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With the unexpected return of two William Hartnell episodes to the BBC archive, Whovians can now, for the first time since 1965, enjoy the first quarter of the 12-part adventure The Daleks’ Master Plan.

The surviving five episodes are now on iPlayer, and the first three make for a stirring introduction to the adventure, with large impressive sets for the Earth control centre and the Dalek ship, contrasting with the dense forbidding foliage of the planet Kembel. Frequent tight closeup shots from director Douglas Camfield on the faces of the cast add to a claustrophobic feel in the jungle sequences.

At the time, of course, Hartnell was not to know that within a year he would be “renewed” as the lead of the show by Patrick Troughton. Hartnell’s health problems, reputation for being difficult on set and frequent flubbing of lines during a production schedule that allowed little leeway for second takes has tainted his tenure in the role.

Here, especially in the opener, we get to see him in some of his strongest moments as the Doctor. With Stephen (Peter Purves) incapacitated by the poison he picked up in Troy, and Katarina (Adrienne Hill) little more than a hollow vessel of a character, Hartnell has much more to do than usual. The actor gets to show the gleeful side of his nature as he delights at his own invention of the magnetic chair and his ingenuity at repelling – at least initially – boarders to the spaceship.

Rediscovering episode one also means we can enjoy beloved children’s television presenter Brian Cant flexing his acting chops in something other than Playschool, and all three episodes prominently feature Nicholas Courtney, who would go on to play Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart for 40 years, as Bret Vyon. A highlight is the Addams family-esque kookiness of the aliens making up the Dalek council, which is certainly preferable to the somewhat cliched prison planet savages set-up of part three.

Sum it up in one sentence?

The Doctor sets out to thwart Dalek plans to conquer the universe while Katarina stands around asking a lot of obvious questions.

Life aboard the Tardis

It is confusing time for the Tardis crew – and maybe for the production team, too. Katarina has just been introduced to replace Vicki (Maureen O’Brien) in the preceding story The Myth Makers, and immediately the script editors seem to have had regrets about her character. “Don’t ask questions and do as you are told,” the Doctor tells her at one point, which just about sums up how interesting she is. Tom Baker companion Leela (Louise Jameson) was a much more successful later attempt at having an Eliza Doolittle-style ingenue.

Fear factor

For a Dalek story there is a remarkably low extermination count – just the two deaths. Their plan to burn down the jungle of Kembel with three Daleks equipped with flame-throwers didn’t seem terribly efficient, either. The stakes, though, were high. Modern Doctor Who is sometimes criticised for having to up the ante every series finale until the whole of reality is under threat, but that trend clearly started in 1965, where in the space of two years the Daleks have gone from wanting to take control of Skaro, to take control of Earth, to take control – in this story – of the whole of the universe using the most evil weapon ever invented, the “time destructor”.

Mysteries and questions

The biggest mystery, of course, is how these episodes have ended up surviving. Film is Fabulous, the people who secured them, have said they are respecting the wishes of the estate of the person who was holding and keeping them anonymous. Perhaps the most intriguing thing is that, given it was never sold overseas, the missing episodes of the Daleks’ Master Plan were among the least likely to ever be found, but two episodes were sitting in those film cans all along. Who knows what else might still be out there?

Deeper into the vortex

• Courtney will later go on to play Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, and – assuming you count him and Colin Baker bellowing at each other over a helicopter during Comic Relief skit Dimensions in Time – is the only actor to have appeared opposite all seven original classic Doctors.

• This story was the last of William Hartnell’s appearances with Daleks as the main enemy. They would feature in two of Patrick Troughton’s season four stories, and then enjoy a long rest. They did not appear between 1967’s Evil of the Daleks and 1972’s Day of the Daleks, when they featured in colour on television for the first time.

• A one-off Dalek cutaway episode – Mission to the Unknown – served as a prequel to this story in October 1965, and this is the only episode of Doctor Who to date not to feature any members of the regular cast. It is missing, but in 2019 it was remounted by students at the University of Central Lancashire with the BBC’s blessing. It can be watched here.

• In BBC centenary special The Power of the Doctor, Sacha Dhawan’s Master riffs on the title of this story, exclaiming “I was thinking we could call this the Master’s Dalek Plan. Or the CyberDalek Masterplan. Or the Cybermasters Dalek Plan. I can’t quite get it.”

• In the expanded universe, during Big Finish audio story Master Thief, written by Fio Trethewey, the Roger Delgado incarnation of the Master stumbles upon a magnetic tape labelled The Traitors, which is implied to be the missing part four of The Daleks’ Master Plan.

Next time …

Barring the unexpected rediscovery of any further episodes, the next recap really will be, as promised after the Reality War, a Christmas special which may or may not feature Billie Piper as the Doctor. That will presumably wrap up the second Russell T Davies era before the show either goes off in a new direction or heads into oblivion. Before then, on Thursday 16 April 2026, BBC Three is celebrating 20 years – 20 YEARS! – since David Tennant made his debut as the Doctor with a themed night of programming. Allons-y!