I would have loved to see these villains make a return appearance or two in the old series, but I just don't think the new one could do them justice.
Top Ten One-off Alien Races That Should Have Returned by Howard Martin 18/6/10
(As with the enemies, these should have come back in the old series but are better off left alone by the new one.)
Big Finish Doctor Who Audios: The First Ten Years by Stephen Maslin 7/7/10
1st Place - 2002
Triumphs: The Eighth Doctor (Season 2002), Spare
Parts, The Church and the Crown, Bang-Bang-A-Boom!.
Disasters: Excelis, The Rapture, Sixth Doctor
stories (The Sandman, Real
Time, ...ish).
If 'Season 2002' (Invaders From Mars to Neverland) had ever been on TV, it would have outshone any competitor since the mid seventies. The Doctor is brilliant, his companion is brilliant, the stories are brilliant, the sound design is brilliant. What's more, after the glorious apotheosis of Neverland, we got the immaculate blend of authenticity, atmosphere and emotion that is Spare Parts. Later on, there was fun too, The Church and the Crown showcasing new companion Erimem and Bang-Bang-A-Boom! revisiting the christmas comedy turn. Forget Excelis, forget the Sixth Doctor tragedies. 2002 is the Eighth Doctor's finest hour, Big Finish's finest hour and one of Doctor Who's finest hours.
2nd Place - 2000
Triumphs: unloved companions (Turlough, Mel, Frobisher) & history (The Marian Conspiracy, The Fires of
Vulcan, Phantasmagoria).
Disasters: None really.
The penny dropped during disc one of Phantasmagoria. "With a decent pair of headphones and a dark room, this audio thing works, it actually works. It's got Turlough in it and it still works..." Unlikelihood piled on unlikeliness and, over the next few months, we had a new elderly companion who wasn't an embarrassment, a comic strip penguin in a quite exceptional story and Bonnie Langford as the best companion the Doctor ever had. It was as if a decade of frustrated creativity had been condensed into a single year.
3rd Place - 2003
Triumphs: Warner's Doctor & Kisgart's Master (Sympathy For The Devil), Paul McGann & Lalla Ward
(Shada), Peter Davison & Himself (Omega), 50% of Zagreus.
Disasters: trying to be all grown-up (Scherzo, Full Fathom Five, Master, Creatures of
Beauty, Flip-Flop), the other 50% of Zagreus, Bill Oddie.
It would be foolish to ignore 2003's manifold faults but there was just so much new Who, it would have been surprising otherwise. And there was a lot to admire. Hell, yes, even Zagreus. The greatest thing about the year was that Big Finish were at their most adventurous, pushing the envelope in all directions, giving us twice as much Who per month with an assuredness and professionalism that was at times awe-inspiring.
4th Place - 2005
Triumphs: two superb McGann performances (Terror Firma, Other
Lives)
& two great Bonnie Langford performances (Juggernauts, Catch 1782).
Disasters: Dreamtime, Thicker Than Water, The Game
and one really poor McGann story (Scaredy Cat).
2005 will of course be remembered by Who fans as The Year of Eccleston but, in the shadows, Big Finish had not quite lost its lustre. Bonnie Langford came good yet again (twice) and Other Lives was not only a highly entertaining year-end finale but the finest frustrated romance since the 2000 BBC novel Casualties Of War. A shame that the body count of poor stories was ominously starting to rise.
5th Place - 2001
Triumphs: Casting (The One Doctor, Storm Warning, Loups Garoux).
Disasters; Over-Acting (Bloodtide, Stones of Venice, Colditz).
Matching 2000 was always going to be a tall order but Big Finish again managed (and for the last time) to produce not a single story that really stank. 2002, a much better year overall, had four lemons, 2001 had none. Alas, no sublime highs either.
6th Place - 2006
Triumphs: 'new' writers (Eddie Robson, Matthew Sweet) & wit (Kingmaker, Memory Lane,
Year of the Pig)
Disasters: Pier Pressure, Red, Return of the Daleks, Something Inside.
The border between madness and genius is a narrow one. It has often been pointed out that such an axiom is more visibly borne out in Doctor Who than almost anywhere else. What makes 2006 such an infuriating beast is that, in spite of a handful of quite exceptional stories, its worst offerings are some of the most pitiful excuses for entertainment ever to bear the Doctor Who name.
7th Place - 2004
Triumphs: One Last Hurrah before the TV return ('Season 2004':
Faith
Stealer, Last, Caerdroia,
Next Life)
Barmy, Barmy, Barmy: Natural History of
Fear, Axis of Insanity.
Disasters: Sixth Doctor stories again (Medicinal Purposes, Arrangements For War), C'rizz (The Creed of the Kromon, The
Twilight Kingdom).
Started badly and got worse. By August's 'Medicinal Purposes, it seemed all up for Who on audio, that quality control had evaporated and everyone was packing up and preparing to make way for the glorious televisual future. The final four stories, 'Season 2004', were, however, a last bow worthy of any great franchise, effortlessly alternating between humour and genuine profundity, all sadly outweighed by eight preceding months of nothing.
8th Place - 2008
Triumphs: D I Menzies (The Condemned, The Raincloud
Man), The Doomwood Curse.
Disasters: Seventh Doctor stories (The Dark Husband, The
Death Collectors, Kingdom of Silver, Forty Five), the
Stage Plays (The Ultimate Adventure, Seven Keys
To Doomsday,
Curse of the Daleks).
As for 2006, so much the more for 2008. The Eighth Doctor BBC7 tales did see an improvement on their first season and the Sixth & Charley strand started on a high (though one which it could not sustain) but the first few months brought us three stories (The Dark Husband, Assassin in the Limelight, The Death Collectors) which plumbed horrendous new depths.
9th Place - 2009
Mitigated Triumphs: The Magic Mousetrap, The Eternal
Summer, The Beast
of Orlok, The Scapegoat.
Disasters: Nick Briggs scripts (Patient Zero, Blue
Forgotten Planet, Wirrn Dawn) & Dalek stories (Enemy of the
Daleks, Plague of the Daleks).
Be honest, are you sick of the Daleks yet? They look great, they always did, and TV has given them a whole new lease of life but as an audio experience they have become just another excuse for not bothering with a plot. And 2009 had little elsewhere either. The Key 2 Time never delivered, nor did the Charley finale. Glimmers here and there but drowned in an ocean of yawning.
Last Place - 2007
Triumphs: almost none.
Disasters: almost everything.
There are probably no statistics for Big Finish subscription cancellations but if one had to lay a bet on it, 2007 would surely take the wreath for causing the most. Apart from Valhalla, a couple of BBC7 Eighth Doctor tales and a few one-parters (Urgent Calls, Urban Myths, The Vanity Box and bits of Circular Time and 100) there was nothing that came anywhere near to recalling past glories. Big Finish seemed to devote its energies almost exclusively to BBC7 (featuring a new companion whose sole function was to insult the Doctor) with the vast majority of the monthly range being downgraded to a huge steaming pile of barely tolerable mediocrity, interspersed with truly excruciating garbage: Nocturne (with Ace wowing at Fisher Price Toy music that is supposed to have been created by a genius), Renaissance of the Daleks (which even Christopher H Bidmead disowned), Frozen Time (and the French accent from hell), The Mind's Eye (all padding and no plot), Dalek Empire IV: The Fearless (other than making money, why?) and, worst of all, Absolution (the risible, po-faced farewell to the companion nobody wanted). Big Finish have rightly pointed to illegal free downloads making a dent in their sales but just as liable is the criminal contempt for the paying public that spawned such trash in 2007.
Best Doctors Who Never Were by Howard Martin 22/7/10
I'm not saying that any of these guys should have gotten the part instead of any of the first nine actors to play the Doctor; I'm just saying that had any of the first nine actors not been picked to play the Doctor, any of these guys would have filled the gap very well. As far as Doctor #10 is concerned, I could happily see him replaced by anything from a walrus to a carrot or even Chuck Norris.
My Favourite Sixties Stories (in Chronological Order) by Ben Kirkham 26/7/10
It's always odd, voting for your favourite Doctor Who story, or giving marks out of ten for each of them. Opinions change from day to day, so it was only after I'd read the results of Doctor Who Magazine's 2009 poll that I started questioning my own choices again, as well as other peoples. Why wasn't The Mind Robber higher up? Why is Paradise Towers so low down? And, for all its faults, is The Twin Dilemma really the worst Doctor Who story ever? So, I thought I'd give a personal where-I-stand-at-the-moment list of my own favourites. And I've not bowed down to popular opinion: these are from the heart. They're in no particular order of preference, but I have decided to work through them chronologically, to the end of the 1960's. A list of other decades will follow...
Ten Stories (1 to 5) by Neil Clarke 2/8/10
As someone who came to Doctor Who when it was off-air, I've never really differentiated between eras and always watched the series piecemeal, as near-standalone stories. Perhaps because of this, I find the relationship between Doctor Who's diverse periods completely fascinating, something that's been emphasised by the new series' more rigorously consecutive season structure.
This, then, is an attempt to watch one of each of the ten Doctors' stories consecutively, preferably from as unbiased a mindset as possible; that is, ones that are new or at least unfamiliar to me. I don't have any great goal in mind, simply to try to view the series' various eras as a complete whole.
Obviously, Doctor Who has always operated in the same fundamental ways but, aside from the fact that we're fans and so appreciate the progression and links, it's hard to see what really connects The Aztecs or Mawdryn Undead (as random example) to, say, Midnight. That's part of the show's brilliance, obviously, but it does throw me sometimes. This, then, is my daring voyage through Doctor Who's distinct eras...
1. "We're trying to beat the Daleks, not start a jumble sale!" - The Chase
Whenever I watch sixties stories, much as I love the era, I can't help
but find it bizarre that there's any relationship between them and the
twenty-first century version. But then, The Chase is
such an ostentatiousmess that it's not a whole lot removed from, say, The Stolen Earth/Journey's End. In fact, there's an
OTT lack of restraint here that actually makes Davies' magnum opus seem a
clear successor to this story.
The Chase is very much an 'adventure' - it's ridiculous, but unselfconsciously, so it doesn't matter - operating under a spectacle-over-story, crowd-pleasing mentality: snippets of famous historical events! Daleks! Dalekmania-milking robots! A horror genre parody! New York! An evil double! The whole thing's an absolute treat, with about ten times the usual amount of madness. Even the plunking piano music makes me imagine some crazed cartoon pianist hammering away, shirt collar askew, sweat flying...
The inclusion of the historical scenes shown on the visualiser alone are joyfully random. Especially with a rare classic series acknowledgement of pop culture thrown in, in the form of the Beatles footage (which is so unprecedented that it feels wrong, but nevertheless fits into this chaotic story). Given its bad reputation, I was amazed by how charmingly funny it is too (and not in a piss-take way); Terry Nation brings a genuine comic sensibility to proceedings, even in small details like the Doctor's extended mumbling and gesticulating with a screwdriver at the beginning, and peeping from behind the time-space visualiser; Ian's deadpanned, "It's a bit far-fetched" about his Monsters from Outer Space book; the whole crew variously kicking the visualiser. There's a tiny moment which I find almost unfeasibly funny, too, where Barbara asks Vicki what flavour space-bar the TARDIS food machine has dispensed, which Vicki's answers with a nonchalant, 'Guava' - which I imagine must have been impossibly exotic in 1965...
Also:
Visually however, this is a particularly shoddy sixties story (compare and contrast with the following, rather beautiful Time Meddler, with its almost stylised forced-perspective sets and back-projected clouds, or the later War Machines), but still includes some unexpectedly creative visual devices (the Doctor operating the TARDIS' controls to camera; Ian and Babs' photomontage farewell; the comic-strip additions to the Dalek/Mechanoid battle, which actually looks quite stunning, with its frenetic cuts, close-ups, zooms, canted angles, and overlaid images).
The Daleks are actually lovingly shot from a variety of angles, and frequently framed so as to show only certain parts of them, with the focus switching between eyestalks and plungers. Nevertheless, this story is enormously hokey, with its literally 2D sets and the poorly dubbed 'double'. But, it just doesn't matter. I won't say poor effects are an intrinsic part of Doctor Who's appeal, but the lower the budget, the less televisual it becomes and the more like a filmed play - and so its effectiveness comes down to suspension of belief. And, as Doctor Who is fundamentally ridiculous, effects just don't matter; it's all about believing in it.
The poncy interpretative-dance-schooled Aridians probably represent exactly what Russell T Davies has been trying to avoid with his reluctance to show alien cultures, and the Fungoids might be a bit Mighty Boosh, but most of the story's dodginess has more to do with the technical limitations of the camerawork and (turgid) editing than anything. (Even the painted Aridian backdrops are perfectly acceptable, and the addition of the calcified rock shapes on the sand on location is strangely effective.)
What I found most notable about this story though was to do with the Doctor. The First Doctor is great: Hartnell is a brilliant actor, and arguably the ultimate expression of the Doctor as an unconventional hero; I love the idea of an old, Edwardian gentleman saving the world every week. However, I do appreciate that he is relatively difficult to appreciate (as opposed to, say, the more immediate Troughton), but here he does have that immediacy. He's crotchety, yes, but also a mix of charming, funny, in control and regretful, playing much of this material surprisingly straight.
It really does feel like the end of an era here - and it's rather a glorious send-off (despite - given the story's reputation - evidently not being to everyone's taste). The Doctor's outrage at Ian and Babs' decision to leave and his refusal to help is touchingly telling, and shows why I like the character of the (First) Doctor so much: he's not always all sweetness and light and can be difficult, rather than being a perfect hero, fully and selflessly in control of his emotions.
That there isn't an actual goodbye for Ian and Babs (key original cast members, no less!) is interestingly effective (the very early companion departures were often a lot cleverer than people tend to give them credit for; cf Vicki's and Victoria's) - and probably a good thing, as it could have become mawkish and overplayed (it certainly would be now). Ian's determination for normality makes him seem very three-dimensional, even within this pulpy story, and it's great and surprising to see Ian and Babs on their own in London, post-Doctor (a privilege few companions are afforded; there's also a lovely, satisfying symmetry to the Doctor and Vicki using the visualiser to watch their return). The La-Jetee-style photomontage is also glorious; not least because of how charming and unprecedented a stylistic departure it is within Doctor Who, considering even basic devices like flashbacks or non-chronological plot progression weren't used pre-2005.
