I do love the 3rd Doctor, and I love how Science fiction his episodes were. There were so many elements of space, like this one, which takes place on Earth, but still has that science fiction side to it, that helps make it so fun (along with such a great doctor, and my favorite companion). This is another of the lost series, so I listened to to it with narration by Frazer Hines, and two episodes are available on the Lost in Time Patrick Troughton DVD.

The TARDIS lands right on the runway at Gatwick Airport in England, and the Doctor (Patrick Troughton), Ben Jackson (Michael Craze), Poly (Anneke Wills) and Jamie McCrimmon (Frazer Hines) all split up and run to avoid arrest, and the TARDIS is taken away by the authorities. Polly ends up the building of Chameleon tours, where she sees a man killed by Spencer (Victor Winding) with a futuristic gun. Spencer reports to his superior, Captain Blade (Donald Pickering) while Polly escapes, and finds the Doctor and Jamie. The trio come and find the body, but are seen by Blade. They go to warn the authorities, but Polly is taken by Blade. The Airport Commandant (Colin Gordon) does not want to believe the doctor, but goes with him and Jamie to Chamelon Tours, to see if there is any truth to the story, but the find no body, nor do they find Polly. After they leave, Spencer opens a crate and brings out a faceless humanoid creature, and the hospital nurse Pinto (Madalena Nicol) comes in with an unconscious air traffic control named Meadows (George Selway) and connects it to the creature, making the creature look like Meadows, and storing his body. The new Meadows returns to Air Traffic control. The Doctor and Jamie see Polly emerge from one of the planes, but the denies knowing them, and says she her name is Michelle and she is from Zurich.

REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS…

Jamie goes and watches the Chamelon Tours kiosk, having followed Polly. There he meets Samantha Briggs (Pauline Collins) from Liverpool. She is looking for her missing brother who when on a Chameleon tour to Rome, but never arrives, even though he sent a postcard from there. With the Doctor the three find more postcards already signed by missing travelers. They also find a monitor looking at the hangar, and see Ben find the real Polly in suspended animation, and then see him frozen by Lade and Spencer. The Doctor rushes off to help.

Jamie and Samantha meet Detective Inspector Crossland (Bernard Kay) who is investigating the missing tourists from Chameleon tours, and realizes that Polly saw his partner getting murdered! The Doctor returns from the hanger having found the unconscious body of Meadows, so he knows he is a fake.

The Doctor and Crossland meet with the Commandant (Colin Gordon) and show him the freezer gun, and talk about the mass kidnappings.The Commandant gives the Doctor the run of the airport for 12 hours to find out more.

Crossland gets on the next Chameleon flight, but is taken by Captain Blade, and shows him that all the passengers on the flight have already disappeared.

Jamie and Samantha return to the Kiosk, and Jamie arranges to get on the next flight to Rome by taking Samantha’s ticket. Samantha meanwhile keeps investigating, and is grabbed by Spencer and taken to nurse Pinto (Madalena Nicol) for duplication.

Jamie takes off in the plane, with an RAF jet in pursuit, but Blade destroys it, and then takes the plane upward. All the passengers have disappeared, and Jamie sneaks off into a space station, finding the passengers have been miniaturized and hidden in drawers. Jamie is caught and locked up.

The Doctor has realized where the planes are going, and he confronts Meadows, threatening to remove his duplicating armband, and Meadows agrees to talk. He tells them how his race was damaged by an explosion on their home world, and lose their identities, and will all die. They need other people’s identities to survive, so they have been stealing humans. They go and find Nurse Pinto, but accidentally remove her armband and she disintegrates, awakening the original nurse Pinto. They release Samantha and learn that Jamie was on the last flight that disappeared.

Jamie meets the director of the Chameleons who is Crossland. He says they have all the people they need and are just going back to get the rest of his people,

The Doctor sets the Commandant to find the originals of the last Chameleons, while he pretends to be Meadows now as the Doctor with Nurse Pinto playing the chameleon version of herself. They get to the space station, but Jamie has been duplicated, letting them know about the Doctor. The Doctor threatens the last Chameleons since their bodies are at the airport, saying they have found the originals (Samantha actually has, since they are hidden in carts at the airport.

The Doctor and Pinto are to be duplicated, but first a Chameleon disintegrated proving that the real staff has been found. Blade and Spencer whose bodies are on earth pull their guns and stage a coup and free the Doctor who negotiates a piece, where all the humans will be released and the Chameleons spared. The Director and Jamie’s duplicate try to take over, but are killed. Blade agrees to the terms, and the freed humans are brought back to Earth.

Jamie says goodbye to Samantha. And Ben and Polly realize that it is the date they left in the Tardis, so the decide to stay, and the Doctor and Jamie go to leave, but see that the TARDIS has been stolen!!

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Another fun adventure. Damn I wish they would find all of these on film someplace!