TV Club is currently discussing the merits of Planet of Giants and it got me thinking about stories where ‘miniaturisation’ is a trope. It has a long tradition in literature, especially children’s literature, from the Borrowers to Alice in Wonderland to films like Fantastic Voyage and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.
Here’s the page for the trope from TARDIS Guide (although I’ve already spotted it’s missing The Armageddon Factor so I’ll be adding that one in).
But I wondered if there were any other striking examples from across the Whoniverse that need to have the trope added?
What are people’s thoughts on the original plan for the show’s first every story to be one about shrinking - The Miniscules or The Giants as it was known? There are some interesting articles about this story in various magazines and production diary books.
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The Invisible Enemy which is a good episode actually, and Into the Dalek both come to mind straight away.
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Well the master definitely likes to shrink people, they just aren’t always alive after …
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Do we think stories where he visibly shrinks people - like Terror of the Autons, The Deadly Assassin and Logopolis should have the trope added?
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That was kinda what the trope was for in the first place but it got reappropriated…
Maybe they should be split into 2 different tropes!
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They are all forms of miniaturisation though so i don’t think we need to complicate things.
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Planet of Fire: Several inches tall Master.
Spyfall 1/2: The Master shows off having miniaturized someone in 1, miniaturizes someone else in 2.
The Halloween Apocalypse: Dan’s house is miniaturized.
Power of the Doctor: The Master refers back to miniaturizing Tegan’s aunt. Dan refers back to his house being miniaturized.
Timeless Children: The Master miniaturized Ashad.
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Because Lets Kill Hitler is on there, I think The Wedding of River Song should also count due to it featuring the Tesselecta!
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So the trope has been updated with people’s suggestions in this thread - has anyone got any other ‘shrinking’ stories they can think of, particularly comic strips? I imagine audio stories will be thin on the ground as it’s a rather visual concept for the audio medium.
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Aargh - The Ark! How did we forget The Ark?
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