The Chase: it's a tacky piece of B-movie fluff - and yet, and yet... I actually loved this story. No other era would, could, or did produce a story as bizarrely, brazenly varied as this. I should hate its crowd-pleasing simplicity, but the Doctor Who-as-comic-strip approach is actually hugely entertaining. For one night only, at least.
2. "Success! Paramount success!" / "He's got a printed circuit where
his heart should be!" - The Ice Warriors
Especially in contrast to the audacity of The
Chase, I increasingly can't help feeling the Troughton era was went
things started to go wrong for Doctor Who. Not that his era is bad
- or that Doctor Who was 'bad' after the sixties generally - but,
after the wildly varied and experimental Hartnell seasons, this was where
reductive thinking started to mould the series into a more fixed format.
Both because Troughton's so lovable and because so many of his stories are missing, negative feeling toward his years feels almost in bad taste, whereas Hartnell is less easily accessible and, with more stories to judge, is more often considered fair game. This imbalance in critical feeling towards the two eras does seem somewhat unfair, cos Troughton's era is so much less interesting...!
However, it's still enormously exciting seeing a whole new Troughton (well, 'whole' in a manner of speaking). I tend not to distinguish between stories I know are completely missing, or are only lacking a couple of episodes, so in my head this story has always been filed under 'I will never see this.' But really, two episodes missing out of six is pretty good!
There are so few Troughtons that it's easy to take him for granted, not having a great amount of variety to judge him on, but seeing him anew, in a new context, reinforces how fab he is (despite what I might think about his era as a whole). It's also easy to forget what a massive leap he is from Hartnell (reminiscent of the Eccleston/Tennant handover). Troughton compares very strongly against Tennant, in fact (who isn't a personal fave, but it's great seeing a dusty old Doctor genuinely holding his own against a current mainstream one); I shouldn't be surprised, it's just there tends to be so much hyperbole about the tenth Doctor. He's so adorable that if you could put him in a story today people'd still love him. (As an aside, it's interesting that the Doctor here considers himself a scientist, which seems remarkably mundane; now he's a hero or champion, or even lost prince or lonely god.)
The story is a strong one from a production point of view: juxtaposing a period setting with futuristic trappings is always a striking visual device, and the combination of the manor and pop-art, printed-circuit costumes is very effective. And, although this is a seemingly studio-bound story, we get a surprisingly good impression of the future ice age, with its caves and ice-falls. Despite the tell-tale squeak of polystyrene, the ice caves actually look impressively detailed (it helps they don't have flat studio floors), while the creepy score helps give the story lashings of atmosphere. Also, Penley is a massively likeable character: when he meets the Doctor, it almost feels like two Doctors for the price of one. (Stor is an annoying bumpkin though.)
The Ice Warriors themselves are very effective monsters for this period: solid and memorably designed (the bipedal but inhuman silhouette is very successful), though the big-headed extras are quite a lot crappier. (They also show the later Ice Lords up as a pointlessly less effective variation.) In fact, these Warriors really wouldn't require much alteration to still be effective on screen today. I love going back to old Doctor Who and it not feeling old; it makes you realise how little current Doctor Who has changed (the TARDIS team turn up, the Doctor sticks his nose in, and takes over the situation; this has almost never changed).
Having watched stories from both sixties eras consecutively, what strikes me about the earliest two Doctors' stories is that it isn't effects which makes the current series more acceptable to modern audiences, by comparison to the old; it's more the editing and general quality of the filming as a whole rather than individual effects that make the old series 'unacceptable' to a modern audience. This should be really obvious, but it's a personal bugbear of mine that people are dismissive of things for entirely superficial reasons.
In fact, I love the sixties specifically for its unique feel; the grainy B&W of the sixties is incomparably more atmospheric than, particularly, the crisp, too-bright eighties - and is beautiful in a way no other era compares with. It's like the difference between vinyl and CD; it has an evocativeness to it even if you had no firsthand experience of it. Perhaps a better comparison is between Polaroid and digital pictures; whereas digital has a basic default colour balance that makes everything look the same, bland and 'ordinary,' Polaroid's unique colour casts and imperfect development make everything look incomparably cooler.
3. "The man's a fool!" - The Ambassadors of Death
It's hard to retrospectively judge the changeover to colour,
especially since this story, with its Ipcress File stylings, particularly
suits black and white (although that film was in colour, but hush...). The
black and white clips at the beginning of the VHS act as a brilliant
trailer, while unfortunately looking far better than the colour footage;
the sets and CSO are hugely improved. The titles especially must have been
dazzling though; they still have such an unearthly, technicolour allure.
It's often all too easy to lump the earliest Doctors' eras together when considering the entirety of Doctor Who in overview, but with its stark industrial settings, this is a massive leap. It's bleak, glum, austere; visually alone, it really doesn't feel 'teatime'. There aren't many Doctor Who stories Michael Caine's Jack Carter would feel at home in, but this is one of them.
Its stylishness - the much-cited shooting into the sun and fast cuts between Liz and the (brief) reveal of the Ambassador's face, with building music - gives much more 'coherent' an approach than we're arguably used to. The Invasion set a precedent for stories like Ambassadors but, despite its relative 'realism,' it still featured supervillians and lairs, etc. Ambassadors is on a whole different level of realism again.
I also really like the earthbound setting when viewed as a not-quite-right 'near future', especially since this is something people tend to ignore now. And it's lovely (as in the later Invasion of the Dinosaurs) to have a bit of intrigue in Doctor Who. The whole thing is strangely - but appealingly - inaccessible (by comparison to the series' most popular periods): things aren't made easy for the audience; the good guys don't have charming foibles, and the villains aren't moustache-twirling cliches. The characters we have here are no longer larger than life figures, at least for a brief interlude. The Doctor doesn't even stage the expected daring rescue when Liz is kidnapped; this very clearly isn't the action-adventure world the Doctor usually operates in.
He does take control quickly and in a more assured manner than we're used to, but the downside of the new realism is that it makes our hero feel like a much more conventional lead than previously. Though no Doctor in and of themselves is dated (in terms of performance or acting; ie, they are all still effective), Pertwee is arguably the most generic, as he is broadly comparable to John Steed or Jason King. Even in the aforementioned trailer alone, the Doctor, who features only as a talking head, is immediately a massive departure from his two predecessors. It's decisiveness that makes him seem like an 'action hero' in a way the first two don't; the decisive, grim Third Doctor is the closest the character has been to a conventional action hero so far.
However, in the end, despite my attraction to its tone, Ambassadors is almost too dour - not that Doctor Who shouldn't do this, but in the sense that there isn't a great deal of variety of location, etc, in this period; the tone could have been used in conjunction with more varied stories (ie, there's no reason, technically, why a Mawdryn Undead or Ghost Light format couldn't have been used in the earth-exile period). Also, considering Carrington's plan hinges on public reaction, this is an example of a story that could have been improved by showing the public or domestic sphere, as per the new series.
Overall, its maturity in trying to be an adult thriller is its weakness; Inferno, say, is intelligent and mature but still plays with pulpy ideas (men into monsters and parallel worlds), whereas Ambassadors' attempt at being a gritty adult drama is belied and undermined by a slight shoddiness (plot holes, continuity errors, under-directed extras) which seems more pronounced in relation to its high intentions.
4. "The wilful procrastination of endless procedure" - Full Circle
This is a big leap, and feels like the first 'modern' story I've
watched so far. There is suddenly much more in common with modern TV
(though not necessarily modern Doctor Who), and it feels like
there's a more definitive divide between this story and the preceding
three, although this is hardly surprising, given the full 10 years gap
separating this from Ambassadors. It almost feels
unfair to represent the Fourth Doctor's era with one story, as his time in
the role was not only so long, but so varied.
I adore Warriors' Gate's visual invention and willingness to deal with concepts that aren't necessarily easy to grasp, so I've always had high hopes for this, the initial story of the 'E-space trilogy' (though State of Decay fumbles what should be the effortless combination of Doctor Who and vampires). However - bearing in mind my choices for these ten stories are entirely arbitrary - this is the worst of the four I've watched so far. In fact, on general terms it's pretty good, but compared to the preceding eras it's just too eighties, in all the ways that label has become notorious in Doctor Who circles.
There are just a few too many things that don't do it any favours: namely, it's populated by default peasantry, in one of those annoying futures where everyone dresses the same (which seems particularly hideous by direct comparison to season seven's realism). Worst of all, the swotty horrible Outlers. Doctor Who never really focuses on adolescents, which is probably for the best on this evidence, as it's so hopelessly out of touch with real teens: the 'rebel' Outlers are preppy, sexless, am-dram tossers. Having said that, I'd take any of them over Adric, the greasy little twot; the fucking Marshchild would have made a better companion... By contrast, Romana doing a Leela and wielding a knife is possibly the best thing I've ever seen, in anything, ever.
The story also heralds the typical eighties hallmarks of the regulars not being involved for the whole first episode (it's weird seeing the Fourth Doctor rendered so impotent). There's also a tendency to put emphasis on inexplicable things (ie, the technobabble about the scanner, and the concept of E-space being treated so as to be as dreary and boring as possible). Not to mention hordes of people in the TARDIS and everyone immediately acting like they've known each other for ages (Romana and Adric are particularly guilty of being written as fellow companions even in their first story together).
On the other hand, there are a lot of lovely things too:
The dressing of the woods with cobwebs, smoke and exotic houseplants looks great. It actually seems hazy and muggy, and the (slightly homoerotic, or is that just me?!) swimmers in the water at the beginning is a nice touch. The Decider being dragged into the lake is surprisingly unpleasant and creepy - it isn't too neat and sanitised - but actually quite a beautiful scene too.
Everyone always raves about the Marshmen, but I've never been convinced by photos; on screen though, shiny and salamander-like, they do look great, especially in the woods, lit by the sunlight coming through the trees. Amazingly, even the Starliner's corridors look pretty good (for corridors); with their ceilings, they are claustrophobic and not too plain, though not as good as the slave ship in Warriors' Gate; and the Doctor on trial by the Deciders looks awesome, in the big, sparely lit Book Room set.
However, though Peter Grimwade makes everything look great, things seems less assured when it comes to the actors. It all looks ace (you have to love the Doctor leaping about through the mist in his moody burgundy greatcoat), but there's a fatal lack of conviction overall. There's a very 'Bidmeadian' attempted cleverness (when it isn't particularly clever at all, really), and ultimately feels a bit flat and banal. It's not witty or funny, and doesn't have any real danger or violence - or humanity, for that matter. It has no balls, spunk, or pizzazz (take your fancy); this is Doctor Who emasculated.
As for Tom, while undeniably a great Doctor, his albeit undoubted effectiveness and ubiquity has always meant I've never found him particularly interesting, and it's also hard to look at him with any objectivity. He's possibly the most brooding, dangerous Doctor to date (although Hartnell could give him a run for his money at times); almost a foreboding figure, which is odd, as he's considered the definitive Doctor (though I guess not for this quality; more his 'zaniness').
However, an element I do like about his performance is the disparity of what is essentially a kids' hero being played by, arguably, a not especially kid-friendly man (ie, a control freak pisshead), which I think imbues his performance with a certain edginess. It would be more typical for an actor to feel a responsibility to play down to a younger audience, which Tom doesn't do; at least in his more serious moments, it's a quite uncompromising and, strangely, not even that likeable performance. However, I prefer this to the accessible, cuddly version which, arguably, Tennant verges too much on (touchy-feely and new man; I prefer the Doctor to have more steel).
5. "Ah, conformity... There is no other freedom" - Four to Doomsday
My comments regarding Full Circle
notwithstanding, I hate the constant criticism of the eighties, because I
genuinely think there is a fairly even mix of good and awful stories
throughout Doctor Who's entire run. However, Davison's era is for
me what 'eighties Doctor Who' conjures up, in a negative sense. In
fact, if I ever say anything derogatory about the eighties, I mean
Davison, with the possible addition of seasons twenty-three and
twenty-four, though at least twenty-four was a new direction.
I've realised that I'd struggle for any way of accurately describing Davison's era. It continues the trend set by Full Circle, in that it isn't funny or witty, clever, whimsical, violent, or dark. It's not even mindless popcorn entertainment. It's just a bit nondescript, possibly po-faced, but with no real direction. It baffles me who the production team thought they were making this for.There's a strange prissiness or prudery at work in this period too, no doubt deriving from John Nathan-Turner's horror of 'hanky-panky in the TARDIS'; ie, all the things Russell T Davies introduced. There's no acknowledgement or suggestion of anything too real, like alcohol or sexuality and people fancying each other. The sixties may have been morally upright, but you could imagine Ian and Barbara at least thinking about having a sex life, whereas Nyssa, say, probably didn't even have a vagina.
Obviously I'm generalising but, for me, the Davison era is the period when Doctor Who really lost its way in that it seems like no one had the faintest clue what they were trying to create. There is no vision behind this. The Fifth Doctor's eighties have no quirkiness or surreality, or even any of the unexpected little twists that characterise (say) Revelation, Greatest Show, or Ghost Light. It's safe, tame and bland.
As for the Fifth Doctor himself, I realised when I got back into Doctor Who that, much as I genuinely love each and every Doctor, it's Peter I probably love the least. Just because there's the least there. Yes, he does amazingly with pretty thin material, but I just find very little to notice, let alone love. I find the idea of a youthful, sporty, blond Doctor far more interesting in theory than practise (to me, he works far better in The Tides of Time comics cycle than he ever did on TV).
