Doctor Who: Tooth and Claw

“This is not my world.”

Crikey. It’s gone all Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Generally speaking Doctor Who can embrace all genres but there’s something about these martial arts scenes, or rather the aesthetics of these martial arts scenes, that feels very odd.

But then we’re back to the TARDIS, and what on Earth is Rose wearing? By God, those clothes look awful. Fortunately, the Doctor’s taste in music this episode is rather better than Rose’s taste in clothing. Going to see Ian Dury in the late ‘70s is exactly the sort of thing I‘d do if I had a time machine, frankly.

They end up, of course, in Scotland in 1879, where the Doctor decides to put on a Scottish accent for some reason. This is obviously at some level a self-referential acknowledgement that Tennant as an actor is doing the exact opposite, but for all my enjoyment of this kind of thing it seems a bit empty here. Still, it’s nice that he calls himself Dr James McCrimmon. From the township of Balamory, naturally.

And Pauline Collins is back after 39 years, this time in a rather different role. The dialogue immediately makes us suspect that Vicky is being led into a trap- the pre-titles sequence was a bit of a clue as well, admittedly- but for the moment that takes second place to the sheer spectacle of what she’s actually like. For the moment we see her nicer side before she’s provoked, but it’s interesting to see RTD opting for a compromise between the mardy battleaxe of popular imagination and the more fun-loving character who flirted with Disraeli and actually, rumour has it, may have had a sense of humour. The character ultimately disappoints, though; she essentially does nothing but react to the threats to her safety and to the Doctor’s behaviour. This isn’t a “celebrity historical” in the way The Unquiet Dead’s portrayal of Dickens was.

The carriage leads them to the, cough, Torchwood Estate. Gosh, I wonder if that’s going to be significant?

By now it’s clear that there’s something worrying about the tone of this story. Nothing bad has even happened yet but the frivolous attitude of the Doctor and Rose has already become annoying. And Rose’s bet with the Doctor that she can get Vicky to say she’s not amused is the worst example of this. Once the monks and the wolf start becoming a threat their frivolity becomes even more objectionable- people are dying. I can certainly see why Vicky reacts as she does.

Oh, and incidentally, it struck me immediately after the wolf announcing its intention to bit Vicky and establish its mighty steampunk “Empire of the Wolf”- this is influenced by Brotherhood of the Wolf, innit?

Annoying though Rose is, the Doctor’s attitude here is basically unforgiveable. His frivolity slips into bad taste here. Even the very fact that he’s ended up with the responsibility for saving Vicky’s life ultimately stems from an act of frivolity- casually flashing the psychic paper before sniggering to Rose shortly afterwards that “We just met Queen Victoria!”

The ending with the telescope is decent enough, and I like the indication that Vicky was bitten, although it should have just been left there. But the scene where our heroes are dubbed “Sir Doctor of TARDIS” and “Dame Rose of the Powell Estate” is cringeworthy in a way that even the parallel scene in The King’s Demons wasn’t. Nothing about the dialogue, the attitudes of the Victorian characters, or the way the Queen does things quite rings true for the period, but this scene takes the biscuit.

I’m on Vicky’s side as she banishes them both, personally, and I can see exactly why she establishes this mysterious Torchwood thing.



Well, after it’s so-so predecessor we finally get the first true clunker of the “new” series, surprisingly so as I recall liking this well enough at the time. But although the plot functions well enough the period just feels wrong and, unforgivably, the Doctor and Rose are completely unlikeable, frivolously arsing about while death and destruction happen around them. 2/5.



The David Tennant I’m-So-Sorry-ometer

The Christmas Invasion: 0
New Earth: 1 (“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”)
Tooth and Claw: 0

Doctor Who: The Faceless Ones

Part One


"It's a flying beastie!"


Once again, I'm really appreciating the luxury of actual footage, and DVD quality no less. And one of the first things we see is a 60s copper with one of those old comedy chinstraps! It's little things like this that make me miss footage so much. A good start from this Malcolm Hulke chap- I wonder if we'll ever hear from him again?

Our heroes get separated within seconds- is this a record? I notice that it's Jamie the Doctor finds first, and he's only mildly concerned about finding the others- favouritism? As many said in the Macra Terror thread, Jamie has now become his fully-fledged permanent self, and the on-screen rapport between Troughton and Hines is now at full strength fabness.

This is very well-directed, which along with the script makes it all seem very reminiscent of The Avengers, not a type of story I remember seeing before- this is most pleasing as recent stories, though good, have not been as innovative as they used to be.

