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Rating *5*
Created and written by Nigel Kneale
Starring André Morell (Professor Bernard Quatermass), Cec Linder (Dr Matthew Roney), Antony Bushell (Colonel James Breen), John Stratton (Captain Potter), Christine Finn (Barbara Judd), Harold Goodwin (Corporal Gibson), Brian Worth (James Fullalove), Richard Shaw (Sladden), Hilda Barry (Mrs Anne Chilcot), Howell Davies (Mr Chilcot), Victor Platt (PC Ellis), Richard Dare (Private Secretary) and Michael Ripper (Sergeant)
A pre-human skull is discovered on building works in Hobbs Lane in Knightsbridge. Palaeontologist Dr Matthew Roney identifies it as a missing link, many thousands of years old, and obtains permission to carry out archaeological excavation of the site. However, when what appears to be a previously-unidentified unexploded World War II German missile is discovered, the site is closed off by an Army bomb disposal team. Roney asks his friend Professor Bernard Quatermass of the British Experimental Rocket Group to intercede on his behalf and they begin to piece together the terrible truth about the origins of the human species.
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When I was growing up, the 1967 Hammer Films version of ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ was one of my favourite films. I guess I would first have watched it as a teenager sometime in the early to mid-1970s. I remain very fond of it. Like the two earlier Quatermass films made by Hammer, it was a remake of a 1950s BBC serial. ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ was the final one in the trilogy, broadcast in six 30-minute segments between 22 December 1958 and 26 January 1959, most of it performed live.
‘Quatermass and the Pit’ is a wildly acknowledged classic, possibly the single greatest example of British science fiction. It was hugely influential, both in style and theme. Doctor Who is a very obvious example of the influence of the Quatermass trilogy, but it extends much wider than just that.
It might be a little bit dated and stagey now, but science fiction does not get any better or more intelligent than this. The quality of the surviving print is also superior to the first two instalments in the trilogy, ‘The Quatermass Experiment’ (1953) and ‘Quatermass II’ (1955).
Review posted on 21 November 2010
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Rating 2¾
Written by Louis Marks
Directed by David Maloney
Starring Tom Baker (The Doctor), Elisabeth Sladen (Sarah Jane Smith), Frederick Jaeger (Sorenson), Ewen Solon (Vishinsky), Prentis Hancock (Salamar), Michael Wisher (Morelli), Graham Weston (De Haan), Louis Mahoney (Ponti), Terence Brook (Braun), Tony McEwan (Baldwin), Haydn Wood (O’Hara) and Melvyn Bedford (Reig)
The TARDIS responds to a distress call from Zeta Minor, the most distant planet in the known universe, where the Doctor and his companion Sarah Jane discover the apparently abandoned base of a geological expedition. A military ship has also answered the distress call and the Doctor and Sarah Jane become suspects for the unexplained deaths of several of the expedition crew. Only Professor Sorenson remains alive and the Doctor realises he has been tampering with antimatter in his bid to discover alternative sources of energy to save his people, whose Sun is dying.
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‘Planet of Evil’, a serial broadcast in four 25-minute episodes between 27 September and 18 October 1975, has always stuck in my memory. I am not sure why. Perhaps because it is clearly based on the classic 1956 film ‘Forbidden Planet’, a real favourite of mine, with a bit of ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ thrown into the mix. Maybe because this was one of the classic periods of Doctor Who, with the most popular and successful Doctor, Tom Baker, and one of the most popular companions, Sarah Jane Smith, played by Elisabeth Sladen.
Elisabeth Sladen played this role from ‘The Time Warrior’ at the start of the final season featuring the third Doctor, played by Jon Pertwee, in December 1973, until ‘The Hand of Fear’ in October 1976, the second serial in Tom Baker’s third season. She made a subsequent appearance in ‘The Five Doctors’ in 1983 and in the aborted 1981 spin-off ‘K9 and Company’, before returning in 2006 for a guest appearance in ‘School Reunion’ in the revived series. This led to the successful spin-off ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’, which has so far run for three seasons, with two more confirmed by the BBC.
Is ‘Planet of Evil’ memorable? Well, I don’t think it ranks amongst the very best Doctor Who serials from the classic series, but I love nearly all Doctor Who and this is a minor gem, even if it does rather fizzle out in the final episode. It is not original by any stretch of the imagination, but it is constructed with some degree of flair. The message can perhaps best be summed up by something the Doctor says to Professor Sorenson: “You and I are scientists, Professor. We buy our privilege to experiment at the cost of total responsibility.” It is a theme that has been explored over the course of the series time and time again.
The sets are what they are and anyone with any knowledge of Doctor Who knows not to expect state-of-the-art special effects. The spacecraft is rather threadbare, to say the least, but the alien jungle landscape of the planet Zeta Minor is not entirely bereft of charm.
Tom Baker had an odd lazy approach to his acting, almost disinterested, which somehow seemed to work perfectly. It gave his Doctor a slightly disengaged air, often one of amused and slightly superior intellectual curiosity. I recall that he was sometimes compared to Harpo Marx and there is occasionally a degree of uninhibited anarchy about him.
‘Planet of Evil’ perhaps has not quite lived up to my memory of it all these years later, but I still enjoyed it very much.
Review posted 17 June 2010
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Rating 2¾
Written by Gareth Roberts
Directed by Catherine Morshead
Starring Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), James Corden (Craig Owens), Daisy Haggard (Sophie), Owen Donovan (Steven), Babatunde Aleshe (Sean), Jem Wall (Michael) and Karen Seacombe (Sandra)
“All I have to do is pass myself off as an ordinary human being. Simple. What could possibly go wrong?”
The TARDIS arrives unplanned in Colchester, but when the Doctor steps out it immediately dematerialises, leaving him separated from his companion Amy. The Doctor turns up on the doorstep of Craig Owens, announcing that he is the new lodger and producing a small brown paper carrier bag full of money. Something very strange is happening upstairs that is preventing the TARDIS from materialising and the Doctor needs to find out what it is, but he is also not blind to Craig and his friend Sophie and the obvious unspoken feelings they have for one another.
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We arrive at episode eleven. The next two episodes will see the latest season reach its climax and be brought to a close, so ‘The Lodger’ might be described as the calm before the storm. This is an episode that perhaps could be equated to ‘Love and Monsters’ in season two of the revived series or ‘Blink’ in season three. From comments I have read, some fans are critical of ‘The Lodger’ because they say it is not Doctor Who. When the Doctor should be concentrating on the mysterious and disturbing events taking place upstairs, the disappearance and we assume death of innocent people, he is out playing football or fooling around at the office where Craig works. This I feel completely misses the point and assumes that Doctor Who is a soulless sci-fi series with no humour and no interest in people and the minutiae of human drama. ‘The Lodger’s is a comic diversion, the story of two people who are in love with one another but find it impossible to openly express their true feelings. The science fiction element, the strange events at the top of the stairs, is not entirely without relevance, but it is to some degree incidental.
