Day Late and a Dollar Short -- Doctor Who Christmas Special

So it's been a hectic Holiday season at the Stress Cave Secret Hideout.

Now that things have calmed down... a bit... it's time to start writing again on all sorts of geeky stuff. And of course, what would Christmas be without the Doctor Who Christmas Special.

2011 saw "The Doctor, The Widow and the Wardrobe" -- an obvious play on C.S. Lewis's classic book The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. So how did this year's installment stack up? Let's take a look....

First of all, it should be said that the BBC did post a short "prequel" on their website that takes place before the episode opens.



In truth, it doesn't really add any necessary information and if you saw last season's finale then you already knew that Amy and Rory were no longer traveling with the Doctor.

So that being said, here's the rest of the plot:

The Doctor escapes from an exploding spaceship... the hard way... without the TARDIS... and lands... badly... in a sleepy English village. He is found by Madge Arwell who seems kind if a bit... scatterbrained. Madge takes the Doctor (whose face she never sees) to the TARDIS and in gratitude the Doctor tells her that if she ever needs his help to just "wish".

Three years later, on Christmas Eve, Madge learns that her husband, an RAF pilot, has apparently been lost in WW II. She hides this fact from her children and takes them to a relative's country estate to enjoy the holiday away from the bombing. She hopes to give them a happy Christmas before she has to tell them the truth.

At the house Madge and her two children discover a new caretaker for the empty old place -- a rather strange and manic young man who has redecorated the house for Christmas, transforming it into a wondrous place of play for the children. There is also a large present under the tree wrapped in TARDIS blue paper....

Late that night, Madge's son sneaks out of bed, opens the present, and finds it a gateway to another world. "The Caretaker" and Madge's daughter follow as does Madge but this "present" proves to be far more dangerous than the Doctor anticipated. Now the family is in for the Christmas of a lifetime... if they can survive it.

My Take: Sadly this story was only 'mediocre'. Doctor Who has a reputation for pulling out all the stops for grand and action packed Christmas specials -- or at least deeply moving, emotional stories -- but this one sort of fails on both fronts.

The bones of the story are good and sound -- the attempt to use the delights of the season to drown out the deprivations of war -- the rationing, the loss of life, etc. -- is interesting and has the potential to resonate well from an emotional stand-point but the execution feels too rushed.

The story does a good job of establishing Madge and her two children but when we get to the alien world nothing else is as well developed. There is a lovely special effect with two alien beings -- a wooden "king" and "queen" -- but we learn nothing about them. They exist and they spout some cryptic exposition and that's it. The special effect seems wasted on them. The native inhabitants of this alien world are also given short shrift as we learn nothing about them, their society or culture. Again, they exist but that is pretty much it.

We also meet some invaders who provide a bit of comedy relief but here they're really not very funny being instead insultingly incompetent and existing to spout exposition... then leave. Arrrggghhhh!!!! It's like the whole episode is made up of characters who are merely "Captain Exposition"!

On top of all of that there are plot holes abounding -- all of which could have been easily fixed... but weren't and unexplained events that are handwaved away without even the good grace of an attempted technobabble explanation.

And all of this probably sounds like the episode was more 'bad' then 'meh' BUT it has a few graces which save it from being outright terrible:

The sets and locations are lovely and there are some great special effects here (and a couple of pretty poor ones but we'll let that slide).

The story of Madge struggling to hide the loss of her children's father just before Christmas is compelling as it means she must constantly swallow her own grief and deal with the knowledge that this will "ruin" Christmas for her children for years, if not a lifetime, to come.

Matt Smith again turns in a bravura performance. His manic Doctor whirls with childlike glee and we see again the mixture of the old soul with the young eyes. He connects with the children on their own level and he becomes joy personified. And yet he also is able to sympathize and understand Madge's struggle. And in the end he struggles with his own connections to humanity and the Christmas season and what they mean to him.

Steven Moffat seems to be keeping true to his word at the end of last season of the Doctor deciding to try to maintain a low profile. In past Christmas adventures the Doctor has often stormed in, loudly proclaiming who he is and his intention to 'save everyone'. Here, he never speaks his name, allowing Madge's family to continue using his alias-away-from-alias "Caretaker" (more on that next) and the one time he tries to take control of the situation he is rebuffed and must take a backseat to another. This is a Doctor who is quickly learning his lesson and discovering that sometimes 'less is more'.