Actually, he is kind of great here, but the problem is I'm not sure that's typical: he's a bit shiftier and more manic than usual in his first performance, as if he manages more sparkle while unsure of himself. His performance in this story brings out a lot of the best attributes of the Doctor (curiosity, sarcasm, distractibility and pained concern) but unfortunately this pretty much amounts to saying 'he's downhill from his first performance on'. (Interestingly, he does seem more modern than his predecessors, in describing the Urbankans as 'frogs with funny hairdos' and talking about safety pins as earrings.)
The radical change of direction for the series, introducing such a vague, dithering Doctor, was obviously always going to be a gamble. So the inexplicable decision to saddle him with not one but two alien companions boggles the mind. Surely 'everyday everyman' audience identification figures make sense, as demonstrated, in fact, by the impossible-to-relate-to main characters here, doing inexplicable technological things in ridiculous costumes. At least Tegan demonstrates some confusion and human emotion; I don't especially like her, but if only there'd been space for her to be developed, one-on-one.
Alien companions just don't work, unless it's an easily graspable concept (ie, Leela - who I know isn't an alien, but, you know: 'savage primitive' is easy to get from the chamois swimwear), whereas Adric is... a maths expert. In pyjamas. Nyssa is... some other sort of expert. In velvet. They end up (by necessity) talking about earth as if they're from it (or have a reason to give a shit), so let's mark this down as a failed experiment and move on. Oh, wait, no; Turlough's on his way.
Perhaps this demonstrates what differentiates the eighties (at least, the Fifth Doctor era) from the preceding eras (more specifically than just 'style over substance'): there is no focus on characterisation. The historical personages here (Mayans, etc) are basically extras. Compare to The Aztecs (or any historical), where Autloc, Cameca, etc are recognisable, believably human characters. There is nothing human here.
And nothing dramatic happens either! (There's a swordfight, which the regulars are no more involved with than to watch, while the villains spend their time watching the regulars.) The WHOLE SHITTING THING amounts to endless exposition; constant babble about silicon chips which is as dull and meaningless as it sounds. It remains likeable enough - it's not hateful - but as I've chosen to watch it, this begs the question, who thought any casual viewer would care about this, and not find it utterly tedious and inexplicable?
There are lots of fudged moments where things could almost get interesting, but don't: Adric's apparent betrayal of the Doctor is robbed of any drama (possibly wishful thinking anyway, where Matthew Waterhouse is concerned) by the Doctor telling him he's an idiot, and Adric accepting it. Similarly, the 'daring' spacewalk is filmed so turgidly that it is in no way exciting, epic or triumphant, as it should be. It is literally as interesting as a walk in the park. At least Monarch is funny and naturalistic (in fact, he's a pretty amazing villain, in that he is actually quite charming, but deranged; that actually comes across).
Yes, this story could be characterised as demonstrating style over substance (ie, shallow storytelling) but, embarrassingly, the direction is actually far more pedestrian than in the sixties, or season seven, which had a sense of style to them! Obviously, things can't always automatically get better as they progress, but surely there must have been some red faces when they realised they were making a series that looked considerably worse than it did 12 years ago? I guess that's the problem; no one was aware or pragmatic enough to realise.
That this story isn't going to rile anyone makes it worse; it's entirely ambitionless. There's no sense of fun or, alternatively, darkness and violence. Four to Doomsday encapsulates the Davison era's sense of naive straightforwardness, but also how it got the basics wrong. It lost not so much realism (a dubious concept within Doctor Who), but conviction.
Also, why the chuffing hell doesn't anyone have a bee in their bonnet about the Fifth Doctor casually chucking poison over Monarch? Sheer favouritism!
End of part one. Still to come in stories 6 to 10? Luddites! Darkness falling! San Francisco! Frozen zombies! And zeppelins. Hurrah!
My Top Ten Tennant Episodes by Tom Marshall 3/8/10 These are listed by date, not quality.
And, to cut a long story short: BEST. ERA. EVER.
Ranking Season 2 of Torchwood by Jamie Beckwith 11/8/10
Top Ten Spinoffs That Never Were by Howard Martin 2/9/10
Top 5 problems with Russell T. Davies Dr. Who era by David Gottner 6/9/10
1. World building, or lack thereof.
Nothing ends suspension of disbelief faster than traveling into the far future and seeing that current 21st century pop-culture is still alive and well. Examples:
I felt that classic Who did a better job of commenting on current culture without asking us to believe that the contemporary form of cultural institutions remain unchanged. The Robots of Death for example feels like there is a new social dynamic going on. Or in Vengeance on Varos, it comments on what was current style of TV entertainment (heck still is) but it's not literally using current TV programs and asking us to believe they are still current in the future.
2. Continuity
Excess continuity is a double-edged sword. It's nice if there is a consistent story arc with reasonably good stories. Bad when it seems like they need to refer to the worst stories ever done in the series to remind you that such dreck exists. There are some stories I would rather pretend are not a part of the Doctor Who Universe. I also felt they should have put classic Who in some parts. For example, in Human Nature/Family of Blood, why not also show scenes from classic Who during the flashback scene?
Particulars:
3. Cringe-worthy moments.
It seems like just about every episode (with a few exceptions of course) has moments that I just find incredibly irritating. What's worse is that these moments spoil what would otherwise be outstanding episodes. Some examples:
4. Messiah Doctor
Nothing more exemplifies the change in the role of the Doctor than Last of the Time Lords. The old Doctor (Tom Baker in particular) encouraged and empowered others to act and stand up. For example, in The Face of Evil, the Doctor's expertise is required, but it is the entire tribe of the Sevateem that gradually accepts the truth of their reality and assists in ending their problems with Xoannon. In The Last of the Time Lords, by contrast, the Doctor organizes everyone via Martha to focus on His Esteemed Presence at a specific time so that he can turn into Messiah Doctor and set things right. Now, if I was going to write that episode, I would have the Doctor analyze the Archangel Network, find some vulnerability and organize everyone to think of a sequence of tones that would bring it down, and at that point the people could organize a revolution against the Tocclaphane. (To do that however, the over-the-top qualities need to also be toned down.? No tiny 10,000 year old Doctor in a cage.)
5. Stupid science / Plot Devices
Doctor Who has always been more questionable as far as science goes, in fact it is more of a fantasy show. How about green ooze turning people into primords in Inferno? Or the Devil (alleged by the Doctor) in The Curse of Fenric, as well as having vampires (calling them heamovores as if renaming them gives them scientific plausibility)? However, at least in these cases, the fantasy premises are worked into the plot and form an integral story. Davies' Doctor Who is marked by silly explanations that defy the logic of the story that had been built up, and serve merely to get out of an impossible situation. Examples:
Give me primord-transforming green slime any day.
Why I love every single Doctor Who story (Part One: the Sixties) by Tom Marshall 16/9/10
Does what it says on the tin!
001. An Unearthly Child (4 episodes; 1963)
The opening shot; in fact, the whole of the opening first episode. Hartnell's enigmatic portrayal of the Doctor, and the TARDIS: the single greatest idea in fiction.
002. The Daleks (7 episodes; 1963-4)
The cliffhanger to Part One as the Dalek approaches Barbara: iconic television. And the jungle of the first alien planet ever.
003. The Edge of Destruction (2 episodes; 1964)
The intense claustrophobia and the disturbing psychological themes.
004. Marco Polo (7 episodes; 1964)
The sense of scale and the real enriching of the historical period.
005. The Keys of Marinus (6 episodes; 1964)
The quest formula, both exciting and expanding the brief of the show; and the opening shot of the sea of acid and the beach of glass, with some particularly ominous music.
006. The Aztecs (4 episodes; 1964)
Barbara. Period.
007. The Sensorites (6 episodes; 1964)
The sheer imagination behind the look of the Sensorites; if it inspired the Ood 42 years later then they must be pretty good!
008. The Reign of Terror (6 episodes; 1964)
The Doctor's more heroic streak coming through, and Barbara again.
009. Planet of Giants (3 episodes; 1964)
The concept, which is bizarre but great.
010. The Dalek Invasion of Earth (6 episodes; 1964)
The cliffhanger to Part One as the Dalek emerges from the waves, and the sheer scale of Dalek saucers above London and Daleks on Westminster Bridge.
011. The Rescue (2 episodes; 1965)
The charming nature of both planet Dido and Vicki herself.
012. The Romans (4 episodes; 1965)
The comedy: the best yet on the show.
013. The Web Planet (6 episodes; 1965)
The Animus: a brilliant, scary idea.
014. The Crusade (4 episodes; 1965)
The unprecedented brilliance of the director, the opening swordfight and the sheer realism of the environment.
015. The Space Museum (4 episodes; 1965)
Vicki's increased prominence and the cliffhanger of Part Four.
016. The Chase (6 episodes; 1965)
Daleks on the Empire State Building, 42 years before Helen Raynor.
017. The Time Meddler (4 episodes; 1965)
Peter Butterworth's delightful turn as the Meddling Monk, plus his chemistry with Hartnell.
018. Galaxy 4 (4 episodes; 1965)
The moral message regarding the Rills and the Drahvins.
019. Mission to the Unknown (1 episode; 1965)
The tragic fate of Cory: being the only main character, you really get to like him in this story; macho and yet slightly desperate.
020. The Myth Makers (4 episodes; 1965)
The Doctor coming up with the Trojan horse.
021. The Daleks' Master Plan (12 episodes; 1965-6)
The sheer epicness of it, and the audacity of making a story this long, plus the variety of aliens and locations.
022. The Massacre (4 episodes; 1966)
The painful message that gets across, and the Doctor being mistaken for the Abbot.
023. The Ark (4 episodes; 1966)
Some of the imagination and ideas behind this story are breathtaking.
024. The Celestial Toymaker (4 episodes; 1966)
The different-ness of this four-parter - and the bullying Cyril, plus creepy clowns and an enemy who conveyed more than just villainy, but real power.
025. The Gunfighters (4 episodes; 1966)
The Doctor's toothache: so simple and yet so funny!
026. The Savages (4 episodes; 1966)
Both William Hartnell and Peter Purves' marvellous performances as the Doctor and Steven.
027. The War Machines (4 episodes; 1966)
The cliffhanger to Part Three, with the Doctor facing the War Machine; plus all those classy aerial shots and zoom-ins to the Post Office Tower.
028. The Smugglers (4 episodes; 1966)
The Doctor being called a "sawbones": a great ring to it.
029. The Tenth Planet (4 episodes; 1966)
Cybermen marching, wreathed in snow; and the very idea of regeneration, plus that bit where Hartnell murmurs to the screen "It's far from being over!" How right you were...
030. The Power of the Daleks (6 episodes; 1966)
Troughton's fresh performance and the Daleks pretending to be friendly.
031. The Highlanders (4 episodes; 1966-7)
JAMIE!!!
032. The Underwater Menace (4 episodes; 1967)
Being the first story to deal with Atlantis.
033. The Moonbase (4 episodes; 1967)
The music, the production, the Cybermen and the Doctor. All flawlessly realised.
034. The Macra Terror (4 episodes; 1967)
Macra in the dark... look so much more impressive than Macra in the light. And the colony's quite good, too.
035. The Faceless Ones (6 episodes; 1967)
The effect of the Chameleon faces; plus the mystery feeling and the coup of filming at Gatwick Airport.
036. The Evil of the Daleks (7 episodes; 1967)
Troughton's performance throughout, going to Skaro again, the genetic side of the plot and the epic finale.
037. The Tomb of the Cybermen (4 episodes; 1967)
When the Cybermen emerge from their tombs!
038. The Abominable Snowmen (6 episodes; 1967)
The location filming which tries to look as Tibetan as possible.
039. The Ice Warriors (6 episodes; 1967)
The hissing whispers of the creatures and their fantastic costumes. Inspired!
040. The Enemy of the World (6 episodes; 1967-8)
Troughton's magnificent turns as both the Doctor and the ruthless Salamander.
041. The Web of Fear (6 episodes; 1968)
The London Underground filming: incredibly realistic and atmospheric, and it definitely inspired Primeval to play the same trick.
042. Fury from the Deep (6 episodes; 1968)
The sound that can be heard; the sonic screwdriver; the foam!
043. The Wheel in Space (6 episodes; 1968)
Zoe Heriot: great character.
044. The Dominators (5 episodes; 1968)
The Quarks: the second most popular Second Doctor enemy (in comic strips, that is!)
045. The Mind Robber (5 episodes; 1968)
Its absolutely incredible atmosphere: totally unique, fantastical. And the bit where the TARDIS is torn to shreds in space!
046. The Invasion (8 episodes; 1968)
The epic plot; the Cybermen emerging from the sewers; Tobias Vaughan and Packer; the Cybermen marching through the streets of London with the hypnotic signal & St Pauls'!
047. The Krotons (4 episodes; 1968-9)
The design of the Krotons: bad but quaint!
048. The Seeds of Death (6 episodes; 1969)
The last look back at the really traditional 'monster of the week' Troughton storylines.
049. The Space Pirates (6 episodes; 1969)
The wacky humour and Clancey's accent!
050. The War Games (10 episodes; 1969)
The sheer epicness of Troughton's last gasp as the Doctor. His performance throughout is marvellous, as is the direction, and the narrative involving the Time Lords.
Ten stories (6 to 10) by Neil Clarke 2/10/10
And here we are again, continuing my era-by-era evaluation/overview of the series. See the preceding half for stories 1 to 5.
6. 'The wood's about to become populated with new trees' - Mark of the Rani
Thank Christ! Real people, in a real, believable environment, the location filming for which is very 'handsome' and authentic. It also shows how much perceptions change; I had this video as a kid, and thought it was all a bit flimsy and dull. Now the scene-setting opening scenes look absolutely gorgeous (the villagers backlit by the sun, with illuminated insects buzzing around). The whole thing in fact is amazingly stylish, for this period (shooting through hedgerows, etc), and the pastoral music helps. (It's certainly one of very few Doctor Who stories that has any call to be compared, even in passing - and totally unexpectedly - to Terrance Malick.)
Considering this is reviled eighties Doctor Who, it is actually quite beautiful (which is rarer than you might hope). Even the cartoonish elements don't feel jarringly silly and, for once, even the extras know what they're doing; there's an attention to detail even here, with their tugging of forelocks; hats off to director Sarah Hellings.
