Doctor Who: The Invisible Enemy

Part One

“Contact has been made.”

We start the story in deep space, for the first time in ages. Unfortunately we then get a crap spaceship set which sets the tone for the rest of the story- I’ve always been annoyed by bland, featureless corridor sets being used to represent the future in space opera type stories and The Invisible Enemy is one of the worst offenders. Every set and every costume is bland and featureless, which casts a kind of dullness over what should be a fun and silly story. Only three stories after The Robots of Death showed us how it should be done, this shows us how it shouldn’t.

At least the TARDIS looks good. It’s a shame to lose the wooden control room, but at least the redesigned traditional control room looks good, even if the Doctor does dismiss it as though he was talking about any one of the other sets in the story! We’re in 5000 AD or thereabouts, the time of Magnus Greel and Time Agents, and also apparently the time of the “Great Break Out”. Presumably this refers to much more widespread colonisation than happened during the Earth Empire days two thousand years earlier. And as this is still said to be Leela’s past, perhaps her ancestors were involved.

It’s good to see Michael Sheard again, even if his horribly designed office oozes an awful lot of the unacceptable side of 70s-ness in spite of it being 5000 AD. And the virus is an interesting threat, giving us a good cliffhanger with the infected doctor about to kill Leela…

Part Two

“Blithering idiots, the pair of you.”

Cra;p though the design is, I like the attempt to suggest spelling has changed, with such uses as “isolayshun ward”.

The Doctor’s out of action for a bit, which means we have Leela flying the TARDIS (!) to some hospital asteroid, where the Bristol Boys get a chance to reuse their line from The Hand of Fear about Gallifrey being somewhere in Ireland. We’re also introduced to the very silly yet somehow fab Professor Marius, with his silly accent and his robot dog, K9. Yay! “That tin thing is my best friend and constant companion”, he informs us.

The Prof has to operate on the doctor whilst being assailed from all sides by the ranks of the infected. At the Doctor’s suggestion he, er, clones the Doctor and Leela, shrinks them, and injects them into the Doctor’s body. This is simultaneously awful and brilliant. Oh, an apparently cloning started in 3922. not in, say, 1997, with Dolly the Sheep or anything.

Oh, and why can’t they just cure the Doctor by transmat, as Harry did with Sarah during Revenge of the Cybermen?

Part Three

“I don’t know what to think. I’ve never been in anybody’s head before.”

This episode marks a turning point in the marathon for me personally- halfway through I finally finish my first notebook!

This entire episode is unintentionally hilarious, and the sets of the inside of the Doctor’s brain are much more fun than the sets we’ve seen elsewhere. I love the way the Clone Doctor keeps pointing bits out to Clone Leela. Apparently the Doctor was once able, Matrix-like, to tune himself into the “Time Lord intelligentsia”, but lost this ability when he was “kicked out”. I like the Doctor’s line about the mind and the brain being analogous to the land and the sea, utter rubbish though it may be.

Plenty of hilariousness abounds, from the Doctor’s beach ball-like antibodies to the ridiculous Slowness of Marius’s countdown. But pretty soon both K9(!) and the Professor are infected…

The Nucleus actually gives a pretty good justification of its actions to the Doctor- like any creature it has every right to survive. But of course, that goes both ways. In another context, this could have been a fairly serious discussion.

The ending is most odd, with the sting seeming to briefly start and then stop a minute before the end. Are the last two scenes in the right order?

Part Four

“I only hope he’s TARDIS trained!”

Hmmm, so the nucleus and all its viruses can survive at human size? Er, yes. And it seems the TARDIS is still bigger on the inside with the dimensional stabiliser gone. But this is not the story to be asking such questions- best just to let the silliness wash over you. Amusingly, for the first time here we see the camera panning upwards from the step at the TARDIS entrance as K9 rolls inside. The first of many…

We get the first appearance of another Graham Williams era trope here too, as the Doctor enters the TARDIS and dematerialises with his scarf still caught in the Door. Never mind the fact we then cut to him at the controls with his scarf clearly far from the entrance!