Finally, I adore the Doctor's temporary new 'name' here. "Caretaker" could almost become his new alias if the show wasn't "Doctor Who" and had been for nearly 50 years now. The Doctor may be playing the role of the caretaker of the manor house but it is quickly apparent that he sees himself as the 'caretaker' of Madge and her family as well. And the name can even apply on a more global and galactic scale as the Doctor has proven himself to be the 'caretaker' of the Earth and even to a large extent the 'caretaker' of oppressed beings across multiple worlds and eras.

To wrap (heh) things up: "The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe" was kind of like the blind gift exchanges at work. There's always a price limit and since no one knows who their gift is going to they try to pick out something blandly neutral that could go to anyone. So the gift you end up with is something unspectacular without any personality or personal touches to it. Yeah, that's this episode. It is, however, all we're getting until the fall. Settle in for your "long winter's nap" and peruse some older episodes until the return of Amy, Rory and the 11th Doctor!

Spoiler-Free "Doctor Who" Mid-Season Finale Thoughts

I'm actually.... on the fence about this one. There were things I liked and things I didn't like. There was stuff that worked well and stuff that I felt didn't work so well.

But there are a couple of things that stood out universally...

* There are some great character moments for all involved but it's Matt Smith who steals the show. Despite his youth his acting is and has been effortless for the series. He never seems to be playing to the camera and the emotions he projects seem genuine. There is one scene in particular in which the Doctor's emotions teeter on the brink of an almost giddy rage. It is a fascinating moment to see the Doctor absolutely enraged and yet... there is a part of him that is almost intoxicated by that rage. It is nicely, nicely done on Smith's part.

* If you don't love Arthur Darvill's character of Rory by now then there's something wrong with you. He perfectly portrays the kind of 'everyman' who, when danger looms, proves that his soft heart is married to a spine of steel. By the end of this episode you will know that you screw with Rory at your own peril.

* Showrunner Steven Moffat takes on the Doctor's legend head-on and makes us THINK about it. Ever since the show returned in 2005 increasingly the Doctor has been portrayed as a kind of man who 'shakes the pillars of heaven'. Fans really responded to the idea of the Doctor as a badass. Like David Tennant proclaiming the the Earth is protected, Tennant also telling the Vashta Nerada in "Forests of the Dead": "You're in the biggest library in the universe... look me up." And the Vashta Nerada back away. Of Matt Smith telling the Atraxi to "Basically... Run." in "The Eleventh Hour". All of these were cool moments and yet, at the end here, we get the flip side of that coin. If the Doctor is a badass what does that really MEAN? To Moffat it means that for all those who see him as a (to borrow from the TV series Firefly) Big Damn Hero there are those who are frightened of him. For all those who see the Doctor as a savior and a helper there are those who see him as a warrior and an avenging angel. This is not what the Doctor started out as and Moffat, in this story, starts asking if this is really what the Doctor is supposed to be. And asking that question is a good thing. Asking audiences to think about this is a good thing as well. We start to see the dichotomy here of the Doctor as a being who tries to help by pushing things along vs. the Doctor as someone who helps by bashing things over the head and making them rue the day they met him.

So, now... half of season 6 is over and we have to wait until the Fall to find out what happens next. The story ends on quite the little cliffhanger and it should be fascinating to see where we go from here...

Grab Bag Reviews: "The Aztecs"

Okay, I'm finally sitting down to work on this one.

And really, the delay has just been delay because it's not like this is a *bad* story. In fact, far from it....

"The Aztecs" was part of the first series but actually part of a kind of second wave of stories.

You see, while the BBC did go ahead and commission Doctor Who it was initially not approved for a full season run. The series original commission of episodes took it up to around the story "Marco Polo". As the show did prove popular, the BBC went ahead and announced to producer Verity Lambert that the Doctor Who team could continue on for a full season. As such, there was a slight scramble to hire writers to produce more scripts quickly to take the show to the end of the season.

