Doctor Who: Horror of Fang Rock

Part One

“I’m not a Teshnician!”

An odd setting, this, In theory the lighthouse and surrounding rocks being all we see should make things claustrophobic and scary, especially as everything seems quite dimly lit. But I just had the impression of limited space and it being more obvious than usual that the story was studio bound.

In theory everything should work- we have a small guest cast in Reuben, Vince and Ben, three nicely differentiated characters. We have a mysterious thing that’s landed from the skies and which kills Ben, and we have some good Leela moments, especially the unselfconscious way she undresses in front of Vince. But in spite of everything from the script to the sets to the performances being perfectly good (Tom’s on particularly good, moody form- that’ll be Paddy Russell then!), the threat seems undefined somehow, making it difficult to engage with the story.

Part Two

“Gentlemen, I’ve got news for you. This lighthouse is under attack and by morning we might all be dead.”

A ship founders on the rocks and three new characters are injected into the story- Lord Palmerdale and Skinsale both provide intrigue as to what secrets each holds, while Adelaide Lessing is basically there as a comic contrast for Leela. Lord Palmerdale is desperate to get to London as money is at stake and it was his haste that caused the ship to founder, with lives being lost- we know at this point that he has zero chance of survival! The blackmail subtext between him and Skinsale provides us with something to happen this episode, as the threat from the alien is more talked about than seen at this stage.

It’s this episode that makes it clear that this is going to be a base under siege, but at least the character dynamic is different from the usual template. Again, though, although nothing seems exactly wrong there’s little definition to the threat.

Part Three

“That is what I thought. But of course, I am only a savage.”

The alien can’t become a direct threat until the very end of the episode because of how the story is structured, give or take the odd individual killing. But Terrance Dicks deals with this well by concluding the feud subplot between Palmerdale and Skinsale (“Some men make me nervous when I’m with them- Salibury, Bonar Law… but your employer has the opposite effect. It’s when he’s out of my sight.”) until Palmerdale is inevitably killed. There’s also a heartstopping moment as Vince is found morally wanting by taking Palmerdale’s bribe, thereby ensuring, by the logic of Doctor Who storytelling, that he can’t possibly survive.

There’s good Leela stuff here- I love the bit where she slaps Adelaide, surely one of the top Leela moments ever. But there’s also a good bit where she dismisses Adelaide’s astrological superstitions- “I, too, used to believe in magic. But the Doctor has taught me about science. It is better to believe in science.”

Part Four

“I don’t like your face either.”

Another good Leela bit at the start as she rolls her eyes at Adelaide fainting. And now that we’re at the final episode we can learn the nature of the threat- it’s a Rutan, a bright green spherical blob from the icy planet of Ruta 3, whose people once controlled “a whole arm of Mutter’s Spiral” (the Milky Way?) but are now losing their interminable war with the Sontarans.

Leela’s shown to be bright here, a quick learner who knows what a laser is, and I’m glad to see this- she may be a “savage” but she was presented as intelligent in Face of Evil and that needs to continue.

I notice the face of the dead Palmerdale is not visible, making it rather obvious that the actor hasn’t been contracted for this episode! Otherwise, though, it’s a good ending which arises logically, leaving everyone dead apart from Leela and the Doctor.

Oh, and Leela’s eyes change colour as she looks back at a bright light. I’m sure that’s exactly what would happen…

Difficult to rate, this. It was well made, cleverly plotted, with well-written characters, good performances and witty dialogue. And yet I never really felt much sense of threat somehow, and I can’t work out whether it’s the script or the direction that’s to blame. 3/5.

Doctor Who: The Talons of Weng-Chiang

Part One

“You’ve been drinking.”

“Not a drop, sir.”

“Then it’s time you started.”

An unusual way of starting a story, straight into the backstage area of a Victorian theatre, but effective, and a brilliant setting from the outset. The constant stream, of great Robert Holmes starts as soon as Henry Gordon Jago starts talking (“I’d have propelled him on to the pavement with a punt up the posterior”), not to let up for six whole episodes. We’re also presented with mysterious and disturbing goings-on from the start, with a missing woman and a ventriloquist’s dummy able to move on its own.

The Doctor and Leela arrive, both in Victorian clothing and the Doctor in a deerstalker. The Doctor wants to show Leela how her “ancestors” enjoyed themselves (she’s human, then) but they’re caught up in trouble very quickly and asked to return to the police station. The Doctor’s gradual shift from suspect to taking charge is expertly and amusingly done.

Aside from the clothes and the general surroundings, a reference to “Jolly Jack” implies that the Whitechapel murders must be fairly recent, giving us a rough idea of when we are. Some of the characters are heard to express a few less than enlightened attitudes to Chinese people, however. To an extent this can be said to simply reflect the time depicted and there’s certainly no indication of any overtly racist intent in the script- Chang’s line “I understand we all look the same” actually undercuts the policeman’s attitudes quite nicely, even if said to the Doctor. But some of the story’s dialogue as presented would probably make the story unbroadcastable today, which is unfortunate but understandable- next episode Litefoot will refer to an “inscrutable chink”. A shame, as a simple ironic comment from the Doctor upon hearing some of these comments, something analogous to the line “It’s political correctness gone mad” from The Shakespeare Code, would probably have done the trick. But let’s not get started on John Bennett’s face make-up!

Oh dear, it’s a giant rat. Moving swiftly on…

Part Two

“A hat box?”

We get some answers here- Chang has a boss with a hidden face, who lives in an underground lair which, this being the Hinchcliffe era, is full of bottles containing bubbling, brightly coloured liquids. He speaks of “Time Agents”. Hmm. No doubt a one-off throwaway line. I’m sure we’ll hear no more of this.

There’s a lot of fun in this episode- I love the Doctor’s magic tricks and Jago’s exasperation, and Litefoot’s reaction to Leela’s eating habits are a joy. It’s only the second episode and already it’s clear that both Litefoot and Jago are more than ordinary supporting characters, both being exceptionally well written and played.

Part Three

“Explode? Unthinkable! It was made in Birmingham.”

Only Robert Holmes could satisfactorily resolve a proper get-out-of-that cliffhanger by having Leela distract the Doctor by jumping out of a window, for entirely valid reasons. This story is great! The Doctor’s fab in this episode, from “Sleep is for tortoises” to the map on Litefoot’s tablecloth to the quoted line. Apparently the Doctor once fished in the Fleet with the Venerable Bede, who’d come down south for some reason.

But there’s lots more good stuff- I particularly enjoy Jago’s “explaining” what’s happening to Casey. Plus Leela continues to be great, sneaking into Weng-Chiang’s lair and escaping again. Only the giant rat is in any way disappointing, and that we shall not speak of.

Part Four

“He’s gone to join his ancestors.”

