Here’s a review of the classic Doctor Who series episode Kinda which has been released as part of the Mara Tales Box set.
The episode, my favourite classic episode, has recently been released on DVD. The picture quality is superb, having been digitally restored. There are even new CGI effects which can be chosen if one prefers. The story was well known for its not so good rubber snake… 🙂
The recent James Cameron movie Avatar was influenced very much by this story, even though Avatar was too pessimistic and anti-human, while Kinda is pro-human and a much more positive story.
It’s worth watching indeed. The enemy is the evil entity, coming from the collective unconscious, known as the Mara. I wrote my first fanfic from which the WhoSliders series emerged as a sequel to the Mara stories in Doctor Who, so it’s worth viewing if you read my fics. It takes a spiritual and anthropological approach to sci-fi pioneered by Ursula K. Le Guin.
Humans from earth are about to colonise planet S14, known to the locals as Deva Loka (the location is revisited in my fics too and Hindle becomes a WhoSlider). And the ancient evil known as the Mara emerges in the subconscious of the Doctor’s companion Tegan (played by the wonderful Janet Fielding). Nyssa is kept out of the story as she is recuperating.
The episode features Peter Davison as the 5th Doctor, Janet Fielding as Tegan, Matthew Waterhouse as Adric, Nerys Hughes as Todd, Simon Rouse as Hindle and Adrian Mills as Aris. It was directed by Peter Grimwade and written by Christopher Bailey. It is really worth getting on DVD and viewing. You can get from the following Amazon uk link..
This is the crossover fanfic in my series featuring Doctor Who (the Fifth Doctor – played by Peter Davison in the classic BBC tv series) – and the Sliders.
Story (C) 2001-2016 Mr SciRev.
For the Dr Who Timeline Related to this Fanfic, or to read what happened just before this fanfic, please see Who Sliders 3
General fanfic-timeline commentary is presented in blue
What you need to know:
“The Doctor is a Time Lord – a time-traveller from the alien world called Gallifrey who travels in space and time thanks to his TARDIS which looks like a police box, bigger inside than outside. When the Doctor is severely injured or even killed, he will regenerate into a new appearance and body. He is currently in his fifth incarnation (4th regeneration). His thirteenth will be the last.
The Sliders have developed a technique called Sliding which allows them to go to different dimensions or parallel universes, but will they ever find the way to their home universe?
The Doctor with his companions – currently an Australian hostess named Tegan, Hindle ( a previously deranged soldier from a future earth colony ), young irritating genius Adric, alien orphan and technological expert Nyssa and the Sliders – is on a crusade to champion the cause of the innocent, the helpless and the powerless throughout the whole multiverse of multiple universes. The Doctor’s alteration to the Sliders’ timeline has resulted in multiple changes across various multiverse timelines in hypertime. Fixing these holes is an important task of the Doctor which has been sanctioned by an angel of God called the White Guardian.”
After they said their goodbyes – for the time being to Colin – and promised that they would return to pick him up, they left in the TARDIS, it dematerialised.
“On the TARDIS viewscreen, Doctor, quick! It’s Colin, stranded in the timestream! Well this is when he met us first. But who’s that woman next to him?” Tegan said.
The Doctor manipulated the TARDIS controls so that the TARDIS briefly materialised around the two, in such a way that the two found themselves inside the TARDIS control room, together with everyone else.
Quinn asked the Doctor how could this be possible and the Doctor promptly replied that a space-time bubble was formed around the two to allow them to do this.
‘Ah’, Quinn said. ‘I think I understand.’
‘Humans’, the Doctor thought.
‘The two are basically all that’s left over from the previous timeline, which was wiped out.’ the Doctor said as a deduction from the results of the scans of the two.
‘Cool’, Remmy said. ‘We could get them to tell us what would had happened if we hadn’t met the Doctor, i.e. how their timeline was.’
‘They have slipped through the cracks of our reality change just like Colonel Rickman did.” the Doctor smiled.
‘A little problem. We were supposed to have found Colin after Hindle leaves. While Hindle is still here! So this means some reality change has occurred again. I hope it is for the better’ the Doctor continued.
Once the two got used to their surroundings, it was clear that the pair were Colin who was stuck between parallel dimensions, due to Dr Geiger’s egotistical experiment in the previous timeline or reality. Dr Geiger wanted to alter the genetic makeup of a handicapped youth, by extracting DNA from the Sliders who travelled between parallel worlds. He had managed to combine the youth with Quinn, who became a single person, which they had called Mallory.
But Colin, Quinn’s brother, was left lost within the Sliding Vortex. Until now. The reality alteration resulted in him being freed.
But who was the other woman with Colin? “Would he know her”, Wade thought, almost with a hint of jealousy.
“I’m Maggie, one of the Sliders.” She said. “Quinn! Professor! You’re alive?”
“So Quinn, tell me, how did you get unmerged?”
“I don’t know you Maggie.. if that’s your name. We don’t know you.” Quinn answered.
“What? You must be a parallel version of my Quinn.” she replied.
“Your Quinn?” Wade was getting angry now.
After some time they managed to explain that the previous timeline had been altered drastically. They also explained to Colin how they had met his self from a day or two in the future, and how they would pick him up after he disappeared somehow. Maggie and Colin explained many things which had happened in their original timeline. This included the fact that Maggie’s parallel earth had been wiped out by a pulsar’s deadly radiation. Only Colonel Rickman, herself and a few others from her world had survived, in her timeline. In the new timeline, she was probably dead. She asked whether the Doctor could take them there but he said it probably would involve the Blinovitch Limitation, and that would be dangerous. “The fact you are here means that the version of yourself in the new timeline has died, unfortunately” the Doctor sighed. There really was nothing even he could do.
“What about the Remmy from the original timeline? What about Mallory and Diana?” Maggie asked. “The Remmy I was with had just slid to Earth-Prime, after injecting himself with antibodies which can kill the Kromaggs. Has all our effort been destroyed?” she asked.
“We have more pressing concerns right now. I can help you deal with your Kromaggs in due course. You should be aware that your timeline’s Colonel Rickman is alive and still sliding as far as we can tell. He attacked all of us here as well as the X-Men.” the Doctor explained.
“The X-Men?” Maggie was curious.
“Superheroes from a parallel earth – basically people born with an altered mutant genes which give them amazing abilities”, Adric explained.
Maggie could only say “Ah”. Years ago she would not have thought superheroes existed, not even in her wildest dreams, but after all she saw in her Slides, this was not an impossibility.
Nyssa scanned the surroundings for further potential lifeforms.
“One other lifeform is present not far away.” Nyssa said, and prepared for taking the lifeform on board.
They discovered it was actually Diana, an intelligent scientist who worked for Dr Geiger. She had joined the Sliders in the previous timeline.
Maggie was overjoyed to find one other person from the previous timeline, one who shared her memories. She was glad to be still alive, knowing that in this new timeline she should have died on her parallel earth. Suddenly Maggie was thoughtful. Diana asked her what the reason was.
Scifi Reviews, Doctor Who, Sliders, Stargate Fanfics & Fanart
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