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Face of Evil is a 1996 American thriller television film starring Tracey Gold as Darcy Palmer, Perry King as Russell Polk and Shawnee Smith as his daughter Jeanelle Polk. This has aired on CBS on April 9, 1996.
- Thriller
A psychopathic young woman who assumes the identity of her murder victims, pretends to be a college freshman and seduces the wealthy widowed father of her ro...
- 90 min
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- Chicken Soup for the Soul TV
- Overview
- Synopsis
- Plot
- Cast
- Crew
- Worldbuilding
- Story notes
- Continuity
- Home video and audio releases
was the fourth serial of season 14 of Doctor Who. When broadcast, it was originally billed in Radio Times as the start of a new series, due to the six-week gap since the final episode of The Deadly Assassin. As originally broadcast, it in fact followed omnibus editions of Pyramids of Mars and The Brain of Morbius, amongst other, unrelated programme...
The Doctor arrives on a planet where two tribes, the savage Sevateem and the technically brilliant Tesh, are at war. He meets Leela, an exile from the Sevateem, and discovers that their god of evil is apparently himself.
Part one
The Doctor, alone in the TARDIS, arrives on a mysterious jungle planet which he cannot resist exploring. He soon encounters Leela, a savage from the local tribe. She denounces him as the Evil One of her people's fables. She has been exiled from her tribe, the Sevateem, for profaning their god, the mysterious Xoanon, who speaks to them through the tribe's shaman, Neeva. Her father, tribal elder Sole, tried to protect her but died taking the Test of the Horda on her behalf. Now Leela is an outcast beyond the invisible barrier around her tribal home. Neeva, meanwhile, has sent two men to murder her, an action witnessed by Leela's friend Tomas. He kills one of them as Leela dispatches the other. In the jungle beyond, she encounters the Doctor, who soon wins her over by defending her from invisible monsters that rampage about, attracted by vibration of any kind. Exploring further, the Doctor finds a sophisticated sonic disruptor. It creates the force field that keeps creatures from attacking the village itself. Leela regales him with more folklore; the god Xoanon is kept prisoner by the Evil One and his followers, the reclusive Tesh, beyond a strange black wall. The Sevateem have decided to launch an attack on the Tesh to free their god. They are led by the combative Andor, who is determined to free his god. He also believes an attack will unite the people. Andor suspects Neeva of being a false prophet, and Tomas tells him of Neeva's attempted murder of Leela. Still, Andor believes the attack will succeed and is prepared to go ahead. Two warriors are scouring the jungle when they find the Doctor. They also call him the Evil One and make a hand gesture which the Doctor interprets as the sequence for checking the seals on a Starfall Seven spacesuit. The warriors seize the Doctor but not Leela. They take him to the village council, where his face is shown to the tribe. Andor is convinced the prisoner is the Evil One and has him confined. However, Leela frees him using poisonous Janis thorns, which paralyse, then kill the victim. The Doctor is horrified by this. He instructs her, "No more Janis thorns, ever." The pair flees the village and heads to a clearing beyond, where the Doctor is greeted by a stunning sight. Carved into a mountain nearby is a relief of his own face.
Part two
The Doctor cannot recall clearly why his face is here. He persuades Leela to return to the village to learn more, despite their death sentences. They return to Neeva's holy tent. The Doctor inspects the ancient tribal relics, recognising them as artefacts from an Earth survey expedition. He also finds a transceiver used by Neeva to hear the commands of Xoanon. It speaks with the Doctor's own voice, exhilarated at hearing the Doctor, saying, "At last we are here. At last I shall be free of us." They head off to inspect the dark wall that stands at the entrance to the realm of the Evil One. The Doctor deduces it is a primitive time barrier. He is certain the Sevateem warriors will be massacred if they attack the fortress of their enemy, the Tesh. From afar they see the massacre unfold, as laser beams cut down warriors armed only with crossbows and other basic weapons. Half the tribe is lost in the assault. One of the elders, the devious Calib, is first back at the camp, where he finds the Doctor and Leela. He is evidently intent on using the Doctor to break Neeva's hold on the tribe by exposing the faith in Xoanon as mythology. Leela's friend Tomas also arrives. He is apalled to find Calib has stabbed Leela with a Janis thorn to prevent her exposing his schemes. The Doctor gets Tomas to help him move Leela to Neeva's tent, where he uses a bio-analyser to synthesise an antidote to the poison. When the surviving warriors return, the Doctor, Leela and Tomas are invited to address the tribal elders in defence of their lives. Leela makes matters worse when she accuses Xoanon of causing the trap at the wall. Calib intervenes to suggest the Doctor is not the Evil One. He suggests this be proven by getting him to take the fabled Test of the Horda. In the centre of the village is a pit full of Horda, two-foot-long worms which hunt in packs and react to the movements of their prey. They are reputed to strip flesh from a man in an instant. The Sevateem evolved the Test of the Horda as a trial of justice and bravery. It involves the defendant standing on a board over the pit, who then must shoot a rope attached to a boulder that is pulling the board out from under him. The Doctor is given a crossbow. He must fire it at a precise moment to sever the rope without making him fall into the pit — the fate of the guilty. The Doctor succeeds, is proven a non-malign influence and freed. He proceeds to examine some relics of the tribe and repair a disruptor gun. He also tells some of the tribe that the Sevateem are the descendants of a "survey team" from a Starfall Seven Earth colony ship. The Doctor and Leela go to examine the face in the mountain; they climb into it by scaling the Doctor's teeth. Neeva returns to his tent, where the voice of Xoanon tells him the tribe will be destroyed. The mysterious being shuts down the sonic disruptor, leaving the village open to attack from the invisible beings. These descend on the village, killing indiscriminately and crushing Andor to death. Tomas uses the disruptor gun built by the Doctor to expose the true appearance of the invisible beings: ferocious, angry versions of the Doctor's face.