‘The Lodger’ is an episode that, after one viewing, I think starts brightly, has countless funny and memorable moments, but perhaps does not quite add up to the sum of its parts. However, it’s affectionate and warm-hearted and benefits from a pitch-perfect performance by Matt Smith, who has proved himself to have exquisite comic timing. There are several references back to the “classic series”, a now familiar refrain in this fifth season of the revived show. When asked if he plays football, the Doctor says, “Football? Is that the one with the sticks?” It’s a funny line in itself, coming in an episode that coincides with the start of the 2010 World Cup, but also a clever reference back to the fifth Doctor, who is incidentally the favourite of executive producer and head writer Steven Moffitt.
From many of the comments I have read about this episode it does seem that I was not alone in being dubious of the involvement of James Corden, who would clearly seem to be a love or hate figure, perhaps more so after his recent childish spat with the actor Patrick Stewart. And like many others, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that he gives a restrained and likeable performance as the sweet natured and lovelorn Craig.
I enjoyed ‘The Lodger’ very much and it might just become more of a favourite in the fullness of time. For now it was a pleasant diversion that does not count amongst the best episodes of this season.
‘The Lodger’ was written Gareth Roberts, who has written several other episodes of the series and many episodes of its spin-off show ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’. His previous work includes the soap operas ‘Emmerdale’ and ‘Brookside’, as well as the Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer revival of ‘Randall & Hopkirk Deceased’, which starred the longest serving and most successful Doctor of them all, Tom Baker, in a supporting role.
Review posted 13 June 2010
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Rating 3¾
Written by Richard Curtis
Directed by Jonny Cambell
Starring Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), Tony Curran (Vincent Van Gogh), Bill Nighy (Dr Black), Nik Howden (Maurice), Sarah Counsell (Waitress) and Nik Howden (Mother)
The Doctor takes Amy to the Musée d’Orsay in Paris to visit the Vincent Van Gogh collection. She mentions that he has taken her to many fabulous places recently and asks why he is treating her to such special attention, but he brushes aside her suspicious questioning. When the Doctor notices a malevolent face in Van Gogh’s painting of The Church at Auvers, he and Amy travel backwards in time in the TARDIS to find out what it was that Van Gogh had painted and discover that he is battling a giant invisible alien creature known as the Krafayis.
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I have been deliberately keeping myself as uninformed as possible about each new episode of Doctor Who, wanting to be surprised by developments in the continuing storyline. Sometimes I have failed, such as the last episode, when I inadvertently discovered in advance that something terrible was going to happen and guessed what it would be. All I knew about ‘Vincent and the Doctor’ in advance of watching it was what I had seen in the trailer at the end of the previous week’s episode and, subsequently, the knowledge that it was written by Richard Curtis, whose work, generally speaking, I am not a fan of. I assumed it would be a jokey throwaway, perhaps along the lines of ‘The Shakespeare Code’ in the third season of the revived series. I was not expecting what we actually got.
On the face of it, ‘Vincent and the Doctor’ is a typical Doctor Who episode. There are several self-referential allusions to the past. Not for the first time in this latest season, there is a visual reference to the first Doctor (William Hartnall). The character played by Bill Nighy, an art expert conducting a tour of the Van Gogh collection, can be related back to John Cleese and Eleanor Bron, the art snobs seen in the Louvre in the famous 1979 Doctor Who serial ‘City of Death’, which was co-written by Douglas Adams.
The invisible creature, a kind of giant rooster, is nothing to get excited about and is, in itself, the least interesting aspect of the episode. However, it serves a purpose, one that I suppose draws on the influence of the classic 1956 science fiction film ‘Forbidden Planet’. In that film, the character Dr Morbius inadvertently creates a gigantic invisible monster with the power of his id. The Krafayis is not created by Van Gogh, but it can be viewed as a kind of manifestation of his illness, not least because ultimately, when it is too late, it is realised that the creature was fearful and disorientated and lashed out for that reason. The action here takes places just months before Van Gogh would commit suicide, a victim of severe depression that had haunted him for much of his life. In the episode we see his extreme mood swings, from great elation to soul-destroying melancholia.
Van Gogh is initially hostile towards the Doctor, although less so towards Amy. However, he craves companionship and people he can talk to who understand him. He soon begins to respond to them and a change can be seen in his manner, until in one tremendous scene we discover how desperately lonely he is. When he realises that the Doctor and Amy will soon leave him he immediately becomes angry and sinks into deep despair. It’s beautifully done, dealt with in a subtle and responsible way.
The episode contains many clever and nicely observed touches. Van Gogh, a native of the Netherlands, speaks in a broad Scottish accent. When the Doctor and Amy first encounter him he observes that Amy has a Dutch accent, because that is how he hears her. We, the audience, are likewise hearing Van Gogh the way that Amy, who is Scottish, does. Van Gogh, because of his acute awareness of the fragility of the mind, is able to recognise Amy’s inner sadness, something she herself is unaware of. Her conscious memory of Rory, her dead fiancé, has been erased, but not it seems her sub-conscious memory.
The episode possibly bludgeons us a little unnecessarily with the fact that Van Gogh was a genius whose paintings were unheralded and unsuccessful in his lifetime and that he was increasingly frustrated that he was unable to reproduce on canvas what he saw in the world around him and in his own head. However, this is leading up to the scene in which the Doctor and Amy bring Van Gogh forward in time so that he can see his work on display in the Musée d’Orsay and hear for himself the enormous admiration and wonder it inspires in people. This scene, complete with cheesy musical accompaniment, courtesy of a song by the dreadful Athlete, could so easily have been mawkish over-sentimental drivel, but against all the odds it works beautifully, in no small part due to the terrific performance by Tony Curran.
The closing scene, also, in which Amy insists that she and the Doctor return to the Musée d’Orsay after taking Van Gogh back to his own time, is effective and cleverly conceived. She expects to find new paintings, even greater works that Van Gogh would have created had he not killed himself when he did. Instead, she discovers that nothing has changed. Those few days of happiness and the renewal of spirit that Van Gogh experienced in the company of the Doctor and Amy were just that, a fleeting respite from his spiralling despair and mental illness.
