Writing Writer
Rona Munro approached script editor
Andrew Cartmel at a BBC scriptwriting workshop and said that she'd "kill to write for
Doctor Who." The story Munro developed incorporated themes including the morals of hunting (personified by the Cheetah People and signposted by Ace's friend Ange collecting for
hunt saboteurs). The battle at the climax of the story was recorded and set on the site of the ancient
hill fort at
Horsenden Hill. The majority of location recording was done in and around Perivale, with small sections shot at nearby
Ealing, and outside and near
The Drayton Court pub.
Legacy Having already surmised that episode three of
Survival was likely to be the last episode of
Doctor Who for some time, and possibly the last ever, the show's producer
John Nathan-Turner decided close to transmission that a more suitable conclusion should be given to the final episode. Script editor
Andrew Cartmel wrote a short, melancholic closing monologue for Sylvester McCoy, which McCoy recorded on 23 November 1989, the day after episode one was broadcast and, by coincidence, the show's twenty-sixth anniversary: ''"There are worlds out there where the sky is burning, the sea's asleep, and the rivers dream. People made of smoke, and cities made of song. Somewhere there's danger, somewhere there's injustice, and somewhere else the tea's getting cold. Come on, Ace – we've got work to do!"'' This was dubbed over the closing scene as the Doctor and Ace walked off into the distance, apparently to further adventures. Although
Survival was the last
Doctor Who serial of the original series to be transmitted, it was not the last to have been produced; that was
Ghost Light, which had been broadcast some weeks earlier, as the second story of the season. The
Doctor Who production office at the BBC finally closed down in August 1990, having been in continuous operation since 1963. This story is the last to feature Anthony Ainley as the Master. Ainley was not asked to return as the Master for the
1996 Doctor Who television movie. Instead, Gordon Tipple was cast as the Master for the prologue and
Eric Roberts played the Master for the rest of the movie. Ainley reprised the role of the Master for the 1997 computer game
Destiny of the Doctors. He continued to be active in
Doctor Who, attending conventions and recording a commentary track for the DVD of the 1981 serial
The Keeper of Traken. Ainley died in May 2004. McCoy and Aldred would reprise their roles onscreen on a number of occasions: first in a 1990 episode of the educational series
Search Out Science; and again in 1993, along with many other former
Doctor Who actors, for the
Children in Need 30th anniversary special
Dimensions in Time. McCoy would briefly return to the role for the
1996 Doctor Who television movie which saw the Seventh Doctor regenerate into the
Eighth Doctor, played by
Paul McGann, and again in 2021 for a webcast trailer promoting the
Blu-ray release of
Season 24 alongside
Bonnie Langford as
Mel Bush. If the series continued, Aldred would have remained in her role until the expiry of her contract midway through the following season. Ace was to be written out of the series in
Ice Time, an
Ice Warrior story written by
Marc Platt. Aldred returned as Ace in 2019 for a webcast trailer promoting the
Blu-ray release of
Season 26. In 1999, McCoy agreed to reprise his role as the Doctor in officially licensed
Doctor Who audio adventures produced by
Big Finish, with Aldred also returning the following year. McCoy and Aldred continue to make regular appearances in
Doctor Who audio releases and associated spin-offs. The pair also returned in 2001 for the BBC
webcast production,
Death Comes to Time.
Doctor Who eventually returned to television as a
BBC Wales production in 2005, helmed by
Russell T Davies. In 2022, Aldred made a special guest appearance as Ace in the revived series, alongside
Janet Fielding as
Tegan Jovanka, in
The Power of the Doctor, which saw the end of
Jodie Whittaker's tenure as the
Thirteenth Doctor and was the last story produced entirely by
BBC Studios before entering a co-production deal with
Bad Wolf. McCoy also made a surprise cameo as a manifestation of the Seventh Doctor. In 2023, as part of Doctor Who's sixtieth anniversary, McCoy and Aldred reprised their roles once again in the streaming series
Tales of the TARDIS.
Cast notes The part of Karra in this serial is played by
Lisa Bowerman, who is now more familiar to fans as the voice of
Bernice Summerfield in the
Big Finish Productions audio dramas. She is also a director of many Big Finish productions, and also returned to the
Doctor Who series proper when she provided voice-acting work for the animated special
Dreamland in 2009. This serial features guest appearances of the comedians
Gareth Hale and
Norman Pace, and actress
Adele Silva (as an 8-year-old, in her first television role). See also
Celebrity appearances in Doctor Who. ==Broadcast and reception==