Oh dear. From Talons to this in two stories! For all its faults it certainly wasn’t dull, and has a certain so-bad-it’s-good capacity to amuse, but this is the worst story since The Time Monster- silly and badly designed, with the Doctor often bordering on being out of character. 2/5.

Doctor Who: Planet of Evil

Part One

“Can’t… breathe…”

So, this is set in the year 37,166 much further into the future than we’ve yet seen- and it’s implies this is indeed 37,166 C.E. as the Doctor tells Sarah they’ve overshot by 30,000 years and all other characters are clearly human by their names. In fact we’re on the edge of the known universe where things start to shade into anti-matter. Never mind the dodgy science- this is very creepy indeed, and there’s a real sense that the Doctor and Sarah are very far away in terms of both time and space.

On the other hand, for the first time since Planet of the Spiders we get to see the inside of the TARDIS. It’s looking very Spartan these days…

There’s a nice sense of mystery and creepiness with Professor Sorenson’s odd behaviour and the general weirdness of the planet, made very effective indeed by the jungle set and great lighting.

Prentis Hancock’s Salamar should be an irritating character, insisting the TARDISeers must be murderers on very little evidence, but while this sort of thing is usually intensely annoying, here it’s clear that Salamar is supposed to be a pillock.

Part Two

“It doesn’t live anywhere. It just is.”

The jungle is still looking great, incredibly so for an all-studio story. Even the “oculoid tracer” looks fab. Doctor Who suddenly seems incapable of not being great. The Forbidden Planet elements become particularly obvious this episode- although it’s a pity that the Doctor, having namedropped Shakespeare (“dreadful actor”) proceeds top quote from Romeo and Juliet instead of The Tempest.

The pool of nothingness is great, in both conception and realisation. This is the scariest story yet, achieving this by keeping us constantly unnerved about how the usual rules don’t work in this place. Here, there’s no need for monsters as such- it’s the planet itself that’s the threat. Perhaps this is the firs out-and-out horror story yet.

I love the Doctor’s speech to the Morestrans: “You call it nothing, a word to cover ignorance.” And of course it’s their meddling- Sorenson’s ambition and Salamar’s imbecility- which is the root of their problems.

Part Three

“If we don’t make it this time, they never will.”

Wow! I can’t believe the cliffhanger resolution wasn’t a cop-out. The Doctor really does plunge into the anti-matter pool, and stays there for some time.

This is the episode where Sorenson comes more to the foreground, and rather amusingly starts acting out all the tropes of cinematic representations of Jekyll and Hyde, even to the point of swigging from a bottle of bubbling liquid. Salamar continues to be an arse, but by now even his own crew are starting to realise what a liability he is, particularly Vishinsky. His decision to eject the Doctor and Sarah into space just makes him look paranoid, and caused Vishinsky to snap. It’s only this that makes me realise this is basically the quintessential base under siege, but done brilliantly.

Part Four

“You and I are scientists, professor. We buy our privilege to experiment only at the cost of total responsibility.”

Salamar, relieved of command, has nothing to do but go completely mad and die pointlessly, as this is the done thing in these circumstances. With Sorenson and his clones on the earth and the ship counting down to impact there’s a real sense of hopelessness- this is a gripping conclusion. All the same, considering the Doctor and Sarah are only here because the TARDIS has overshot, it seems rather implausible that the Doctor makes two short hops without trouble at the end of the episode.

It’s quite surprising that Sorenson actually survives- by all the normal rules of the programme he should be dead!

That was great, genuinely scary and atmospheric. 5/5.

Doctor Who: The Savages

Part One

"You don't have to do everything he tells you. You're a grown man. Or are you?"


