The Doctor returns to Gallifrey, gets accused of murder, ends up in the presidential election, and has to survive a hallucinogenic funhouse designed by sadistic Time Lords. Politics, am I right?
Short Synopsis
Summoned back to Gallifrey, the Doctor arrives just in time to be framed for the assassination of the Lord President. As if that wasn’t enough, he gets dragged into the Matrix — a virtual reality nightmare world full of booby traps — before uncovering the true culprit: the Master, now looking like a walking skeleton with a taste for capes and convoluted schemes.
Extended Storyline
The Doctor receives a telepathic summons to Gallifrey, where the Time Lords are preparing to elect a new President. Unfortunately, he arrives looking like a scruffy bohemian with a bad haircut, which doesn’t do much for his credibility. Things only get worse when he has a vision of the Lord President being assassinated — and is promptly accused of doing it himself.
Since Gallifrey’s justice system seems to work on the principle of “guilty until proven less guilty,” the Doctor has to clear his name while dodging pompous Time Lords in silly hats. Enter the Matrix — not the Keanu Reeves one, but Gallifrey’s own computer-generated hellscape where political enemies try to murder you with flamethrowers, snipers, and the occasional surreal nightmare sequence.
Inside the Matrix, the Doctor faces a deadly assassin (hence the title) who stalks him through swamps, deserts, and creepy graveyards. Tom Baker throws himself into it with gusto, at one point nearly drowning in a swamp because apparently the BBC thought that was safe.
Eventually, the Doctor unmasks the true mastermind: the Master. Only, this isn’t the suave, mustache-twirling Roger Delgado version — this is a rotting, skeletal husk held together by spite, glue, and latex. Desperate to extend his last regeneration, he’s concocted a plan to seize Gallifrey’s power source, the Eye of Harmony, and cheat death. Unfortunately, his plan mostly results in the Doctor foiling him and the Master falling into yet another pit. (It’s practically his signature move at this point.)
With the crisis averted, the Doctor wanders off alone in the TARDIS, leaving Gallifrey to sort out its political mess. And people say Westminster is dysfunctional.