Gothic stories Gothic stories have become a mainstay of " Doctor Who " , and while Season 13 and 14 are often viewed as the " gothic seasons " of " Doctor Who " , elements of the gothic are present throughout the show ' s history . Gothic novels have formed a part of horror and science fiction literary exploration from the 18th century onwards with ' s novel considered to be the first " gothic " novel . " Gothic literature is devoted primarily to stories of horror , the fantastic , and the “ darker ” supernatural forces . " Novels such as and highlight these elements . One of the elements considered to be a part of gothic fiction is its setting , in an antiquated space such as a " a castle , a foreign place , an abbey , a vast prison , a subterranean crypt , a graveyard , a primeval frontier or island , a large old house or theatre , an ageing city or urban underworld . . . a factory , laboratory . . . some new recreation of an older venue . . . an overworked spaceship , or a computer memory " . Within this space or combination of such spaces are hidden secrets from the past ( sometimes the recent past ) that haunt the characters psychologically , physically , or otherwise at the time of the story . These hauntings can take many forms , but they frequently assume the forms of ghosts , spectres , or monsters ( mixing features from different realms of being , often life and death ) that rise from within or sometimes invade it from other or alien realms . At this level the fictions often oscillate between the " laws of conventional reality and the possibilities of the supernatural " . Gothic fiction often places heavy emphasis on its setting or " atmosphere " , using setting and filmic elements such as music and sound effects to build suspense and a sense of unease in the reader . It also can incorporate a romantic plot or sub - plot . Other key elements of gothic fiction that also flow into gothic horror ( a sub - genre of the gothic ) include literal transformations such as " loss of humanity " transformation of an individual into a beast - like being ( such as werewolf ) . While this is mostly portrayed as a negative action , it is sometimes viewed as a liberating experience for the individuals , but this also leads to an ambiguous interpretation for these individuals , being both good " and " evil . Central characters are often revealed to have or be haunted by a second " unconscious " element to their personalities , or they have split elements of their psychological profiles that often attempt to resolve themselves throughout the piece . Women are often cast in these pieces as in distress or threatened by one of the central ( usually male ) characters . These female characters are typically framed as being a heroine in the piece , both drawing the readers in and making them sympathise with the female character . Doctor Who TV gothic stories . While Season 13 and Season 14 are often seen as the " most " gothic of " Doctor Who " ' s stories , they are not the " first " to explore this genre . 1965 ' s " The Rescue " , often seen as just an introductory story for new companion Vicki Pallister , has all the elements of a gothic story . The planet Dido is the " antiquated space " , both the planet and the spaceship that Vicki and Bennet share . Koquillion is the being haunting Vicki , and Bennet and Vicki ' s relationship forms a somewhat twisted father - substitute relationship . Both Vicki and Barbara take lead roles as the lead female characters placed in distress forming another part of the gothic genre ' s element . The natives of Dido also take up the mantle of the haunters , being almost unseen while the impression of them is felt throughout the story : the traps within the caves and the Doctor ' s relating of his previous meeting with them , presenting the natives of Dido as a duality of character , much like Koquillion and Bennet ' s duality , in a much style echoing Jekyll and Hyde ' s duality in " The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde " . In the 1971 Jon Pertwee story " The Dæmons " there is a much more literal form of " gothic " , with a story set in the middle of the occult , with grotesques coming to life . The burrow is a quintessential " old space " , with the crypt below the church also fulfilling this mark of a gothic story . There is also the haunting that Azal brings , both in the form of the heat barrier around the township and the more literal haunting from Bok ' s presence . There are many " hidden secrets " throughout this story , from the literal " secret within " freezing the Doctor to the more revelatory of the Dæmons ' effect on Earth ' s culture . Again there is the romantic sub - plot of Jo ' s love for the Doctor , in willingness to give herself to Azal for the Doctor . In the story ' s final minutes the church , the main area below which Azal grouped his followers , is destroyed , lifting the gothic elements from the story at its close . By the mid - 70s , and with the change in producer and script editor to Philip Hinchcliffe and Robert Holmes , a new production strategy was adopted , with stories leaning towards a more gothic , or in some cases horror , aesthetic . This was for