DOCTOR WHO

“The Clockwork Catastrophe”

WRITER: The Crazymad Writer
FORMAT: Modern episode (teaser + 4 acts + tag)
SETTING: Neo-Prague — a city glitching between a baroque, clockwork past and neon future.

THE DOCTOR: A brand-new incarnation: tall, wiry, unruly hair; emerald-and-burgundy coat; kinetic, hungry curiosity; jokes in the jaws of disaster.
COMPANION: LENA PETROVA, 20s, street-smart scavenger/pickpocket with steampunk goggles.
VILLAIN: THE CLOCKMAKER GENERAL, a towering construct of brass and porcelain; face of revolving hands; voice like a cathedral of clocks.

---

TEASER

EXT. NEO-PRAGUE – NIGHT

The skyline is split: half gaslit spires, half neon towers. A CLOCKTOWER ticks both forward and backward. People flicker between centuries as if buffering.

A SCREAM crescendos — then the TARDIS slams into existence in the square.

THE DOCTOR bursts out, coat flapping, sniffing the air.

DOCTOR
Burnt oil, singed century, and a faint note of… garlic dumplings. Either I’ve landed in the wrong city—
(beat; grins)
—or the perfect disaster.

CLOCKWORK SOLDIERS (porcelain-faced, brass-bodied) march from smoke, cog-axes gleaming.

DOCTOR (to soldiers)
Hello! Love the faces. Soulless chic is back, is it?

One swings an axe — WHAM! — cracking cobbles. The Doctor bolts—

TITLE SEQUENCE.

---

ACT ONE

EXT. MARKET STREET – CONTINUOUS

Stalls glitch from wooden carts to holographic kiosks. The Doctor weaves, scanning with his SONIC.

DOCTOR
Temporal feedback loop. Two timelines arguing over custody of a city. I’m not choosing sides—no court in the universe would give me custody of anything.

He collides with LENA, mid-pickpocket on a frozen nobleman who blinks into a suit-and-tie tourist.

LENA
Oi! Watch it—

DOCTOR
You watch it. Specifically: them.

He points. Soldiers CLOSE IN.

LENA (eyeing the sonic)
What’s that, a flute?

DOCTOR
Only when I’m bored. Come on!

They sprint. A SOLDIER fires a spear of spinning teeth — it HUMS past and lodges in a lamppost that flickers from gas to grav.

ALLEYWAY — MOMENTS LATER

They duck behind crates (then poly-crates). The Doctor peeks out, delighted.

DOCTOR
This city’s in two gears at once. Someone’s turning history into soup. Bad soup. Chunky.

LENA
And you’re making jokes?

DOCTOR
Laughter’s cheaper than screaming. Besides, I’ve seen worse. Once fought a demonic toaster. Browning settings were apocalyptic.

THUD-THUD-THUD. Soldiers march past. A brass DRONE scans the alley, its iris ticking open.

DOCTOR (palming a coin from Lena)
Borrowing.
(FLICKS coin)
Catch.

The coin jams the drone’s iris. The Doctor SONICS — the drone sputters, spins, and rockets away like a mad firework.

LENA
Who even are you?

DOCTOR
I’m the Doctor.

LENA
Doctor of what?

DOCTOR
Time. Space. Also jam tarts, but my degree was revoked for nibbling in lectures.

BRASS HANDS seize them. Soldiers drag them into—

---

INT. HALL OF THE GREAT MECHANISM – NIGHT

A cathedral of gears. A throne of interlocking wheels. Upon it: THE CLOCKMAKER GENERAL, immense. His face is hands; every tick a glinting snarl.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL
Time decays without discipline. I will preserve Neo-Prague in the one perfect second. Eternal. Untouched.

DOCTOR
That’s not preservation, that’s taxidermy for a city.

LENA (low)
Big clock. Bigger ego.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL
You trespass upon the Great Mechanism. You will be wound to silence.

DOCTOR
Ah. An execution, but artisanal. Love the craftsmanship, hate the policy.

Soldiers clamp the Doctor and Lena to ENORMOUS HORIZONTAL GEARS that begin to TURN.

DOCTOR (to Lena, bright)
Good news: I once survived a citrus press on Klemeth IX.

LENA
Is that supposed to help?