Compared to the Fifth Doctor's seasons, this has a genuinely sense of style, and an authenticity and surfeit of imagination (albeit of a bonkers Pip'n'Jane variety). This story has quite a solid rep; undeserved, I thought, on the basis of years' old memories, but it is actually kind of great. I love season twenty-two's distinctive darkness and, yes, violence, but it must be admitted that, though an uncharacteristically tame story for the season, this does seem far more timeless than Varos or Revelation. (Also, it's lovely to see some trees!)
Its reputation is sullied (for me) by its association with the ludicrous cartoon that is Time and the Rani, but - despite a few silly coincidences, etc - it is an amazingly subtle, well-characterised, and attractively shot story, with above-par direction. Which is pretty impressive for a Pip'n'Jane story featuring Antony Ainley, Kate O'Mara, a rubber tree, and a baby T-Rex. I'm so glad the classic series is still capable of surprising me, or at least of overturning my preconceptions!
However, while I do hate the really obvious mindset of introducing a 'female Master,' not least because it demeans his and the Doctor's dualistic opposition, the Rani is actually far more dangerous and credible a threat than Ainley is here. Her contemptuous, superior snideness is a ball, and I love how she and the Master act like a bitchy married couple ("You see what she's like?"). And, yes, the Rani's TARDIS is a triumph of design and realisation.
It helps - and I'm not just being charitable or making allowances, as people tend to do for the runt of the litter - that Colin is a genuinely great Doctor here. He's an engaging mix of the shrewd, compassionate (with Luke), reckless (setting off the Rani's booby-trap unnecessarily!), passionate, frivolous, and righteous. ("They should never have exiled you. They should have locked you in a padded cell.")
I even quite like the Sixth Doctor's costume. Or at least, I've come to terms with it. Yes, it's an odd decision on the part of the production team, motivated presumably by the desire to create a brandable look rather than anything else but, as a magician's costume, it isn't inappropriate for the Doctor. It works against Baker's snappish persona, creating an interesting tension; though a visually darker, more 'serious' costume would undeniably have acted as a helpful visual signifier of the antiheroic elements of his characterisation, perhaps making the Sixth Doctor easier to swallow. As it is though, what bugs me is how perfect and precise it is. A 'tasteless' costume would work much better if it didn't seem quite so homogenous; clearly made as a whole outfit, it'd be more believable if it appeared like random parts.
The Sixth Doctor's characterisation is funny; he is presumably meant to be 'dangerous'. Except... he isn't; he's likeable, just a bit snappish. Tom and Billy are far more dangerous than Colin is. I'm sure people would have far less problem with his performance if he weren't so obviously being shoehorned into a role that doesn't sit quite right. He seems like what he is: a nice, genial man trying to act like a bastard.
However, having said all that, much as I was pleasantly surprised by this story's relative solidity and coherence, I don't find Mark of the Rani that interesting. Personally, I find the jumble of ideas and approaches of Revelation (and, to a lesser extent, The Two Doctors) more appealing. Mark of the Rani could be from any era; some people no doubt prefer that, but I'd rather stories have an approach individual to their era (surely something must be wrong if they don't?).
(Also: jeez, Luke Ward fills his britches! I mean, literally.)
7. 'Let us teach them the limits of their technologies!' - Battlefield
Though I've seen Battlefield before, it was always such a crushing disappointment compared to the rest of season twenty-six that it has remained very unfamiliar to me. Opening a season with a scene set in a garden centre is baffling enough, and I can't help but question the logic of presenting the Brigadier and UNIT without explanation, fifteen years after they stopped being regular fixtures of the series.
However, rewatching it now, despite not being a prime example of its era, the change of emphasis from the last few stories I've watched is notable: Doctor Who is suddenly aware of and drawing on its own mythology in a positive way, rather than through meaninglessly returning monsters. There's a complex, adult awareness of the Doctor as a mythic, legendary figure; for the first time, the Doctor is explicitly presented in the mythologised way which will culminate in Russell T Davies' 'lonely god'. Similarly, UNIT and the Brigadier are rejigged and reimagined in line with the current production team's approach, not rehashed verbatim; UNIT is international and hardware-oriented, while the Brigadier is given a domestic life.
Suddenly, Doctor Who is trying to be bigger and more ambitious than just telling 'thrilling adventures': it's epic and mythic, and has honest-to-god themes (nuclear armageddon, etc). Even in a shit story, it's noticeably more sophisticated an approach, being experimental in a way Doctor Who hasn't been since, arguably, season eighteen.
It's such a shame the production is fumbled here, cos Aaronovitch's skill at characterisation and the continued mythologisation of the Doctor has the potential to be as effective as Remembrance of the Daleks. I'm not sure the cast of characters are even especially likeable, but never before this period would such a multitude of characters have been as economically but effectively characterised as broadly believable real people. There's also a lot of good - if somewhat hyperbolic or portentous - lines, which remind me quite a lot of Steven Moffat's scripts: "The situation is normal; it doesn't get much worse than that"; "She vanquished me - and I threw myself on her mercy"; "I cannot be bound so easily!"; "Night has fallen here"; "Look to your children, Merlin!"
What's particularly frustratingly is that the superficial awfulness of this story masks the good stuff underneath. If there was ever a story crying out for a dark tone, and a bit of subtlety to emphasise its mystery, it's this. Instead, we get bizarre little decisions which really damage the story's credibility: eg, characters inexplicably spinning into the tinselly vortex. The sunny weather really doesn't help the atmosphere, either, and the infamous music ruins it.
However, though a lot of things aren't right with this production, it's not hard to imagine it pruned and reshaped (beyond the realms of what's possible with the DVD edit, which I haven't seen), with a subtler score and more atmosphere (night filming, stormy weather), and performances taken down a less-is-more route. Unfortunately, the production design is obviously unalterable, which is tragic as the initial shot of Excalibur makes my heart sink; it's so cheap and tawdry in its Quasar set. (A far cry from Mike Tucker's brilliantly original, organic design sketches.)
I also really wish the budget had stretched to the intended technological suits of armour, with mirrored visors and built-in displays; it would not only have been much more memorable, but also helped to visually present the idea of extradimensional knights. Similarly, though the Destroyer really is excellent, it's a pity his gradual transformation from businessman to demon couldn't have been realised (especially since this could have been done inexpensively with some horned shadows and creativity). More prosaically though, he's crying out for an action figure, dammit!
In terms of format, it struck me whilst watching this how bizarre it is that the 25 minute episode-and-cliffhanger format remained entirely unchanged from 1963 to 1989 (even more so given the exception of season twenty-two's 45 minute episodes). I'm not sure if that's a case of 'if it ain't broke don't fix it,' or whether it just shows a dubious reticence on the part of the production team to alter anything fundamental, when they should've had the bravery to do whatever would best suit the stories.
Ultimately, it doesn't work to try to reconcile Battlefield with the darkness and realism of the rest of season twenty-six, but viewed as an ideas-packed, larger-than-life adventure more akin to the preceding season (with a certain amount of complexity and underlying themes), it works quite nicely. It's set in the near future! A modernised UNIT is back! And the Brigadier! With Arthurian knights from another dimension! And a big blue demon! And helicopter crashes! These are the bold - but slightly bonkers - concepts that people are so taken with if Russell T Davies' name is on the credits, but reviled elsewhere.
Looked at in this way, I actually quite enjoyed this story. The realisation is a mess, and it should be a lot better than this, but even in terms of what actually made it to the screen, I found it quite agreeable. Which is a lot preferable to hating it for not being as good as Fenric or Ghost Light (or even its own novelisation). Watched charitably, it's an imaginative script let down by cartoonish realisation. You can see at least a bit of the brilliance of the writer of Transit and The Also People (ie, the 'tab' scene, and the hardware-oriented international UNIT), and that's enough for me to forgive any amount of sparkly gunfire and weedy swordfights. (It's interesting noting Aaronovitch's interest in the Brigadier and African characters, which will culminate with the African Lethbridge-Stewart dynasty, and Kadiatu, in the New Adventures.)
8. 'This can't be how it ends!' - The TV Movie
It can't be overstated how inexplicable the TVM is, especially when you consider it functioning as the pilot for a reboot of a then-defunct series. After a story from an era very obviously getting to grips with the idea of utilising, rethinking and expanding the mythology of the series, the garbled introductory voiceover makes it painfully clear that this is made by people who don't have a clue what they're doing. "It was on the planet Skaro that my old enemy, the Master, was finally put on trial"; two seconds in and it's already displaying a fatal disregard for anyone not on intimate terms with the original series. It's inexplicable; did anyone involved with this have the faintest clue how to market a pilot?! Cos this isn't how. Skaro, the Master? What?
More fundamentally baffling is the introduction of a past Doctor with no pop-cultural status, not from the PoV of an audience identification figure, but in the TARDIS console room - which it wouldn't even be immediately obvious to a new audience is within the police box-in-space. It's all too easy to say this, post-Rose, but restarting a series by going back to absolute basics (the Doctor: otherworldly hero; the TARDIS: erratic time machine) is surely a no-brainer. That is really all that the audience needs to be provided with (just look at An Unearthly Child; less is more, people!). Who really thought muddying the waters with thirteen lives - or even starting out with a regeneration! - was a good idea. (In fact, kicking off with a regeneration is the most damning demonstration of the counter-productively fan-pleasing approach adopted by Philip Segal; including something fan 'wisdom' demands should be included, even though it doesn't work narratively, and which has no emotion behind it for the general audience.) Funny how, after four-and-a-bit series, the BBC Wales crew haven't found any discussion of how regeneration works necessary, yet here '12 lives' is bandied around willy-nilly, as if it means anything at all.
The TVM's so concerned with what 'should' be included that, consequentially, nothing's bold enough here. As often stated, they tried to play with all the old continuity, but then messed it up; better that they'd had the courage to make big changes. The new series may be flawed, but its canniness in gradually reintroducing the fundamentals of the series from the ground up, and dispensing with those which aren't relevant, really makes the TVM seem more inept than ever. The 2005 series managed to reformat the structure of the series (increased emotional content and emphasis on the 'real world') without actually disagreeing with or rebooting established continuity (allowing for fan-pleasing references which don't alienate the general audience). The TVM, on the other hand, manages to alienate the general audience whilst trying to give lip-service to the past.
Contrasting the stylistic approach of the TVM and the new series says a lot about their fundamental differences; here, the Doctor is a Byronic dandy, while Davies gave us a bovver boy and a skinny-suited geek; the TVM has Puccini, the new series has Britney, Soft Cell and the Scissor Sisters. Ordinarily I'd find the higher-brow approach more laudable, but though the new series' pop-cultural excesses can grate, there has also been genuine intelligence and emotion beyond that which the TVM, with its apparent greater aspirations, doesn't ever achieve.
It'd be missing the point to think that its being made (well, set) in America, with American actors, is the problem; it's that it's made with an American mentality applied to a British franchise, which jars horribly; ie, po-faced, self-important, lazy, illogical... which is a slur, but generally true outside of HBO. Christ, I'd pay good money for a HBO Doctor Who... The US setting doesn't work, not because of the setting itself, but because though an English element is injected, it's so patently fake and affected (tea, waistcoats, HG Wells), that it doesn't ring true at all and is ultimately meaningless. (Whereas British productions like The Gunfighters or Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks are better able to integrate the show's oft-cited 'Englishness' into an American milieu.) At least if an effort had been made to realise the San Francisco setting as something more than a generic American city, there would have been some individuality.
What we got is a generic rainy thriller, in a generic American setting, with no individuality or any memorable ideas (the 'yeti in the Underground' factor). It's pretty much the sort of rain-slicked, low-rent thriller Channel 5 used to show late at night; all that's missing is the soft porn and Jean Claude Van Damme. Or Eric Roberts. (...Oh.) As such, I realised this time round that I'd never watch this if it weren't (tangentially) Doctor Who.
All this is especially frustrating considering the set design; were the production overall as good and assured as it looks - if it had the plot and ideas to match - it'd be great. (The mirroring of scenes also is at least stylistically interesting: James Whale's Frankenstein with the regeneration; the reborn Doctor and Master; the Doctor looking for clothes and Chang Lee investigating his belongings.) Regardless of your opinion of the concept of the TVM's TARDIS interior, it looks fantastic. It's so lovingly shot that I want to be in it and smell the beeswax polish.
The quality of the production design also makes me feel we might really have missed out because of the lack of monsters. Which is rather a baffling omission, making this story feel fundamentally different to existing Doctor Who. I guess 'monsters' were a bit passe in 1996, but a major appeal of Doctor Who is slavering BEMs lumbering out of the shadows. There's fun, humour, excitement, tension and scares there, and this story is therefore a good deal less fun, humorous, exciting, tense and scary than it could otherwise have been. Not that I don't think there should be monsterless stories, but a more tangibly dangerous threat might have been the jolt this story needed. (What would a TVM monster have been like though? They could at least have had a good one-off one, a la Battlefield, rather than an army of CG Daleks landing on the Golden Gate Bridge; probably something bestial, shifty, and mainly unseen. Something a bit 'edgy,' more X-Files than B-movie; maybe like that Eighth Doctor DWM strip with Grace, focusing on a monster based on the weird translucent snake, rather than the Master (arguably a better concept...).)
Despite this oversight, at least Grace counts for quite a lot, and I like her: a genuinely grown-up, intelligent woman. She is quite similar to the sardonic Liz Shaw - no bad thing - though, like her, she almost doesn't feel like a bona fide companion at all, whether because of these atypical characteristics, or a lack of roundels and blobby monsters, I'm not sure). McGann's obviously beautiful and brilliant, and clearly deserves better, as he is mainly called upon to shout a lot (which, luckily, he is very good at).
Yeah, there are some lovely scenes in this story: the 'don't be sad, Grace; you'll do great things' scene between Grace and the Doctor in her house is charming, but, on balance, the more I think about the TVM (and let's face it, it's had a lot of scrutiny), the worse it is. I started off trying to be fairly charitable, but, by the end, it's unforgivable. It's just bollocks, isn't it? I like what it gave to the Doctor Who world (in terms of the books and audio ranges), but considering that amounts to the Eighth Doctor and the Gothic TARDIS interior, that doesn't seem much pay off for seven years' wait and 89 minutes of my life.