Part three
Leela and the Doctor notice a figure in a spacesuit in the "mouth" entrance and follow it through a projection of a wall. Beyond this barrier is a rocket, which the Doctor recalls as belonging to the Mordee Expedition; his memory of events earlier in his incarnation are returning. Xoanon has detected the Doctor. When he reaches the ship, the god-creature is ecstatic that "we are here" and also maniacally pledging that "we must destroy us". The Doctor and Leela meet three of the Tesh who serve and worship Xoanon. They are human too, but technologically advanced and possessing telepathic abilities. The Doctor deduces both Sevateem and Tesh are descendants of the same crew from the Mordee Expedition, with the Tesh (or technicians) involved in the same deadly eugenics exercise as the Sevateem. The invisible creatures which attacked the Sevateem are also part of the same deranged scheme. Xoanon is a highly sophisticated computer, designed to think independently. The Doctor repaired Xoanon but forgot to wipe his personality print from the data core, leaving the computer with a split personality. The Doctor and Leela are soon imprisoned, then escape and find the device used to communicate with Neeva. The Doctor, speaking as Xoanon, instructs Neeva to tell Calib, who is now tribal leader, to lead the Sevateem survivors through the mouth of the carved face in the mountain. Calib accepts this instruction and leads them into the safety of the mouth, where the invisible beings cannot threaten the tribe. With Leela keeping guard and holding the Tesh at bay with a disruptor gun, the Doctor ventures into the computer room of the ship to confront Xoanon. He blames himself for creating the computer's maddened split personality. He attempts to persuade Xoanon that he is separate from itself. Xoanon cannot accept this and channels a vicious mental attack at the Doctor. As the Doctor writhes on the floor, Xoanon shouts in a child's voice: "Who am I?"
•Doctor Who - Tom Baker
•Leela - Louise Jameson
•Neeva - David Garfield
•Andor - Victor Lucas
•Tomas - Brendan Price
•Calib - Leslie Schofield
•Writer - Chris Boucher
•Incidental Music - Dudley Simpson
•Title Music - Ron Grainer and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop
•Title Sequence - Bernard Lodge
•Production Assistant - Marion McDougall
•Production Unit Manager - Chris D'Oyly-John
Individuals
•Korus is killed. •Sarton is a Tesh.
The Doctor
•The Doctor mentions that he once studied marksmanship with William Tell. •When the Doctor offers a jelly baby to Leela, she misunderstands his gesture and accuses him of being the Evil One who eats babies. •The Doctor threatens to turn the Sevateem into toads. •The Doctor describes a non-functioning communicator as being "Dead as a Dalek."
Science
•Xoanon produces psi-tri projections called Phantoms.
•This story had the working titles The Tower of Imelo and The Day God Went Mad. The latter was objected to by Philip Hinchcliffe, not because it might offend viewers with religious sensibilities, but because it was out of keeping with other titles.
•The Radio Times programme listing for part one was accompanied by a black-and-white artwork illustration by Roy Ellsworth depicting the Doctor and Leela being watched over by the face of Xoanon on a video screen, with the accompanying caption "Dr. Who and new girl companion, Leela, confront The Face of Evil: 6.20".
•On emerging from the TARDIS in part one, the Doctor directly addresses the camera/audience:
Doctor: "I think this is not Hyde Park. Could be a nexial discontinuity. Must remember to overhaul those tracers. Put a knot in my hanky. (Pause. He puts his hand in his trouser pocket, and produces a blue handkerchief which already has a knot tied in it. He looks at it quizzically for a second, then turns back to the camera.) Wonder what that was for? (Pause, as he tries to remember. No luck. He puts the handkerchief away.) Little look round, Doctor? Why not?"
•The Doctor's opening fourth wall break would be mirrored in TV: Before the Flood in 2015 by the Twelfth Doctor discussing the Bootstrap paradox with the audience.
•The Janis thorns which Leela uses were originally pronounced with the first syllable rhyming with "can"; however, Tom Baker pointed out that "Janice Thorn" sounded like the name of an out-of-work soap actress, so the pronunciation was changed. (DCOM: The Face of Evil)
•The Eleventh Doctor helps a ship be born in PROSE: The Way Through the Woods.
•Leela experiences intense edited flashbacks to her father's death in AUDIO: The Evil One, as part of the Decayed Master's attempts to brainwash her into becoming his assassin.
Video releases
This story was released on VHS in May 1999 in the UK and in March 2000 in the US.
DVD release
The DVD was released in Region 2 on 5 March 2012 and in Region 1 on 13 March 2012.
- 3 min
Apr 9, 1996 · Tracey Gold stars as Darcy Palmer, a psychopath who murders a college student and assumes her identity to pursue her fiancé's father. She also kills anyone who stands in her way, until she is caught by the police.
- (539)
- Drama, Thriller
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A TV series that reenacts the investigations of cold cases involving heartless killers. Using forensic science and expert profiles, police try to catch the culprits and bring justice to the victims.
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- 2019-04-18
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The Face of Evil is the fourth serial of the 14th season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts on BBC1 from 1 to 22 January 1977. This serial marked the debut of Louise Jameson as companion Leela.
Aug 21, 2020 · The Doctor confronts Xoanon, and the reflection of his personality that he left behind all those years ago. Subscribe to Doctor Who for more exclusive videos: http://bit.ly/SubscribeToDoctorWho ...
- 4 min
- 43.4K
- Doctor Who
