an eviction.
The gynoids advance on a naked Jack but he produces a compact laser gun from a hidden location and destroys them. The Anne-Droid destroys another contestant, leaving only three contestants left. Rodrick points out that Rose doesn’t know the answers and plans to be up against her so he can win. He mentions the Bad Wolf Corporation, the ones who are in charge, and Rose suspects something is up since they keep hearing those words, and someone has been planning the entire thing.
Big Brother evicts the Doctor and he goes into the disintegration corridor. The programmers are helpless to do anything as the process is automatic, but the Doctor is unharmed – he knew whoever brought him into the game won’t let him die. The Doctor escapes through the corridor and asks Lynda to come with him. She agrees and they step out into an area, which the Doctor recognizes as Satellite Five (from “The Long Game”).
The Doctor explains to Lynda his previous adventure on the satellite and wonders why the station is drawing so much power. Lynda wonders where he’s come from and suggests she might like to come with him – he considers the idea. But first they need to get out and she shows him the logo of the Badwolf Corporation.
The programmers try to gain access to Archive 6 to determine how the new contestants got on the station. The male one goes to see the Controller and she tells him to continue working, that the new contestants are no one. She warns that no one can access Archive 6 and they must go back to work.
Jack converts the defabricator ray into a blaster and goes looking for the Doctor, locking on to the bio-signal of his two hearts. Lynda shows the Doctor Earth below, covered in pollution, and he realizes his previous attempt to put earth’s history back on track failed. Lynda reveals when there was nothing to replace Satellite 5, they went through a hundred years of hell and the Doctor realizes he’s responsible.
Rodrick and Rose are the last two remaining contestants in The Weakest Link. Jack finds the Doctor who is patching into the satellite computer. He locates the Doctor and they head to Rose’s studio, where she is inevitably losing to Rodrick. They get to the studio but are unable to gain entrance before Rose loses. The Anne-Droid disintegrates Rose just as the Doctor and the others arrive. The guards take them into custody and a forlorn Doctor surrenders without a fight.
The guards interrogate the Doctor and when they get no answers, sentence him, Jack, and Lynda to the lunar penal colony. The Doctor and Jack make a break for it and the programmers spot them on the scanners. The programmers warn the Controller about them without success—she’s more concerned about the coming solar flares. The Doctor gives up his gun to the male programmer and the male programmer explains the Controller is linked into the transmission system and can’t recognize the Doctor or any other non-staff member. Jack seals the doors, buying them ten minutes, and the male programmer confirms the Doctor’s suspicions. They find the TARDIS in Archive 6 and Jack discovers something amazing on its scanners.
The solar flares occur on schedule and the station powers down. The Controller calls out for the Doctor and tells him that due to the outside interference her “masters” can’t read her thoughts. She explains that she secretly brought the Doctor here and hid him inside the games, and her masters are hiding in the “dark spaces” and shaping the Earth for centuries. Before she can identify her “masters,” the systems come back on line and the next solar flare won’t be for two years.
Jack arrives and reveals that the TARDIS worked out that the disintegration beams are actually a secondary transmat system. He demonstrates on Lynda, sending her out and then back. Rose met a similar fate.
Rose wakes up in an alien chamber and an unseen creature approaches her. The Controller sacrifices herself to give the Doctor the coordinates of her “masters” before being teleported away by them. She appears in the same chamber as Rose and gloats that she has brought their destruction—they kill her.
Jack and the male programmer, Davish, track the transmat signal to the edge of the solar system. The enemy base is shielded but the Doctor jams the cloaking signal, revealing a fleet of two hundred aliens saucers…Dalek saucers.
The Daleks establish communication with the Doctor and show him Rose. They warn him that if he interferes they will kill Rose. The Doctor refuses to accept their terms, and warns that he will stop them and rescue Rose. The Daleks began to assemble their invasion force to take over the Earth…
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