THE INVASION
BY DERRICK SHERWIN
From a Story By Kit Pedler

PLOT SUMMARY
(Taken from the Television Companion, 1st Edition, by David J. Howe and Stephen James Walker)
The TARDIS materialises in England in the 1970s and the time travellers meet a girl named Isobel whose uncle, computer scientist Professor Watkins, has recently gone missing. The Doctor offers to help track him down, starting at the place where he last worked- the London HQ of International Electromatics, the world's major supplier of electronic equipment. His inital suspicions about IE's managing director, Tobias Vaughn, are confirmed after he becomes reaquainted with Lethbridge-Stewart, now promoted to Brigadier and in charge of the British branch of the United Nations Intelligence Task Force (UNIT), and learns that there have been other disappearances at IE premises, He discovers that Vaughn is in league with the Cybermen in a plan to invade Earth, but is also plotting against them with the aim of seizing power for himself. Watkins is being forced by Vaughn to develop the cerebration mentor, a machine designed to generate emotional impulses as a weapon against the Cybermen. The Cybermen immobilise most of the Earth's population- sending a hypnotic siganl through special cicuits incorporated in all IE equipment- and launch their invasion. The Doctor has managed to protect himself and all his friends from the signal and - with help from an embittered Vaughn, who is killed during the fighting- the invasion is
eventually defeated.

PERSONAL REVIEW
BY BARRY STANTON
Before I start my overall review, I'll mention, being born 15 years too late I have never seen the orignal version of this story only the special DVD that came out recently.
It is a great story. Starts off a bit slow, but so do most late sixties stories and the story ebbs and flows having to great high points. The first appearance of the Cybermen at the end of Episode 4 and the start of the invasion with the iconic image of the Cybermen walking down the steps with St Paul's cathedral in the background at the end of Episode 6.
The build up to both cliffhangers is great and you really get the sense of impending danger leading up to the end of Episode 4 and the sense of urgency leading up to the end of Episode 6. Unfortunatley the resolution of the story leaves a little to be desired and peters out when really it should of finshed on a danger and for this reason it shouldn't of been stretched to 8 episodes but rather keep it at 7 episodes.
All in all it shows the best in the Patrick Troughton Era.

RATING
8 out of 10