The bottom line: scratch McCoy (much as I love him) and the regeneration (at least on screen), along with the backstory, amnesia, and temporal orbit, then add a monster, idiosyncrasy, wittier humour... and, then, yeah, it'd work. It is an intriguing digression (no other DW looks or feels like thi; unfortunately, that's not entirely a good thing.
9. 'We all know what happens to nonentities! They get promoted' - The Long Game
I'm not overly familiar with series one as, though it got me back into Doctor Who, I wasn't massively involved with it (and certainly not its run-up). But now, I've gotten to grips with the new series' approach; the mix of serious stories with 'zany' ones, its emotional button-pushing and crowd-pleasing, and consequentially tend to cherry-pick the bits I like. But in 2005, it all felt hugely inconsistent, and a personal affront every time it was too crass or lazy. (It's funny that now - already - it's like going back to a forgotten, apocryphal era; like the Cushing movies, or at least an obscure prologue to Tennant's incumbency.)
As for the Doctor, I'm deeply ambivalent about his 2005 vintage: I can't help but feel, if you wanted an uneccentric, cocky, aggressive, war-scarred character, why make him the Doctor at all? ("Ooh, he's tough, isn't he?") But, at the same time, the unexpectedness of these characteristics makes him one of the most interesting incarnations, because no one would have predicted his Mancunian swagger.
In fact, a lot of my beef with the Ninth Doctor is with his costume. I mean, I get it: black leather is shorthand for an unpretentious 'edginess' that's accessible to the masses in a way a wing-collared shirt wouldn't be. But I tend to view things in a visual sense so, as the Doctor's costume has always been such a strong visual signifier of his characteristics, this seems... unfortunately mundane. However, again, as an exception to the rule it's interesting, so I'm ambivalent here too. (Mainly I just don't like the hideous T-shirt/jumper thing. At least a shirt or actual jumper would've been more timeless.)
I do like that the Ninth Doctor is ugly though (striking, yes; handsome, no); they didn't cast a stud Doctor, which would be one of the worst things that could happen to the character (and which is fortunately equally true of Tennant (unconventionally pretty), and Smith ('Edward Tardishands')). I should be grateful a leather jacket was as great a concession they made to accessibility.
Eccleston's Doctor is also childish to the point of vindictive, but I like that he's not perfect; what does annoy me though are the moments of forced 'zaniness'; his 'idiot savant' routine, which doesn't seem to come naturally at all (and even if this is deliberate, I still don't like the effect it gives). Playing it straight, he's great, so he's not too bad here (though his anger and survivor guilt obviously comes out most in Dalek). This mostly harder portrayal of the Doctor makes the Eighth, by contrast, feel overly idealised and a bit wishy-washy. In fact, I know that Lawrence Miles considers, compared to the Ninth Doctor - introduced blowing up a department store - the nice, romantic, handsome Eighth Doctor feels like a total gyp.
Overall, it's funny how old-school this feels (a bovver boy Doctor notwithstanding), which is quite reassuring; with a bit of distance, it's easy to really see that, where the TVM does feels like a different beast, this is unavoidably the same series, just given a lick of fresh paint. I even kept expecting cliffhangers ("'That thing,' as you put it, is in charge of the human race" - cue music!).
A decision of the current production team which is very 'now' (being so desperate not to turn people off with anything not quite obvious enough), which I get but don't really like, is the contemporary-clothes-in-the-far-future approach. Yes, it avoids pyjamas and silver jumpsuits, but (say) Blade-Runner-like ethnic diversity would be far more interesting and memorable (there are some weird haircuts here, but it's mainly Next T-shirts).
More understandable (and humanising) is Davies' trademark focus on real peoples' lives (or lower-middle-class fixation, depending on how charitable you want to be), even in such a far-flung future. However, I can't help feel the Editor's rant about humanity rings worryingly true: 'Strutting about all over the surface of the earth, like they're so individualm, when of course they're not; they're just cattle.'
This is probably the most positive I've ever felt about the Ninth Doctor, but suddenly, it works. A harder, black-clad, no-frills Doctor (literally); I get it now. After the event, this suddenly seems quite an attractive concept. And at least these characteristics are addressed thematically/fictively (he's like this due to the Time War) and the hard-wearing, no-nonsense clothing reflects his personality, so doesn't appear an arbitrary choice (unlike, say, the Sixth Doctor's costume).
The Long Game isn't a exceptional story, by any means, but it is pretty representative of the new series' take on the show and, even given its cons, I'd so much rather take this over the reverential (but just... wrong) TVM. Immediately, even a 'lesser' story like this makes so much more sense than the TVM. This is recognisably Doctor Who: not especially in relation to a given era, but like a distillation of the public's expectations; it's big, brash, bold, set on a space station, has humour, action, emotion, monsters and possession, and an old-school villain. I may not like every element of Russell T Davies' approach, but at least it has some notable imagination and idiosyncrasy.
10. 'Everlasting unity and uniformity' - Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel
This is the only new series story I missed when it was on TV and never managed to see, up to now. It's awful from before the credits ("From beyond the grave!" / the gurning death) and riddled with typical portentous new series hyperbole ("The TARDIS is dead!" / "The silent realm, the lost dimension").
After finding myself unexpectedly enjoying the not especially highly thought of Long Game, this two-parter feels like a renege on the previous season's promise. This is possibly an unfair story to judge by, but everything's so colourless, even down to the Doctor (who really doesn't make much impression; he's just some gangly hyperactive schoolboy). Tennant doesn't come across well at all here: it's not so much that he's too young, as too 'contemporary'. With his prettiness and Cons, he seems all too readymade for the 'MySpace generation'. Ugh.
Unfortunately, an extreme example though it is, I think this is fairly representative of the majority of the post-2005 era. It feels very shallow and flimsy, very '21st century' Doctor Who. I can imagine this appeals to emo 14-year-old girls, who think it's the height of emotional sophistication (with its rehashing of Father's Day's Rose-Pete interaction, but with diminishing returns), and the people who do those hideous cartoon/manga pictures of Adric and Turlough making out on DeviantArt. (I bet there's plenty of Mickey/Jake slashfic out there too.)
This is one of those stories where lots of picky little elements add up to seriously damage the whole (somewhat like Battlefield, though there are considerably less interesting concepts or themes under the surface here). It feels very teenage: like bad nineties 'young adult' programming; bright, with no real threat, and shallow emoting (Rose's petulance, etc). The permatanned CBBC twink as a guerrilla; so is this actually a comedy?! Certainly not exactly a 'Genesis' for the Cybermen, or a triumphant return for Graeme Harper. (Not to mention how hard I find it to believe that they predicated Mickey's double around the Mickey/Ricky 'gag'. Noel Clarke's 'hard' acting is pretty funny though.) Oh, and Lumic looks like he's touching cloth. All the time.
Given how lauded the new series is as 'Doctor Who with less wobbly effects,' the Cybermen actually look pretty disappointing, with their flares and child-bearing hips and one-man-band racket/stomping, while all the computer jargon stuff - 'free upgrade,' 'not compatible,' 'you will be deleted,' 'human 0.2' - relegates the Cybermen to the level of junk mail internet freebies, and about as threatening. (The thinking that they have to have a Dalek-equivalent war cry is absurd too.) And the extras' electrocution acting is a big mistake; did we learn nothing from Destiny of the Daleks?
Even worse is the computer-generated conversion process and factory, which is laughably, inexplicably bad. It'd be awful even if it were made for a DVD menu or something. And 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight'... Yes, I get the idea of the juxtaposition, but it's totally meaningless; there's no thematic irony. I mean, if the character listened to something, say, romantic or emotional, it'd work. (Maybe something rat pack; they were all total thugs. At least that'd suit Lilt. I mean, Crane).
This feels like it has a lot less to do with Doctor Who than The Long Game (despite coming off as an Invasion remake); it's hollow, brash, and shallow. It really encapsulates all the worst elements of a Doctor Who trying to be modern and 'relevant' (ooh, mobile phones help them win; how zeitgeist!). Doctor Who's nearly always at its best when it simply does its own thing (in the new series, even if I don't necessarily like all the more eccentric stories like Gridlock, Love & Monsters, even Partners in Crime or Turn Left, they are at least much more laudable for being so individual, compared to contrived and mass-produced stories like this or the various specials). Even the parallel world is immensely boring and uninventive - contemporary England, with some zeppelins - and this is yet another new series story with 'possessed contemporary humans' zombie-walking around.
In the context of a direct contrast with his nine predecessors, Tennant seems a bit too weedy and inconsequential. Like Eccleston, he's best when he has the chance to play straight, but he doesn't have enough gravitas, here at least. Much as I do like him when he has stronger material to play (Human Nature, Midnight, Silence in the Library), I do tend to find the Doctors who are arguably most effective on-screen (in the sense of most obviously living up to what is expected of them) less interesting than those who are flawed, or in some way less predictable (ie, Hartnell is unusual as he is essentially an elderly hero; Colin's perceived flaws - verbosity and violence - keep him unpredictable; and Eccleston's Doctor is fascinating as an unexpectedly original interpretation).
By comparison, Tennant seems unfortunately predictable. Yes, he's among the less typically youthful Doctors, and is one of the most attractive, but these things are so predictable in the context of modern TV that they don't feel like departures. Beyond that, he's gobby and energetic, but to an extent those characteristics have always been part of his character, and don't seem new.
Conclusion:
So, what have I leant from my travails through these ten stories? To be hone, I'm not really sure. I do find it fascinating trying to reconcile the various approaches to the show... but, in fact, they're possibly too disparate to ever be able to truly relate to each other to any meaningful extent (a Not-We would probably find it bizarre that The Dalek Invasion of Earth, say, and Blink are from the same series, in the way ming-mongs like us just don't). Their relationship is that they were made as part of a continuing series; beyond that, I suppose, it's the wild differences of approach that make them interesting.
In that sense, watching these stories has given me a renewed appreciation for Doctor Who's ambition (albeit unintentional, or unplanned), but perhaps in future it's actually more interesting to try not to contextualise the eras in relation to one another. Their relationship just 'is' that they were all made under the banner of 'Doctor Who', but in a way is far less important than the enjoyment a specific story can offer. Perhaps it's more rewarding to decontextualise; to try to divorce a given story from its position in the canon and just enjoy it purely on its own terms.
Ignoring preconceptions and the same tired associations (ratings and popular opinion), what came before and what we know followed; now, there's a challenge.
If nothing else though, I think this marathon has shown me why I like DW so much: nothing revolutionary, but for its stupidly mad ideas, imagination, diversity of approach, and, of course, characters and actors. These aren't remarkable reasons, but it's good to be reminded. DW really is very silly but, though it means a lot to me and I take it quite seriously, my appreciation derives in a big part from that. A lot of people seem to downplay the programme's silliness, but I really love that even when it's playing things straight and taking an individual story seriously, its fundamental concepts are still really stupid. I enjoy that tension. It kind of means it can get away with being serious without being po-faced.
DW is mad. I love DW.
Top Ten Memorable Moments! by Scott Williams 8/10/10
Why I love every single Doctor Who Story (Part Two: The Seventies) by Tom Marshall 2/11/10
Does what it says on the tin!
051. Spearhead from Space (4 episodes; 1970)
The colour filming. The Autons (but definitely not the Nestenes). Jon Pertwee's farcical facial comedy.
052. The Silurians (7 episodes; 1970)
The moral quandary the Doctor is placed in, and his rocky relationship with the Brigadier. Plus the caves and the Silurians - and Geoffrey Palmer's death at the hands of the plague.
053. The Ambassadors of Death (7 episodes; 1970)
MARS!
054. Inferno (7 episodes; 1970)
The epic story with the first parallel world scenario, plus the fantastic climax. And the Primords are really quite scary whilst Pertwee is marvellous.
055. Terror of the Autons (4 episodes; 1971)
"I am the Master and you will obey me!" - forget Bond villains, here comes Roger Delgado!
056. The Mind of Evil (6 episodes; 1971)
The concept of the machine.
057. The Claws of Axos (4 episodes; 1971)
The design of the Axon spaceship and the Axons when in their 'golden' form.
058. Colony in Space (6 episodes; 1971)
The fact that the Master turns up AGAIN.
059. The Daemons (5 episodes; 1971)
The Brigadier's frustration; the growing mythic power of Azal; the forcefield around the village.
060. Day of the Daleks (4 episodes; 1972)
Seeing the Daleks in colour and fighting Pertwee. Oh, and Ogrons.
061. The Curse of Peladon (4 episodes; 1972)
Ice Warriors that are good for once. And Arcturus. And the Doctor's numerous fights.
062. The Sea Devils (6 episodes; 1972)
The extensive location filming by the shore, the cliffhanger with the Sea Devil coming out of the waves, the mischievous Delgado, the navy equipment etc., the swordfight...
063. The Mutants (6 episodes; 1972)
The design of the Mutts.
064. The Time Monster (6 episodes; 1972)
The Master's most insane, grandiose plan yet: and the Doctor's "daisy" speech.
065. The Three Doctors (4 episodes; 1972-3)
The genuinely marvellous double-act between Troughton and Pertwee.
066. Carnival of Monsters (4 episodes; 1973)
The concept of the Miniscope and the mystery in the first episode.
067. Frontier in Space (6 episodes; 1973)
The Draconians: a fantastic alien species.
068. Planet of the Daleks (6 episodes; 1973)
The invisible Dalek army, and the return of the Thals (good old continuity!)
069. The Green Death (6 episodes; 1973)
The maggots, the miner and the green slime, BOSS, Jo's melancholy departure.
070. The Time Warrior (4 episodes; 1973-4)
Linx the Sontaran: one of the best realised monsters of the 70s; plus Sarah Jane Smith!
071. Invasion of the Dinosaurs (6 episodes; 1974)
The plot: insane but great.