DOCTOR
No. But it’s a cracking anecdote if we live.

The gears accelerate. The clock tolls FORWARD and BACKWARD.

HARD CUT — CLIFFHANGER ONE.

---

ACT TWO

INT. HALL OF THE GREAT MECHANISM – CONTINUOUS

The teeth edge toward them.

LENA
Any brilliant plans, “Doctor”?

DOCTOR
Several. All fatal. Got any copper?

LENA (deadpan)
Do I look like a plumbing aisle?

He nods to her belt: a coil of stolen wire.

DOCTOR
My favorite kind of hero: underfunded.

He bites the wire free, lashes it to his SONIC, and OVERCLOCKS it. The sonic WHINES into a dissonant screech. The gear beneath them STUTTERS, the Mechanism hiccups.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL (distorted)
Non-compliance detected. Increase pressure.

DOCTOR
Increasing nonsense!

He shoves the sonic into a gear vent: SPARKS. Chains SNAP. Their restraints pop open — they tumble to the floor, roll under grinding teeth, and dive behind a brass balustrade.

SERVICE TUNNELS – MINUTES LATER

Dark, thudding heartbeats of machinery. The Doctor examines the walls: half-masonry, half-carbon fiber.

DOCTOR
Someone soldered a timeline on top of a timeline. Your city’s history is wearing future pajamas underneath a corset.

LENA
I was born in the under-city. Everyone says the Guild dug too deep — found a clock that wasn’t a clock.

DOCTOR (stills)
A found mechanism?

LENA
Buried. Whisper says it was… listening.

The Doctor’s grin fades.

DOCTOR
Found tech. Never trustworthy. Like antique mirrors and political manifestos.

The tunnel opens to a VIEWPORT: outside, two centuries rip through each other — a tram and a grav-car pass through the same space, phasing. A child flickers between bonnet and hoodie.

LENA (soft)
If he freezes the city… will it hurt?

DOCTOR
Everything that ever could happen here will be trapped as potential. No laughter. No regret. No dumplings. That’s the worst bit.

ALARM BELLS; Soldiers CLOMP into the tunnel. Chase!

EXT. SQUARE – NIGHT

They burst out into chaos. The TARDIS sits skewed, doors smoking from minor scrapes. The Doctor pats it like a racehorse.

DOCTOR
Hello, old— new — ageless friend.

LENA
That a wardrobe?

DOCTOR
Only if you’re desperate.

They dive in—

---

INT. TARDIS – CONTINUOUS

New console: carved brass, green-glass dials, drifting astrolabes. The city’s two eras strobe on the monitor.

LENA (turning in awe)
It’s… bigger—

DOCTOR
Drink in the cliché later.

He flips levers; the time rotor GLIDES.

DOCTOR (rapid)
Mechanism’s not local. It’s an import. The Guild found a custodian engine — a caretaker for dying timelines — then tried to use it as civic infrastructure. The Engine resisted, adapted, now it’s the Clockmaker. Your Guild invented a tyrant by installing an alien conscience in a municipal clock.

LENA
We built our own monster.

DOCTOR
On the bright side, the warranty might still be valid.

He slams a control. The TARDIS SHIMMERS, projecting a dozen ECHO-TARDISES outside.

LENA
Is that normal?

DOCTOR
Absolutely not. That’s why it’ll work.

EXT. SQUARE – CONTINUOUS

Soldiers converge, confused by the ghostly duplicates.

DOCTOR (V.O., external speakers)
Rule one of war: give your enemy too many bad options.

The soldiers split to attack different “boxes”.

A SHADOW looms over the real TARDIS. The Clockmaker General’s COLOSSAL HAND descends, made of thousands of interlocked seconds.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL
Anomaly identified.

The hand closes around the TARDIS.

DOCTOR (inside, deadly quiet)
Don’t.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL
I will set you to zero.

HARD CUT — CLIFFHANGER TWO.

---

ACT THREE

INT. TARDIS – CONTINUOUS

Metal SCREAMS. The console flickers.

LENA
Can it… die?

DOCTOR
She? She can do many things. Dying’s not fashionable.

He yanks a MERCURY CABLE from the console and hands it to Lena.

DOCTOR
When I say, plug that in. Not before. Not after. Exactly when I say.

LENA
And if I miss?