We start with more amusing dialogue between Jago and Casey, and the episode centres around a performance by Chang in front of the watching Doctor. The moment where Chang points a gun at the Doctor only to shoot the cards is gripping stuff, but ironically Chang has been sacked by his master and has no agenda here but to entertain. So it’s shocking to him as well as Jago and the Doctor when Casey’s corpse is made to appear on stage- a turning point in the story.

It’s partly as though the initial four-parter is concluded, as we end with Weng-Chiang in possession of the time cabinet, waiting for the final two-parter to begin…

Part Five

“I may have had a bang on the head but this is a dashed queer story.”

We start to get some real explanations here: Mr Sin is in fact the “Peking Homonculus from the year 5000, where there is apparently an Ice Age. He has the cerebral cortex of a pig and almost started World War VI- some pleasingly random world-building there. And we get some ratcheting up of the villainy from Weng-Chiang, with the traditional scene of an underling being forced to commit suicide for the crime of failure.

I love the way Litefoot describes the area the Doctor and Leela as being full of “scenes of vice and squalor”, but, this being a tea-time show, we see nothing but the underside of a trap door! Meanwhile, Jago and Litefoot finally meet, and about time too. Jago’s dismissal of the police is classic Holmes: “we all know they’re solid, sterling fellows, but their buttons are the brightest thing about them”- shades of authorial voice from our ex-copper scribe here?

I love Leela’s attitude, deciding with real anger in her voice, to set up an ambush for Weng-Chiang. Louise Jameson is great.

Part Six

“Let the talons of Weng-Chiang rend your flesh!”

A superb finale. It’s pretty much all go from the off, but we also get room for a nice character moment as Jago confesses his cowardice to Litefoot- it’s nice that he gets a chance to be brave later on, distracting Greel while Leela reaches for the gun. There’s also more backstory- the Filipino army, a final advance on Reykjavik, Greel as the “butcher of Brisbane”. We also get a hint of just how nasty a dictator he was: “At my camps, the extraction process was considered the most painful of all.”

But of course he is defeated, and we finish with one of the best final scenes ever, from Litefoot’s attempts at Eliza Doolittling Leela to the contrasting reactions of Jago and Litefoot to the dematerialising TARDIS.

A magnificent story, not quite as good as its reputation but easily a high 5/5.

Doctor Who: The Robots of Death

Part One

“Shoomph!”

Just to go blatantly OT from the very start, this viewing is particularly fascinating to me as it’s the first time I’ve seen the story since hearing the unbelievably magnificent Kaldor City audios, set in the same society and with Uvanov such a promising figure. But back to the story…

Everything looks fantastic, with the set design, costumes and robot designs possibly giving this story the best aesthetic ever seen in Doctor Who. There’s a real sense that in this society, with robots to do all the drudgery, people tend to behave in ways that evoke the aristocracy of pre-revolutionary France. Everyone wears male-up and fancy clothes designed entirely for display and with practicalities not an issue, revealing a lot about their lifestyle. There’s also some impressive world-building with the dialogue- the company, the founding families and the like.

Leela also gets a nice introduction to the dimensions of the TARDIS. Sadly, I think I’m right in saying that’s the last time we’ll be seeing this version of the control room, after it’s appeared in only three stories.

Part Two

“We’ve all got something to hide. Don’t you think so, Commander?”

The whodunit plot gathers steam, and a very good whodunit plot it is too, with plenty of genuine suspects. In fact, it makes me wish I hadn’t seen this story so many times so I could enjoy it again. The characters are well drawn too- perhaps I’m back-projecting from the Kaldor City audios, but I love Uvanov’s dialogue- “You have cost me and the company a great deal of money and you have killed three people.” Nice to see what his priorities are!

There’s some nice direction, too- I’m particularly noticing all these shots of the robots’ feet.

Part Three

“I heard a cry.”

More plot unfolds, with details of Uvanov’s history, our first mention of Taren Capel and the revelation of the fantastic D84 as a company agent. I love his turn of phrase, especially when offering the Doctor a communicator- “Would you like to use it? I cannot speak.”

Leela gets a great line, too, as her knife gets stuck in an advancing robot; “Now you’re showing off!” Only her second story, and she’s magnificent, taking all these new experiences in her stride while still being true to her origins. It’s a huge bonus to have her second story written by Chris Boucher as well as her first.

Part Four

“Please do not throw hands at me.”

Robophobia, caused by the disturbing lack of body language in the otherwise humanoid robots, is a fantastic sci-fi concept, which goes to show that, for all the obvious Agatha Christie trappings of this story, Chris Boucher has shown himself in both his stories so far to be heavily grounded in literary science fiction- here there are obvious echoes of Isaac Asimov and Frank Herbert, and there’s even a character called Poul. 

As silly as Taren Capel may seem all made up to look like a robot, and however much we may snigger at the line “I’ll release more of our brothers from bondage- we’ll be irresistible!”, ultimately he’s a tragic and deluded figure. The feelings of brotherhood are all one way- in reality, to the robots he’s just another “master”. The story’s conclusion is clever, but also the cruellest possible fate for Taren Capel.

One of the greatest stories ever, entering my top ten at number four. 5/5.

Doctor Who: The Face of Evil

Part One

“Now drop your weapons or I’ll kill him with this deadly jelly baby.”

My BBC video starts with an edition of Multi-Coloured Swap Shop from 1977 with Noel Edmonds interviewing Louise Jameson. I don’t remember ordering Noel Edmonds from the cosmos, so fast forward to the story…

We start with Leela’s trial for blaspheming against Xoanon. Not our Xoanon, another one. Anyway, she’s to be exiled outside the barriers which protect this Neolithic-ish tribe, the Sevateem, from the nasty things outside for the crime of suggesting that a seemingly suicidal attack on their enemies the Tesh, ordered by their god Xoanon, is not such a great idea. She is offered the alternative of facing the Horda, whatever they are, but declines it, and it’s clear from her reaction that this is a fearful experience leading to almost certain death. Horribly, her father agrees to take it for her, and is duly killed. This is very dark, illustrating both the horrors of a society which punishes “blasphemers” and the horrible moral complications of resistance to such a society.

The TARDIS lands in an area where we’ve just seen a creature crawling along- a Horda, presumably, going by what we see later. That’s a nice touch. Unfortunately the Doctor, being alone, talks to himself, and indeed the camera, which is very awkward. He needs a new companion to talk to, and sharpish. And right on cue, here’s Leela.

Interestingly, Leela’s fellow Sevateems Calib and Tomas are also sceptical about the upcoming attack, if more cautious about voicing it. This scene does a lot of useful expositing, letting us know all about the planned attack on the Tesh, whereas a later recital by Neeva (my avatarsake!) gives us the mythological version, complete with clues. This is nicely counterpointed by Leela’s reactions to “The Evil One”. There’s also some good character stuff as Leela realises she can trust the Doctor.

