The Moonbase - Plot

Plot

The TARDIS makes a bumpy landing on the Moon in the year 2070 and, dressed in spacesuits, the Second Doctor and his companions Jamie, Polly and Ben venture outside and enjoy the low gravity environment. Jamie is injured while they fool around.

The only building on that part of the moon’s surface is the Moonbase, a weather tracking and managing station which is staffed by an international crew managed by the bullish Hobson. They are using the gravity machine the Gravitron to control the Earth’s weather. When the time travellers arrive, the Doctor ingratiates them in the usual manner and is on hand to do some detective work because some of the crew have been collapsing in comas with a strange virus that spreads throughout the body. International Space Control responds to the crisis by quarantining the Moonbase. The station doctor, Evans, was the first one to get the disease and in a delirium talks of a silver hand but immediately dies of the disease.

Something is definitely amiss because another of the Moonbase crew, Ralph, has disappeared in the food stores, and they have also noticed the Moonbase radio transmissions are being monitored from somewhere else on the moon. Jamie has been placed in the sickbay where, feverish and delirious, he begins mumbling about a “Phantom Piper”, a figure which appears to McCrimmon before he dies. While attending to Jamie, Polly sees a large figure leave through the door. When Hobson, The Doctor, Ben, John and Nils arrive to collect Evans' body it has disappeared. They then leave to investigate where this 'piper' is. Polly goes to get some water, and Jamie wakes up to see the 'piper' advancing on him.

The 'piper' ignores Jamie, as he doesn't have the disease, so he steals another patient and leaves. Polly comes back in just as the figure is leaving and recognises it as a Cyberman, and the Doctor realises their old enemies are stalking the Moonbase and taking the patients' bodies. Hobson brushes away the cyber-story, believing they died out years ago. He gives the Doctor 24 hours to discover the cause of the virus, or else he leaves the moon.

While Hobson deals with the Gravitron, which is becoming difficult to control with fewer staff, the Doctor decides to focus on the cause of the viral disease. In the sickbay, Polly and Jamie are attacked by a Cyberman, which stuns them with electricity from his hand (which was used to stun Ralph) and subsequently leaves with another patient's body.

It is discovered that the Gravitron isn't working because some antennae on the Moon's surface are broken. Jools and Franz go out to fix them but are ambushed by two Cybermen (on whom the low gravity has no significant effect) and beaten to death. The Doctor can't work out the cause of the disease and is ordered to leave by Hobson. Polly makes some coffee and another crewmember gets infected. The Doctor works out the neurotropic virus has been spread through infected sugar from the food stores – and is thus an organised scheme to destabilise the crew. The humans have searched the base and found nowhere to hide a Cyberman. At that moment, a Cyberman who had been posing as a patient in bed reveals himself and aims his gun at them.

Another Cyberman emerges and kills Bob when he tries to attack the other with a metal bar. The Cybermen recognise the Doctor and use their weapons to take control of the central control centre of the Moonbase, while confining Polly and Ben to the sickbay. The Cybermen reveal that they want to use the Gravitron to destroy all life on Earth by altering the weather.

On board the cyber-ship Evans, Jools and Ralph are conditioned to obey the Cybermen like zombie slaves. They are taken to the base and are sent into the heart of the Gravitron to subvert the machine. The Cybermen have been entering and leaving the base using a tunnel that goes into the food stores, explaining the drops in air pressure.

Using fire extinguishers, nail varnish remover and other objects that dissolve plastic, Ben, Polly and a recovered Jamie lead a fightback from their incarceration in the medical wing. The three Cybermen in the initial attack force are destroyed.

Benoit goes outside to see what happened to Jools and Franz. He only finds their spacesuits, and is caught and chased around by a Cyberman. Ben puts some of the solvent in a bottle and goes out. He then throws the bottle at the Cyberman's chest unit, killing it and saving Benoit. The crew block off the hole in the food stores to prevent more Cybermen entering. The cybership is located, but to the crew's horror, a large squad of Cybermen start advancing on the Moonbase.

They advance on the Moonbase through the vacuum of the Moon’s surface. Two Cybermen on the surface damage the aerial, preventing the Moonbase from contacting Earth; however a relief ship is on the way. The Cybermen use radio beams to reactivate their zombies inside the base, who infiltrate the Gravitron and use it to deflect a relief ship sent by Earth into the sun. A hole is blasted in the wall, which depressurises the base, but Hobson and Benoit use a coffee tray to plug the leak. The depressurisation deactivates Evans and the other zombies.

Two more cyberships arrive (one of these blasted the hole). The Cybermen already on the surface erect a large laser cannon and threaten to blow the base open unless the entry port is opened within 10 seconds. They fire, but the beam is deflected by the Gravitron, so the Cybermen pack the cannon away. Another large squad from one of the other cyberships take up positions around the base. With the help of Hobson, Polly and Benoit, the Doctor points the Gravitron at the lunar surface, which blasts the Cybermen and their ships away into space.

As Hobson and his team reorientate the Gravitron to its proper use, the Doctor and his companions slip away. Back in the TARDIS they dematerialise, and then activate the rarely-used time scanner to reveal a monstrous claw waving around.