42 (Doctor Who)

188 - 42
Cast
Doctor David Tennant (Tenth Doctor)
Companions Martha Jones
Production
Directed by	Graeme Harper
Written by	Chris Chibnall
Script editor	Simon Winstone
Produced by	Phil Collinson
Executive producer(s)	Russell T. Davies Julie Gardner
Production code	3.7
Series	Series 3
Running time	45 minutes
First broadcast	19 May, 2007
Chronology
← Preceded by The Lazarus Experiment Followed by → Human Nature

42 is an episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was first broadcast on BBC One on 19 May 2007, and is the seventh episode of Series 3 of the revived Doctor Who series. The story is written by Chris Chibnall and directed by Graeme Harper.

Synopsis

In a distant galaxy, in the 42nd century, a spaceship hurtles out of control towards a boiling sun. The Doctor has 42 minutes to uncover the saboteurs, but with a mysterious force starting to possess the ship's crew, the Doctor and Martha are running out of time.

Plot

File:42 (Doctor Who).jpg

The S.S. Pentallian is being pulled into a sun... and the Doctor has only 42 minutes to stop it.

In the TARDIS, the Doctor is adjusting Martha's mobile 'phone, enabling it to call anwhere in time and space - an ability he refers to as Universal Roaming. As she is about to telephone her mum, they materialise on a very hot spaceship (in answer to a distress signal), with no engine-sounds.

The captain, McDonnell, explains that the engines cut out, and that they are being slowly pulled into the sun in their star-system. The impact will take place in 42 minutes.

The Doctor organises Martha and one of the crew to open a series of password-protected doors, enabling access to the auxilliary engines, while the rest move to the main engine-room, to try to fix the systems. The Doctor finds that all the engine-related machiniery has been destroyed, and comments that someone "knew what they were doing".

There is a call from Abi, a medic, to say that Korwin, McDonnell's husband, is having some sort of seizure. The Doctor tells everyone else to continue trying to save the ship and he runs to Abi to find the others have followed him.

Cast

• The Doctor — David Tennant
• Martha Jones — Freema Agyeman
• Francine Jones — Adjoa Andoh
• Kath McDonnell — Michelle Collins
• Riley Vashtee — William Ash
• Orin Scannell — Anthony Flanagan
• Hal Korwin — Matthew Chambers
• Abi Lerner — Vinette Robinson
• Dev Ashton — Gary Powell
• Erina Lessak — Rebecca Oldfield
• Sinister Woman — Elize du Toit

Cultural references

• The Doctor asks the crew "Where's your Dunkirk spirit?"
• One security question refers to Elvis Presley and The Beatles, and the Doctor refers to The Beatles song "Here Comes The Sun" as well as the remixed single of Presley's "A Little Less Conversation".
• Another security question refers to a series of happy prime numbers.

Notes

• When the captain of the ship pushes the second infected crew member into the stasis tube, the screen next to it reads -273 degrees Celsius, which is within one degree of absolute zero.

Continuity

• The Doctor uses the phrase "allons-y" again, as in Army of Ghosts and Evolution of the Daleks.
• Mr Saxon is referred to by a "Sinister Woman" who thanks Martha's mother on his behalf for her cooperation, and bags the mobile phone Mrs. Jones has used to receive her third call from her daughter. Martha's mother tells Martha during the last call that it is "election day", but Mrs. Jones pointedly refuses to tell the mysterious woman which candidate she has voted for
• The Doctor gives Martha two "frequent flyer privileges"; upgrading her mobile phone to have "universal roaming" and a key to the TARDIS. He also gave these to Rose, although the TARDIS key looks different from its Series 1 incarnation, and he uses the sonic screwdriver to update the phone, whereas in The End of the World he installed an unidentified device in the battery compartment.
• When the system lockdown begins and the Doctor asks about the defences, it is said the doors are deadlock sealed and the Doctor replies that a sonic screwdriver will not help. In Bad Wolf when the way out of the Big Brother house is deadlock sealed and in School Reunion when the computers are deadlock sealed the sonic screwdriver proves similarly ineffective.
• The phrase "Burn with me" was heard used in a different context in Smith and Jones and appears several times throughout this episode.
• Before being put into the stasis chamber, the Doctor begins to explain to Martha that a process will happen if he dies. This is a reference to Time Lord regeneration. In the accompanying Doctor Who Confidential episode, David Tennant questioned whether that would have done any good because, while he might change, he could still be possesed.

Pre-broadcast publicity

• Doctor Who Magazine reported in the preview for this episode that the title 42 was chosen for the fact the episode is set in real time, and had little to do with the American series 24 (named for the same reason). However, producer Phil Collinson explicitly said the opposite in the episode commentary that was done for the official web site. He maintained there that the title is indeed a direct play on 24. Writer Chris Chibnall has confused the matter further. When asked whether the title referred either to that television series or to the work of Douglas Adams (See Life, the Universe, and Everything), he said yes, and acknowledged that "It's a playful title." Chibnall goes on to compare the episode itself to The Satan Pit, at least from a visual standpoint.
• On the official Doctor Who website for this episode, a password requested to access extra material can be either Doctor, Who, Saxon, Martha, TARDIS or 42. Ironically, it unlocks items to which one already had access.
• On 5 May 2007, Parkinson, at 10:30 on ITV1, showed a clip of 42, with a member of crew seemingly wounded by a gas ejection from a pipe as it was revealing its identity. Martha was also taken out into space in an escape pod by an unknown man, with the Doctor promising to save her.
• On Totally Doctor Who, a clip was shown of 42 of someone calling for assistance; a man called Korwin was reported as sick and was saying the phrase "Burn with me". He then opened his eyes, and a woman screamed as bright lights shone out of his eye sockets.
• On 12 May 2007, the BBC website published a text-based "exclusive prologue" to the episode. It details the reactions of one of the characters, Erina Lissak, a recent addition to the crew of the Pentallian, as the ship's engines stop, a countdown to impact begins, and she unexpectedly meets the Doctor and Martha.

Broadcast

Originally planned for broadcast on 12 May, 2007, this episode was postponed by the BBC due to the Eurovision Song Contest. It was decided that "an early start for episode seven, Chris Chibnall's 42, wasn't a good idea", and therefore the schedules were shuffled and 42 was broadcast one week later, 19th May, 2007 at 7:15 pm.