The concept behind this story- an apparently stone age tribe on an alien planet using items of spacefaring technology as religious relics, is a brilliant one, and it’s introduced early. There are lots of fun little touches on this theme throughout this episode, such as the motions for checking a spacesuit having changed into a ritual for warding off evil. And of course there’s the panel saying “Survey team 6”- nice!

The Doctor and Leela make a great pairing, and whatever may have happened offscreen, they have great chemistry onscreen. But it’s notable that the Doctor suddenly becomes very stern as soon as Leela starts killing people with Janis thorns.

Part Two

“I like the hat. Very fetching.”

The concepts of the first episode get more development here, with the overall message of the story probably coming through most clearly as the doctor comments that Neeva was seemingly expecting an answer to his prayers. “There wouldn’t be much point in praying if he didn’t.” Only through the medium of the fantastic can such a blatantly atheist subtext excite seemingly no contemporary comment!

Calib gets to be cunning, and the Doctor gets to be very clever indeed, curing Leela from the Janis thorn, and successfully facing the trial of the Horda- I love the moment where he chucks a Horda at the bloke who slaps Leela!

The episode ends with some invisible creatures (well, it’s cheap!) which sound like the Skarasen and look like the Doctor when visible. And what’s that great big carving of the Doctor’s face…?

Part Three

“I don’t believe in ghosts either.”

Now we get to see the Tesh, and how their situation parallels that of the Sevateem. There isn’t the time to develop them as much as the Sevateem- no bad thing as they’re such arrogant arses- but it’s ironic how they think the Sevateem can open the barrier and Xoanon is playing both tribes against each other.

One thing that strikes me- as Xoanon has lifted the barriers and all of his nasties are now able to terrorise the Sevateem, presumably the whole tribe is heading down the Doctor’s throat. And Calib speaks of getting “the men” inside the barrier. Is Leela the only woman then?

Part Four

“We start getting proof and we stop believing.”

“With proof, we don’t have to believe.”

We get our first instance of Leela not suffering cowards gladly as she says to a cowering Tesh “Lying there isn’t going to help, then.” We’ll be seeing a lot more of this sort of thing.

The plot, excellent throughout, is nicely tied up. It’s good to see Neeva being the sacrificial hero in the end, ironically being the only one able to resist Xoanon’s brainwashing. Leela is elected leader, and then immediately scarpers… yes, she’s companion material, all right! Into the TARDIS she goes…

Magnificent, a criminally underrated story. 5/5.

Doctor Who: The Deadly Assassin

Part One

“Oh, I say! Weren’t you expelled or something? Some scandal?”

How strange- a full year before Star Wars, and we get a voiceover by Tom alongside a rolling caption thingy. In context this is very odd- not only does it instantly make this story stand out from the stories surrounding it and seem “epic” and “big”, it also blurs the boundaries between form and content in a way Doctor Who arguably has not done since the likes of The Gunfighters and The Feast of Steven. Instantly we sense the rules are different, and indeed it turns out that they are- as a traveller the Doctor is used to the leeway he is given as an outsider to behave eccentrically, but here on his home planet, where he’s a “convicted criminal” of no particular notoriety, this doesn’t get him anywhere. Everything is different.

Much about this first episode has a dislocating effect; the Doctor is travelling alone, and the plot springs from a prophetic dream experienced by the Doctor, not the sort of device the series traditionally employs. And it’s just unbelievable how every throwaway line, every costume, every prop, every piece of design, seems to establish some little thing which will help to establish how Gallifrey will be portrayed from this point on. There are so many firsts in the first few minutes alone- the Presidency; Time Lord robes; the Capitol; the Chancery Guards and their distinctive red uniforms; the Doctor’s TARDIS being referred to as a “Type Forty”- and there’ll be a lot more along in a minute. And in a way that’s a shame, as it tends to obscure The Deadly Assassin as a story in itself, with its political subtext and design aesthetic which deserve to be appreciated on their own terms rather than be thought of just in terms of continuity.

As a blatantly hypocritical aside, though, we get some interesting continuity stuff- it’s meaningless without a context to put it in, really, but we’re still told that The War Games took place in the Time Lord year 309,906. And is it the first time we’re told that earth is in “Mutter’s Spiral”, presumably the Time Lords’ name for the Milky Way Galaxy?

There’s some stuff that’s fun aside from all this mythological malarkey too- there are many things I was expecting to see in this episode but a hookah wasn’t one of them! And there are plenty of political asides- the CIA, of course, but also “His Supremacy” the President has a “resignation honours list”, confiding to his underling that there are “some names here that will surprise them.” I wonder if there’s a Time Lady called Marcia Williams?

More revelations come thick and fast. Chancellor Goth is played by Bernard Horsfall- they can’t seriously expect us not to assume he’s that bloke from the tribunal. We are also introduced to Gallifreyan script and another pile of firsts- the Castellan (this one’s likeable from the start, very much the put-upon decent copper), cardinals, the Panopticon, and the various aristocratic Time Lord orders- the Prydonians, the Arcalians, the Patrexes “and so on”, each of which has its own design of “seldom-worn” robe. 

Fascinatingly, the Doctor is revealed to be a Prydonian- very posh, apparently- and is obliged to wear a robe. Again we see how he can’t act as he normally does on his home planet, anchored to his place in society by the chapter he belongs to and even being obliged to conform to rigid Time Lord ways of dressing by wearing his robe. And it’s very noticeable that for almost all of this story his trademark hat and scarf are absent.

Besides all this rich mythological stuff and mischievous political commentary shoved under the radar as only science fiction can make possible, there are some nicely drawn characters too. The Castellan, of course, is a character type immediately recognisable from many a whodunit, the determined, clear-minded police inspector under constant harassment from his superiors. Then there’s Cardinal Borusa- haughty, supercilious, but clearly a highly adept politician. He’s our obligatory red herring. And even the two members of the House of Lords- er, Time Lords- we overhear discussing the glory days of “Pandak III” are nicely drawn caricatures.

Oh, and there’s the Master. It’s good to see him again- it’s been ages- but it’s a shock seeing him so emaciated and literally skeletal as this, seemingly alive only through sheer will. His appearance is yet another example of great design.

Part Two

“Vaporisation without representation is against the constitution!”

So, Goth is insisting the Doctor be tried and executed quickly within 48 hours just to spare the newly elected president (ie Goth) the dilemma of whether to pardon him. How very revealing this is as regards Robert Holmes’ views on power! It’s also traditionally said to be the start of a new, more cynical, treatment of the Time Lords, but I’m not sure this is true- if we look at Holmes’ treatment of the Time Lords in Genesis of the Daleks and even the Doctor’s comments at the start of The Brain of Morbius it seems very much in keeping with all of this. And I’m not sure they were ever exactly portrayed as benevolent godlike figures right from the moment they first appeared in part ten of The War Games.