072. Death to the Daleks (4 episodes; 1974)
The fact that the Daleks are weakened but more cunning. And the Exxilon City: "only 699 wonders!"
073. The Monster of Peladon (6 episodes; 1974)
The originality of doing a 'sequel' story and the parallels with the real 70s strikes.
074. Planet of the Spiders (6 episodes; 1974)
The chase, the cliffhanger to Part One, and Pertwee's finest hour bravely facing the Great One.
075. Robot (4 episodes; 1974-5)
TOM BAKER!!!!!! And not much else...
076. The Ark in Space (4 episodes; 1975)
The speech: "Homo sapiens!" and the way that the cliffhangers are effectively one spread over three episodes.
077. The Sontaran Experiment (2 episodes; 1975)
The direction, plus Tom Baker's cheerful performance... and the gruesome Styre's experiments.
078. Genesis of the Daleks (6 episodes; 1975)
The hardcore warfare imagery, the Nazi parallels, the epic scale, the incredible direction, Davros, Nyder, and the Daleks themselves...
079. Revenge of the Cybermen (4 episodes; 1975)
Tom Baker and Ian Marter: brilliant. And that bit where the Cyberman reaches for the Doctor from behind.
080. Terror of the Zygons (4 episodes; 1975)
The filming which really looks like they went to Scotland, the Zygons and their spaceship which are incredibly well created, plus Baker and Courtney who get along famously.
081. Planet of Evil (4 episodes; 1975)
The anti-matter monsters, the Doctor and Sarah at their peak, and best of all the incredibly realistic alien jungle: still Doctor Who's best-looking alien planet.
082. Pyramids of Mars (4 episodes; 1975)
The creepiness of the mummies in the woods, and Gabriel Woolf's vocal talents as Sutekh, plus some of the lyrical dialogue.
083. The Android Invasion (4 episodes; 1975)
The bits where you don't know who's the android and who's real. And the Kraals, especially when they bleed salad dressing...
084. The Brain of Morbius (4 episodes; 1976)
The wonderful alien planet, the gloriously OTT Sisterhood of Karn, and the Frankenstein-style monster of Morbius himself. Solon is brilliant too.
085. The Seeds of Doom (6 episodes; 1976)
The hardcore storyline, the Doctor as an action hero beating people up and being generally short-tempered. The marvellous direction: Antarctica! Stately mansion! Compost! Krynoid!
086. The Masque of Mandragora (4 episodes; 1976)
The beautiful filming and the swordfights.
087. The Hand of Fear (4 episodes; 1976)
Sarah's marvellous departure.
088. The Deadly Assassin (4 episodes; 1976)
The innovation of a lonely Doctor, and his action fights with Goth in the Matrix: gritty and superbly realised.
089. The Face of Evil (4 episodes; 1977)
The imagination of the writer, and the Doctor's marvellous jokey nature, along with the superb introduction of Leela.
090. The Robots of Death (4 episodes; 1977)
The murder mystery and the production: both flawless.
091. The Talons of Weng-Chiang (6 episodes; 1977)
The sheer panache with which Holmes ties together every single plot strand he has introduced, the wonderful landscape of Victorian London, and the characters: Greel, Jago, Litefoot...
092. Horror of Fang Rock (4 episodes; 1977)
The chilling, misty filming and the tension of being trapped in the lighthouse.
093. The Invisible Enemy (4 episodes; 1977)
K9! And the wonderful and imaginative model-work.
094. Image of the Fendahl (4 episodes; 1977)
The creepy Gothic horror style throughout, and the epic climax.
095. The Sun Makers (4 episodes; 1977)
The wit and humour, and the surprising small-scale plot.
096. Underworld (4 episodes; 1978)
The... er... parallels with Greek mythology, and the fact that we learn more about the Time Lords.
097. The Invasion of Time (6 episodes; 1978)
The first part of the story as the Vardans take over Gallifrey and the Doctor pretends to be mad, plus the cliffhanger to Part Four.
098. The Ribos Operation (4 episodes; 1978)
The delightful double-acts throughout, not to mention the new Romana.
099. The Pirate Planet (4 episodes; 1978)
The sheer imagination with which Adams tells his story.
100. The Stones of Blood (4 episodes; 1978)
The excellent mix of sci-fi and Gothic horror.
101. The Androids of Tara (4 episodes; 1978)
The charming battle between good and evil in a very good setting.
102. The Power of Kroll (4 episodes; 1978-9)
The swamp filming, and the Doctor's humour.
103. The Armageddon Factor (6 episodes; 1979)
The final battle with the Black Guardian and the Shadow: epic!
104. Destiny of the Daleks (4 episodes; 1979)
The suicide attack of the Daleks; the refrain of "Do not move!"; and the revival of Davros!
105. City of Death (4 episodes; 1979)
The charm and humour. The plot. Scaroth, last of the Jagaroth. The Mona Lisa. Duggan. Paris. The filming. The Doctor and Romana.
106. The Creature from the Pit (4 episodes; 1979)
K9 battles wolf-weeds! Yeah!
107. Nightmare of Eden (4 episodes; 1979)
The Mandrels: a very different type of monster.
108. The Horns of Nimon (4 episodes; 1979-80)
The jokey humour and the ridiculously pantomime-esque performances.
Why I love every single Doctor Who story (Part Three: The Eighties) by Tom Marshall 6/3/11
Does what it says on the tin!
108. The Horns of Nimon (4 episodes; 1979-80)
The jokey humour and the ridiculously pantomime-esque performances.
108b. Shada (6 episodes; 1980; unaired)
The sheer imagination: if only this had been made!
109. The Leisure Hive (4 episodes; 1980)
The brave and brand new stab at totally revitalizing the show.
110. Meglos (4 episodes; 1980)
Tom Baker's turns as both an alien cactus and the Doctor.
111. Full Circle (4 episodes; 1980)
The cinematic direction, the performances, and the brave, intelligent plot.
112. State of Decay (4 episodes; 1980)
The classic 'horror-movie' feel and some stunning performances and imaginative direction.
113. Warriors' Gate (4 episodes; 1981)
The wonderful direction but best of all the sheer imagination and thought put into the script. One that will always leave you thinking.
114. The Keeper of Traken (4 episodes; 1981)
The way in which the Master comes back, and the tragic downfall of Nyssa and her family.
115. Logopolis (4 episodes; 1981)
The sombre, sonorous, funerary air to the whole thing. The Watcher. The heavy science-fiction elements. And the regeneration itself: perfect.
116. Castrovalva (4 episodes; 1982)
Ainley's disguise (didn't see it coming for once). Davison's pleasant Doctor coming across as a breath of fresh air.
117. Four to Doomsday (4 episodes; 1982)
The weird plot - you'd see it in no other show.
118. Kinda (4 episodes; 1982)
The intelligent psychological angle.
119. The Visitation (4 episodes; 1982)
One of the most charming and fun historical romps the show has ever done.
120. Black Orchid (2 episodes; 1982)
The Fifth Doctor playing cricket.
121. Earthshock (4 episodes; 1982)
The cliffhanger to Part One, the newly-designed Cybermen, and Adric's final moments.
122. Time-Flight (4 episodes; 1982)
The filming at Heathrow - great to see Davison's Doctor in a contemporary setting and the Concorde is marvellous.
123. Arc of Infinity (4 episodes; 1983)
The Amsterdam filming (if tangential to the plot) and many of the scenes on Gallifrey.
124. Snakedance (4 episodes; 1983)
The Mara: brilliant enemy.
125. Mawdryn Undead (4 episodes; 1983)
The Brigadier. And the clever plot.
126. Terminus (4 episodes; 1983)
The crash-bang-whallop of ideas that Steve Gallagher presents you with.
127. Enlightenment (4 episodes; 1983)
Some of the gorgeous model work - and the Black Guardian.
128. The King's Demons (2 episodes; 1983)
Doing for Davison and Ainley what The Sea Devils did for Pertwee and Delgado.
129. The Five Doctors (1 episode; 1983)
The sheer audacity of this 90-minute special. And the Raston Warrior Robot.
130. Warriors of the Deep (4 episodes; 1984)
The handling of the Silurians and the Sea Devils, the 'power blocs' and the ending.
131. The Awakening (2 episodes; 1984)
The Malus! Best Doctor Who idea ever!
132. Frontios (4 episodes; 1984)
One of Davison's greatest moments in the role and a defining view of the Fifth Doctor.
133. Resurrection of the Daleks (2 episodes; 1984)
The battles, the Dalek falling out of the window, Lytton, the Doctor's confrontation with Davros...
134. Planet of Fire (4 episodes; 1984)
The filming, and seeing what actually happens to Kamelion.
135. The Caves of Androzani (4 episodes; 1984)
Graeme Harper's direction, the way Holmes can build an entire world by himself, all the three-dimensional characters, Peri stuck in the middle, and Davison's magnificent Doctor.
136. The Twin Dilemma (4 episodes; 1984)
The strange but involving plot; Colin Baker's bizarre but unpredictably enjoyable performance, and some of the model work.
137. Attack of the Cybermen (2 episodes; 1985)
Lytton, the brutal violence, the Cybermen, the Six-and-Peri combination.
138. Vengeance on Varos (2 episodes; 1985)
The flawless portrayal of the planet Varos; the direction and the lighting. Colin Baker's performance.
139. The Mark of the Rani (2 episodes; 1985)
The wintry feel to the whole thing; the banter between the three Time Lords; the period-piece filming.
140. The Two Doctors (3 episodes; 1985)
The location filming, the exchanges between Doctors Two and Six, and the Sontarans.
141. Timelash (2 episodes; 1985)
The cleverness that Herbert is HG Wells.
142. Revelation of the Daleks (2 episodes; 1985)
Harper's evocative filmography, the planet Necros, and all the characterisation.
143. The Trial of a Time Lord: The Mysterious Planet (4 episodes; 1986)
The characterisation of the Doctor and Peri; and that of Glitz and Dibber.
144. The Trial of a Time Lord: Mindwarp (4 episodes; 1986)
The freaky atmosphere with its garish colours and tampered plot.
145. The Trial of a Time Lord: Terror of the Vervoids (4 episodes; 1986)
The Vervoids, and the marvellous base-under-siege tension of the old days.
146. The Trial of a Time Lord: The Ultimate Foe (2 episodes; 1986)
Jayston's memorable turn as the Valeyard, Ainley's memorable turn as the Master, and Baker's memorable turn as the Doctor.
147. Time and the Rani (4 episodes; 1987)
The loopy atmosphere, the direction and the quarry. Oh, and those bubble traps.
148. Paradise Towers (4 episodes; 1987)
The moody interior of the tower-block, McCoy's performance, and the macabre characters.
149. Delta and the Bannermen (3 episodes; 1987)
The fun singing and period-setting of '59...the Bannermen, and McCoy getting darker.
150. Dragonfire (3 episodes; 1987)
The set, Glitz, Ace, Mel's departure, and McCoy getting darker still. And Kane as well.
151. Remembrance of the Daleks (4 episodes; 1988)
The explosions and the action, the Daleks, the darkening Doctor, the Hand of Omega.
152. The Happiness Patrol (3 episodes; 1988)
The depiction of the dictatorship society, Fifi, the sniper scene.
153. Silver Nemesis (3 episodes; 1988)
The Cybermen versus the Neo-Nazis, the fun sense of adventure and the Nemesis statue itself.
154. The Greatest Show in the Galaxy (4 episodes; 1988-9)
To sum up: the fact that there never has been and never will be a story quite like this one.
155. Battlefield (4 episodes; 1989)
The action and adventure wrapped up in a magical tale of mystery and sorcerers.
156. Ghost Light (3 episodes; 1989)
The confusing plot, with its reliance on detail and symbolism. McCoy and Aldred's performances.
157. The Curse of Fenric (4 episodes; 1989)
The bleak setting and militaristic air, along with the portent of doom which comes with the Haemovores and Fenric's arrival; plus the direction and the music.
158. Survival (3 episodes; 1989)
The filming, the FX shots, the scripting, the characterisation, the music, and that wonderful final speech.
Why I love every single Doctor Who story (Part Four: the Nineties/Noughties) by Tom Marshall 5/6/11
Does what it says on the tin!
159. Enemy Within (1 episode; 1996)
Paul McGann's incredible performance as the Doctor. This man owns the role from 'I am the Doctor!' onwards.
160. Rose (1 episode; 2005)
Eccleston instantly 'getting' the role, as well as the Autons' return and some of the dialogue particularly the 'earth is moving' speech. But not the wheelie bin. Shudder.
161. The End of the World (1 episode; 2005)
The marvellous mix of Rose's mundane Earth life and the futuristic atmosphere of Platform One. The music and the direction are top-notch too.
162. The Unquiet Dead (1 episode; 2005)
The superlative production values, a witty and sparkling script from Gatiss and some creepy aliens in the form of the Gelth.
163. Aliens of London/World War Three (2 episodes; 2005)
The whole of London on red alert and that brilliant spaceship crash! And the Slitheen, too...
164. Dalek (1 episode; 2005)
The intense and bitter performances from Eccleston and Briggs and the flawless depiction of the Ninth Doctor and the Dalek. And Joe Ahearne's unparalleled direction.
165. The Long Game (1 episode; 2005)
The performances - especially Simon Pegg's - and the interesting depiction of the future.
166. Father's Day (1 episode; 2005)
The real tug-at-your-heartstrings story.
167. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances (2 episodes; 2005)
The brilliant plot, the creepy gasmask zombies, the likeable characterisation, the jokes...and the moment where Constantine is transformed: classic!
168. Boom Town (1 episode; 2005)
The characterisation: flawless depictions of the Doctor, Rose, Jack, Mickey and Blon Fel Fotch.
169. Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways (2 episodes; 2005)
Eccleston's magnificent Doctor gets an absolutely perfect end to his tenure.
170. The Christmas Invasion (1 episode; 2005)
A cracking start for the new Doctor - plus the Sycorax, and the Satsuma, and the swordfight.