John Lucarotti had written the script for "Marco Polo" and really impressed Lambert and the rest of the team. At the time of pitching the script for "Marco Polo" Lucarotti had also pitched a script idea for a story involving the ancient Aztecs. Recalling this pitch, Lambert told Lucarotti to move forward on the idea for that script to fill out the rest of the season.

There is also a somewhat commonly held belief that the costumes were not historically accurate in order to make sure they passed the censor board. This is not true -- the costume design team actually extensively researched Aztec clothing and replicated it very accurately.

And now on with the show....

The Plot: The TARDIS lands at a large, Aztec city and Barbara is quickly mistaken for a reincarnated high priest named Yetaxa -- favored of the gods. Unfortunately, the time traveling team is also cut off from the TARDIS, making them unable to leave until they can find a way back. Barbara sees this as an opportunity, believing that if she can rid the Aztecs of their rituals of human sacrifice then when the Spanish arrive they will not destroy the civilization. The Doctor warns her not to meddle but Barbara is insistent. Soon she finds herself embroiled in intrigues which threaten not only her own life but that of her friends as well!

My Take: It has been noted that, particularly here in the early days of the series, the historical stories tended to have a Shakespearean feel to them if not an actual Shakespearean tone and structure. That is really on display here as the actor playing the Aztec priest Tlotoxl goes into full-on Richard III mode. And it isn't just a viewer's interpretation, John Ringham, the actor in question, was more than upfront about it in interviews.

On the one hand, it makes for a delightfully villainous performance. On the other hand though it also occasionally makes for a performance made of canned ham. At one point Ringham, as Tlotoxl, actually turns and speaks directly into the camera thereby breaking the fourth wall by essentially speaking to the audience. No! No! No! You do not DO that!! Yes, it was a device used by Shakespeare and in Shakespeare it works. On television, however, it immediately reminds the viewer that they are watching a TV show. The cables on the suspension of disbelief bridge instantly snap. And as if that were not bad enough it's repeated in the opening recap of the next installment! Ack!!

Also, as a historian, I have a little problem with Barbara's assessment of the situation. Yes, I know the show was still at least paying lip service to the idea that the stories were supposed to educate children. And since it was aiming for children it didn't want to get too technical on them (although this was more a problem of the times -- the idea that kids needed to be spoon fed information. Nowadays we know we don't have to 'dumb things down' for them quite so much). Still, there is a metric crap ton of holes in Barbara's idea and as a supposed history teacher she really should have known better... And yes, I *am* going to divert here and discuss them. Go scroll down a bit if your eyes glaze over.

First, we'll give the show a pass on why a British high school history teacher would have "specialized" in Meso-American history. Hey, all us historians usually have a favorite field of history and sometimes it has nothing to do with where we live or our background but it has to be acknowledged that it *is* a little weird for Barbara to have this as a specialty.

Second, Barbara's assessment of the Aztec culture being destroyed by Spanish invaders simply because of the human sacrifice element of Aztec religion is simplistic in the extreme. Did the human sacrifice element contribute? Oh, yes, but Barbara's idea that eliminating that one element would save the Aztecs is just ignorant.

For one thing, the Aztec culture was already in decline when the Spanish arrived. There was corruption in high places. It happens. Given enough time if it hadn't been the Spanish the Aztec culture probably would have collapsed under it's own weight and evolved into something different from the rubble.

For another thing, the Spanish explorers/conquerors were there to bring back wealth for Spain. Gold and other precious metals, gems, etc. They were bound to destroy the Aztecs in the process of getting these items. It was sadly common for invaders to basically end up enslaving the local populace to get what they wanted. Again, all that follows was the times, this is *not* an attack on modern Spain, the Spanish people, or the Catholic church. History is ugly and there isn't a one of us whose ancestors didn't do something horrid at one point in time. Face up to it, deal with it, don't forget it, and move forward. That's what history is about.

And tied to that was the European ideas of superiority. No matter what the Aztecs were bound to be seen as "savages" by the Spanish and the process of "civilizing" them back then meant 'making their culture look like ours'. This, of course, destroyed the native culture in the process.