The Doctor’s being a suspect threatens to inflict on us the dullness of interminable cell scenes and interrogations, but Holmes admirably manages to sidestep this be having the Doctor escape execution, for the moment, on a technicality, which earns bonus points by itself being amusing. And as the Castellan, a competent detective, tends to believe the Doctor, the story can now focus on their investigation. That’s very good plotting. That said, there’s only one suspect, but I’m sure there’s supposed to be!

There are far fewer embellishments to the mythology this episode- although we get “Shabogans”, whoever they may be, and “Artron Energy”. But the big one is the Matrix, or the APC net as it’s called here- a depository for the recorded brain patterns of every single Time Lord, taken just before the point of death. The Doctor enters the Matrix to find, aside from a quick burst of the opening titles, a dreamscape, controlled by his mysterious opponent, full of surreal threats such as a surgeon with a syringe- surely this must have scared the kids more than any monster. As Philip Hinchcliffe says on one of the DVD documentaries, as an idea this would have been right out there in 1976!

Of course, the best thing about it is that we’re able to end on the ultimate Perils of Pauline style cliffhanger!

Part Three

“It’ll be over soon. One way or another…”

It’s quite jaw-droppingly brave to set this whole episode in an imaginary dreamscape and expect a mainstream audience in 1976 to watch it. But somehow it works. I can’t help that the cultural references are all ours, rather than Gallifreyan, which is odd considering this is Goth’s reality, but I think it’d be churlish to press that point as the whole thing not only works but manages to advance the plot by revealing the villain as… the bloke we knew it was all along. All the same, much as I hate to say this for something so genuinely experimental, it does go on a bit towards the end. It’s very noticeable how visual this all is- there’s very little dialogue, and uniquely for a Robert Holmes episode I was stumped for an opening quote!

Here’s the Doctor again using weapons, contrary to myth, this time a grenade and a blowpipe. It’s all very violent, especially the cliffhanger. I’m not sure whether we’re watching a restoration of the full scene on the DVD, so I should probably watch the relevant extra and find out.

Part Four

“You wistful, you craven-hearted, spineless poltroon!”

The Matrix stuff seems to end very suddenly, and then it seems the Master is dead and the story is over. But this episode is the rarest of phenomena; a second ending that actually works.

Before things conclude, though, we learn an awful lot of things, Apparently Goth met the Master at somewhere called “Terserus”, dying, at the “end of his regeneration cycle.” And of course this is later confirmed: “After the twelfth regeneration,” says Elgin, “nothing can postpone death.” This is quite a bombshell! For something which exists essentially to provide the Master with motivation and a backstory, this one line has had a massive effect of the programme.

There’s another gleefully cynical piece of social commentary too, of course, with Borusa’s insistence on adjusting the truth as it “will not do” to “maintain public confidence in the Time Lords and their leadership.” The way this is phrased seems to suggest that not all Gallifreyans are Time Lords.

And then there are all the scraps we’re thrown from “The Old Time”. There is the first mention of Rassilon, now thought of as founder of Time Lord civilisation, but thought of by his contemporaries more as an engineer and architect- so not a politician, presumably. His relics are the Sash of Rassilon, worn by the President, and the Great Key, both of which relate to the Eye of Harmony, the domesticated black hole from which Gallifrey draws its power. Apparently Rassilon, not Omega, is responsible for harnessing the black hole- how does this square with what we learn of Omega in The Three Doctors, then?

Enough of such matters. The Master, of course, is not dead, and we get our final(ish) battle between the Doctor and the Master, with the fate of Gallifrey and a large chunk of the surrounding area of space at stake. And, even better, the hatch from Tomb of the Cybermen seems to make a reappearance. The Master survives, of course, and is seen leaving in his TARDIS, shaped like a grandfather clock. The Doctor leaves too, having been awarded “nine out of ten” by Borusa. But wait! Weren’t he and Goth the only two candidates for the presidency? Surely that means-

4/5, missing out on the top mark because the script simply had so many jobs to do. But this was genuinely groundbreaking in so many ways. Doctor Who is on fire at the moment.

Doctor Who: The Hand of Fear

 
Part One

“Do they have seasons in South Croydon?”

I remember RTD once saying he’d never dream of starting a story on Planet Zog with a load of aliens we’ve never met before expositing at each other. Well, it seems the Bristol Boys have no such qualms! Interesting look for an alien race- faces unseen behind the hood of an anorak…

In an already familiar seeming self-referential moment the Doctor and Sarah land in a quarry on earth, and there’s a hilarious reference to it seeming like an alien world. Oh my aching sides. There’s a siren blatantly going off, and the our heroes are caught in an explosion. You can’t help but be impressed with the Doctor’s health and safety regime for TARDIS landings…

All the same, I’m quite enjoying this. It’s consistently witty, even in little moments- I like the hospital doctor’s speech about pain, a nice little moment for a minor character. And then there’s the agreeable Dr Tyler- er, Carter, who seems a nice chap, enthusiastically investigating this strange, ancient stone hand Sarah’s been clutching. He’s a nice chap, who doesn’t at all deserve to get whacked over the head by Sarah during her latest alien possession. While interestingly dressed- “Yes, just like Andy Pandy!”

Of course, this being a script by the Bristol Boys, the action now moves to a scientific complex…

Part Two

“That’s not as ‘armless as it looks!

A rather long reprise, and what with this becoming practically a hostage situation in a nuclear reaction things get very tense very quickly. Once again Lis Sladen performs being possessed brilliantly, even taking in to account all the practice she’s had.

It’s a shame Dr Carter gets killed- he seemed a nice chap! But it’s a moment which indicates how high the stakes are, something achieved very well with the Professor’s touching “last” phone call to his family.

There’s a nice moment as Sarah responds to the Doctor’s hypnotising her with “Ah no, that’s not fair! Not aga-“. But on the other hand that’s a bit more mission creep for one of the Doctor’s recently acquired superpowers.

Part Three

“It’s just that no one is going to believe me.”

We begin with our heroes in big radioactive trouble, but fortunately Eldrad absorbs the radiation. Fine so far. But then, as in Claws of Axos, the RAF happily set about dropping a nuclear bomb on the complex while Sarah and the Prof shelter behind a car? Oh dear! Yes, Eldrad absorbs the blast, and the Doctor probably expects this, but that still leaves a hell of a lot of bad science on show.

I like the “I worry about you” chat between the Doctor and Sarah on their way to meet Eldrad- it reminds us what a great relationship they have just as it’s about to end.