Robert Holmes to attempt to differentiate the programme from the era of Barry Letts , Terrance Dicks and Jon Pertwee , following " Revenge of the Cybermen " , that Robert Holmes described as " only for children ( and that it was ) too straight forward and therefore rather dull . " Season 12 can be viewed as more of a testing ground for the stories that would follow in Season 14 and beyond , with its mix of phasing out of UNIT in " Robot " and the aforementioned " children ' s story " of " Revenge of the Cybermen " . " Genesis of the Daleks " , while not usually associated with the " gothic " of " Doctor Who " , does have many elements of the gothic genre : an oppressive environment and the domes of the Kaled and Thal s form the main setting . It is the Doctor and Sarah ' s future knowledge of the Daleks ' future deeds ( and the audience ' s knowledge of this ) that haunts the characters throughout this story , with elements of horror and possession following the Doctor ' s attack by the mutant Daleks . " Genesis of the Daleks " provides a view into the future stories that would come to be known as " Doctor Who ' s " gothic period . " The Ark in Space " , meanwhile , also delves into the gothic genre , but explores the nature of horror to a greater degree than any stories in this season , especially the themes of " body horror " ( explored in further detail below ) . In the seasons that followed , " Doctor Who " stories began to be literally set within gothic worlds of oppressive and hostile environments , castles , jungles and the exploration of horror . With Season 13 , " Doctor Who " begins to redefine how its stories are told . The title character of the Doctor is " reinstated as alien outcast in this period – moving away from the avuncular , patriarchal father figure of Pertwee - and became a figure representative of the Gothic novel ' s tragic outsider , at odds with himself , society and the cosmos . " In " Terror of the Zygons " , the first story of Season 13 , the beginnings of the gothic begin to make themselves known : the juxtapositioning between the sedentary setting of the village pub and the alien hands manipulating controls on the Zygons ' spaceship , Angus the barman claiming to possess the second sight , whilst he himself is monitored ( or " haunted " ) . There are also once more , as seen in " The Ark in Space " , elements of body horror and possession , with the Zygons taking on the forms of humans , not a literal possession , but one that is explored to great effect when the Harry Sullivan - Zygon is killed . Yet more juxtapositioning is found between the main locations found in this story : the pub , an old classical setting ; the Zygon ship , alien and foreign to all the main cast ; and the infirmary , a modern sleek location , but also alien compared to the others . There is also the appearance of a castle leading into the Zygons ' ship , wrapping up the gothic elements , with the castle being linked to the Zygon ship and by extension the pub ( as it was being monitored ) and the infirmary ( Sister Lamont ' s domain ) . With " Planet of Evil " begins the theme of borrowing literally from gothic literature . In " Planet of Evil " the transformation of Sorenson through his own experimentations is an almost literal reference to " The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde " . However the gothic references do not stop here ; the Zeta Minor forest fulfills the " primeval frontier " together with the anti - matter monsters haunting the Morestran ship as it attempts to leave . Philip Hinchcliffe even admitted that he liked to borrow such conventions as this , stating , " What I liked to do was to go to a literary convention or a science fiction convention . . . and borrow the trappings of it , and then re - dress that up within the " Doctor Who format . " " With " Pyramids of Mars " the gothic genre is explored further , with Sutekh imprisoned in his " castle " on Mars , the duality of the Scarman brothers ; Marcus being possessed by Sutekh whilst Lawrence the " believer " being killed by manifestations of man and by extension , his brother . The brotherly relationship is also mirrored by Sutekh and Horus ' relationship mentioned in the story . The following story , " The Android Invasion " , may seem like something less of a gothic story than others in this season , but it does contain elements of gothic . One such is the torture of the hero - the Doctor in this case . Previous stories , " The Ark in Space " , " Terror of the Zygons " , " Planet of Evil " and " Planet of Evil " , have had the Doctor tortured , a common theme in gothic literature . This story continues the trend . In addition , this story revisited a major Gothic theme : " the doppelganger . This literature of duality , most potently evoked in Stevenson ' s " Jekyll and Hyde " or Oscar Wilde ' s " The Picture Of Dorian Gray " , was at its heart about identity or lack of identity . The androids of Sarah , Benton and Harry exemplified this slippage of identity , the fragmentation of the self . The Doctor ' s duplicated companions become masked , both hiding secrets that speak of another self and haunted by their real selves . " The