The only jarring note for me was the “To Amy” message now appended to the painting of Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers. It was enough for us to suppose that Amy had inspired Van Gogh to create this celebrated painting, but this unnecessary addition made it became too artificial and pulled me away from the narrative.
This fifth season of the revived series is increasingly proving to be one of the best yet. It is certainly, for me, a return to the brilliance of the first two seasons back in 2005 and 2006. My rating for each episode has been deliberately on the low side. I do not want to fall into the trap of awarding a “5” based on my initial reaction after watching an episode once or twice at most. However, ‘Vincent and the Doctor’ is an episode that quite possibly will, in the fullness of time, prove to be just that.
Review posted 8 June 2010
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Rating: 2¼
Written by Graeme Curry
Directed by Chris Clough
Starring Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Sophie Aldred (Ace), Sheila Hancock (Helen A), Ronald Fraser (Joseph C), Harold Innocent (Gilbert M), Lesley Dunlop (Susan Q), Georgina Hale (Daisy K), Rachel Bell (Priscilla P), Jonathan Burn (Silas P), Tim Baker (Harold V), Richard D Sharp (Earl Sigma), John Normington (Trevor Sigma), Tim Scott (Forum Doorman) and David John Pope (Kandy Man)
The TARDIS materialises on the planet Terra Alpha. The Doctor has heard rumours of unrest amongst the human colony there and tells his companion Ace that they have a busy night ahead of them. They soon discover that unhappiness has been outlawed and large numbers of the population, those designated as “killjoys”, have disappeared. They also hear tales of a grotesque and frightening executioner known as the Kandy Man.
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This is a very interesting one. At the time of first broadcast, Margaret Thatcher had been the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom for nine and a half years, with a another two years in office still remaining. For many of us living in Britain at that time it was a very dark period. Moving forward two decades, the new coalition government, led by Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, talks meaningless nonsense about the “Big Society”, but Thatcher said “there is no such thing as society” and set about proving her contention by destroying it, a goal she more than succeeded in achieving. That quote, from an interview she gave in 1987, two years before coming to power, is rather taken out of context, but Thatcher was a malignant and destructive force, whose terrible impact is still being felt today, some twenty years after her own party prised her out of Downing Street.
The purpose of this rant? Although somewhat watered down by the time production was complete, ‘The Happiness Patrol’ was a less-than-complementary commentary about Margaret Thatcher and the Conservative government of the time. It is not hard to interpret the intended meaning behind a storyline in which freedom of expression is forcibly suppressed and demonstrations are crushed.
‘The Happiness Patrol’ was told across three 25-minutes episodes between 2 and 16 November 1988, during the second season to feature Sylvester McCoy in the role of the Doctor. This was the twenty-fifth season, all told, and McCoy was the seventh actor to play the lead role. The first thing one notices is how threadbare it looks. All three episodes are studio-bound and much of the action takes place on an obviously tiny and very fake set. It looks more like the set of an amateur play than a prime-time television series. The story itself is quite peculiar and although there are some very good actors here the whole thing is so odd and inexplicable that they are faced with overwhelming obstacles to overcome.
The next thing that most immediately stands out in these episodes is the Kandy Man, a sadistic psychotic killer robot that looks like a liquorice allsort and is thwarted by the Doctor not once but twice using lemonade. Bassett’s, the makers of liquorice allsorts, lodged an official complaint with the BBC, claiming, not unreasonably, that the Kandy Man was nothing more than a copy of “Bertie Bassett”, the company’s mascot. The BBC agreed not to use the Kandy Man again, which is actually a pity. The first instinct might be to laugh, but he is certainly memorable.
It did strike me how plodding and careless the direction seemed to be. It needed to make a virtue of the limitations, but failed to do so, although oddly the very fact that it was so derisory seems somehow appropriate. Perhaps that was the intention. Chris Clough directed six Doctor Who serials in total and has had a long career on British television as a director and producer.
This was the dog-end of the original series, as it wound down towards its inevitable cancellation, but strangely it was also a genuinely creative period. These final three seasons were not always successful, but they always strived to be inventive. ‘The Happiness Patrol’, which, apart from its commentary on Margaret Thatcher, also contains a very obvious gay subtext, runs out of steam before the end of the third episode, but for all of its very obvious faults it does remain quite fascinating as an allegorical tale of the time.
Review posted 3 June 2010
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WARNING: major spoiler if you have not already watched these two episodes
Rating 2¾
Written by Chris Chibnall
Directed by Ashley Way
Starring Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), Arthur Darvill (Rory), Meera Syal (Nasreen Chaudhry), Robert Pugh (Tony Mack), Nina Roberts (Ambrose Northover), Alun Raglan (Mo Northover), Samuel Davies (Elliot Northover), Neve McIntosh (Alaya / Restac), Richard Hope (Malohkeh) and Stephen Moore (Eldane)
The TARDIS materialises in what the Doctor thinks is going to be Rio de Janeiro, but actually turns out to be the small Welsh village of Cwntaff, the centre of an ambitious drilling project going deeper into the core of the planet than has ever previously been achieved. When Amy is sucked into the ground, the Doctor realises that something deep inside the earth is coming up and soon he is faced with an old adversary, the Silurians.
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The second two-part story of the fifth season, ‘The Hungry Earth’ and ‘Cold Blood’ pays homage to the old “classic series” and in particular the first season that starred Jon Pertwee in the lead role, originally broadcast in the first six months of 1970. That season, the seventh of the old series, introduced the Silurians in a tremendous story called ‘Doctor Who and the Silurians’ that followed a storyline very similar to this new one. The Silurians, who are also referred to as the Eocenes and “Homo reptilia”, made a second appearance in 1984 in the story ‘Warriors of the Deep’.
Watching ‘The Hungry Earth’, the first of these two new episodes, for the first time I came away feeling a little disappointed, but when I watched it a second time that changed completely. Not only did I thoroughly enjoy it, I also started to pick up on many little subtleties in the writing. I suspect my initial reaction was simply a subconscious expectation that it wouldn’t live up to my memories of the old series from what remains my favourite era of the show. ‘The Hungry Earth’, in fact, proved on second viewing to be a very tightly written and well structured episode with a real emotional resonance to it.
‘Cold Blood’ had a lot to live up to and, ultimately, probably did not quite manage to pull it off, despite a powerful ending. That ending, which should have come as a rather shocking surprise, was slightly dampened for me because of something I read in The Guardian newspaper that morning that alerted me to what was coming – and the television critic responsible should be ashamed of himself.