Interesting that Eldrad, from 150 million years ago, and Solon, from at least a few centuries in our future, have both heard of Time Lords. They must have been around a while then. And the Doctor tells Edrad, without being contradicted, that he can’t break the “first law” of history and take her back to Kastria in her own time- it has to be the present day. Not only this but the Doctor claims she can’t harm him in the still brand spanking new TARDIS control room because it exists in a state of “temporal grace”, something which seems rather inconsistent with previous stories, The Enemy of the World for one. And these are both rather big and limiting things to set up for plot convenience in one story!

The Prof shoots at Eldrad yet he gets to live. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised in hindsight- after that phone call there was no way he was going to die…

Part Four

“I’m sick of being cold and wet and hypnotised left, right and centre. I’m sick of being shot at, savaged by bug-eyed monsters, never knowing if I’m coming, going or been.”

Well, Eldrad can’t pronounce “matrix”, and the abyss looks too obviously like a set, but otherwise this is a satisfying conclusion. Sadly Eldrad has to become a rather shouty bloke who is much more obviously a baddie from the word go. As Sarah puts it, “I quite liked her, but I couldn’t stand him.” The Kastrians’ trap for Eldrad perhaps becomes implausible if dwelt on, but it feels satisfactory as a conclusion and I for one find it a fitting ending: “Hail Eldrad, king of nothing!”

And then it happens. One of no doubt many half-hearted arguments, but then the Doctor is summoned to Gallifrey, and actresses whose contracts are about to end may not set foot on that world be ancient degree, or not until next season in any case. It’s a great scene, threatening even my own tear ducts of steel. Sarah will be missed. Doing this marathon has shown me just how great she was, and what a great actress Lis Sladen is, especially with facial expressions and so many little physical things. I think at the moment she’s by far my favourite.

All good fun, if not quite up there with the best, as so many of this run are turning out to be. 4/5.

Doctor Who: The Masque of Mandragora

Part One

“You humans have such limited minds. Sometimes I wonder why I like you so much.”

Once again we get a tale by Louis Marks, author of a bizarrely spread out run of stories. But having seen this story for the first time (now there’s only Underworld and Meglos that I’ve never seen from all of Doctor Who!), I’d probably call it his best.

We start, rarely for this era, with an extended TARDIS scene, in which we get to see places other than the control room for what I think is the first time since Hartnell’s day, more than six years, er, months, ago. The point of this, of course, is to introduce the new and rather excellent looking control room. And it has a recorder in it, so apparently the Doctor used to spend a lot of time here when he was Patrick Troughton, but only when the camera wasn’t looking. I particularly like the new scanner.

All this is admirably rounded off before it can degenerate into fanwank, and we’re off into the plot, with the Mandragora Helix, a strange void, and a fantastic looking late mediaeval / early Renaissance Italy. I have to praise the costumes here, and also the excellent location- Portmeiron, I think.

We’re introduced to our guest characters with admirable economy, and at the same time it becomes clear that this story is about reason versus both superstition and tyranny, hence it being set at such an appropriate time and place. The pace is very fast indeed, with Sarah being captured almost as quickly as good old Babs was, way back in The Crusade. There’s definitely something about mediaeval settings and fast paced plots for some reason.

The Doctor gets a great scene putting an apple on the end of Count Federico’s sword and using a football rattle (what else?) to effect his escape.

Part Two

“They say there are places where the bat droppings are as high as a man.”

We get a case of escape by scarf for the first time in ages. A completely implausible method of escape from the executioner’s block, of course, but easily cool enough to get away with it.

There’s a lot of excitement this episode, but it’s also where the pieces start to be put into place- Heironymous is, rather unsurprisingly, revealed as the cult leader, the Doctor makes friends with Giuliano and his hot-headed boyfriend, and conflict is sown between Heironymous and Count Federico. It’s all rather neatly done, and it all looks so sumptuous too. It’s also worrying me a bit though- I’m loving this, it’s bringing back good memories of John Lucarotti and the like from long ago, but that’s because it practically is a pure historical; the sci-fi elements are thin, perfunctory, and a rather obvious metaphor to boot. What is there here to attract the kiddies? Is there enough buckling of swashes to do the job?

Part Three

“You can’t count, Count!”

Giuliano shows himself to be a damn good swordsman, and then along comes the Doctor to show us that he may have regenerated since The Sea Devils but he’s pretty handy with a sword. Perhaps there is enough swashbuckling after all.

I really like Heironymous’s beard. In fact, I think I want one. There’s nothing quite like a good villainous bit of high maintenance facial hair. He’s quite barmy, of course, but then as an astrologer he would be. But there’s one point in his favour- it must be quite nice for Sarah to be hypnotised by someone other than the Doctor for a change.

We get an important first- Sarah asks how come she can understand Italian as she can’t speak it, alluding to a problem which has been successfully brushed under the carpet by the programme for the last twelve and a half years. Apparently it a “Time Lord gift” which the Doctor “allows” Sarah to share. Well, that explains everything perfectly. And it seems it’s Sarah asking this that makes the Doctor realise she’s been hypnotised. Eh?

Meanwhile Marco gets tortured, and even though this actually happens offscreen it feels a bit nasty for a family show. And things are set up for the finale, with Heironymous foretelling Federico’s death, a “prophecy” fulfilled at the end of the episode; superstition has triumphed against the Machiavellian use of power, how will it prevail against the upcoming values of the Renaissance?

Part Four

“You know, the worse the situation, the worse your jokes get.”

It’s nice to see Giuliano’s authority being affirmed on the death of his uncle; this is the episode where he has to come of age. He’ already shown he’s intelligent and rational, but here he has to find the judgement to rule. The discussion with Marco on the need for the masque to go ahead to maintain appearances is important, and shows a rather subtler kind of Machiavellian thinking than Federico.

The ending works, being satisfying and twisty-turny enough to wrongfoot us at the end, plus everyone (including Sarah) looks great in their fancy dress costumes.

Magnificent, and not at all the sort of thing I was expecting at this stage of the marathon. Easily a 5/5. I’ll certainly be watching this again- it’s obvious there’s an awful lot going on in this script that calls for multiple viewings. I suspect it might have bored the kids, mind.

Doctor Who: The Seeds of Doom

Part One

“That chap you called in from UNIT- is he quite sane?”

Another story from Robert Banks Stewart is an exciting prospect given how fantastic Terror of the Zygons was, and this starts off promisingly, with a mysterious and clearly alien spore being found in Antarctica. Our first sight of the Doctor and Sarah is a little odd though- from the beginning he’s basically acting as a government agent with the only reason given being a throwaway reference to UNIT. This doesn’t sit well with the Doctor’s recent impatience with his ties to UNIT, and seems to owe an awful lot to Banks Stewart’s history as a writer on The Avengers.

