Doctor Who: The Caves of Androzani Special Edition

On the cave-riddled world of Androzani Minor, the Doctor and Peri inadvertently find themselves enmeshed in a war fought between the ruthless General Chellak and the sinister Sharaz Jek and his army of androids.

The duplicitous politician Morgus wants Chellak to execute the time travelers as spies, while the disfigured Jek seeks to keep Peri forever hostage within his stronghold. But the Doctor soon realizes an even more gruesome fate awaits them - they have been infected with fatal spectrox toxemia, and there is no cure.
Hunted by both factions and with death just hours away, how far must the Doctor go in order to save his friend's life?

The TARDIS arrives on Androzani Minor, the source of a life-prolonging drug refined from a substance called spectrox. Production of the drug is controlled by Sharaz Jek, a facially deformed madman in self imposed exile, who blames Morgus, a powerful industrialist on Androzani Major, for all his misfortunes.
Jek is fighting government troops sent to liberate the drug. His weaponry is being supplied by gun-runners secretly employed by Morgus, who receives payment from Jek in refined spectrox. This gives Morgus a monopoly of the drug on Major.
Jek becomes infatuated with Peri, and saves her and the Doctor from being executed on Morgus's orders by government troops led by General Chellak. The two travellers escape after learning that they have contracted spectrox toxaemia, a fatal condition to which there is only one antidote - the milk from a queen bat, which the Doctor must obtain from the deep caves on Minor. Morgus, seeing his power base slipping away, travels to Minor.
In a climactic battle, Morgus, Jek and all the soldiers are killed. With moments to spare, the Doctor carries Peri back to the TARDIS, where he gives her all the milk that he has managed to collect. She recovers, but the Doctor has to regenerate to save his own life.

Directed by Graeme Harper
Written by Robert Holmes
Produced by John Nathan-Turner
Original Music by Roger Limb
Film Editing by Roger Guertin
Costume Design by Andrew Rose

First Transmitted
1 - 08/03/1984 18:40
2 - 09/03/1984 18:40
3 - 15/03/1984 18:40
4 - 16/03/1984 18:40

There are brief, specially recorded cameos for all the fifth Doctor's companions and the Master seen during the regeneration sequence in Part Four.

The closing credits to Part Four feature the face of new Doctor Colin Baker, and list him before Peter Davison.

One of the soldier extras was played by Steve Wickham, later to head the Doctor Who Appreciation Society.