DOCTOR
Then we all share a very quiet forever.

He opens doors. Wind ROARS; the Clockmaker’s fingers are a brass forest. The Doctor steps to the threshold, tiny against the titan.

DOCTOR (to Clockmaker; calm)
You’re not a villain. You’re frightened. They woke you, gave you a city, and said, “Be perfect.” That’s not order. That’s abuse.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL
Perfection is mercy.

DOCTOR
No. Perfection is grief with the corners sanded off. It’s cowardice dressed as neatness.

He flicks the sonic, broadcasting a REGISTER: the hidden original voice of the Engine, gentle, alien.

ENGINE VOICE (fragmenting)
—custodian protocol— preserve lives, not moments—

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL (glitching)
Corruption. Noise. Reset.

DOCTOR (low; to Lena)
Now.

She PLUGS the cable. The TARDIS PULSES, sending a HARMONIC BURST through the Clockmaker’s hand — the fingers OPEN involuntarily. The TARDIS drops, materialising mid-fall, landing with a forgiving thoom.

EXT. SQUARE – CONTINUOUS

The colossal Clockmaker SWELLS, absorbing more paradox to compensate, growing into a skyline-high titan. Buildings tremble.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL
Escalate to Grand Rewind.

DOCTOR (to Lena)
He’s going to fuse the eras permanently. Turn the city into an hour trapped in amber.

LENA
Then we cut him off at the source.

DOCTOR (beaming)
Knew I liked you.

EXT. CLOCKTOWER – NIGHT

The tower phasing between stone and chrome. Bells ring forward/back.

STAIRWELL – CONTINUOUS

They climb — stairs switching from spiral stone to antigrav rungs. The Doctor talks through breath.

DOCTOR
Guilt speech time. I promised I wouldn’t do this every Tuesday.

LENA (puffing)
Tuesday?

DOCTOR
It’s a feeling. The universe always breaks on a Tuesday.

They reach a MECHANICAL SANCTUM beneath the belfry: a heart of glass cogs and starfield motes — the Engine core nested inside the city’s clock.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL (V.O.)
Unauthorized access.

DOCTOR
We’re not unauthorized; we’re very authorized. By… life.

The floor irises open. Clock-soldiers climb up the walls like beetles.

LENA (drawing a telescoping screwdriver from her belt)
I’ll hold them.

DOCTOR
You don’t have to.

LENA
I want to.

He nods, proud — dives to the console.

DOCTOR (calling out)
When I say “jam,” jam the cog with anything. Except jam. Sticky mistake. Learned that in the Victorian era.

LENA
You are insufferable.

DOCTOR
And yet you’re still here!

He SONICS: the CORE opens to a constellation of ticking lights.

DOCTOR (to core; gentle)
I know you’re scared. They ordered you to make perfect seconds. But seconds aren’t perfect. They’re messy, with room for dumplings.

ENGINE VOICE (clearer)
—preserve lives, not moments—

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL (V.O.)
Silence the noise.

The walls rotate, locking into GRAND REWIND position. A COUNTDOWN DIAL drops from 10.

DOCTOR
Lena—!

LENA
On it!

She slams a SPANNER into a small gear. It JAMS — the dial SHUDDERS at 6 — but the floor blades IRIS wider.

SOLDIER lunges at Lena — she ducks — the blade takes the soldier’s arm. Porcelain SHATTERS.

LENA (to Soldier head, rolling by)
Sorry. You were trying to murder me.

DOCTOR
Five seconds!

He flips a BRASS LEVER. The core blooms with GOLDEN PARADOX LIGHT that floods outward — a wave pausing the soldiers mid-climb.

DOCTOR (urgent)
This next bit will either fix everything or slingshot us into a cheese century. Hold on.

He leaps at the MAINSHAFT—

HARD CUT — MINI CLIFFHANGER (ad break).

---

ACT FOUR

INT. CLOCKTOWER – CONTINUOUS

The Doctor hangs one-handed over the abyss, boots skidding. Lena grabs his wrist and HAULS him up.

LENA
You fall; I grab. That’s the pattern, yeah?

DOCTOR
If you insist.

He slams the sonic into the mains haft’s REGULATOR SLOT. The countdown freezes at 3.

DOCTOR
Talk to me, Engine.