171. New Earth (1 episode; 2006)
The CGI of the alien world and exploring its alien races.
172. Tooth and Claw (1 episode; 2006)
The terrifying werewolf, the scary chasing and the direction. And Queen Victoria.
173. School Reunion (1 episode; 2006)
Having Sarah Jane back!
174. The Girl in the Fireplace (1 episode; 2006)
The beautiful direction and scripting.
175. Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel (2 episodes; 2006)
The perfect revival of the silver giants.
176. The Idiot's Lantern (1 episode; 2006)
The fight atop Alexandra Palace; very Logopolis.
177. The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit (2 episodes; 2006)
The sheer iconic classiness of the planet on the edge of a black hole. And the Ood.
178. Love & Monsters (1 episode; 2006)
Elton Pope: most believable characterisation ever.
179. Fear Her (1 episode; 2006)
A refreshingly low-key narrative with its wealth of humour and chills.
180. Army of Ghosts/Doomsday (2 episodes; 2006)
The fight between Daleks and Cybermen: how could anyone not love that?
181. The Runaway Bride (1 episode; 2006)
The motorway chase scene, the Racnoss Empress, the Tenth Doctor's darker side...
182. Smith and Jones (1 episode; 2007)
The brilliantly frenetic plot, and the seamless introduction of the new companion.
183. The Shakespeare Code (1 episode; 2007)
The CGI effects of Elizabethan London; and the depiction of Shakespeare.
184. Gridlock (1 episode; 2007)
The way the writer creates the entire world so skilfully; and the haunting ending.
185. Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks (2 episodes; 2007)
Tennant's shocking performance: if you dislike these episodes, watch them again. He exudes gravitas.
186. The Lazarus Experiment (1 episode; 2007)
The delightfully contemporary runaround, a little more jazzed up than usual.
187. 42 (1 episode; 2007)
The moment where the Doctor confesses that he is scared.
188. Human Nature/The Family of Blood (2 episodes; 2007)
The entire concept of the Doctor as a human, the Family and the scarecrows, Tim Latimer's fire and ice description of the Doctor, and the fury of the Time Lord at the end.
189. Blink (1 episode; 2007)
Weeping Angels. Best. Idea. Ever. Nuff said.
190. Utopia/The Sound of Drums/Last of the Time Lords (3 episodes; 2007)
John Simm's marvellously insane performance as the Master, and his interaction with Tennant. Not forgetting the flawless last 15 minutes of Utopia.
190b. Time Crash (1 mini-episode; 2007)
Has to be included for the moment where Tennant tells Davison that he was his Doctor.
191. Voyage of the Damned (1 episode; 2007)
The sheer punch in the guts the episode gives you. It is an exhausting 71 minutes.
192. Partners in Crime (1 episode; 2008)
The hilarious way the two characters meet.
193. The Fires of Pompeii (1 episode; 2008)
The ending: explosive, spectacular, heartbreaking.
194. Planet of the Ood (1 episode; 2008)
The way humanity's morals are questioned (especially in that scene where...well, you know the one!)
195. The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky (2 episodes; 2008)
The new depiction of the Sontarans in their mothership.
196. The Doctor's Daughter (1 episode; 2008)
Tennant's acting throughout. He deserves a BAFTA. Oh wait, he got one.
197. The Unicorn and the Wasp (1 episode; 2008)
The funniest 45 minutes of Doctor Who ever.
198. Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead (2 episodes; 2008)
The scale, imagination and flawless intricacy with which Moffat tells his story, weaving together all the disparate elements.
199. Midnight (1 episode; 2008)
The masterpiece that is the whole thing.
200. Turn Left/The Stolen Earth/Journey's End (3 episodes; 2008)
The fact that together they constitute the most exciting, on-the-edge-of-your-seat Doctor Who storyline in the series' long history.
201. The Next Doctor (1 episode; 2008)
THE CYBERKING!!!
202. Planet of the Dead (1 episode; 2009)
Lee Evans. Easily. With bells on. He should so come back.
203. The Waters of Mars (1 episode; 2009)
Tennant's acting; he is quite an amazing personality on the screen in this episode. The CGI and the direction and the new ground explored.
204. The End of Time (2 episodes; 2009-10)
The sheer emotion Russell T Davies puts into all his scenes. But most of all the last half an hour.
Ten Generally Disliked Stories Which I have a Soft Spot For by Joe Briggs-Ritchie 17/7/11
Yes it looks horrendously shaky at times, but this was an experiment, an attempt at creating a totally alien world inhabited by insects. The regulars are all on top form and the story contains some nice ideas. There isn't anything else like this in all of Doctor Who and for that reason alone deserves to be much more appreciated than it is. This is from a season which also features The Chase, so no way can it possibly be the worst one.
This one took a few years to grow on me, but grow on me it did. Jon Pertwee is as dazzling as ever and the quarry setting really does evoke a barren, dead world. I used to think that this one was dull and turgid, but over time I've come to appreciate the greyness of it. It gives it an air of sobriety and bleakness. There are some interesting moral issues posed and anything involving long-dead civilisations and weapons of universal armageddon has to be a good thing surely?
I've always loved this one. It was the very first Doctor Who story I owned on video and therefore I'm unable to view it objectively. I love the creepy Exxilons, the barren planet, the City, Jon Pertwee's performance, Lis Sladen, the music... Actually I think this has one of the finest scores in the history of the show. The Exxilon's chant - or the Main Theme, if you will - was obviously inspired by the ancient peoples of South America.
What exactly is wrong with this? Seriously. I cannot understand why everyone seems to hate this one. I don't really like how the Cybermen go downhill from this point and the ones in this story are admittedly a little talky but come on... This is the Golden Era of Doctor Who, why on Earth would anyone wish to dislike anything from this era?
Oh yes, tee hee, snigger snigger. Ok so it's crap, I admit it. This is definitely one to file under 'Guilty Pleasures'. It's unbearably cheap but it's got Michael Sheard in it and there are times when it almost gets quite sinister, so it isn't completely beyond redemption. Just don't ever show it to a non-fan and we'll be fine.
Dull they say, dull, dull, dull, dull, dull... It isn't exactly riveting but neither is it anywhere near as chronically boring as everyone makes it out to be. The first episode is great in my opinion and some of the model shots are actually really good. I don't find the CSO caves nearly as objectionable as everyone seems to either.
As with Revenge of the Cybermen, words fail me. I think Terminus is great, it has menace, mystery, intrigue and some of the ideas behind it really are first rate. The first episode is genuinely creepy and the whole thing is imbued with a sense of bleakness. All really needs is the lights turned down a bit lower and a better musical score.
It's completely entertaining from beginning to end. The twins are awful and Hugo Lang's sartorial tastes leave a little to be desired, but on the whole I find this to be a cracking good yarn. Even the slugs aren't really that bad.
Surgically remove Herbert and this would dramatically improve. He's the only really bad thing about it as far as I'm concerned. Okay, so the Bandril ambassador is a glove puppet, but if you care about such things then you really are watching the wrong show. The Borad is a great villain, seriously menacing and his makeup is superb.
Mel is awful. She always was but she's especially awful in this one. If she were to be gotten rid of, then things would automatically improve. It all looks a bit tacky and having the Vervoids speak was a mistake but even so it's by far the most consistently enjoyable part of Season 23. As with most 1980's Doctor Who, it's overlit, which tends to lead to things looking tacky, but hey ho...
Top Ten Big Finish Tie-Ins by Stephen Maslin 2/11/11
There was a time when Big Finish Productions were the most important part of a franchise that probably should have died in 1996 (or maybe even 1984). Their output has been widely varied both in scope and quality and there have been more than a few times when one has thrown one's hands in the air in despair. Yet they have produced (and hopefully will again) many stories that juggle a seemingly impossible collection of flaming torches: respectful continuity, encyclopaedic detail and damn fine entertainment, to name but three.
To the uninitiated, it is impossible to understand just how clever many of their better stories really are, referring as they do to a bewildering array of conflicting narratives (not all of which are readily available or even widely known), in a variety of formats, over a period of many decades.
Here are ten great stories that tied into the bigger picture...
10 The Shadow of the Scourge (Paul Cornell, 2000)
(re: The Virgin New Adventures book range)
There must have been more than a few fans hankering for a return to
the world of the NAs and what better writer to fill that void than NAs
stalwart Paul Cornell. TSotS is a little
self-consciously wacky at times (Bernice at the seance for example) but,
with the leads slotting effortlessly into their allotted roles, hopes were
perhaps high for an extended run of 7th, Ace & Benny stories. If that were
ever planned, then it was killed stone dead by The
Dark Flame.
9 The Juggernauts (Scott Alan Woodward,
2005)
(re: The Chase, 1965)
Ah yes, The Chase. Has Doctor Who ever
been barmier? Hard to credit that such lightweight obeisance to the shrine
of Dalekmania could be re-woven into such a grown-up tale as this, one of
a handful of rather good Davros-is-back-again stories. Davros and Terror Firma
are pretty good too but what swings the balance in favour of The Juggernauts is Melanie Bush. Whatever you
thought of Bonnie Langford on TV, think again. She is one of Big Finish's
brightest and best. (For further proof, see also: The One
Doctor, Catch 1782, Bang-Bang-a-Boom!, The Fires of
Vulcan...)
8 The Kingmaker (Nev Fountain, 2006)
(re: Doctor Who Discovers...)
Sorry, a sequel to what? To a range of children's educational books
which cashed in on the Fourth Doctor's not inconsiderable 1970s profile?
Well, yes but it's much, much more than that. For a start, The Kingmaker does what a drama released on CD
really should do and seldom does: it bears repeated listening. (An
often-stated criticism has been that the plot is too complicated but the
rejoinder might be that those who think so just weren't prepared to give
an audio-only story enough attention.) The
Kingmaker also manages to convincingly career between high comedy and
medieval savagery without taking a breath, and has a wonderful sound
design with some quite exceptional (and, BBC please take note, restrained)
music. For my money, this is also one of the finest double companion
stories we have ever had (Nicola Bryant and Caroline Morris take a bow)
and Nev Fountain's BBC connections ensure that the rest of the cast is
absolutely marvellous too (yes, even Arthur Smith). Funny, clever, great.
7 Zagreus (Gary Russell & Alan Barnes, 2003)
(re: The Five Doctors, 1983)
Groaning under the weight of massive fan expectations after an
18-month wait, as well as being the flagship of the Doctor's 40th year, Zagreus was always doomed to underachieve. Yet, for
the first two discs, it really doesn't. A magical labyrinth, on the
borders of incomprehensibility, it only comes unstuck when it settles down
into more familiar multi-Doctor territory. Compare, say, the end of disc
one or the credulity-mangling cartoon-animals-at-war on disc two with
almost anything on disc three and you'll find a painful contrast between
the utterly extraordinary and a rather tired bundle of cliches. In short,
two thirds supremely inventive, with the past only obliquely referenced,
and one third dreary rehash.
6 Spare Parts (Marc Platt, 2002)
(re: The Tenth Planet, 1966)
If it were only for its authenticity, Spare
Parts would stand out, but there is a lot more to it than appealing to
those who crave solutions to loopholes in the show's copious history. It
is first and foremost a human tragedy (and also perhaps a stark warning),
very serious drama right from the off and totally compelling. There have
been many attempts to shoehorn the Cybermen's early days into consistent
narrative, but this is the one, boys and girls. Look no further. The sound
design is first class and Nicholas Briggs does a fantastic, nay, uncanny
job in recreating the Tenth Planet cyber voices.
Bleak yet unmissable.
5 Brave New Town (Jonathan Clements, 2008)
(re: Terror of the Autons, 1971)
The New Eighth Doctor Adventures have tried again and again to revisit
the past with hardly any returns. (It's Wirrn, Zygon and Krynoid stories
are just terrible and its resurrection of Morbius is not much better.)
Brave New Town is unique in its being the only NEDA to shed
unexpected light on old adversaries rather than merely to re-present them.
As with almost all of the stories listed here, there is a strong vein of
humour but also, more importantly, a willingness to confront the potential
of the aliens' actual nature. An unexpected oddball but a gem.
4 The Magic Mousetrap (Matthew Sweet, 2009)
(re: The Celestial Toymaker, 1966)
Not Matthew Sweet's finest offering for Big Finish (for that honour,
check out The Year of the Pig or The Diet of Worms) but, in spite of being hampered
by an occasionally dodgy sound design, The Magic Mousetrap is the
best Toymaker story since the original. As elsewhere (another theme
running through many of these stories), the author makes a point of giving
the leads something to do other than just trot out a character they once
played on screen. (More surprising than that is such an unexpected point
of reference as Thomas Mann's 'The Magic Mountain'!) But best of all is a
script that, for craft, wit and invention puts almost all current
Doctor Who writers, audio or TV, to shame. "Switzerland... Where
the nuts go to."
3 The Holy Terror (Robert Shearman, 2000)
(re: The DWM Comic Strips)
The first of BF's journeys into left field and still one of its most
rewarding (though its occasional whiffs of nostalgia owe more to I
Claudius than to classic Who). I've no idea how much professional
work Rob Shearman had done beforehand, but in terms of quality (as well as
in respect of its chosen reference point), The Holy
Terror seemed to appear right out of nowhere. Frobisher should have
been really, really annoying: a shape-shifting penguin with a Canadian
accent? Yet the script is so well-crafted that after a few minutes all is
forgiven. Surprising, funny ("The lying blasphemer speaks the truth, my
lord!") and, with its faux-medievalism and eventual dissipation, perfect
for audio. The Chimes of Midnight and Jubilee cemented the author's miraculous early
reputation but, alas, nothing he has done since has come even remotely
close.
2 Omega (Nev Fountain, 2003)
(re: The Arc of Infinity, 1983)
The Doctor's 1983 trip to Amsterdam has to rank as one of the shows
all-time lemons. What idiot would either want, least of all attempt, to
create a sequel to such a disaster? Omega came as
the first of three homages to past villains in the runup to the 40th
anniversary behemoth that was Zagreus and was the
most surprising and entertaining. It is also downright barking and
features one of the most jaw-dropping cliff-hangers ever. The last part is
admittedly far too long, over-indulging its task of expanding on the past,
and yet, as a couple of hours of audio entertainment for anyone saturated
in the Who universe, Omega is hard to beat.
