10 Times Doctor Who Has Ripped Off Other Franchises

3. Classic Adventure Fiction

As well as Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Who has borrowed now and again from classic adventure stories. This started early on with writer Dennis Spooner deciding that John Lucarotti had the serious historical sewn up and choosing to go a more genre route with The Reign of Terror. Yes, it's based on true events but the inspiration is as much The Scarlet Pimpernel as the history. This borrowing of literature for the historical continued with The Smugglers, which draws on such classics as Treasure Island and the Dr Syn novels, and The Highlanders which meshes the Battle of Culloden with many elements of Kidnapped. With the demise of the pure historical, the classic adventure yarns came up less frequently, however they still made the odd appearance. The Talons of Weng-Chiang is a melting pot of literary influences from Holmes to Fu-Manchu, while The Androids of Tara happily remade The Prisoner of Zenda, complete with medieval setting (with added androids). The revived show has not used classic adventure tales as inspiration, instead happier to wink to the audience when they feature a cameo from a famous writer by including elements of their work or even lines of dialogue in the episode. Gareth Roberts had a field day in The Shakespeare Code and The Unicorn and the Wasp.