And finally (at least for this assessment where I hit just a few of the high points), at the time of the conquest Spain was a Catholic nation and they took as one of their duties an idea of spreading Catholicism as the one, true religion. As such, priests were dispatched to convert the native population. So in the context of this story, even if Barbara had managed to eliminate human sacrifice she could not have (and wisely did not try to) removed the Aztecs belief in their pantheon of gods. And no matter what, that belief system would have been targeted by the Spanish invaders as well and the stripping of it would have been another key in the destruction of the culture.

So, from a historical standpoint, Barbara gets a 'D' at least as a history teacher from me.


Okay, you can start reading the rest of the review now if you decided to skip over my historian's rant.

The rest of the story really is Barbara's story and, well, to be honest, I'm a little bit mixed about it.

On the one hand, it is an excellent showcase for actress Jacqueline Hill. That woman proves she was born to play royalty with her turn as Yetaxa. She pitches everything perfectly. She also gets a chance to show off Barbara's steel spine. I've said it before and I'll say it again -- Barbara is a badass. Not only does she verbally put the smackdown on Tlotoxl on more than one occasion, she also physically does so when she saves Ian's life by grabbing a knife and putting it to Tlotoxl's throat.

Let me repeat that. She saves *Ian's* life (that's right, traditional hero dude saved by the chick!) by grabbing the knife off the belt of an Aztec warrior and then holding it to Tlotoxl's throat like she means business. Not a single shake, not a single hesitation, she's ice cold throughout. YES!

On the other hand, however, Barbara comes off as both a bit too stubborn and emotional in her crusade and she is slightly condescended to when both the Doctor and Ian tell her she's wrong to try to change Aztec society and that she is also doomed to failure. So in that way there is a slight whiff of the 'overly emotional female who can't take good advice' trope. And I really hate that trope. Thankfully it's slight and doesn't ruin the rest of the story.

Then, of course, there is the Doctor's "romance". Fans of old have often disliked the merest hint of an idea that the Doctor may have had an actual romance with the older, learned, Cameca but for me, personally, I find it sweet. There are also indications that the Doctor did hold Cameca in some regard and he regretted very much breaking her heart. At the same time there is also no shame in the relationship for, despite Cameca being from a less advanced culture, she is still consistently treated with respect in the script and she is shown to be wise, experienced and insightful.

Really, the script is great on all counts in treating all the characters with a great amount of respect. Sure, Tlotoxl is a bit stereotypical and his motivations are a bit muddied but he is always treated as a genuine threat and never as a joke to be laughed off or discarded. The warrior Ixta who becomes Ian's nemesis is also shown to be a fast learner and a genuine antagonist as he takes Ian's lessons about unconventional fighting and the element of surprise and turns them on Ian himself. And in the end, the audience ends up feeling great remorse for Autloc -- the other priest and the one who accepts Barbara's message. In one way, Barbara succeeds with him in convincing him human sacrifice is wrong but in another way she fails because in doing this she causes the older man to lose not only his belief but also his faith in all his civilization. He gives away his worldly possessions and leaves to wander the wastelands in hopes of finding something to put his trust in. It's very nearly heartbreaking to see.

Kudos must also be raised to the costumers, prop designers, and set designers all. The costumes are exacting and beautiful and really add to the flavor of the story. Likewise the props -- the jewelry, weaponry, and pottery are also well researched and wonderfully executed. And the set designers certainly do a terrific job considering their limitations. At this time the series was still completely studio-bound and not only that but forced to film in one of the BBC's smallest sound stages. Despite this the set designers go all out in recreating an Aztec city. The fakey-ness of the background paintings is detectable today, yes, *but* modern television screens produce a higher resolution than older ones did and the original tape has been cleaned up to provide a clearer picture as well. Taking that into account the backgrounds are still very effective in the story.

Overall, (because I've already gone on too long) if you want to see one of the highlights of the First Doctor's era then this is the story to see. There is action and when there isn't action the drama keeps one on the edge of the seat. There are great performances by all of the regular cast but William Hartnell and Jacqueline Hill in particular shine here. Even where there is padding in this four parter it never really feels like padding. Arguably the best story of the show's first season.

"Web of Fear" Useless Trivia

So yeah, stuff you probably don't care about but I think it's fun....