1 Shada (Douglas Adams)
(re: Shada, 1980)
Shada 2003 was one of the biggest joys of a
year that had many. Forget the BBCi visuals which are atrocious. Just slip
on some headphones, turn the lights off and revel in... well, revel in
what exactly? Late 70s nostalgia? Not really. Shada still sounds fresh, even contemporary. What
makes the 2003 version so much better than it had any right to be, other
than having a Douglas Adams script, is its excellent cast: James Fox, Sean
Biggerstaff, Susannah Harker, Melvyn Hayes and Hannah Gordon all shine, as
does Paul McGann. I still wish we could have had more of Romana travelling
with the Eighth Doctor, rather than her being shunted off to Gallifrey and
him being lumbered with C'rizz and dispatched to the Divergent Universe.
Never mind: this is audio heaven from beginning to end. Pity they couldn't
have done a better job with the cover.
***
The sad thing is that, as good as the above stories are, their roots being so firmly in the-show-as-it-was means that none of them have any hope of communicating to a mass audience. So let us love them for what they are: nerdy, obsessive, peculiar genius.
Top Ten Loose Ends by Stephen Maslin 3/4/12
There's a lot of Doctor Who. A lot. This is one of its fascinations. It is also one of its curses. Cursed in two senses: firstly, the sheer quantity of stuff to keep up with, to spend one's time and money on; the vast amount of space that it can fill your consciousness up with. Secondly, there's making it all fit together. Although, in this regard, Doctor Who has one glorious get-out clause: time travel. (And, perhaps, the possibility of multiple universes. No doubt your average Gallifreyan would have no trouble with William Hartnell, Peter Cushing, Richard Hurndall and Geoffrey Bayldon all being the First Doctor or there being uncertainty about when UNIT actually had its heyday. For those of us trapped in a mere four dimensions, such matters are not so easy to stomach.)
In a show that has thrown up so much consequence and inter-connection, it has been tempting to write off things that don't fit as simply unfit. "Don't worry about it, it's just a story." Yes but...
Here are ten aspects of the Doctor Who universe about which I have clearly missed something.
10 Sarah Jane: From Journalist To World Saver In Under Five Minutes. Forget Bullet Time. (Did she really meet the Seventh Doctor in Hong Kong? Did she really die in 1997? Er, no.) The real question is this: when (and how) did her current role as defender of Earth begin? Between The Time Warrior and The Hand of Fear she was travelling with the Doc. During K9 and Company, The Five Doctors and Downtime, she was perhaps back in a conventionally journalistic role. From Comeback to Dreamland and then in School Reunion, likewise. Then all of a sudden... It's not that the Doctor doesn't mention her role as Defender of Earth (after all, he goes back often enough, why should such a position be necessary?), but that she never mentioned it either. Until she got her own show that is.
9 The Second Coming of Steve. A couple of years before Doctor Who returned to TV in 2005, Doctor Who returned to TV. Well, kind of, when Russell T Davies made The Second Coming for ITV. Apart from an RTD script (and the title!), Murray Gold did the music (and it is streets better than anything he has done for Doctor Who proper) and, playing the lead, is none other than Christopher Eccleston dressed in almost identical garb to the Ninth Doctor. Part Two is frankly terrible, a real let-down (the theology of Philip Pullman played on the set of Coronation Street) but Part One is absolutely exceptional - required viewing, in terms of televisual craft and innovation. More's the point, skip the first few minutes in the pub and we have what is nothing more than a dry run for Doctor Who 2005. In fact, I think The Second Coming, Part One really is Doctor Who. ("Come with me. Find out.") That being the case, we are left with one of two uncomfortable alternatives: either the Doctor's real name is Steve or he chose that name as some kind of disguise. Neither bears thinking about.
8 The Eighth Doctor (1996 - 2004). The awful TV movie, his mostly excellent Big Finish audios, the patchy BBC novels, the DWM comic strip... Simple question: what the hell goes where? As each format span its own little narrative, the realisation was that, save for extended periods of amnesia by all concerned, most of the stories from McGann's tenure had to be some kind of lie. The Company of Friends (Parkin, Cole, Barnes & Morris, 2009) at least attempted to put them all on an equal footing, but merely made the simple question yet more complicated.
7 Death Comes To Time (Dan Freedman & Nev Fountain, 2001-2). If you've never heard DC2T, you should. Much of the time, it has little to do with Doctor Who as we know it and it gradually disintegrates over the last two episodes. Yet it is for the most part magnificently produced and genuinely epic. Sylvester McCoy was never better and there's a host of great characters and superb dialogue. Best of all, the musical score is truly breathtaking; it should be required listening for any producer of the show. (This is how you do it, even if you have to steal half of Richard Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung.) It's not the attempt to rewrite the show or that its later stages aren't much cop that leaves one frustrated but the two loose ends that book-end it all. The Doctor first appears with Antimony, one of the show's best non-canon companions. A wonderfully engaging character (hats off Kevin Eldon) and a far better foil for the Seventh Doctor than Ace ever was. Yet he is gone all too soon and, though his origin is explained, one is left wanting more. (A prequel perhaps?) And at the end of course, the Doctor (notoriously) dies. We all know that the Seventh Doctor regenerated into the Eighth in San Francisco in 1999, so how is this death to be explained? Dan Friedman revealed his intentions had the show been commissioned for an extended series but as it stands, we're left with a death that doesn't fit. Is it something to do with Paul Cornell's NA novel Happy Endings, where we have two Seventh Doctors, one going off to meet his destiny in the US and the other carrying on as a book character? DC2T is just too good to be written-off as a non-canonical dead end.
6 Neither Style Nor Anti-Style: JNT Gaff #1017. The Doctors, previous to v.6, were all either consciously stylish (frilly-collared shirts and velvet smoking jacket) or stylized (Toulouse-Lautrec, Edwardian throwback, cricketting gent) or, in the case of the Second Doc, consciously anti-style. So what the hell happened with the Sixth? Think of all the reasons why one adopts a certain mode of dress (for example, force of habit or a statement about oneself) or why a writer should insist on a particular outfit (for example, camouflage or utility) or why a TV exec should specify a certain look (for example, a marketing idea). Then look at the Sixth Doc and tell me what on Earth is going on. Strange as this may seem, this raises stark questions about the regeneration process itself (and, if you want to stretch it a whole lot further, about Cartesian Dualism and the Mind-Body Problem). The unique essence that is the Doctor seems to have been totally bypassed in the change from the Fifth to the Sixth and we are left with the uneasy feeling that the process of regeneration is a kind of brain damage.
5 Celery.
4 From Hero To Berk: Season Seventeen. We all know the real reason why the Fourth Doctor became such a twat after City of Death: too much tolerance, too little money, one long liver-bloating party at Douglas Adams' house. But is there a narrative reason? At least the Sixth Doctor's oafishness has some sort of rationale, not that it makes his TV stories any better, but the Fourth goes from being the majesterial king of family television to being nothing more than a mediocre music-hall artiste in the blink of an eye.
3 The Ultimate Adventure (Terrance Dicks, 1989). Just when does the Third Doctor knock about with Jason the French aristo and Crystal the wannabee balladeer? The most likely spot is after the Doc drives off into deepest, darkest Wales at the end of The Green Death and before the coming of Potatohead in The Time Warrior. Fine, but if we are to exhalt such frippery as The Ultimate Adventure into semi-canonical status (just above The Paradise of Death and The Ghosts of N-Space), can we not also make space for the vastly superior Sympathy For The Devil? Is there some connection to be made? Casting David Warner in the 2008 audio remake of the original stage play would have made for some truly fascinating possibilties.
2 Season 6B. Gaps are bad and gaps are good. Bad: they are gaps. Good: they are gaps in which you can put something. The back-to-back nature of 60s Who makes finding a gap to play around in not an easy proposition. (Harder still when the lead actors are no longer with us.) Season 6B is one of the show's most notable crowbars, first proposed in 1995's The Discontinuity Guide. Yet it has provided very little of substance, just a ragbag of miscellaneous stories that don't fit anywhere else. It's a rather naff question to ask whether or not it is 'canon', though perhaps more pertinent to enquire as to whether 6B was ever a good idea.
1 John and Gillian. The Doctor would appear to have three grandchildren: Susan, obviously, and the altogether less televisual John and Gillian, who accompanied the comic strip versions of the First and Second Doctors. (They also turned up in a more recent Eighth Doctor strip, the actually rather moving The Land of Happy Endings in DWM 337.) He has two daughters; Miranda (adopted, in Father Time) and Jenny (extracted, in The Doctor's Daughter). So what is the Theta Sigma family tree actually like? Big Finish (and the BBC novels and Virgin New Adventures before them) have trawled almost every highway and byway for dark little corners to enlighten but John and Gillian they have studiously avoided, as has almost everyone else. Kim Newman's rather lame implication, in Time and Relative, that they are merely schoolfriends of Susan just won't do. So?
Answers on a postcard please.
Top Ten Pertwees by Joe Briggs-Ritchie 9/9/12 In chronological order.
The first of the Season Seven epics and one which many people consider to be the finest story of the Pertwee era. It's a remarkable production all round, with the scenes of the Silurian plague victims dropping like flies in London lending the thing a grand scope. The cast are uniformly excellent and the regulars are wonderfully effective, their chemistry all the more impressive for the fact that this is only their second story. The moral issues have made this story rightly famous, with plenty of thought-provoking material and the final scene with the Doctor's horrified reaction to the Brigadier's actions is sublime and quietly powerful.
Possibly my favourite story of Season Seven, possibly of the entire Pertwee Era. I first saw this on UK Gold entirely in black & white. The restored colour scenes on the video release weren't really to my taste; this story works so much better in black & white. In a way, this is a far more subtle adventure than either The Silurians or Inferno, with a sense that not all that much is actually happening give or take a few gunfights and car chases. This is easily one of Pertwee's finest performances as the Doctor and once again the guest cast are all superb, particularly Ronald Allen and William Dysart. Keeping the aliens hidden by spacesuits was a masterstroke, as it gives them a faceless, creepy sense of menace even if they do eventually turn out to be all nice and cuddly. As with Colony in Space this isn't one that wowed me on first viewing. It took several attempts before it worked its magic but rest assured, once it has you in its charms it won't ever let you go.
Oh wow. Seriously wow. It's easy to see why Season Seven is one of the most consistently brilliant in the show's history. The Silurians and The Ambassadors of Death made extensive use of the theme of humanity being its own worst enemy. In The Silurians, the arrogance of humanity leads them to blowing up a colony of intelligent creatures who have just as much to claim to the Earth as they do; in The Ambassadors of Death, human xenophobia very nearly results in the Earth being reduced to ashes. Inferno takes this theme in another direction with the ignorance and single-mindedness of Professor Stahlman and his drilling project very nearly resulting in the Earth being dissolved. The genius of Inferno is that it allows us to see what happens when the Professor succeeds with his mad programme of underworld dentistry. This is one occasion when the Doctor can't save the day and everyone dies. Yes, that's right. EVERYONE. As with the rest of Season Seven, it's also very much a character piece and everyone on screen positively shines.
The Doctor seems seriously pissed off throughout, Jo is on much better form than usual and it's one of the Master's finest outings. As with The Ambassadors of Death, it works so much better in black and white than I think it would in colour and the bleak tone benefits from the monochrome visual style. Dudley Simpson's score has some great themes in it and the location filming at Dover Castle is very effective. A relatively monster-free adventure and very effective for it.
Lots of wonderfully organic technology on display here when the Axons land their spaghetti-bolognaise machine on Dungeness beach. In a nice use of contrasts, the story alternates between the grey, beautifully barren expanses of fogbound Dungeness and the psychadelic, fleshy, riotously colourful interior of Axos. The theme of human greed once again pops up, this time in the form of a self-serving idiot from the Ministry. Dudley Simpson's score is once again very effective and the whole concept of Axos is brilliant.
Generally not one of Jon Pertwee's more popular stories, but I have a soft spot for it. Pertwee is brilliant throughout and his chemistry with Roger Delgado is a joy to behold. It all looks rather bleak, due to the extensive location filming in a quarry and the production design is also rather subdued, but it fits with the tone of the story and also with the idea that this bunch of colonists are well and truly down on their luck. It has some nice character touches as well, from the desperate and somewhat spineless colony leader to Morgan the psychotic IMC man.
A great start to a very dodgy season. This story makes excellent use of the Daleks by not having them in it very much and it really does work a treat, imbuing them with an effectiveness that is absent from most of their later stories. This is where the time-travel aspect of the show is really brought to the fore, playing around with the notion of temporal paradoxes and changing history. Great location filming and the climax is also rather effective.
A bit like The Silurians, but wetter and less thinky. It looks expensive and has some truly iconic scenes of the Sea Devils coming out of the water. The Navy were very helpful with this one, as can be seen be all the location filming and the amount of Naval equipment/personal on display. Sea forts, boats, warships, diving bells, hovercraft, jet skis... they're all here. Captain Hart is a nice stand-in for the Brigadier and he has some moments of comedic frustration in his dealings with the Doctor.
The dinosaur effects are woeful. Horrendously woeful. Very possibly the worst in the history of the programme. The rest of it, however, is of rather good quality. The mystery and intrigue of the plot is very nicely built up over the course of six episodes and, despite some tiresome chases and a little too much of the old escape/capture/escape routine, it all holds up very well. Pertwee and Sladen work great together and it leads one to wonder what it would have been like if they'd had more time together. I didn't have very high expectations the first time I saw this story, but I was very pleasantly surprised.
I've always loved this one. I know it isn't a very popular story but so what? The Exxilons are creepy, the City is an inspired creation, the music is ridiculously catchy, the location filming is great, Jon Pertwee and Lis Sladen are firing on all cylinders, and the Daleks ain't half bad either. It's definitely a winner as far as I'm concerned.