Season One

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Lore & Background

The first three episodes begin with third year secondary school girl Marcie and her two fifth-year friends Tom and Reet becoming suspicious of the sinister Mr Eldritch, whose computer company arrives at the school and distributes free computers to all the pupils. With the reluctant help of their teacher Miss Maitland they apparently defeat the threat of Eldritch, who disappears. However, the second three episodes tell of the actions of Miss Pendragon, who works for Eldritch and is attempting to revive the massive, secret Behemoth computer from its long-hidden location beneath the school. At the end of the BBC novelisation, there are indications that Davies had ideas or interest in a potential third adventure using the same characters. A single paragraph describing the opening of an amusement arcade concludes with "...but that's another story."

In Their Own Story

The apparent conclusion of the first story at episode 3 seemed so complete to BBC executives that they were, according to Davies, "a bit shocked". This, in part, stemmed from the fact that he had not sold the programme to them as two three-part stories—"in case they told me not to do it!". By the conclusion of episode 6 it becomes apparent to the viewer that all six episodes tell a conjoined story, though split across two seemingly unrelated tales.

Reader's Guide

The episodes were merely numbered, all sharing a gradually-revealed common plot. The six episodes are divided into two stories of three episodes each. Transmitted at 4.35 pm on Thursdays from 14 November to 19 December 1991, each episode would be repeated the Sunday morning following first broadcast. Viewing figures varied from 3.6 to 4.2 million per episode. The series was filmed in Mytchett in Surrey, in Farnborough, Hampshire (Woburn Avenue) and the long-closed Robert Haining Secondary School, in the summer of 1991. Studio scenes were shot at the BBC's Ealing Studios. Dark Season was re-shown on BBC One in 1994, and in 2002 was also repeated on the CBBC Channel on digital television, cropped to 14:9 widescreen with the loss of the top and bottom sections of the original picture. Dark Season was released on DVD by 2|entertain Ltd on 24 July 2006. Upon this release, it received a British Board of Film Classification rating of PG.

Did You Know?

• Dark Season was the first television drama written by Russell T Davies.
• Kate Winslet appeared in her first major television role as Reet.
• The series was filmed in Mytchett, Surrey; Farnborough, Hampshire; and the long-closed Robert Haining Secondary School.
• Viewing figures varied from 3.6 to 4.2 million per episode.
• Davies also penned a novelisation of Dark Season for BBC Books, released concurrently with the transmission of the serial.