Because nothing says “high drama” like an evil garden gnome that wants to eat your planet.
Short Synopsis
The Doctor and Adric are summoned to the peaceful Union of Traken, where a dying Keeper warns that evil is on the rise. Sure enough, a malevolent statue called Melkur is causing chaos. Spoiler: it’s the Master, squatting in a garden ornament until he can steal a new body.
Extended Storyline
The Doctor, still traveling with Adric (for reasons unknown to science), receives a summons from the Keeper of Traken — a wizened old figure in a floaty chair who looks like he wandered in from a Shakespearean rehearsal. The Keeper rules over the Union of Traken, a supposedly peaceful society held together by something called “the Source.” Think of it as a magical Wi-Fi hotspot that powers the entire planet’s order and prosperity.
But the Keeper is dying, and he’s worried. He tells the Doctor that a great evil has infiltrated Traken, threatening to corrupt the Source itself. Naturally, this is Doctor Who, so the evil turns out to be… a statue. Yes, Melkur, a sinister garden ornament that’s been lurking in the grove for years, is suddenly causing mysterious deaths and general mayhem. Locals are scandalized — Traken prides itself on being so good and harmonious that even the most malicious being would eventually just… turn nice by osmosis. Clearly, no one thought to install “evil statue prevention” as part of their utopia plan.
Enter Kassia, a devoted but tragically gullible woman who keeps visiting Melkur in the garden like he’s a therapy rock. Melkur, of course, whispers sweet nothings into her mind, manipulating her into becoming his pawn. She obligingly marries Tremas, a kindly councilor (and Nyssa’s dad), but she’s soon helping the statue engineer a full-on coup of Traken’s ruling council.
The Doctor and Adric are predictably blamed for all the bad stuff happening — because when mysterious deaths occur, it’s always the scruffy guy with the scarf and the teenage boy who looks like he’s about to fail algebra. They spend a large portion of the story either under suspicion, in custody, or sneaking around Traken’s beautifully decorated but poorly guarded sets.
As things escalate, Melkur’s plan becomes clear: he wants to seize control of the Source, effectively making him god of Traken. At the climax, Kassia is tricked into becoming Keeper, only to immediately be possessed and killed as Melkur usurps her place. When the Doctor confronts the statue, the truth comes out — Melkur is none other than the Master, still burned, withered, and clinging to existence after his failed schemes in earlier seasons. He’s been living inside the statue as a kind of life-support husk, waiting for the right moment to hijack something more powerful.
The Doctor nearly manages to stop him, but at the last second, the Master outmaneuvers everyone and takes over the Source. Tremas, poor guy, is left devastated by his wife’s betrayal and death. Worse still, in the cliffhanger ending, Tremas himself becomes the Master’s final victim: hypnotized, frozen, and body-snatched, providing the Master with his shiny new Anthony Ainley look.
Meanwhile, Nyssa is left orphaned and bewildered, though she doesn’t officially join the Doctor yet. Adric is… still there. The Doctor broods about the Master’s return, and fans everywhere brace themselves for a new era of scenery-chewing villainy.