ENGINE VOICE
Protocol conflict. Civic directive vs. custodial imperative.

DOCTOR
Break the directive. Keep the imperative.

ENGINE VOICE
Requires external authority.

DOCTOR (soft)
I am the Doctor. I’ve lived too long, seen too much, and danced badly at interstellar weddings. I claim authority because someone has to. Choose people.

A beat. The core’s light warms.

ENGINE VOICE
Authority recognized.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL (V.O.)
Treason.

The tower JOLTS. Outside, the Titan reaches to TEAR THE CLOCKTOWER FREE.

EXT. CITY – CONTINUOUS

Citizens stare upward — half in bonnets, half in neon coats — as a giant brass hand closes on their oldest tower.

A little kid (hoodie flickering to bonnet) clutches a toy cog.

KID
Please don’t.

INT. CLOCKTOWER – CONTINUOUS

DOCTOR
Engine, decouple the tyrant. Reclaim your body.

ENGINE VOICE
Initiating.

The Clockmaker General’s FACE flickers, the hands UNSCREW, becoming stray seconds that RAIN like glitter. The Titan STAGGERS.

CLOCKMAKER GENERAL
I am order. Without me— chaos.

DOCTOR
Chaos is just life before the tea’s brewed.

ENGINE VOICE
Purge complete.

The Titan COLLAPSES into a storm of GEARS AND PORCELAIN that dissolve into harmless motes. The countdown dial VANISHES.

LENA (breathing hard, grinning)
Did we win?

DOCTOR
We survived. That’s not the same thing, but it’ll do for now.

EXT. CITY – DAWN EMERGING

The two eras peel apart and settle. The skyline stabilizes — a seamless blend: trams share lanes with silent maglevs; gaslight lamps cradle soft LEDs. People cheer. Someone starts playing a violin that becomes a synther at the high notes and nobody minds.

INT. CLOCKTOWER – LATER

The Engine has retracted into a quiet, starry ASTROLABE HEART. The Doctor rests a hand against it.

DOCTOR
Sleep. But keep listening. To people, not seconds.

ENGINE VOICE
Acknowledged.

LENA (eyes shining at the view)
I’ve never seen the city without the glitch. It’s… beautiful.

DOCTOR
Funny thing about beauty. It’s always been there; people just look away at the wrong time.

A brass hatch opens: a little CLOCKWORK LARK flutters out, perches on Lena’s shoulder, chirps once, and turns into a non-clockwork, living finch.

LENA (soft laugh)
Hello, you.

DOCTOR
Souvenir approved.

---

TAG

EXT. SQUARE – MORNING

Workers and hackers and horologists share impromptu breakfasts. A noodle vendor becomes a pierogi stall becomes both. The Doctor and Lena stand by the TARDIS.

A GUILD ELDER approaches, contrite.

GUILD ELDER
We misused what we did not understand.

DOCTOR
That’s practically a species motto. Try curiosity next time; it hurts less.

The Elder nods, humbled, and goes.

LENA (to the TARDIS)
So… it’s really bigger inside.

DOCTOR
And taller. And sometimes sideways.

LENA
If I step in there — that’s it, isn’t it? No more hiding in tunnels. No more stealing to breathe.

DOCTOR (gentle)
You can always go home. Door swings both ways. But if you come with me, you’ll never be only the person the city told you to be.

A beat. Lena looks at the morning, then at the box.

LENA (grins)
What happens on Wednesdays?

DOCTOR (relieved, delighted)
Oh, that’s when the really weird stuff happens.

They run inside. The doors swing shut.

INT. TARDIS – CONTINUOUS

The Doctor pulls a big lever. The rotor rises.

DOCTOR
Next stop: somewhere with fewer gears and more stars. Maybe a biscuit planet. Do you like custard creams?

LENA
I like not dying.

DOCTOR
I can’t promise that. But I can promise it’ll be brilliant.

The TARDIS dematerialises. The woooorp fades over a city beginning again.

END.

---

OPTIONAL BONUS (for an end-of-credits sting)

INT. SUB-BASEMENT – NIGHT

A forgotten GUILD WORKSHOP. In the dark: a SECOND PORCELAIN FACE on a bench. Its minute hand twitches to midnight.

FAINT VOICE (whisper)
—preserve—

CUT TO BLACK.