I felt that in the middle of the episode ‘Cold Blood’ seemed to veer off into ‘Star Trek’ territory, with the Doctor acting as a kind of slightly high-handed diplomatic envoy, creating, by using almost bullying tactics, an atmosphere in which negotiations could take place between two opposing factions, a la Captain Picard. These scenes were effective enough, without injecting much drama into the proceedings, but more than that they were never very believable, even within a context that is already, if we think about it, fairly far-fetched to start with.
The storyline dabbled in some moral issues. The Silurians, although aggressive, were not the aggressors per se and the humans failed to, as the Doctor put it, “be the best of humanity.” Whether or not, however, this ultimately amounted to very much is somewhat debatable. It worked well enough, without really giving pause for thought. Having said this, it was more than made up for by the simple fact that the two episodes had a good feel to them. For an old-timer like me it did feel like “old Doctor Who”, without stripping away all the things that have made the revived series so successful.
There was a nice little nod in ‘Cold Blood’ to the Peter Davison era, with the Doctor’s comical reference to celery and all in all it was not too much of a letdown after the tremendous opening episode. The closing scenes, however, made it a whole lot more important, with the death of Rory. A central character dying in Doctor Who is still something of a rarity, enough so that it does come as a shock when it is not expected. Joss Whedon made killing off main characters into an art form, but he has done it so often now that it has become very tired and boring, simply too predictable. Rory’s death in Doctor Who didn’t fall into this trap, although I am very sorry to see him go so soon. However, many fans doubt this is the last we will see of him and suspect he will be back in some guise or other before the season is done.
‘The Hungry Earth’ and ‘Cold Blood’ were watched by what might be the lowest audience numbers since the series was revived back in 2005. That is a pity because this new season is proving to be very good indeed, although the low viewing figures are probably not quite the cause for alarm that some fans have been suggesting. Somehow, I do not think the series is in danger of being cancelled just yet.
Review posted 31 May 2010
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Rating 3¾
Written by Simon Nye
Directed by Catherine Morshead
Starring Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), Arthur Darvill (Rory), Toby Jones (Dream Lord), Nick Hobbs (Mr Nainby), Joan Linder (Mrs Hamill) and Audrey Ardington (Mrs Poggit)
“If you can’t save him, then what is the point of you?”
The Doctor unexpectedly arrives in the small village of Upper Leadworth to visit Amy, who is heavily pregnant, and Rory, five years after they last travelled with him. All three fall asleep while sitting on a bench and wake up back in the TARDIS. It has, or so it seems, been a shared dream. They encounter a mysterious figure who has somehow managed to infiltrate the TARDIS. He calls himself the Dream Lord and tells them they must decide which reality is real. Death awaits them if they make the wrong choice.
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‘Amy’s Choice’ is the seventh episode of the fifth season of the revived series. With the exception of the somewhat under-par ‘Victory of the Daleks’, the standard has been very high so far, closer to that of the first two seasons than the slightly tired latter stages of David Tennant’s time in the role, when the episodes, especially the “specials” broadcast in 2009, were becoming a little brash, if still just about the best thing on television.
Matt Smith settled into the lead role immediately. As has been commented elsewhere, he seems to have an uncanny ability to project the fact that although the Doctor now has the appearance of a young man and outwardly behaves as such, he is, in fact, extremely old and carries the weight of often painful and traumatic experience. Karen Gillan, also in her first season, has proved to be excellent and should be given extra points for getting the Daily Mail worked up into a froth of moral outrage. I like the character Rory and the performance of Arthur Darvill, but this character does seem to have been greeted with scepticism by many fans.
‘Amy’s Choice’ instantly became a favourite episode on first viewing and that didn’t change when I watched it for a second time. It put me in mind of episodes of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’, in particular ‘Nightmares’ from the first season of that show, ‘Restless’, the inspired season four closer, and, to some degree, ‘Dead Things’, a dark and controversial episode from the sixth season. Although there is no reason to assume that ‘Amy’s Choice’ drew any direct inspiration from these episodes, it would not be the first time the revived series has been influenced by Buffy. Former executive producer and head writer Russell T Davies never hid his love of that show or his admiration for Joss Whedon.
The episode is very cleverly pieced together, as the Doctor and his two companions move between two possible realities – one inside a dead TARDIS, where they are rapidly freezing to death, and the other in what initially appears to by an idyllic rural setting, one that the Doctor thinks is “boring” and then very quickly realises is not as it seems on the surface. It also manages to incorporate some very well judged and genuinely laugh-out-loud humour into what otherwise proves to be an ultimately rather dark episode with a real sting in its tail.
Added to this, the Doctor is left with the riddle of the true identity of the Dream Lord (brilliantly played by Toby Jones), which proves to be a particularly compelling component of the episode and one that promises to provide some more twists in the future.
‘Amy’s Choice’ was written by Simon Nye, creator of the 1990s sitcom ‘Men Behaving Badly’ and more recently the co-writer of the misfiring ‘Reggie Perrin’ update.
Review posted 25 April 2010
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WARNING: spoilers if you have not watched this episodeRating 3
Written by Toby Whithouse
Directed by Jonny Campbell
Starring Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), Arthur Darvill (Rory Williams), Helen McCrory (Rosanna Calvierri), Alex Price (Francesco Calvierri), Lucian Msarnati (Guido), Alisha Bailey (Isabella) and Simon Gregor (Steward)
Following “the kiss”*, the Doctor reunites Amy with her fiancé Rory and takes them in the TARDIS to Venice in 1580 for a romantic weekend to get their relationship back on track. Once there, the Doctor immediately realises that something is wrong and when he investigates a mysterious school for girls run by the city’s patron Rosanna Calvierri it seems that he has uncovered a nest of vampires.
(*See the episode ‘Flesh and Stone’.)
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Toby Whithouse, who wrote ‘The Vampires of Venice’, is the creator and main writer of the BBC3 series ‘Being Human’, an inspired mix of comedy, drama, thriller and horror that tells the story of a vampire, a werewolf and a ghost who share a house. He previously wrote the season two Doctor Who episode ‘School Reunion’, which saw the return of Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, and was responsible for my favourite ‘Torchwood’ episode ‘Greeks Bearing Gifts’.
Before I realised that ‘The Vampires of Venice’ was written by Toby Whithouse I had been slightly wary of it. Vampires have started to become rather tired and clichéd recently due to over-exposure, what with the ‘Twilight’ film franchise and the television series ‘True Blood’, amongst others. In the event, it proved to be a very enjoyable episode, with plenty of humour typical of Whithouse, although not without its faults.
