The Time Lords send the Doctor and Jo to the planet Solos to deliver a mysterious message to an unknown party. Solos is about to become independent from Earth, to the chagrin of its sadistic Marshal, whose hobby is to hunt Solonian Mutants. He commissions a Solonian to murder the Earth Administrator and plans to oxygenize Solos's atmosphere. Ky, a Solonian unjustly accused of the murder, takes Jo with him to the planet's surface. The Doctor escapes from the Marshal  and tries to find them. On the surface he meets Sondergaard, a doctor who is searching for a cure for the mutating disease which threatens the Solonians. The Doctor, recaptured, is forced to perfect the Marshal's oxygenizing machine. Sondergaard gives Ky a crystal which turns him first into a mutant then a super-being. The crystal - found in a cave indicated by the Time Lords' message - enables Ky to kill the Marshal, present his case to the newly arrived Earth Investigator, and help the rest of the Solonians to evolve into super-beings too, part of a century long evolution process. 
.
.


The Doctor:  Jon Pertwee
Jo Grant: Katy Manning

Guest Appearances:
Marshal: Paul Whitson-Jones
Administrator: Geoffrey Palmer
Stubbs: Christopher Coll
Cotton: Rick James
Varan: James Mellor
Varan's Son: Jonathan Sherwood
Ky: Garrick Hagon
Jaeger: George Pravda
Sondergaard: John Hollis
Old Men: Sidney Johnson, David J. Graham
Solos Guard: Roy Pearce
Guard Warrior: David Arlen
Guards: Damon Sanders, Martin Taylor
Investigator: Peter Howell
Mutts: John Scott Martin, Mike Torres, Eddie Sommer, Laurie Goode, Nick Thompson Hill, Mike Mungarvan, Ricky Newby, Bill Gosling
Bodyguard: Steve Ismay
Overlord Guard: Terry Walsh
Exit Guard: Joe Santo
.
.

Producer: Barry Letts.
Script Editor: Terrence Dicks.
Writer: Bob Baker and Dave Martin.
Director: Christopher Barry.
Designer: Jeremy Bear. 
Costume: James Acheson.
Make up: Joan Barrett.
Visual Effects: John Horton.
Music : Tristram Cary.
.
.


Novelised as "Doctor Who And The Mutants"  by Terrence Dicks  (0 426 11690 9) first published by Wyndham Publications (now Virgin Publishing Ltd.) in 1977 with cover by Jeff Cummins.  Target library number 44.

.
.

a
Not yet released on video.

.

.

"The Mutants" is actually the second serial to be called by that name, the first being the original Dalek serial, now known as "The Daleks".
The story experienced a variety of set design problems, including fire regulation troubles with the Marshal's office, missing corridors, props and set pieces.

All six episodes exist in color as follows: episodes 1 & 2 as PAL conversions from NTSC 2" color videotape recovered in Canada in 1979. Episodes 3-6 as PAL 2" color videotape. 16mm black & white telerecordings also exist.

Studio recording in TC3. (27-28 February 1972)
Studio recording in TC4. (22, 28-29 February 1972)
Studio recording in TC8. (13-14 March 1972)
Western Quarry, Bean Road, Northfleet, Kent. (7-8 February 1972)
Stone House Farm, Lower Rochester Road, Frindsbury, Kent. (9-10 February 1972)
Chislehurst Caves, Old Hill, Chiselhurst, Kent. (10-12 February 1972)

Episode 1 -After the mysterious package arrives, the Doctor tells Jo "I couldn't open it even if I wanted to" twice in the same speech.
Episode 2 - As the Administrator comes in to talk to the Doctor, there's a very loud creaking noise from somewhere on the set.
Episode 2 - When Ky and Jo dematerialise in the transmat booth on Skybase, Ky is holding Jo in front of him. But when they rematerialise on Solos, they are facing each other, talking.
Episode 2 - Just after the Doctor stops Stubbs from shooting Varan in the herbarium, a boom mike drops into view in the top-left corner of the picture for several seconds.
Episode 3 - During a "firestorm" on Solos, we see Skybase being hit by flaming debris. But Skybase is in orbit around Solos, completely above the atmosphere where the firestorm is.
Episode 4 - On several occasions, the movement of the cloaks worn by Varan's warriors reveals that their "Mutt" vertebrae are simply stuck onto their cloaks, not attached to their bodies.
Episode 4 - The ending of this episode defies belief. A hole in Skybase the size of the one Varan gets sucked out of should have caused a violent, almost-immediate depressurisation of the whole of Skybase. Yet Jo and the others can scramble their way to safety with just a slight breeze ruffling their hair – and the Marshal, despite being right next to the hole, manages to get out before them!