fifth story of Season 13 , " The Brain of Morbius " borrows heavily from Mary Shelley ' s " Frankenstein " . Morbius ' body is created by Soloman within his castle . With this story begins some more violent and more horrific elements of Doctor Who . In this story there is decapitation , strangulation , and blood - splatter from gunshots . The Doctor is again tortured and Sarah is gassed into blindness . The story also mimics elements of horror films , most notably " Frankenstein " , with the monster and the crowd wielding torches at the story ' s ending . With the final story of season 13 , it ' s a return to elements of " The Ark in Space " . " The Seeds of Doom " features a horror transformation of a man into a monster , set within a large country estate and with a ( mad ) lord of the estate prodding his experiment along . There are also gothic elements of science perverting nature and being triumphed by it : the Krynoid and its transformation into a house sized monster , eventually defeated by UNIT ' s laser technology . With Season 14 there is a new and revisited exploration of the " gothic " . " The Masque of Mandragora " typifies a classic gothic setting , with crypts and alien possession , all set within a classic gothic setting . The possession by the Helix and Count Frederico are paralleled together with Guiliano stating at one point that under his uncle ' s rule , " All attempt at learning would be repressed " . Again the references between learning ( science ) and superstition rear their heads in this story . " The Hand of Fear " , the last story to feature Sarah Jane Smith , again features familiar ground of possession , torture , haunting , castles and parallels between technology and superstition . Sarah Jane Smith is possessed by Eldrad , the Doctor is tortured by Eldrad , and Eldrad is haunted by his people . Kastria is quite literally an antiquated space . In the story ' s close the Doctor is summoned home via a " higher power " . With " The Deadly Assassin " , the first solo " Doctor Who " adventure , the story plunges into new territory and familiar elements . The Doctor is tortured , both within the Matrix and on Gallifrey . Everything within the Matrix can be viewed as both a time of possession and haunting . Indeed , the Master and Goth ' s presence on Gallifrey and within the Matrix are hauntings : Goth , a figure from the Doctor ' s Gallifrey - based past and the Master , an individual he has crossed paths with on numerous occasions . With Goth serving the Master and the Doctor himself ( and therefore enlightenment ) , with the Master literally representing darkness in his blackened and burnt attire and seeking to de - stabilise the Eye of Harmony . The setting of Gallifrey is also of gothic nature , of senility and decline . An alternate reading of the Master ' s situation is that it is mirroring the decay of Time Lord civilisation , with the Master lurking beneath the Panopticon in an allusion to the Phantom from " Phantom of the Opera " . It was in " The Deadly Assassin " that one of the better known sequences in which the Doctor is ( once again ) tortured raised the ire of Mary Whitehouse - at the end of episode 3 the Doctor is almost drowned by Goth . In both " The Face of Evil " and " The Robots of Death " , there are explorations of self and mimicry , with both stories exploring the nature of god - hood and hauntings , with the Doctor being both god and haunted in " The Face of Evil " , and in " The Robots of Death " Taren Capel is god and haunts his fellow crew members through his automaton . Likewise in setting , they both have the classical elements of a gothic tale : a remote location under attack from a mysterious force , a futuristic world where technology is fighting back in the case of " The Robots of Death " and a villainous man who betrays his own side to the enemy , before they fight back and destroy him as well . " The Talons of Weng - Chiang " the final story of Season 14 , is a Victorian gothic tale . Sherlock Holmes is one of the story ' s most obvious influences with the Doctor dressing as Holmes himself . Leela has been " cast " into the role of a femme fatale , both becoming the type and subverting it within the realms of her character . Lawrence Miles and Tat Wood best describe this story as " " Doctor Who " does Victorian Hammer Horror " , but in all honesty no single Hammer film is as accomplished as this . Checklist of Victorian / Sherlock Holmes / Fu Manchu / " Phantom of the Opera " standards here " With all these references , this story can often seem to be almost a pastiche of the genre , and yet it is something of a favourite in " Doctor Who Magazine " polls and amongst the fan - community in general . It is likely " because " of these familiar elements that this story is so appealing to fans and non - fans alike , with its recognisable gothic and other genre fiction elements : Greel the masked villain , the Doctor in a culturally recognisable manner of Sherlock Holmes , with two identifiable sidekicks of Jago and Litefoot . Brought together like this , it manages to cover " all the bases of classic Doctor Who : the action , the humour , the wit , the thrilling ride . . . this