The Impossible Planet

178a - The Impossible Planet
Cast
Doctor David Tennant (Tenth Doctor)
Production
Directed by	James Strong
Written by	Matt Jones
Script editor	Simon Winstone
Produced by	Phil Collinson
Executive producer(s)	Russell T. Davies Julie Gardner
Production code	Series 2, Episode 8
Series	Series 2 (2006)
Running time	1 of 2 episodes, 45 mins
First broadcast	June 3, 2006
Chronology
← Preceded by The Idiot's Lantern Followed by → The Satan Pit

The Impossible Planet is an episode in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It is the first part of a two-part story, followed by The Satan Pit. The story was broadcast on 3 June 2006.

Synopsis

Template:Spoiler When the TARDIS crew land on an alien planet in the orbit of a black hole, the last thing they expect is to arrive in a Hell-like world, with an unexplained darkness that stumps even the Doctor. Human scientists are mining to claim the power that keeps the planet in orbit for themselves. But in doing so they reawaken an ancient evil...

Plot

File:Theimpossibleplanet.jpg

"We must feed…"

to bring back satan

Cast

• The Doctor — David Tennant
• Rose Tyler — Billie Piper
• Mr Jefferson — Danny Webb
• Zachary Cross Flane — Shaun Parkes
• Toby Zed — Will Thorp
• Ida Scott — Claire Rushbrook
• Danny Bartock — Ronny Jhutti
• Scooti Manista — MyAnna Buring
• The Ood — Paul Kasey
• Voice of the Beast — Gabriel Woolf
• Voice of the Ood — Silas Carson

Notes

1. Chris Evans was rumoured to be playing the part of the Devil in this two-part story. However, David Tennant confirmed on the Christian O'Connell Breakfast Show on Virgin Radio that Evans will not be appearing in the episode.
2. The Voice of the Beast is provided by Gabriel Woolf. Woolf is best known in Doctor Who for playing Sutekh the Destroyer (also known as the "Typhonian beast") in the Fourth Doctor serial Pyramids of Mars (1975). The Fourth Doctor also states that Sutekh has been known by many aliases, including Satan.
3. Writer Matt Jones also wrote, as Matthew Jones, the Virgin New Adventures novel Bad Therapy, featuring the Seventh Doctor and Chris Cwej. He was script editor on Russell T. Davies's Channel 4 series, Queer as Folk.
4. According to Doctor Who Magazine #366, The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit will be released together with Love & Monsters as a basic DVD with no special features.
5. According to The Guardian on March 30, 2006, this episode is set on a "spaceship adrift at the edge of a black hole." [1]
6. In an interview with SFX magazine (#142), Russell T. Davies said that the characters in this story are "pioneers in a dangerous situation, like the Wild West."
7. At the press launch for the 2006 season of Doctor Who, David Tennant said, "Basically they find a 'darkness' which doesn't seem to have an explanation and even The Doctor is stumped by what is under the planet." Billie Piper also said, "The Ood are in this one." Press coverage described the Ood as "squid-like aliens".
8. Russell T. Davies and director James Strong have described this episode as "Just about as tense and scary as Doctor Who can get".
9. The Doctor encountered adversaries that used a black hole in The Horns of Nimon and The Three Doctors.
10. In the preview and TARDISODE the human government is "the Empire". This may be any one of several human Empires mentioned previously in the series, depending on the era in which the episode is set.
11. The June 3-June 9 issue of the Radio Times revealed the Ood communicate using a translation ball mounted on their left breast.
12. Shaun Parkes previously starred with David Tennant in the BBC's 2005 Casanova serial written by Russell T. Davies.
13. This episode has numerous references to hell, and the Number of the Beast, as well as taking part either side of June 6, 2006 (06/06/06)
14. The episode features Ravel's Boléro.
15. Rose refers to the dinner lady job she had in School Reunion when talking to an Ood serving food.
16. This episode sees Rose's 'super phone' lose its signal for the first time. Rose cannot ring Jackie.
17. This episode is full of varying religious quotations (most of which are fragmented) the most used is 'He is Awake ' and 'We are Legion' . The legion quotation being an obvious throwback to Mark 5:9:
18. After finding Scooti's body, the Doctor repeats the phrase, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." He has used these words before, for example when examining a dying Cyberman in The Age of Steel.
19. Continuing from Rise of the Cybermen, the trailer is not shown during the start of the closing theme. However, the trailer was accompanied with a warning and was broadcast during the middle eight, a possible reference to the outcome of the Doctor in World War Three being spoiled by a trailer at the end of Aliens of London

External links

• BBC Press Office release