Inferno’s SSSI – Site of Special Science-fiction Interest

By Danny Nicol

“Inferno” (1970) is one of the finest Doctor Who stories.  It is the first to introduce the idea of parallel universes, and in so doing imagines a fascist Britain.  The plot involves an attempt to drill through the Earth’s crust in order to harness a new power source.  In the parallel-fascist Britain, secrecy, authoritarianism and deference combine to prevent any real resistance to the dangers of the project.  In one of the most tense Doctor Who stories ever broadcast, this leads to the destruction of the planet, and the Doctor has to try to return to our own reality in order to prevent the same fate befalling us.

 

The drilling operation turns humans into Primords 

In The Humanism of Doctor Who, David Layton observes that the negative image of the fascist Britain in “Inferno” is always implied in the “real” Britain of the Doctor Who world (D. Layton, The Humanism of Doctor Who (Jefferson NC and London: McFarland, 2012) 329).  Real Britain still has disparities in social power, rigidity of social structure, an over-reliance on authority and so on.  Thus for Layton the genius of “Inferno” lies in the similarities between the parallel fascist Britain and our own.  

The Doctor encounters the fascist
version of companion Liz Shaw

In a sense, though, Doctor Who imagines alternative universes in each and every episode, through its sustained use of metaphor.  Thus “Inferno” really offers three universes to compare and contrast – fascist Britain, "normal" Doctor Who Britain, and our own Britain.   I am looking forward to hearing a paper on parallel universes in Doctor Who (and Star Trek) from University of Wolverhampton academics Dr Aidan Byrne and Dr Mark Jones at the “Politics and Law of Doctor Who Symposium”, for further insights into “Inferno”.

The film location of “Inferno” is the Kingsnorth Industrial Estate on the surreal Hoo Peninsula in north Kent, an area I know and love.  Here am I on the quirkily-named promontory Horrid Hill, with the Kingsnorth Industrial Estate in the background across the estuary of the River Medway.   

Bleak house: the "Inferno" film location looms through the mist

The area forms “Boris Island”, the piece of land which the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, wishes to turn into London’s main airport replacing Heathrow.  Yet this rural Peninsula contains fruit farms (Kent being famously “the garden of England"), the marshes in which Charles Dickens based Great Expectations and two huge RSPB bird reserves.  It has a remarkable sense of remoteness despite being close to London.  The “Inferno” location itself is incongruously surrounded by countryside: just outside its perimeter fence are marshes teeming with waterfowl. 

The protected “green belt” which surrounds Britain’s cities is essential not just for those who live there but for those who don’t – city dwellers who need greenery and space.  It provides respite from the insatiable concreting-over of our country.  The London Mayor believes “Boris Island” would be good for business: thankfully many business leaders disagree.  Nonetheless more recent Doctor Who stories have often imagined worlds dominated by corporate interests – and no doubt if “Inferno” were conceived today, the drilling would be a private not public sector operation.  Applying David Layton’s idea, ours is rather too close to these alternative worlds for comfort: the relentless domination of economic concerns over the environment is what “Inferno” rightly warns against.