Still, it’s a great episode, however oddly it slots into the series- and it slots in particularly oddly in the context of the marathon. Tony Beckley gives an excellently camp performance as Harrison Chase from the start, although the character is yet another aspect of the story which seems to owe as much to The Avengers as Doctor Who. And John Challis is great as Scorby too. Maaaarleeene…

Oh, and just to remind us it’s the BBC in the mid 70s, we get the Governor from Porridge too!

Lots of great ratcheting up of tension here though, with a nice little base-under-siege style Quatermass Experiment situation developing. I could do without all these extra superpowers the Doctor keeps picking up, though- apparently he’s not that bothered by the Antarctic temperatures. I don’t remember hearing anything about this in The Tenth Planet.

Part Two

“I understand policemen are few and far between in the Antarctic.”

John Challis is fantastic as the cuckoo in the Antarctic nest, exuding real menace, and the presence of the weaker character Keeler really emphasises this. This episode has it all- it’s a tension-packed episode full of excitement with Scorby and the creature as this episode’s threat, while intrigue continues back in London with Dunbar’s betrayal (his reasons are petty, carefully calibrated for us to have no sympathy for him) and Harrison Chase’s general Bond villain demeanour.

But of course, this excellent two-part thriller is only the beginning.

Part Three

“A car boot?”

“A Daimler car boot.”

“The car is immaterial.”

This episode changes the scene4 to Whitehall and Chase’s mansion, but the non-stop action continues. And there’s never been so much fisticuffs from the Doctor as we see here, not even during the “Hai!” Pertwee years. On the other hand, there was a fair bit of this sort of thing from John Steed in The Avengers…

Oh, and Amelia Ducat is fab. If also a bit of an Avengers character.

We’re reminded this is Doctor Who, though, as the Doctor is marched up to Harrison Chase at gunpoint, entirely under Chase’s power, and he declares “Hand over the pod.” The confrontation between the Doctor and chase is great, Chase coming across as a cross between a Bond villain and Prince Charles. He also gets what is possibly the best line of any villain ever: “I could play all day in my green cathedral.”

Towards the end, we get even more fisticuffs from the Doctor…

Part Four

“What do you do for an encore, Doctor?”

“I win!”

The overall tone may be very different (no more harping on about The Avengers till the end of the review, I promise), but this story has a lot in common with The Ambassadors of Death in that the main threat, for most of the story, is not the alien being but the human reaction to it. Only in this episode does the threat from the Krynoid itself really start to become established.

So, the Doctor crashes through the glass skylight, gets stuck in with the fisticuffs, and pulls a gun on Chase- not the sort of thing you’d traditionally associate with the character, but then one thing this marathon has taught me is that the Doctor tends to use his fists and, yes, guns, rather more often than generally thought. Although, to put things in perspective, we also have Scorby being really violent.

We get even more fun in the shape of Harrison Chase’s nasty Bond villain deathtrap, and just when you think things can’t get any better Amelia Ducat herself turns out to be spying on chase for the World Ecology Bureau! Dunbar decides to redeem himself and is, inevitably killed, but the Krynoid is starting to grow very big indeed…

Part Five

“Invent a code word- they love that.”

Scorby has a change of heart and decides to side with the Doctor and Sarah, which is believable. Scorby may not be very nice- in fact he’s pretty much your standard psychopath- but he’s a rational psychopath and can clearly see that Chase is a nutter.

Sir Colin calls in UNIT. Ok- but why wait until now? Still, the Brig’s in Geneva and we won’t be getting any actual familiar faces at all. For the first time UNIT is portrayed as just some organisation, and feels much more distanced from the Doctor and Sarah because of it.

There’s some good character stuff here, with Sarah giving Scorby the sharp end of her tongue and the Doctor’s impatience at the reluctance of both Major Beresford (who he?) and Sir Colin to attack a private house. There’s a plot reason for this scene, yes, but it shows very clearly how less tolerant of this sort of thing this Doctor is as compared to his predecessor.

Unfortunately, the Krynoid can talk. This is something of a misstep, and feels very silly in the context of the atmosphere that has been built up. Nevertheless, things are getting a bit desperate, and it’s becoming clear that the ending of the story is going to owe as much to The Quatermass Experiment as the earlier parts.

There’s another kind of déjà vu that comes in towards the end, too- just one story after we saw a brain in a jar, we get a building being attacked from the outside by plant life. It’s The Keys of Marinus all over again!

Part Six

“I’m a survivor, right?”

Scorby gets a nice little speech about his mercenary past and self-reliance, and then pretty much gives up, which rather nicely serves both to flesh out his character and to make it clear to the viewers, who know their tropes, that he’s going to get killed very soon.

There’s a lot of nasty stuff going on with the composting machine- the sergeant actually does get crushed, while Sarah and the Doctor take turns in rescuing each other from that gruesome fate. Of course, Harrison Chase ends up a victim of his own machine, as we always knew he would.

Bizarrely, the Doctor actually offers Sir Colin to join Sarah and himself in the TARDIS. It would have been rather interesting if he’d said yes.

Well, that was all great fun, a very high 4/5. Unfortunately in this extraordinary season of mostly 5/5s it’s one of the lesser lights, but it would be a highlight of many a lesser season. I didn't really mind the way Doctor Who pretty much turned into The Avengers for six weeks as it was all such fun, but all the same I wouldn't like this to happen every time!

As for Season 13 as a whole… wow. 4.5/5, an incredibly high mark which easily takes first place. It simply blew me away. I’m genuinely excited to find out whether the next one can possibly top this!

Doctor Who: The Brain of Morbius

Part One

“Can you spare a glass of water?”

Bizarrely, we start with the sight of a mutant from, er, The Mutants. Of course, I know I shouldn’t read too much into the fact that they’re just reusing an old costume, but it’s interesting that the Doctor later refers to it as a “Mutt”, although he then proceeds to give it an origin showing it’s clearly not from Solos.

Just as in Genesis of the Daleks, the Doctor is hugely annoyed at the Time Lords for clearly having sent him here (“some dirty work that they won’t touch with their lily-white hands”). This time he throws a right strop and refuses to investigate, instead just sitting around playing with his yo yo. Pertwee would never have reacted in quite this way! It’s interesting to see how much less respect the Time Lords are given in the Hinchcliffe / Holmes era, right through from the beginning. And as we’ll see, there’s a lot established about Time Lords in this story. The Doctor even says he was “born in these parts”.

Right from his first scene Philip Madoc, a fantastic villain in The War Games, makes it clear that he’s out to challenge Kevin Stoney for the title of Doctor Who’s greatest one-off villain so far. He’s clearly playing the Peter Cushing role in a pastiche of Hammer-style Frankenstein (is this the one Hinchcliffe story that lives up to it’s old “Hammer horror” reputation?) and his lab, with its many vials of bubbling liquids, is splendidly redolent of the films. He even has his own Igor in Condo.

