Century Falls: Episode 6

 "Before disaster came, when things were perfect still."

This script is beautiful; consider the quote above with its perfect iambs. And this is a beautiful finale, satisgying thematically as much as in terms of plot, with every character getting perfect focus and development.

I've been ambivalent about Century Falls. It's been fun getting the Doctor Who Easter Eggs- characters called Ashe and Josiah, a mysterious Watcher, the whole vibe. And I'm aware there's a lot more subtext here- about hope, about indivoiduality vs comformity on several layers- that I've been slow to realise. But it has, at times, been hard going.

That is not at all the case for this perfect final episode. Even Julia gets redemption and closure, and only Josiah unambiguously dies. It took a while to get here but this finale makes me glad that, like Tess, I kept the faith.

Century Falls: Episode 5

 "I've never tied anyone up before..."

I have, thus far, defended RTD's script for Century Falls while allowing criticism to fall upon the production. After all, the dialogue is rich and the characters convincing. And yet... this fifth episode is just running around to no good purpose.

Worse, the revelation of who Julia is falls flat. I expected more than some nebulous sense of her being some kind of gestalt entity for the whole village. There's some nice character stuff wiyth Carey and Ben, and the two Harkness sistors, and the cliffhanger is exciting, but tnis penultimate episiode has very little substance.

This is, perhaps, a fifth episode thing. RTD is, as we know, a bloody good writer, though rather young here. And Dark Season was a pair of linked three parters.

Hopefully the finale will impress.

Century Falls: Episode 4

 "Being alone is the easiest escape there is."

This episode is the turning point, full of revelations. Tess and her mother are reconciled, both with each other and with the truth: Elizabeth was adopted, but was born in Century Falls. We also hear a fuller account of what happened in 1953, and who Century is... although we get only hints of who Century is.

We learn who it is that Richard Naismith has been keping prisoner, though; his own father, Dr Josiah Naismith. We Doctor Who fans find all this very Ghost Light, no doubt very deliberate from RTD. There are lots of nice little character touches, too- Julia's manipulation of Ben, and her interesting longing for oblivion. Who is she?

And yet... somehow the brilliance of the poetic, beautiful script is not conveyed well by the visuals and, perhaps, the acting. Nevertheless, this is getting interesting.

Century Falls: Episode 3

 "I'm aware only that three spinster women have nothing better to do than gossip."

This is, it has to be said, a slow episode, but I don't think the failt is that of RTD's script, which feels very classic kids' TV stuff and, I noticed today, has twin sisters named "Harkness", a link between Agatha and Captain Jack.

Of course, the big character thing is that Tess's mother wants to keep her away from the Harkness sisters, bitter at what Esme said and understandably so. But the way she speaks to her poor daughter for believing the story is horrifying.

We see a little more, though not much, of what happened at the temple in 1953, and a gold masked woman called "Century". It's a nice drip, drip, drip for the third episode of six.

And then the big revelation... Julia, the "maid", is really in charge. I didn't see that coming, but it makes sense in hindsight. Is she Century? I'm dsure there's much to come.

And yet, despite the script, I think the direction and the cast aren't quite selling this as well as they could.

Century Falls: Episode 2

 "All the past of Century Falls- and it's coming back."

The plot thickens. So Richard has powers too, as do many in the village; Ben is merely particularly powerful.Then there's the "Gathering", where those villagers with a "birthright"do this psychic seance type thing. Oh, and no pregnancy in the village has been carried successfully to term for forty years, which is not good news for Tess' mum.

However, good though the script is, and good though much of the adult cast are, this suffers a bit from an abundance of child actors, all three of which are adequate but little more. There's an intriguing and effective atmosphere, though, in spite of this clearly not being an expensive programme to make. 

The village's attitude towards outsiders is clearer now, with Tess and her mum in a rather worrying position. Richard is all the more sinister. And what is this creepy, gold-masked figure? This is a very different series to Dark Season, and the characters, while well written, are less charismatic; there's no one to compare with Marcie.

Still, I'm enjoying this.

Century Falls: Episode 1

 "If you were born outside Century Falls, you're always an outsider!"

Yes indeed, this is a local village for local people.

I've been wishing to watch this early kids' drama by Russell T. Davies for years. It's very different from Dark Season, but feels very much in the lineage of a certain type of childrens' telefantasy. We have the Falls themselves, a mysterios temple that burned down forty years ago despite being made of stone- are these suspicious villagers pagan? Have Tess and her pregnant mother stumbled into The Wicker Man?

The characterisation, and the dialogue, are brilliantly RTD. Tess and her mum seem very real in comparison to the otherworldly villagers and those strange kids, Carey and the disturbingly odd Ben, a complex figure, with bullying tendencies and hidden depths, seemingly feared even my hos despairing father.

So many secrets and subplots are developing already, yet it's all very easy to follow. This is all rather intriguing.

Dark Season: Episodes 5 and 6

Episode Five

"A ventilation shaft. Marvellous. I’m a cliche.”

The middle episode, and we discover that Pendragon is digging not for Celtic archaeology but for an old MOD building beneath the school, and the Behemoth is an AI war machine that she once created. In spite of her cod-mysticism she’s actually a scientist, but so mad and melodramatic that only Jacqueline Pearce could possibly have played her: a genius scientist sacked for being a Nazi and prone to lots and lots of speechifying.

Elsewhere, Miss Maitland fails as an English teacher as she “corrects” Reet’s grammar to end a sentence with “and I”, failing to understand the difference between the nominative and the accusative.  Don’t you just hate that? But at least she begins to overcome her scepticism and get stuck in. Thomas, in spite of some more terrible acting from Ben Chandler, has some amusing scenes with Pendragon as it turns out his Aryan looks come mostly from hair dye.