1) "The Web of Fear" is pretty much the start of the so-called U.N.I.T. Dating Controversy in Doctor Who. And no, it doesn't have anything to do with the Doctor finding someone to go out with on the weekends. The U.N.I.T. Dating Controversy a debate among fans who like to try to peg down when certain Earth-set stories are happening. Originally, the production team intended for the Third Doctor's era to be occurring in the "near future" -- then about the late 1970's to early 1980's since the show was actually airing in the early to mid-1970's. The problem is that prop designers and costumers kept using items which were clearly current and not even slightly fashion forward. The writers also kept messing things up and forgetting that the stories weren't set in current time. This led to a bit of confusion but it all starts with "The Web of Fear" because all future stories date from this one. In the later story "The Invasion" Lethbridge-Stewart shows up again and tells the Doctor that the events in "The Web of Fear" were four years earlier. Following this "Spearhead from Space" -- the story that began the Third Doctor's era -- indicates that not that much time has passed since "The Invasion" -- not more than 12 months or so.

The "Web of Fear" aired in 1968 but there are some slight indications that he writers intended for it to be taking place in the "near future" of about 1974. Again, the problem is that the costumes and technology are very 1968. The mentions here are so slight that most people automatically think the story is taking place in 1968. There are, however, indications that "The Invasion" was supposed to be taking place in 1978 but, again, clothing and technology are clearly compliant with 1960's and not the late 70's. Those 1978 indications, however, are also so slight they can be easily ignored.

So the point of all of this, if there is one, is that all the problems with figuring out when the UNIT based stories were occuring can be traced back to this particular story. It's also something that still gets touched on in the modern series. As a tribute to the confusion in the Season Four story "The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky" the Tenth Doctor comments that UNIT has come a long way since he worked with them "In the 70's.... or was it the 80's? I can never remember."

2) The Yeti/the Great Intelligence were slated to return for one, final story in Patrick Troughton's final season. Fraser Hines had been heavily urged by his agent to break away from Doctor Who after three years to do other things. As he was having great fun working on the show, however, and enjoyed his co-workers in Troughton and Wendy Padbury (who played Victoria's replacement, Zoe) he was reluctant to do so. Finally, he agreed and told the production team he would be leaving the show but he dragged his feet on deciding when to leave. At one point it looked as though he would leave near the end of the 1968-1969 season and a story outline was created for an episode to give his character of Jamie a send-off. In the proposed story the TARDIS would finally land in Scotland not long after Jamie first left (totally ignoring the fact that the Scots were pretty brutally supressed by the English for several years after the Battle of Culloden, which is when Jamie was picked up). Jamie would meet a bonnie lass and the Doctor would discover that the Great Intelligence and it's Yeti robots were active in the area trying to gain power. Jamie would get mind controlled by the Great Intelligence for a while but eventually the Doctor would free him, destroying the Great Intelligence once and for all in the process. The dying Laird of Jamie's clan would then ask him to become Laird and Jamie would feel his duty was to his clan and would decide to stay, marry the young woman he had fallen in love with, and take up the duties of leader of his clan.

The story would be scrapped when Hines discovered that Troughton was leaving at the end of the season and so decide to stay on until the end and leave at the same time Troughton did.

3) After redesigning the Yeti to be more fierce and fearsome the production team felt it would be a good idea to kind of publicize this fact. Therefore, at the end of the preceding story, "The Enemy of the World", they showed a little blurb that was specially filmed with Patrick Troughton. The scene was actually shot on the Underground sets used for "The Web of Fear". Sadly, that footage, along with most of "The Enemy of the World" and "The Web of Fear" is missing. An enterprising computer animator on YouTube who goes by the handle tardistimegirl, however, has created a reconstruction. And it is awesome. Check it out...

Grab Bag Reviews: "The Web of Fear"

Patrick Troughton's era on Doctor Who introduced a number of new monsters and alien being but only a few ever really caught on well with fans. One of those were, surprisingly, the Yeti... or more precisely the Great Intelligence.