The Sisters of Karn, though… I’m doing my best to just think of them in the context of the series rather than the New Adventures, but it’s hard, especially when Maren mentions the “silent gas dirigibles of the Hoothi”. And apparently I’ve been pronouncing “Hoothi” wrongly all these years. NAs aside, though, they’re basically a coven of witches (they transport the TARDIS by what can only be described as magic), but interestingly they seem to know the Time Lords quite well.

Interestingly, Solon seems to be a human from a spacefaring future, and is a contemporary of Morbius, and yet this can’t be long after the Doctor’s own “present” on Gallifrey. So can we assume the Doctor’s from the fairly near future, say sometime in the next few thousand years?

This is a fantastic first episode, full of Hammeresque fun and great dialogue. And Philip Madoc’s performance is a joy.

Part Two

“I can see that, you chicken-brained biological disaster!”

I love the dialogue between the Doctor and Maren, and underneath it the Doctor’s casual attitude to his forthcoming burning at the stake: “Surely you remember Popecatepetl?” Fortunately he’s rescued by Sarah- for the second story in a row. Unfortunately Sarah is blinded, something Lis Sladen plays brilliantly.

Philip Madoc continues to ooze greatness as Solon (apparently poor Condo should be “put down!”). And it’s a nice plot development that the Doctor has to rely on Solon to examine Sarah’s eyes. Solon of course tricks him into another visit to a forewarned sisterhood in a nice example of lying acting from Madoc.

There’s a great cliffhanger, with Morbius revealed as a brain in a jar.

Part Three

“Even a sponge has more life than I!”

We get a lot of exposition from the Sisterhood, who are now less suspicious of the Doctor. And in spite of the fact that they’re revealed to be luring the spaceships to their destruction, and they earlier tried to kill the Doctor in a particularly nasty way for no reason whatsoever, we’re clearly now supposed to think of them as goodies.

Still, they and the Doctor are now mates, especially after he fixes their flame for them. I like the Doctor’s speech about immortality and stagnation, though. And it’s ironic that Morbius, although completely paranoid, is in fact broadly correct when he tells a panicking Solon that the Doctor and Maren must be in league and he must be given an artificial brain case immediately. Of course, Solon gets to work, and it’s at the worst possible time that Condo discovers Solon has used his arm for Morbius’s previously headless body, and gets shot.

Part Four

“You thought I was dead, didn’t you?”

“Mmm.”

“You’re always making that mistake.”

If we’re in any mistake as to the source of this story, Solon gets to say to Morbius “Look, don’t you recognise me? I made you!” Fortunately, Condo is still alive to save Sarah before being killed, but the Doctor and Solon have to run after Solon with an elephant gun. And the Doctor, in a rare lapse into stupidity, leaves Solon alone in a room with Morbius and an operating theatre. Oops!

The Doctor and Sarah are in trouble, and in a touch which made me smile the Doctor has left the Sonic Screwdriver in the TARDIS. Ha! The Doctor’s plan, to poison Solon and Morbius with cyanide, is clever but extremely nasty.

And so we come to the famous mind-bending scene, oddly suggested by the Doctor himself. It does indeed seem from the context that all the faces are the Doctor’s, which can’t be true- er, I think the only way round this is possibly the “Let us never speak of this again” strategy.

How fitting that Morbius should meet his demise at the hands of a torch-wielding mob.

I loved that- a witty and fun spoof with great dialogue and Philip Madoc being fab. 5/5.

Doctor Who: The Android Invasion

Part One

“Is that finger loaded?”

We begin with an apparently lobotomised chap staggering towards his apparent demise, Roboman style- that’ll be a Terry Nation script, then. It means we’re in store for a solid exploratory first episode, though, and this one is nice and mysterious. Plus we’ve got Robert Holmes polishing the script plus Tom and Lis have really hit their stride- the relationship between the Doctor and Sarah is great here, with all sorts of subtle touches.

Unfortunately there’s an unintentionally funny scene with Sarah hanging from an, er, “cliff”, which even the camera angle can’t save. Still, I’m sure they’ll never allow this sort of thing to happen again so I’ll let it pass.

We have the intriguing and Avengers-esque situation of an English village, seemingly deserted, with the occasional oddity such as all the coins being new. A promising beginning, and the scene where everyone suddenly springs to life in the pub is very effective. Meanwhile there’s a new UNIT HQ, but people aren’t friendly, and terrifyingly the TARDIS takes off with the key in it. I have a problem with reviewing all this though- I’ve seen this story a fair few times and so I have no idea how obvious it is that they’re not on Earth and all the NPCs, to nick a useful term from roleplaying, are androids. Pretty damn obvious, I suspect, but I can’t really say.

Robert Holmes has been having fun with his script polishing duties- the Doctor’s reply to Crayford’s “Keep your hands where I can see them!” is a cheerful “Those are the first friendly words I’ve heard since I got here.” Unfortunately, though, we find out early on that the Brig has been called to Geneva to be temporarily replaced with some generic Avengers style colonel.

Part Two

“I will now activate the hostility circuits.”

Lots of dialogue between Sarah and the Doctor at the start of the episode, which reveals the important plot point that Crayford is supposed to have died on a space flight, is whispered and barely audible. Roll on the DVD and subtitles.

We get to see Benton and Harry but, alas, they’re androids. Instead, we’ll have to rely for our nostalgia fix on Sarah twisting her ankle like companions of old. And on the memories of Terror of the Zygons invoked by Styggron’s use of the dartboard as a scanner. Why did he do that, then? He wasn’t expecting visitors to the pub!

Part Three

“A foolish experiment, Styggron.”

For some reason the Kraals are now going to destroy the replica village, which gives us our first countdown of this most countdown-heavy of all Terry Nation’s Who scripts. There’s something so perfect for the genre in the concept of Styggron tying the Doctor to the centre of a village square which is going to explode in nine minutes while telling him that “Resistance is inadvisable!” that somehow it doesn’t seem to matter that the plot stopped making sense a long time ago. That’s the thing about this wonderful season; even the bad stories are great.

The silly conversations between Styggron and Chelaki crack me up. I can only assume that it’s a fundamental axiom of Kraal societies that maverick scientists must be given free reign to pursue even the most random and potty experiments. No doubt it’s a world full of Jeff Goldblums where the disaster movie has never been invented.

Things now start to get even more wonderfully silly. Not only does Styggron get to call Crayford a “puny-minded weakling”, but Crayford has apparently resumed contact with Earth claiming to still be in his ship having been missing for two years, his excuse being that he survived by recycling his water. Er, yes. And no doubt he saved oxygen by holding his breath a lot. This is the point where it becomes necessary to stop worrying about the plot and open another bottle of wine.

I suspect Robert Holmes came to the same conclusion while script editing it, and decided to give up on the lost cause that was the plot in favour of having fun with the dialogue. We end with some classic stuff: “I feel disorientated.” “it’s the disorientation centre.” “That makes sense.”