Bringing back Rory, who we first encountered in ‘The Eleventh Hour’ (the first episode of this latest season), worked very well. In a clever twist, he was not overwhelmed that the TARDIS is bigger on the inside than outside, immediately guessing that the inside exists within a different dimension. His anger at the Doctor when he tells him “you have no idea how dangerous you make people to themselves” was powerful and palpable, although we might wonder how he has been able to form such an incisive impression of the Doctor so quickly. Perhaps there is more to Rory than meets the eye and we are in for some surprises later on. The prospect is intriguing.
The vampire storyline works well for the first twenty minutes or so, with its echoes of the 1989 story ‘The Curse of Fenric’, but it seems as if one minute they are not affected by light and the next minute they are, something that occurs time and time again. Having watched the episode twice and taken care the second time to look for clues to explain this, it still seems like an inconsistency in the story, unless I am missing a subtle explanation for it. Once we discover that the vampires are, in fact, no such thing the episode does begin to unravel a little bit, but this is always going to be a problem when trying to tell a story in 45 minutes. Everything starts to become rather rushed and frenetic as the action builds up towards its climax.
Signora Calvierri (played by Helen McCrory, who I recently saw in the now cancelled American crime-drama series ‘Life’) clearly knows exactly who the Doctor is once she has discovered that he comes from Gallifrey, although this is not particularly well explained to us. She knows of the fate of the Time Lords and of the part the Doctor played in the Time War, suggesting to him that he is now responsible for the extinction of two races, hers as well as his own. This new season is clearly harking back to the first season of the revived series, both in theme and content.
It does seem a little odd that knowing the creatures are still in the water beneath Venice, the Doctor just leaves them there to die, but I suppose there is nothing he can do to save them. Once again, though, it does seem like an inconsistency in the story. After all, they will presumably continue to devour anyone unfortunate enough to fall into the water. Equally, it seems inconceivable that earlier in the story Signori Calvierri would just allow the Doctor to walk away once she has discovered who he is and that he intends to stop her plans. Surely she would have had him killed immediately or at least hold him captive.
I don’t think this is ultimately destined to be remembered as a classic Doctor Who episode, but it is a very good one and there seems to be a lot here that will become much more relevant as we see future episodes in this season.
‘The Vampires of Venice’ was filmed in Trogir, Croatia, on the Adriatic coast, and at St Donat’s Castle in Glamorgan. It looks fantastic, a very realistic depiction of Venice.
Review posted 9 May 2010
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Rating 2½
Written by Peter Grimwade
Directed by Fiona Cumming
Starring Peter Davison (The Doctor), Nicola Bryant (Peri Brown), Mark Strickson (Turlough), Anthony Ainley (The Master), Peter Wyngarde (Timanov), Barbara Shelley (Sorasta), James Bate (Amyand), Michael Bangerter (Curt), John Alkin (Lomand), Edward Highmore (Malkon), Jonathan Caplan (Roskal), Dallas Adams (Professor Howard Foster) and Gerald Flood (Voice of Kamelion)
The Doctor and Turlough are drawn to the planet Sarn, which holds secrets about Turlough’s identity and past that he is reluctant to share. Once on Sarn they encounter the Doctor’s old adversary the Master. They also pick-up an accidental hitch-hiker along the way, American botany student Perpugilliam ‘Peri’ Brown.
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Peter Davison had the unenviable task of taking over from Tom Baker, who had played the Doctor for seven seasons between December 1974 and March 1981, by far the longest tenure of any of the actors who have played the role to date. More so than that, Doctor Who was enormously popular during Baker’s tenure, averaging eight or nine million viewers an episode. The final episode of the story ‘The City of Death’, co-written by Douglas Adams and broadcast on 20 October 1979, was watched by over 16 million viewers. It remains a record for the show, one that is extremely unlikely to be broken.
Davison proved to be a clever choice because not only was he quite different to Tom Baker, his Doctor was quite different to any of his predecessors. This Doctor was less arrogant than had been seen in the past, a much more reserved and diffident character. Rather than wanting to always be at the very centre of the action, he was frequently content to remain on the sidelines, observing events as they unfolded from a distance. His relationship with his companions was also quite different in many ways and much more collaborative.
‘Planet of Fire’, the penultimate story to feature Peter Davison, is not the best of his time in the role. In many respects it is hampered by the fact that it needs to help to bring one era to an end and set the scene for the new era that was soon to come, preparing the way for the change from the fifth to the sixth Doctor. Turlough leaves the story here and Peri is introduced, complete with numerous gratuitous bikini scenes. There was also what appeared at the time to be a somewhat unsatisfactory final appearance of the Master, at least as played by Anthony Ainley, although in fact it would not be long before his return.
The story is not an altogether uninteresting one, with its themes of religious belief and intolerance, even if perhaps it is a little flat. There is even some genuine location filming in Lanzarote. It is enlivened by the presence of Peter Wyngarde, who is great value. Wyngarde had been a big star on British television and a larger-than-life one in the late 1960s and early 1970s in ‘Department S’ and its spin-off ‘Jason King’. Barbara Shelley, a familiar face from many British horror films of the 1950s and 1960s, is also featured, although she is underused in a rather inconsequential role.
At the time of Nicola Bryant’s arrival as Peri the producers of the show played down the fact that she is actually British, although she was playing an American character. They were also reluctant to make it known that she was married – oddly enough, to an American, which gave her dual British-American citizenship.
Review posted 8 May 2010
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Rating 2½
Written by Anthony Steven (completed by Eric Saward)
Directed by Peter Moffatt
Starring Colin Baker (The Doctor), Nicola Bryant (Peri Brown), Maurice Denham (Professor Edgeworth / Azmael), Edwin Richfield (Mester), Kevin McNally (Hugo Lang), Barry Stanton (Noma), Oliver Smith (Drak), Dennis Chinnery (Sylvest), Gavin Conrad (Romulus), Andrew Conrad (Remus), Seymour Green (Chamberlain), Dione Inman (Elena) and Helen Blatch (Fabian)
Following his regeneration, the Doctor’s behaviour becomes increasingly erratic and borders on psychotic. He attempts to strangle his companion Peri, but apparently remembers nothing of the incident immediately afterwards. He sets the controls of the TARDIS to take them to Titan 3 where, he says, he intends to spend a thousand years of solitude, but once there they encounter Commander Hugo Lang and become tangled up in a mystery involving Azmael, another Time Lord and an old friend of the Doctor.
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There were two things more than anything else that contributed to the success of Doctor Who when it first began back in 1963. One was the iconic electronic theme music and the other was the creation of the Daleks. However, one thing more than anything else ensured its longevity and that was the regeneration of the Doctor. Initially, it was an expedient forced upon the producers of the show when William Hartnell, the first Doctor, departed in 1966, partly as a result of increasing ill health. The series had been a huge success and they were looking for a novel way of persuading the audience to accept another actor in the lead role. It worked beautifully and it meant that the show could now effectively continue for as long as there was an audience to watch it.