The Doctor and Jamie don't seem all that enthusiastic to help Polly find Ben, and they seem to lose Polly rather easily! And Ben doesn't seem to be in this episode much at all, especially towards the end. A very unusual episode- the only real sci-fi element until the cliffhanger arrives is the ray gun.


Part Two


"We have ways of dealing with such people!"


Back to the recon, then, which is good for one thing at least- the captions along the bottom ain't half good at getting you to learn the names of all the guest characters! Things slow down an awful lot with this episode- the eye chart stuff is blatant filler, and you begin to notice how little is happening. It's not too much of a problem, at least not yet, as you're still curious about what's going on. But things need to start happening soon. And this may be competently written but after The Macra Terror it all looks a bit formulaic.

It's Pauline Collins! Er, that's an interesting Liverpool accent. Very Z-Cars... Of course, I barely recognised her as the photo's very fuzzy. These old Loose Cannon recons are noticeably much less good than the recent ones, although the fact that mine is a 50,000th generation copy probably isn't helping!

Ah, Ben finds Polly and looks around for a phone. Not the kind of scene you see much of in drama today...



Part Three


"All right, stay here. After all, they can only murder me. Ta ra!"


The Doctor's being menaced by a sinister surveillance camera. Makes you think, that- back in 1967 surveillance cameras were the stuff of Orwellian nightmares!

I'm loving the relationship between Jamie and the clearly-intended-as-a-possible-companion Samantha. And Jamie gets pulled up on why he always does what the Doctor says, which seems to be a developing theme.

Er, where have Ben and Polly gone?

Part Four


"It'll cost you 28 quid. Pounds, to you."

"Ach, but that's a fortune! I've never seen that much money in my life!"


I've only just noticed, eight episodes into the new title sequence, that the music has changed as well! Duh. It's also becoming very noticeable that this is a very old recon- perhaps there's a more recent one? The photos are not clear at all and there's no footage from the surviving episodes used for recaps, the first time I've seen this.

The deathtrap set here for the Doctor, Jamie and Samantha is in no way evocative of a certain 60s film, and I have no doubt that no one above me in this thread can possibly have quoted the line "No, Mr Bond, I expect you to die!"

Ooh, a mention for Ben and Polly!

Once again we get some obvious padding out of the episode to fill up the time as Meadows is found not to be on duty. The episode ends intriguingly though- it's a crying shame we can't see Jamie's 18th century reaction to being on a plane!

Part Five


"Polly, then Ben, now Jamie..."

A swanky space station in Earth orbit may not be particularly futuristic now but, of course, in 1967, six years before Skylab, this stuff was all in the zeitgeist. Plus we get miniaturised people! In filing cabinets!

At last, the all important exposition scene... what? An explosion, er, destroys the identities of the Chameleons? oh dear. Still, nicely surprising when the Inspector turns out to be a duplicate- and the Director, no less!

Good old Doctor- cheerfully going on to the chameleon plane without any sort of plan! Nurse Pinto's really quite incredibly brave too. They completely fluff their bluffing, mind- Pinto still refers to the "chameleon" who's ostensibly switched bodies from Meadows to the Doctor as "Meadows" and we're to expect Blade won't smell a rat!

Oh, and it's just dawned on me- the Inspector / Director is none other than good old Bernard Kay!


Part Six


"We are the most intelligent race in the universe!"


Interesting line spoken by Blade about both Pinto and the Doctor: "I checked at the medical centre. You're both human!" So, it's not as though the Doctor has, say, an alien physiology or anything! Still, he does have tendencies towards vandalism, which he demonstrates rather splendidly with the Chameleons' machine. I love the Trout!

Samantha leaves rather abruptly after all the proto-companioneering, but at least she and Jamie get to snog each other, according to my recon at least. And we actually get to see Ben and Polly again. Yay! I was genuinely fearing they were about to be Dodo'd. It's a bit of a coincidence that this is the exact date they left, of course, but we get a wonderfully evocative pair of lines between Polly and the Doctor that should be much better known: "The thing is, Doctor... it's my world." "Yes, yes, you're very lucky... I never got back to mine."


Well... I didn't think much of that really. It was competently structured, perhaps, and what we could see of it looked good, but things just happened so bloody slowly. This is the first time in the marathon I have to trot out the old cliché about a six parter being two episodes too long. But it's not just that- it all just felt so formulaic, and felt oddly humourless. Where was the sparkle in the dialogue? Still, I liked Samantha, and the Doctor / Jamie double act (and, I'm sure, shipping!) properly starts here. 2/5