For the first time the TARDISeers land somewhere the Doctor's known- he's famous! In fact, the city dwellers seem to be card-carrying Doctor Who fans and, initially, they seem very nice. But of course, there are sinister, authoritarian undercurrents from the moment the Doctor first meets the two guards- he "must" follow them to the city. We know they're the baddies pretty much from the start, that's not where the mystery lies- the very existence of "savages" excluded from their society reflects badly on them from the beginning. The question is how they are exploiting the "savages".

The central idea behind this story is an extremely powerful sci-fi concept, very reminiscent of Brave New World, and the development of this central idea throughout the story is very effective. There's a real sense of underplayed totalitarian horror throughout the story.

The bickering between the scientist and the security chief is a nice touch in a story which generally succeeds in fleshing out the guest characters. These people are quite normal, not evil- they've simply dehumanised the savages because they're the "other".

This is an excellent recon (I'm watching the new one, hence the delay in my watching this!), but unfortunately much of the story is very visual- there was a long stretch of this episode towards the end where I had to concentrate very hard on the text descriptions. But although visual this story is quite talky and light on action- I'm enjoying it but I suspect it wouldn't have much appeal to kids,


Part Two


"Oppose you? Indeed I'm going to oppose you! Just in the same way as I oppose the Daleks, or any other menace to common humanity."


This is actually a good story for Dodo, who does a lot of investigating early on. And the reactions of the city dwellers to their disappearance are quietly effective; the fate of the couple responsible for losing her is all the more horrible for being understated. This is no paradise even for the city dwellers, and the Doctor's eventual fate shows this society's stance towards dissent.

The Doctor's argument with Jano is a wonderful moment, one of the highlights of the crusading nature of Hartnell's Doctor in his later stories.

Part Three


"I'm afraid I'm- I'm not quite myself."


We get a brief moment of footage this episode, but it would have been nice to see what the cave looked like. The guest characters continue to be well-sketched- Nanina's kindness to Exorse is a nice touch.

One worry is that, although Hartnell seems to be on screen, he doesn't get much to do- is this another sign of Hartnell's failing health affecting things on screen?


Part Four


"I don't intend to leave these people in this oppressed state."

Lots of short, tantalising bits of off-air footage in this episode. It's a real shame this story is missing- more than any missing story so far I've been missing the visuals.

Once again the guest characters are well-written- Tor provides balance by showing the savages can be unsympathetic too. It's also nice that the baddies get a chance to redeem themselves; Jano's attack of conscience may be due to the Doctor's influence but Exorse changes his mind on his own.

Steven gets an excellent leaving scene, which fits his character very well, in a story which has shown him at his best. it's a shame that he never really caught fire as a companion after a promising start, but at least he ends well.



Overall, excellent; well structured in terms of plot, character and themes, and arguably rather more adult than any previous sci-fi story, which may well not have worked in its favour with younger viewers, a definite flaw, but I enjoyed this story hugely- 5/5.

Doctor Who: The Crusade

The Lion

"I have a hopeful heart and, which is better, a lucky king."


I'm watching this on a combo of the video release and Loose Cannon, so the first thing I see is the nice little intro by William Russell. He looks very young and sprightly for his age.

This is the paciest start yet; no TARDIs intro scene. The TARDISeers step right into a forest (once again the pokiness of Lime Grove is cleverly obscured) and straight into trouble. Ian, and even more excellently the Doctor, are thrust into swordfights while Barbara is kidnapped within seconds- is this a record? The greatness of the dialogue is established very early: "A king at liberty may give commands. A captured one obeys them."

The Doctor's very naughty in this episode, what with the blatant thieving. Still, I love the way Hartnell plays it.

This is a very strong first episode, and the dialogue appeals hugely to a Shakespeare obsessive like myself. Nice referencing of Arabian Nights by Barbara- the show's still fulfilling its educational remit.

The Knight of Jaffa

"By my father's name, you have wit, old man."


"Your heart calls for England, Richard!" says Joanna. Of course, in reality he didn't give a damn about the place, but I'll let that pass as frankly this is great. Also, Richard's "This bloodletting must stop!" is a bit rich coming from him but, again, the historical inaccuracies aren't bothering me as I'm too preoccupied with the general excellence of everything.

