“The Hand of Fear” is an adventure of the fourteenth season of “Doctor Who” classic series which aired in 1976. It follows “The Masque of Mandragora” and it’s a four parts adventure written by Bob Baker and Dave Martin and directed by Lennie Mayne.

The story

On the planet Kastria, a criminal named Eldrad is sentenced to death. A pod with him on board is disintegrated but on of his hands remains almost intact.

Many millennia later, the Fourth Doctor (Tom Baker) returns to the Earth in the present along with Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen) but they land in a quarry just when an explosion is about to occur. Sarah Jane gets buried in the rubble but gets away with just a few bruises however when she gets rescued she’s clinging to a strange fossil hand.

In the hospital where she’s taken to make sure she’s alright, Sarah Jane starts behaving strangely taking the fossil hand and going to a nuclear power plant where she can find the energy needed to rebuild Eldrad’s body because Eldrad must live!

Extras

This DVD has a good amount of extras. There are typical contents such as production subtitles, Radio Time Billings and a gallery of pictures from this adventure.

There are comments in the adventure alternative audio track by protagonists Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen, actress Judith Paris, producer Philip Hinchcliffe and co-author Bob Baker.

Changing Time. A 50-minute documentary that looks not only at the production of this adventure but also at the relationship between Sarah Jane Smith and the Third and Fourth Doctor. There’s a lot of material but the quality isn’t always extraordinary.

Swap Shop. Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen interviewed a few hours before the transmission of the first episode of this adventure.

Continuity Compilation. Several announcements for various BBC broadcasts of this adventure.

The Doctor Who Annual 1977. The 1977 issue of “The Doctor Who Annual” in PDF format.

There’s also an “Easter egg” containing a brief interview with Elisabeth Sladen.

The script for “The Hand of Fear” is the result of a series of rewrites. Around the central idea of the hand apparently dead coming back to life a number of stories were developed. Producer Philip Hinchcliffe and script editor Robert Holmes had made many changes to “Doctor Who” and among them there was the gradual elimination of UNIT so initially a final story for Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart was written.

After some time, however, it was decided to restructure the story of “The Hand of Fear”, this time having Harry Sullivan among the characters. The result, however, was deemed too convoluted so Bob Baker and Dave Martin rewrote it to make it a four parts adventure with a more straightforward plot. Its production was originally scheduled for the thirteenth season but it was postponed because of its many changes to its fourteenth season.

Meanwhile, Elisabeth Sladen had announced her intention to leave “Doctor Who” so that element had to be put into the script as well. The result of all these changes is an adventure that has its ups and downs and is remembered mostly for being the last in which Sarah Jane Smith is a regular character.

“The Hand of Fear” beginning, with Eldrad’s execution, isn’t particularly clear and serves only to introduce the character in some way. However, the first episode is good thanks to Elisabeth Sladen who offers a creepy performance as Sarah Jane possessed by Eldrad who arrives to the nuclear power plant.

It’s in later episodes that there are some issues. The scenes at the power station are partly the typical fillers you could see in “Doctor Who” classic series with some characters who went here and there. It’s puzzling that the Director of the power plant could obtain a nuclear strike within minutes with the characters who remain in the vicinity merely hiding behind cars.

The good part is that Eldrad is an ambiguous character and for most of the story we don’t know whether she’s really a criminal or the victim of a conspiracy who had to resort to extreme measures to come back to life. That’s until the last episode, where we discover the truth about Eldrad: the good part is that we get to know more about the people of the planet Kastria but the character becomes really dull taking strenght from the story.

Almost thirty years later, in the TV show “Angel” there’s the character of Illirya, who shares similarities with Eldrad both in terms of physical appearance and in her story.

The real ending of “The Hand of Fear” is, however, in Sarah Jane’s farewell scene. If this is one of the most memorable farewells seen in “Doctor Who” it’s thanks to Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen. In fact they manage to make us realize that an era has ended without many words but making us feel their sense of loss with their attitudes and even with the sober tone of their words.

Overall, I think “The Hand of Fear” is a pretty good adventure that inevitably is famous mostly for the departure of Sarah Jane Smith. The extras on the DVD seem to me at the same level as the adventure, with ups and downs, so it makes sense to buy it mainly for its importance in “Doctor Who” saga, possibly when you find it at a bargain price.