Colin Baker was the sixth Doctor, taking over the role from Peter Davison at the end of the twenty-first season. The regeneration itself took place at the end of the story ‘The Caves of Androzani’, which was voted by fans as the greatest Doctor Who story of all-time in the official magazine in 2009. ‘The Twin Dilemma’ was the final story in that season, told across four episodes between the 22 and 30 March 1984.
Unlike the previous story, ‘The Twin Dilemma’ is not universally well-regarded and it marked the start of a very troubled time for the show. In fact, many fans would claim it is the worst story in the history of the series. Through no fault of Colin Baker, several factors meant that his time in the lead role was not a happy one. In retrospect, however, it is clear that Baker was a good choice for the role and there were some interesting ideas played with during his brief tenure as the Doctor.
Baker’s performance in ‘The Twin Dilemma’ is perhaps rather hammy at times, but this was his first story in the role and the writers were attempting to show a new and much less likeable side of the Doctor. The moment when he attempts to strangle Peri still has enough of an impact to shock. The story itself fizzles, never quite catching fire, and doesn’t make a great deal of sense, but it is enjoyable enough and I rather like Mester, the telepathic giant slug creature.
There was, as I recall it, some unhappiness at the suggestion that this was a Doctor who was deeply flawed, one who bordered on megalomania. It brings to mind the reaction of some fans to Buffy’s flawed and complex character in ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ – and later on when dislike of both the lead character and the actress who played her had become deeply entrenched in those same fans (irrationally so, in my opinion), their negative reaction to the flaws explored in supporting characters like Willow.
I don’t know if I watched all four episodes of ‘The Twin Dilemma’ the first time around, but I did watch the opening episode and it has always been one that has remained in my memory. I came to it again all these years later not expecting too much, but I was pleasantly surprised. Doctor Who has been much better than this many times, both before and since, but even below its best it remains compulsive viewing.
Review posted 8 May 2010
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Rating 2¾
Written by Ben Aaronovitch
Directed by Michael Kerrigan
Starring Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Sophie Aldred (Ace), Nicholas Courtney (Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart), Jean Marsh (Morgaine), James Ellis (Peter Warmsly), Angela Bruce (Brigadier Winifred Bambera), Marcus Gilbert (Ancelyn), Christopher Bowen (Mordred), Ling Tai (Shou Yuing), Noel Collins (Pat Rawlinson), June Bland (Elizabeth Rawlinson), Dorota Rae (Flight Lieutenant Lavel), Robert Jezek (Sergeant Zbrigniev), Paul Tormany (Major Husak), Marek Anton (The Destroyer) and Angela Douglas (Doris Lethbridge-Stewart)
The Doctor responds to a distress signal and the TARDIS materialises close by Lake Vortigern in England in the 20th Century, where he encounters a UNIT convoy transporting a nuclear device. When Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, now retired from active service, is informed that the Doctor has returned, he immediately responds to the call and a military helicopter is sent to take him to the site. They all get caught up in an ancient war spilling sideways across time from an alternative dimension involving sorcery and the legend of King Arthur. The Doctor is already known to the combatants, who identify him as Merlin.
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‘Battlefield’, which was broadcast on BBC1 between the 6th and 27th September 1989, was the opening story of the twenty-sixth and final season of the original Doctor Who, the so-called “classic series”. It was the third and final season to feature Sylvester McCoy, the seventh Doctor, although he did return for the “regeneration” scenes in the 1996 film version starring Paul McGann. McCoy is, along with David Tennant, one of two Scottish actors to have played the Doctor.
‘Battlefield’ was made during the period when John Nathan-Turner was producing Doctor Who (pictured with Sylvester McCoy). He was the longest-serving producer on the series, having taken over the role in 1980, and presided over 130 episodes. Nathan-Turner cast the fifth, sixth and seventh Doctors (Pater Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy), during what became an increasingly turbulent time after the tremendous popularity and success of the Tom Baker years. He dealt with complaints from campaigners like Mary Whitehouse, who thought the show had a negative influence on children, and opposition from within the BBC. He also faced criticism from some fans of the show as a result of the changes he made, not least because of declining audience ratings.
In Sylvester McCoy’s first season the Doctor was portrayed as slightly comical and clownish, not entirely dissimilar to the second Doctor, played by Patrick Troughton. This perhaps was influenced by McCoy’s own acting background and in particular his time as a member of the Ken Campbell Roadshow, where his brand of physical humour included hammering nails up his nose and setting fire to his head. Later on, however, McCoy’s Doctor became a distinctly darker and more ambiguous character.
I have always been extremely fond of McCoy’s third and final season in the role and consider the four stories, told across fourteen episodes, to be amongst my favourites from any era of the series. However, it had been many years since I last watched ‘Battlefield’. It’s an ambitious attempt to marry the legend of King Arthur and Excalibur to a theme of inter-dimension warfare and although it is a little bit messy and convoluted it is not altogether unsuccessful, despite more than a few faults.
The battle scenes do look like the rather peculiar re-enactments that historical societies like to put on and the special effects are a long way short of being realistic. The incidental music is horrible and not remotely fitting, although certainly typical of the late 1980s. These faults, however, are more than made up for by the simple fact that this is a spirited romp, even if it does feel a little rushed at times and perhaps would have benefited from more than its four 25-minute episodes. I would have liked to have seen the Arthurian legend expanded a little more. There is an interesting take on the legend that one day King Arthur will make a messianic return to lead the Britons to freedom and victory. Here, it is ultimately discovered that Arthur turned to dust centuries ago and the continued conflict has been a futile exercise in unnecessary killing and retribution.
There is a return for Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart after quite a considerable gap. Courtney made his first appearance in the Doctor Who story ‘The Web of Fear’ in early 1968 and was most recently seen in 2008 in the second season of the spin-off series ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’. There is also an unnecessary but not at all unwelcome appearance by “Bessie”, the car that had been driven by the third Doctor.
When Sylvester McCoy first took over the role of the Doctor he inherited the companion of his predecessor Colin Baker. Sophie Aldred joined in the final story of that first season and her character Ace became the Doctor’s companion for the next two seasons. This was a rebellious, forthright and tough character with a troubled home background and in many ways quite a departure from the past, a clear reaction to the slightly simpering companion exemplified by Jo Grant (played by Katy Manning). Ace is an interesting character and even if Aldred is perhaps not the most skilful of actors, I always thought she was a good match for the role and she and McCoy worked very well together.