Nice to see Bernard Kay again, playing Saladin. And also nice to see that the Saracens are as blessed with exalted dialogue as the English Normans. Also interesting to see that Walter Randall, who was frankly rubbish in The Aztecs, seems to be doing a much better job as El Akir.

The Doctor's managing to get out of stealing the clothes last episode is most amusing, and once again most excellently played by Hartnell.

Once again, Barbara's in dire peril, and of an unusually dark and adult kind, to boot. But once again she's irrepressible, and tries to escape. Yay!

The Wheel of Fortune

"There's something new in you, yet something older than the sky itself."

Vicki doesn't exactly look like a boy here, but of course, along with the style of the dialogue, this merely signals that, just as The Romans was a farce, this story is in the style of Elizabethan theatre.

Interestingly, we get our first bit of characterisation for Vicki since The Rescue; she says to the Doctor "You wouldn't go off and leave me, would you?". We're reminded of how rootless and vulnerable she is, perhaps even over-dependent. Still, there's no denying by this point that Vicki has a much more superficial characterisation than even Susan did, great as Maureen O'Brien's performance is.

Barbara gets a horrible dilemma as Haroun gives her a knife to kill Saliya and herself if necessary- this is a horrible dilemma, but fantastic drama, and once again Jacqueline Hill shows us what an excellent actress she is.

The debate at court over Richard's plan to marry Joanna to Saphadin is another dramatic, well-written, well-acted and, as we shall see, pivotal scene. The dialogue between the Doctor and the Earl of Leicester sparkles, although the Doctor is a bit gratuitously insulting: "You stupid butcher! Can you think of nothing else but killing, hmm?" Leicester replies with a wonderful line; "When you men of eloquence have stunned each other with your words, we, the soldiers, have to face it out." The Doctor's in an awkward position, though: he's sworn to tell Joanna of her brother's plans for her, and has now found out, but he's damned if he tells her and damned if he doesn't. And, it must be said, from a contemporary perspective it's unsettling to see the Doctor supporting what is in effect a forced marriage, even set against the potential cost to countless lives. Cue excellence from Jean Marsh.

We only see Sir Ian in a single film sequence. By now, I've become a seasoned veteran at spotting cast holidays.

In the event it's Leicester, not the Doctor, who tells Joanna of Richard's plans, but it doesn't matter- through his rash promise to Joanna he ends up alienating both parties.

The ending is quite disturbingly dark: "The only pleasure left for you is death. And death is very far away".

The Warlords

"I must see Jerusalem. I must."


El Akir is extremely sadistic, disturbing, and, surprisingly, reasonably well acted by Walter Randall of all people. Ibrahim, meanwhile, is merely an annoying stereotype, and this is the fault of actor Tutte Lemkow rather than the script. Still, Sir Ian faces a gruesome fate, being slowly eaten by ants.

King Richard, in conversation with the Doctor and Vicki, turns out to be cleverer than we might have supposed; he knows of Leicester's duplicity but needs him for the upcoming war. This conversation has an interesting postscript as the Doctor states that "history must take its course". It seems this story sides with The Aztecs and The Reign of Terror in The Great Changing History Debate, and they're all going to team up to give The Romans a good kicking.

Nice that Haroun's daughter Maimuna turns out to be one of the women who saves Barbara in the harem- the plot threads are all very neatly tied up.

The way the story ends, with Sir Ian's quick thinking allowing our heroes to return to the Ship, is most amusing. Nice little Billy-fluff at the end; "Oh, my good woman! Why don't you go and have a cup of... tea or something?"

Ooh, we end with another cliffhanger!


Overall, it was quite fitting that the... challenge... that was The Web Planet should be followed by the best story so far not to have been written by John Lucarotti. Quite sublime, its main fault being that, almost uniquely, for a four part story it seemed too short.