Part Four

“So, provided we don’t burn up in re-entry and aren’t suffocated on the way down, we’ll probably be crushed to a pulp when we land.” 

“Exactly! You’ve put your finger on the one tiny flaw in our plan.”

Finally we get to see the real Earth. But there’s no time to dwell on this as it’s all action from this point on. There’s an awful lot of fun on who’s an android and who’s not, but the result of this is that Harry and Benton don’t get to do much in their last story which is a real shame.

As usual we get great dialogue, presumably by Holmes (“If you do see me again today then I want you to report it to me immediately”), while Nation provides the countdowns (Three in one story!) and the triumphant eyepatch moment, which of course requires a certain quota of alcohol to experience properly.

There’s no denying it- this story is absolutely terrible. And yet I loved watching it! This is the Plan 9 From Outer Space of Doctor Who. It doesn’t really deserve a 3/5, but it’s going to get one.

Doctor Who: Pyramids of Mars

Part One

“I bring Sutekh’s gift of death to all humanity.”

After an appropriately horror film-esque teaser with lots of stock footage in an Egyptian bent, we get a brief shot of the TARDIS flying through space, Just as we did at the end of Planet of Evil. Sarah’s trying on Victoria’s old dress in a bit of gratuitous continuity that’s mind-bogglingly rare for the Hinchcliffe era. The Doctor, meanwhile, is such a mardyarse that the script cannot be the sole culprit- would Paddy Russell be directing this one, perchance?

Mardy or not, he gets a good line in just-this-side-of-pretentious dialogue from, ahem, “Stephen Harris”: “I’m not a human being. I walk in eternity.” Oooh! The reason for the Doctor’s foul mood (Tom Baker’s obvious foul mood is something else entirely!) Is that he’s got a massive strop on about running around after the Brigadier. Is it me, or is there some sort of running theme emerging here? Actually, I suspect there may be two, the other one being that he doesn’t want Sarah to leave.

The TARDISeers land in the Doctor’s lab at UNIT HQ, except they don’t because it’s 1911 and still “the old priory” before it mysteriously burned down. Gosh, I wonder, for no reason in particular, what the last shot of the story could possibly be?

The Doctor’s getting quite into his namedropping again, Marie Antoinette being this week’s lucky woman. The Doctor’s rather fond of 1911, “An excellent year, one of my favourites.” Sarah, meanwhile, is revealed to be from 1980. That exact year. Fact. She says it straight up. Still, it could really be any old year as UNIT chronology is arguably completely buggered up by this point anyway.

Aside from all this we get a splendidly atmospheric first episode, with a real sense of threat, and the Doctor’s brooding presence and sudden mood changes really help in establish this. The Doctor manipulates Lawrence Scarman (the excellent Michael Sheard) into helping him by being alternately rude and charming. Well, alright, he’s charming once. Oh, and the Doctor claims to never carry firearms. Liar!

Good stuff so far, and a cliffhanger that really raises the stakes.

Part Two

“Holy Moses!"

So the Egyptian gods were really “Osirans”, all-powerful aliens who were behind all of Egyptian culture and, presumably, built the pyramids. Grr! I really hate this stuff. Just for once, can’t we have some ancient monument somewhere just being a result of ancient humans being clever?

Still, that’s not all we get. In what I like to see as a nod to the era just gone we have a poacher getting killed. How nice! And there’s a great scene where Laurence Scarman gets to see the inside of the TARDIS, just to make up for the Doctor bullying him even more than he did last episode, if that’s possible. Blimey, Tom / the Doctor really is in a foul mood. Was the Coach and Horses closed for refurbishment or something? Gosh, this bloke is, clearly, in no way going to get killed. And there’s more accurate piloting from the Doctor, incidentally. 

The guff about the alternate 1980 is nice, too, and something the series had to do at least once. I’m not sure it really works though- surely Marcus Scarman would have found the tomb anyway whether the TARDIS landed in 1911 or not, so all this would always have happened anyway?

Oh, and why is all this happening in England anyway if all Sutekh’s stuff was originally in that tomb near Sakkara?

Part Three

“Perhaps he sneezes?”

This is my fave ever Tom/ Lis episode, as it consists of the Doctor going straight for an attempt of the world mardiness record while Sarah spends the whole episode mocking him. All this and a real sense of peril too. Sadly Laurence has to die (isn’t Michael Sheard magnificent?) but at least he won’t have to put up with any more nastiness from the Doctor. The worst thing is, the Doctor still manages to be likeable even when neither he nor Tom Baker are trying to be.

Sutekh is a uniquely terrifying villain; he doesn’t want to rule the universe but to destroy all life. And it’s made clear just how powerful he is; even the Doctor’s precious Time Lords wouldn’t stand a chance.

The Doctor (well, actually Lawrence) determines to blow up the rocket Marcus Scarman is building with some gelignite, so he dresses up as a mummy with some rags. I love Sarah’s comment that it must have been a nasty accident, although I can’t help wondering how come all that metal framework is clearly visible underneath.

The ending is fantastic- Sutekh stops the explosion through sheer force of will, but then the Doctor distracts him so the gelignite can explodes. But, it seems, only at the cost of his certain death…

Part Four

“Where I tread I leave nothing but darkness. I find that good.”

Gabriel Woolfe must surely have the greatest voice for a superbaddie that ever, er, walked the planet. Just imagine Stephen Thorne saying these lines and you realise just how peerless he is. I mean, he even manages to say the line “You pit your puny will against mine?” without hamming it up, a feat surely once thought impossible.

Interesting line from the Doctor about the TARDIS controls being “isomorphic”- they certainly never have been in the past. Either he’s been tinkering or he’s telling porkies. Can Sutekh actually be lied to, though?

Tom Baker is spine-chillingly good as the possessed Doctor in a scene which must have scared the kiddies out of their wits. This is a great last episode; until the last couple of minutes it looks as though our heroes stand absolutely no chance whatsoever. Still, at least the Doctor survives his possession by using yet another previously undivulged superpower, his “respiratory bypass system”.

Incidentally, I love the Doctor’s description of the Osirans as having “dome-shaped heads… and cerebellums like spiral staircases”.

The bit with the puzzles is nice (I especially like the use of the old “forked road” riddle) and doesn’t hang around long enough to outstay its welcome. Bits of it look uncannily similar to puzzles in Death to the Daleks, but that’s ok because Sarah gets to undercut this by actually pointing it out!

The time loop ending is a clever twist, although I have no idea whether it makes sense or not. But in dramatic terms it’s a triumph. Oh, and famously all the supporting characters have been killed!

Probably not quite as good as either of its two predecessors, but still earns the third 5/5 of the season. Is this going to be the best season ever?