The Trial of a Time Lord

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The Trial of a Time Lord is the name used on screen for all 14 episodes comprising the 23rd season of the original Doctor Who series. Despite the single name, however, it is actually the linking narrative that holds together the separate serials that comprise the season.

Synopsis

The Doctor (Colin Baker) is taken out of time, his TARDIS lured to a mysterious space station where it is revealed that his people, the Time Lords, are putting him on Trial once again. Using the evidence presented from the Matrix, which collects data from the various time zones in which a TARDIS lands and records it, three segments of evidence are shown to prove the Doctor's guilt or otherwise: one from his past, one from his (near) present and one from his own future.

The segments used within evidence are separately known as The Mysterious Planet, Mindwarp, Terror of the Vervoids and The Ultimate Foe (aka Time Incorporated).

Main cast

• The Doctor: Colin Baker
• The Valeyard: Michael Jayston
• The Inquisitor: Lynda Bellingham

Notes and comments

Although each of the separate segments has been given a name by the fans, based upon working titles, the story is only ever credited on screen as "The Trial of a Time Lord". This leads to the single story being 14 episodes long, making it the longest ever Doctor who story (although technically the Key to Time story arc from Season 16 is longer, it is always presented on screen as six separate stories).

A decade after the story first aired, special effects footage of the TARDIS arriving at the space station, taken from the opening moments of episode one, was used in TV promotions for the 1996 Twentieth-Century Fox telemovie, Enemy Within.