It’s a rather cool ending as the Behemoth awakes and it’s revealed that the “chosen one” is in fact needed to sit in the chair and be subsumed into the machine- a sacrifice which now suddenly falls to a bizarrely ecstatic Pendragon. This is brilliantly mad chikdren’s telly.

Oh, look. There’s Mr Eldritch.


Episode Six

“There will be now new age. Only a dark age.”

A rather excellent finale as Marcie exploits the differences between the Nazis and the chaos-loving Eldritch, Lawful Evil vs Chaotic Evil. There’s a debate between Marcie and Eldritch to persuade the fully sentient Behemoth, and arguably a debate about whether it’s Miss Maitland with her bulldozer or Marcie with her words who saves the day.

All this stuff about the end of a century being an important time (it’s only 1991, kids) feels quaint from the vantage point of today, but it works. And Grant Parsons’ Eldritch is a splendidly melodramatic villain. And best of all is the scene where the increasingly cool Miss Maitland gives the Nazis a right good bollocking.

It’s a nice upbeat ending, Marcie is blatantly the Doctor as always, and this is a brilliant bit of telly. But I suppose it had to end; there are only so many sci-fi thrrats that could threaten a school. But that young RTD, the Why Don’t You bloke who wrote this- he’s going places, I tell you.

Dark Season: Episodes 3 and 4

Episode Three

"If I was here to give answers, I'd open an answer shop!"

A satisfying conclusion to the first three part story here, with a nice little twist as it’s revealed by the old man that “Professor Becjinski is my wife!” using Mr Eldritch’s casually misogynistic assumption that the man must be the professor as a trick. Of course, this means that Marcie and her mates don’t actually save the day, but it’s a nice way to end. I also like the way Mr Becjinsky tries to persuade Dr Osley to turn on Eldritch, giving Osley his big speech about the world deserving what it’s going to get.

Also interesting is Eldritch’s motive; although he intends to ensure all computers are networked and under his control, he doesn’t want control; no, he wants to create chaos.

Marcie gets some heroic stuff to do, and there’s a countdown (why do baddies never just press a button that does things instantly?). And, of course, Eldritch vanishes. It’s a big, satisfying ending, although Marcie, Reet and Thomas are perhaps a little sidelined. In fact, things would have pretty much unfolded much the same without them.


Episode Four

“Liberty Hall!”

Don’t imagine I didn’t spit the blatant reference to The Three Doctors up there. Anyway, Marcie, Reet and Thomas are back, with hesitant help from Miss Maitland, as Jacqueline Pearce turns up and steals every scene she’s in with aplomb. She was a force of nature and she will be missed.

Miss Pendragon is an eccentric baddie with a mysterious agenda and, quite rightly, the manners of Servalan, who is conducting a sham archaeological dig in a quest to find the “Behemoth” of Celtic legend. As Thomas notes, her commitment to diversity is less than ideal as all of her underlines have a suspiciously Aryan look. Indeed, she seems to have hired the handsome but dim Luke just to stand around being Aryan and unblemished, and suddenly abandons him when he gets slightly hurt. Nazi much?

Marnie spends the episode being splendidly moody mixed with bursts of Doctorish activity. We’ve established the format in the first three parter; now we can just get on with the adventure, and it appears the Behemoth may now be emerging...

Dark Season: Episodes One and Two

Episode One

“Normal is for the comatose!”

If you think Jodie Whittaker is the first female Doctor Who then you are quite, quite wrong. Let’s look at the evidence: RTD writes; 25 minute episodes; Marcie acts and speaks exactly like the Doctor; the directorial style and incidental music is exactly like Cartmel-era Who which is, after all, only a couple of years ago. The baddie even begins by saying “Nothing in the world can stop me now!”. I rest my case.

This is, in fact, a brilliant bit of telly that only the very 1991 fashions can’t spoil. The script is superb; Victoria Lambert is superb, Sylvester McCoy’s Doctor as a thirteen year old girl. The paddle is a bit of genius. It’s genuinely bizarre that she doesn’t seem to have acted in anything else. Then there’s a young Kate Wibslet (the less said about Ben Chandler the better) and such British telly stalwarts as Brigit Forsyth and the great Cyril Shaps.

Like Cartmel era Doctor Who, the programme hides its lack of budget with lots of mood, atmosphere, and having this and intrigue be a substitute for expensive spectacle, and does it well. It’s also full of strong characters, an intriguing mystery, and an intriguing men-in-black villain in the splendid Mr Eldritch. But the clothes, oh, the clothes...



Episode Two

“If I can teach you two anything it’s this; shut up and do as I say. Out!”

The plot thickens and so does the characterisation; I love Marcie’s fun little relationship with the exasperated and harassed Miss Maitland, and how only she realises that anything weird happened. We also begin to see how the Professor is at the heart of all this, leading to a splendid cliffhanger. And, this being the early ‘90s, we have the obligatory cyberspace bit, with even a kind of proto-internet. In 1991.

It’s weird to think I was about the same age as the kids in this at the time, but in some ways it doesn’t feel so very long ago. It’s intetesting to be reminded of a time where not all schools gave lip service to any of this silly uniform nonsense, for example, whatever the resulting fashion disasters. Thing is, though, what does Mr Eldritch want? So far he just walks around looking cool while talking like a super villain in a vague sort of way, more of a trope than a character as such. Not that I have any problem with this.