Doctor Who: 10 Behind The Scenes Bust-Ups BBC Doesn't Want You To Know

9. Terrance Dicks Vs. Robert Holmes

Doctor Who The Brain Of Morbius Robin Bland
BBC

A much more amicable falling out during the production of the classic series, the clash between Terrance Dicks and Robert Holmes over the Fourth Doctor serial The Brain Of Morbius does have a happy ending, unlike many examples on this list.

Tasked with bringing the scripts for The Brain Of Morbius to life, Dicks took heavy inspiration from Mary Shelley's classic novel, Frankenstein. He wanted to write a story about a character called Morbius who crash-lands on a planet, forcing his robot servant to build him a new body using random parts from other creatures.

Once his scripts were finished, Dicks jetted off on holiday, and unfortunately, this is where his vision for The Brain Of Morbius took a major hit.

Unsatisfied with the story that Dicks had turned in (and concerned that it would be too expensive to produce) script editor Robert Holmes significantly altered Dicks' scripts, making lots of notable changes - including removing the robot servant entirely.

Naturally, Dicks wasn't too pleased when he read the revised scripts, and he demanded that his name be removed from the serial entirely. In response, Holmes credited the serial to "Robin Bland" - which, reportedly, Dicks was greatly amused by.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!