A few seeds of the revived series devised by Russell T Davies can be found here. Ace quickly forms a friendship with the only other young person she encounters, Shou Yuing. The Doctor’s relationship with Lethbridge-Stewart is seen at the end of the story to be very much that of old friends. Instead of making a swift departure in the TARDIS, as he would normally do, he stays as a guest at the brigadier’s house. In fact, more than one friendship has been forged during the events just told. Davies expanded on this theme, something that contributed greatly to the success of the revived series.
There are several things in ‘Battlefield’ that alert us to the fact that this story was made in the 1980s and not the 1970s – and that some hard-fought battles had been won in between times. The presence of a female “brigadier” is just one example. In retrospect it may seem rather quaint and for younger viewers the significance of it may be lost entirely now, but it does lend this period of Doctor Who an added importance.
If truth be told, ‘Battlefield’ doesn’t stand the test of time. However, for someone like me who remembers it with great fondness its weaknesses are outweighed by the sheer nostalgic joy of watching it again. It was great fun and brought back some good memories.
The Northern Irish actor James Ellis, who plays archaeologist Peter Warmsly, is a well-known face on British television. He starred in the long-running crime drama series ‘Z Cars’ between 1962 and 1978, appearing in 625 episodes.
Review posted 3 May 2010
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WARNING: spoilers if you have not watched these episodes.
Rating 3½
Written by Steven Moffat
Directed by Adam Smith
Starring Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), Alex Kingston (River Song), Ian Glen (Octavian), David Atkins (Bob), Darren Morfitt (Marco), Mark Monero (Pedro), George Russo (Phillip), Mark Springer (Christian), Troy Glasgow (Angelo), Simon Dutton (Alistair) and Mike Skinner (Security Guard)
The Doctor spots a 12,000 year old “home box” (a starship version of a black box) in a museum, with a message burnt into it written in ancient Gallifreyan text. Recognising that he is the intended recipient of the message, he takes the TARDIS back in time to rescue River Song from the starship Byzantium, which then crashes into an ancient and long deserted monastery on the planet Alfava Metraxis. A group of soldier clerics led by Father Octavian arrive and the Doctor is informed that a Weeping Angel was in the bowels of the ship and they must now go down into a catacomb of tunnels known as the Maze of the Dead in search of it.
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The fifth season of the revived Doctor Who (the thirty-first season in total, not including “specials”) started promisingly with ‘The Eleventh Hour’. The second episode ‘The Beast Below’ felt slightest flat first time around, but has benefited from repeat viewings. The rather rushed ‘Victory of the Daleks’ was a slight disappointment, but now the season has hit a high with a two-part story that sees the return of River Song and the Weeping Angels.
River Song, a role originally written with Kate Winslet in mind, but ultimately played by the actress Alex Kingston, first appeared in ‘Silence in the Library’ and ‘Forest of the Dead’, a two-part story in the fourth season of the revived series in 2008. It was hinted at the time that she might have been the Doctor’s wife and in the first of those episodes she asked the Doctor if he yet knew about the crash of the Byzantium, creating a link to this new story. This time around we have stronger hints that River Song is the Doctor’s wife in the future, although it is never explicitly confirmed and denied.
The Weeping Angels made their first appearance in ‘Blink’. That highly-acclaimed episode from 2007 starred Carey Mulligan, who has since received a best actress Academy Award nomination and is tipped for big things in the future, including, so it is claimed, the lead role in a remake of ‘My Fair Lady’. ‘Blink’, ‘Silence in the Library’ and ‘Forest of the Dead’ were all written by Steven Moffat, who has subsequently assumed the role of executive producer and head writer from Russell T Davies. He wrote these two new episodes.
I liked ‘Blink’ very much and thought the Weeping Angels were a fascinating creation. However, because that was such an unusual episode I was not sure about their use again. As it turns out, they work brilliantly here. I didn’t have any strong opinion about River Song following her first appearance, although watching those two episodes again very recently has led me to the conclusion that they are much better than I had remembered, not that I disliked them first time around. I think she works extremely well in these new episodes, but my own preference would be that we don’t meet her again too frequently in the future. The occasional encounter would work best and help to maintain the air of mystery and ambiguity.
I think I am right in saying the budget for this new season of Doctor Who has been cut. It certainly doesn’t show here. These episodes look spectacular and there are some superb special effects. As is the style of Doctor Who now, it is very fast paced, but telling the story across two episodes has allowed for it to build up without the rushed and rather under-cooked feel of ‘Victory of the Daleks’. There is a well-judged aura of foreboding and claustrophobia throughout the two episodes, but particularly in part one. This reaches a crescendo when the young soldier-cleric Bob radios Octavian and the Doctor and it is discovered that he is, in fact, already dead.
There are one or two moments that don’t really work that well and are perhaps best not given too much thought – for example, Amy walking with her eyes shut amongst the Weeping Angels, tricking them into believing that she can see them. I guess this works if we assume the Doctor did not have any better solution to the problem and this was the only thing he could think of in a seemingly hopeless situation. His demeanour and loss of temper with River Song certainly suggests that he was feeling the pressure and I for one am pleased to see this side of him, previously evident in Christopher Eccleston’s Doctor, starting to come to the surface again.
I still do have a sense of déjà vu, something that has been with me since ‘The Beast Below’. Apart from the return of River Song and the Weeping Angels, there are many other things here to remind us of previous stories in the revived series. Episodes that immediately came to my mind include ‘The Satan Pit’ and ‘The Waters of Mars’.
The closing scene in which Amy passionately kisses the Doctor and tries to entice him into bed has caused some debate and disquiet. I had not read about this before watching ‘Flesh & Stone’ and it did come as a surprise on first viewing. I have subsequently learned that the Daily Mail has rather predictably taken against it. That newspaper has already previously complained about Karen Gillan being too sexy, laughably and implausibly claiming that at no time previously could any of the Doctor’s companions be described as “sexy”. Having watched ‘Flesh & Stone’ again, I think the scene works very well. I am not going to worry unduly about where it might lead to just yet.
Reaction to the new Doctor and to this new season has been generally very positive, but there have been some dissenting voices. One particularly angry fan comment I have read in response to ‘The Time of Angels’ and ‘Flesh & Stone’ suggests that it is now so bad on every level that it should be cancelled immediately. The only reason I am not more taken aback by such opinions, apparently coming from fans of the show, is that I encountered exactly the same thing in the days of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’. At that time I was quite shocked that a large minority of fans seemed so angry and critical and so quick to voice their disapproval, but now I realise it is just a symptom of such loyal and fanatical fandoms.