is the acme of everything that early , gothic " Doctor Who " was trying to achieve . " With the departure of Philip Hinchcliffe at the end of Season 14 , his influence over " Doctor Who " ' s genre mix declined . However there were several more stories that continued to be influenced by the gothic . " State of Decay " rightly feels as though it is part of Season 13 / 14 , mostly because it was an undeveloped script from Terrance Dicks and script - editor at the time , Robert Holmes . It was developed ( though unused at the time ) under the title " The Witch Lords " . Bram Stoker ' s " Dracula " is one of many stories to have influenced creation of this story , with director Peter Moffatt eager to accentuate the Hammer Horror elements of this story . However script editor Christopher H Bidmead re - edited the story ' s script to downplay these elements of the story to give it more of a science based grounding . This does not stop the standard gothic genre elements appearing in this story : with spaceship as a castle , the atmosphere of a downtrodden populace , secret wars from the Doctor and Romana ' s races ' past and even something of a mixed romance possession sub - plot through Adric . The era of Fifth Doctor Peter Davison has less truly gothic stories than Tom Baker ' s before it , " Black Orchid " is occasionally attributed as a piece of gothic television , with its scarred anti - villain of George Crangleigh adopting a " Phantom of the Opera " role . The story does take place within an antiquated space ( viewed through the main cast ) but it is lacking in any atmosphere to really define the gothic elements of the story . In " The Caves of Androzani " Robert Holmes revisits an element of his past stories , with a masked figure , seen previously in " The Talons of Weng - Chiang " . Here Sharaz Jek is the madman in his underground lair , who fulfills another of the elements of gothic , last seen in force in " The Android Invasion " : doppelgangers , and once again these are android doppelgangers . What really brings this story into the gothic though is the intensity of the story , brought to life by director Graeme Harper . There is genuine atmosphere and believability to every scene , Peri ' s poisoning by the spectrox rapidly devolves , placing ever more emphasis on the two men vying for her attention : the Doctor and Jek , with Jek attempting to resolve elements of his personality and appearance towards his love , Peri . It is in his final moments , having saved Peri , that the Doctor goes through the ultimate transformation , facing his inner " unconscious " , and regenerates . In Sylvester McCoy ' s portrayal of the Seventh Doctor , particularly in his later seasons , a darker , more subdued Doctor is present and the stories likewise take on a more malevolent nature . " Ghost Light " , like " The Dæmons " before it , focuses on an alien scientist attempting to catalogue everything . In this story there is an ever present dark humour , with such elements as Reverend Ernest Matthews , a reverend who disbelieved Josiah Smith ' s theories of evolution , devolved to an ape . Again , as with " The Talons of Weng - Chiang " , the setting is a literal manifestation of the gothic theme : a Victorian gothic manor house , one that literally haunts Ace . Prose and audio based gothic . With the end of television - based " Doctor Who " in the late 1990s , prose , audio and comic - based gothic stories took the lead , with some novels such as " The Shadow of Weng - Chiang " taking their thematic lead from television stories , whilst audio story " The Stones of Venice " , with its hundred - year curse , a duke moping for his lost love and a cult readying for her resurrection , and Venice ' s gondoliers , is an all too present reminder of the city sinking beneath the waves . Doctor Who TV gothic stories : Redux . When " Doctor Who " returned to television in 2005 it brought a new group of writers , many of whom had grown up on " Doctor Who ' s " past stories . They had also been part of a larger cultural mediascape , aware of the tropes and genres of modern fiction . Even with this knowledge everything was " ramped up to the max , including Gothic genre tropes . The barbaric forces of the past became the Time War . . . Contemporary anxieties are addressed more regularly than ever , with Daleks becoming religious zealots and the Master as a smarmy policy - free Prime Minister . Gothic ' s other obsession ( sex ) finally figures , with unrequited love and ambivalent sexual relationships as recurring story lines . Lawrence Miles has even suggested a reading of " The Parting of the Ways " in which the Dalek army is vanquished by an unfulfilled Rose Tyler ' s time - space orgasm . " More specifically the third story of 2005 , " The Unquiet Dead " , once more revisits elements of the gothic : aliens seeking direct possession of the dead . With a more supernatural theme than scientific , this story veers away from " Doctor Who " ' s usual scientific explanations of such things . This is also the true beginning of the haunting of Rose Tyler , albeit a haunting from her own future . Both of 2006 ' s " The Impossible Planet " and " The Satan Pit " have many forms of gothic , with possession , haunting and body horror as Toby Zed is possessed by the Beast , in addition to the claustrophobic atmosphere of the Sanctuary base and the additional haunting of the masses of Ood massing around the group , with the Doctor as a tiny figure confronting the mass ( implied ) evil being of the Beast , yet defeated by the innocent ( Rose ) . By 2007 , with " The Lazarus Experiment " , it is a return to familiar territory of body horror and the transformation of humanity , with extra emphasis on the gothic with the final scenes of the story occurring within a gothic church . Stories penned by Steven Moffat have come to take on a further gothic edge with familiar ideas of possession and haunting present throughout stories such as " The Empty Child " , " Blink " and " The Time of Angels " . With 2010 ' s " The Pandorica Opens " and " The Big Bang " , there was something of a resurgence of the gothic doppelganger , combined with an inversion of body horror aesthetic with the appearance of Rory Williams as an Auton duplicate . An Auton duplicate had appeared previously in the new series with a duplicate of Mickey Smith in the 2005 series ' first episode " Rose " . However this was very much a comical appearance and only briefly veered into a dangerous framing . With Rory however , there is a duality to his role within the doppelganger genre of gothic , as he is also possessed / psychologically tortured by the duality of his Auton " heritage " , with Amy Pond also leading a dual role throughout their interaction as heroine and hero , heroine and sympathiser to Rory and heroine , tortured and ultimately killed by him as his body transforms and he is unable to resist the " dark side " of himself . Torchwood . With the arrival of " Torchwood " in 2006 , its stories were generally far darker and more mature than those that had gone before in " Doctor Who " . In the very first story , " Everything Changes " , the use of the Resurrection gauntlet evokes a theme of resurrection and life - giving similar to " Frankenstein " . However the whole of the series is an exercise in elements of gothic , with hauntings , romance , death and possession . Practically all characters in " Torchwood " pass through all elements of the gothic . " Torchwood " can be seen , if nothing else , " to offer a far more reparative exploration of subjectivity and desire than most popular culture – underscoring possibility , pleasure , understanding , belonging and healing . That ' s precisely what the pansexual postmodern postcolonial gothic is all about " . Horror . In looking at the " gothic " it is also necessary to look at the role that horror plays in the formulation of gothic stories , with gothic fiction often viewed as a sub - set of the horror genre . The horror sub - type that is most often explored in " Doctor Who " ( and its spin - offs ) is body horror , most succinctly described by TV Tropes . org as " Someone is about to turn into a monster . Or they have something inside them that is definitely not supposed to be there . Or they wake up to find that they are missing some bits . " Stories such as " The Ark in Space " , " The Seeds of Doom " and " Vengeance on Varos " explore this theme with some veracity . Noah , the " primary unit " in " The Ark in Space " , transforms into a Wirrn in a shocking and horrific transformation for both the character and audience ; likewise " The Seeds of Doom " features several detailed scenes of bodily transformation , with even Sarah Jane Smith threatened with becoming a Krynoid at one point in the story . In " Vengeance on Varos " it is almost the reverse as a masked scientist performs experiments on women to his master ' s perverted glee . This horror transformation is not limited to one off examples , but also two of " Doctor Who ' s " most popular villains : the Cybermen and the Daleks ; the true horrifying nature of the Cybermen is realised in " Attack of the Cybermen " with half - converted humanoids in various stages of transformation . It is true that earlier ' 60s era stories showed humans partially converted ; in them it was a psychological horror more in keeping with the gothic , whilst in " Attack of the Cybermen " it becomes a more viceral horror . 1985 ' s " Revelation of the Daleks " is the first literal body horror of the Daleks , with a man literally pleading with his " daughter " to kill him from within the casing of a Dalek . Prose and audio horror . Prose and audio stories also pursue the horror element , with 1992 ' s Virgin New Adventures novel " Love and War " exploring in vivid detail the " body horror " with the transformation of several individuals , a church glorifying this monster - transformation and the Doctor ( with knowledge of the events ) manipulating Ace who was framed as a powerful " hero " into the role of betrayed ( somewhat ) powerless heroine . Ace ' s character from this point would undergo something of a rewrite and reversal of events portrayed in this novel ; this is just one example of Virgin ' s era of novels . During BBC Books ' Eighth and Past Doctor range of novels there were several other novels that explored this genre and style .