The cameo appearance by Mike Skinner in the opening scene of ‘The Time of Angels’ passed me by completely because, up to that moment, I did not actually know what he looked like.
My expectations of this new season are probably still too high just now, but this was very good. I don’t think there is a better show on television at the moment.
Review posted 2 May 2010
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Rating 3½
Written by Terrance Dicks and Malcolm Hulke
Directed by David Maloney
Starring Patrick Troughton (The Doctor); Frazer Hines (Jamie); Wendy Padbury (Zoe); David Savile (Lieutenant Carstairs); Philip Madoc (War Lord); Edward Brayshaw (War Chief); James Brae (Security Chief); Vernon Dobtcheff (Scientist); Jane Sherwin (Lady Jennifer Buckingham); Noel Coleman (General Smythe); Hubert Rees (Captain Ransom); Richard Steele (Commandant Gorton); Graham Weston (Russell); David Troughton (Moor); Rudolph Walker (Harper); Bermard Horsfell (First Time Lord); Trevor Martin (Second Time Lord) and Clyde Pollitt (Third Time Lord)
The TARDIS materialises in no-man’s land in what appears to be a trench war zone in the Great War. The Doctor and his two companions, Jamie and Zoe, end up in the field headquarters of the British Army, where they are accused of being spies and court-martialled and the Doctor is sentenced to be executed by firing squad. However, when they escape and find themselves chased by Roman foot soldiers it quickly becomes apparent that all is not as it seems. They are at the epicentre of a complex Alien plot to become absolute rulers of the Galaxy.
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‘The War Games’ was the final regular story to feature the second Doctor, played by Patrick Troughton, although he did turn up again on three more occasions in the company of subsequent Doctors. It was told across ten episodes and a total running time a little over four hours between 19 April and 21 June 1969. As far as I know, only ‘The Daleks Master Plan’, told across twelve episodes in late 1965 and early 1966, is longer, unless one counts ‘The Trial of a Time Lord’ in 1986. 63 episodes from the Patrick Troughton era are lost, so we should be grateful that all ten episodes of ‘The War Games’ still exist and in good condition. This was the last time Doctor Who was filmed in black and white.
Despite its lengthy running time, ‘The War Games’ has surprising few real dead spots, although it does have a tendency to repeat itself a little too often and undoubtedly would have benefited from some trimming. The concept is a very interesting one and the subtext about the horror and futility of war is admirable. The recreation of the horrific reality of trench warfare is surprisingly effective, if perhaps the other war zones are not quite so successfully realised. Some extremely dodgy attempts at German, American and Mexican accents do not help, but somehow the variable acting doesn’t really seem to matter. Some of the acting is truly awful, but that is part of the period charm of it all.
Special mention must be given to Philip Madoc for a great performance as the War Lord. Madoc had already made an appearance in the 1966 film ‘Daleks Invasion Earth 2150AD’, which is not considered to be part of canon, and in another Patrick Troughton story ‘The Krotons’ in 1968. He appeared in Doctor Who again in 1976 in one of my favourite stories, ‘The Brain of Morbius’, which was written by Terrance Dicks, one of the two co-writers of ‘The War Games’. I loved the hammy performance of James Brae as the Security Chief. The strange over-emphasised monotone voice patterns he employed are almost identical to Dan Aykroyd in the Saturday Night Live sketches and 1993 film ‘Coneheads’. It made me smile, but at the same time it was strangely chilling.
There is an appearance by Rudolph Walker, who went on to star in the contentious 1970s sit-com ‘Love Thy Neighbour’ and later on in ‘The Thin Blue Line’ with Rowan Atkinson, before joining the cast of the soap opera ‘EastEnders’. There is also an early role for David Troughton, the son of Patrick Troughton and an acclaimed stage and television actor in his own right. He has appeared in Doctor Who again, most recently in the 2008 episode ‘Midnight’ with David Tennant.
The few Patrick Troughton stories that I can still recall are very stylised. That is particularly true here when the action moves from the war zones to the Alien centre of operations, complete with control panels that are actually nothing more than metal shapes on a magnetic board. This is, I think, the first time we visit the home planet of the Time Lords, although the name Gallifrey is not actually mentioned. I also think it is the first time they are called the “Time Lords”.
Troughton’s Doctor is often referred to as the “Cosmic Hobo”. He was quite different to the first Doctor, portrayed by William Hartnell, and indeed to his successor Jon Pertwee. He often appeared befuddled, but was something of a trickster, meaning that his adversaries would underestimate his quicksilver mind. He had a number of catch-phrases, of which the one I recall best is, “When I say run... RUN!”
As well as being Patrick Troughton’s final story, ‘The War Games’ also marks the departure of Fraser Hines, who played Jamie Robert McCrimmon from ‘The Highlander’ in December 1966, the second story with Troughton, onwards. Hines returned, alongside Patrick Troughton, to appear in the ‘The Five Doctors’ in 1983 and ‘The Two Doctors’ in 1985. Wendy Padbury also departed at the end of ‘The War Games’. Her character Zoe Heriot had first appeared in ‘The Wheel in Space’ in April 1968. She made one subsequent appearance, a cameo in ‘The Five Doctors’. Padbury went on to star in a now largely-forgotten series called ‘Freewheelers’, while Hines was among the regular cast of the long-running soap opera ‘Emmerdale Farm’ (later shortened to ‘Emmerdale’) between 1972 and 1994.
I don’t know where ‘The War Games’ sits in the pantheon of classic Doctor Who stories, but while it certainly isn’t without its faults, I enjoyed it immensely.
Review posted 2 May 2010
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A pre-human skull is discovered on building works in Hobbs Lane in Knightsbridge. Palaeontologist Dr Matthew Roney identifies it as a missing link, many thousands of years old, and obtains permission to carry out archaeological excavation of the site. However, when what appears to be a previously-unidentified unexploded World War II German missile is discovered, the site is closed off by an Army bomb disposal team. Roney asks his friend Professor Bernard Quatermass of the British Experimental Rocket Group to intercede on his behalf and they begin to piece together the terrible truth about the origins of the human species.
When I was growing up, the 1967 Hammer Films version of ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ was one of my favourite films. I guess I would first have watched it as a teenager sometime in the early to mid-1970s. I remain very fond of it. Like the two earlier Quatermass films made by Hammer, it was a remake of a 1950s BBC serial. ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ was the final one in the trilogy, broadcast in six 30-minute segments between 22 December 1958 and 26 January 1959, most of it performed live.