Writers Mervyn Haysman and Henry Lincoln penned the first story featuring the Yeti in 1967's "The Abominable Snowmen". The story pulled heavily from real figures in Tibetan Buddhism and for it's villain featured the formless being known as the Great Intelligence which in turn controlled the minds of certain humans in order to build his robotic Yeti servants.

The story proved popular enough that Haysman and Lincoln were asked to write a sequel -- 1968's "The Web of Fear". For this story the original Yeti costumes would be redesigned to look more fierce and the sound effect of a roar was added as well since one of the complaints about the Yeti were that they were too cuddly looking to be truly scary.

This story would also mark the introduction of a new character -- British Army Colonel Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, played by Nicolas Courtney. Courtney had previously appeared on the show in the First Doctor story "The Daleks Master Plan" where he portrayed the ill-fated Brett Vyon. The Lethbridge-Stewart character would eventually prove quite popular and would become a regular supporting cast member during the Third Doctor era.

Reprising a role here was Jack Watling -- actress Deborah Watling's father. Jack Watling had played a reporter named Travers in "The Abominable Snowmen" but here he returns as "Professor" Travers -- a scientist. I guess somewhere in the intervening years he went back to college and got a scientific degree?

What the story is perhaps most memorable for, however, is the fact that director Douglas Camfield wanted to film part of the story in the real London subway system (known as the Underground for those not up on their British terminology). The office in charge of the Underground system wanted too much money though so in retaliation the set designers took pictures and then worked off the pictures to create near-perfect replicas on the studio soundstage. In fact, the replication was so close that the Underground system accused Camfield of sneaking down and actually filming there on the sly without permission!

Like many of the stories from Patrick Troughton's era, "The Web of Fear" is almost entirely lost. Only one episode, the first one, still exists out of the six parts. The entire audio track was preserved by some fans though and was released as an audio drama with descriptive narration provided by Fraser Hines.

And now it's time to get tangled in a web of fear....

The Plot: Something actually stops the TARDIS in space -- a strange, cocooning web. When the web finally lets go the TARDIS lands in (though) roughly contemporary London in the Underground system. The system is strangely deserted though -- no passengers waiting at the station, no trains running, and all the power switched off.

Finding soldiers in the tunnels the time traveling bunch lean the terrifying secret -- the Yeti are back! And this time they are loose in the Underground and have terrifying new weapons -- like a strange fog which, once people enter, they never come out, and gun which fire a web-like substance, and a strange, massive fungus that is growing and sealing off the Underground station by station.

One group of soldiers in a field base have been tasked with stopping the menace but they are slowly being cut off, their position overrun and their men cut down. The Great Intelligence has set a trap like a spider with a web and the Doctor, his companions and allies have stumbled into it. Now the Doctor must match wits with the Great Intelligence and this time if he fails the cost to himself and the Earth may be incalculable.

My Take: Yes, this is yet another "base-under-siege" story but it is a quintessential 'base-under-siege' story and also a literal one since this time there is a base... and it is under siege. Mervyn Haysman and Henry Lincoln really did a cracking job with this story -- getting at what makes a base-under-siege story really click -- the slow, strangling tension as the characters are cut off from help step-by-step. Added to this is the fact that each one of their plans for victory or escape are cruelly crushed. In point of fact, it is telling that the military personnel go from formulating plans to try to defeat the Yeti and the Great Intelligence to merely trying to survive. The audience are dragged along with them and feels the danger mount as the situation grows more and more dire.

There are also elements of Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None as it is revealed there is a traitor in their midst. As characters are killed off one-by-one the pool of potential traitors shrinks and the tension grows as those who survive increasingly eye one another with suspicion. For once the story does a truly excellent job at maintaining the mystery. There are multiple red herrings dragged across the trail but we do not know the truth until the end -- one one obvious ever stands out. Of course one of the costs of this is a pretty high body count all things considered.

The sound design for this story should definitely be mentioned. The sound engineers did a tremendous job in making sure that the actors' voices took on an echo-y quality for the scenes taking place in the train tunnels. Even without the visuals to reinforce it, it is easy to believe that the actors really were wandering around in a bunch of cold, tile tunnels.

Also of interest are the changes to the Great Intelligence here. In the first appearance the villain wants to inhabit the Earth -- to take on a corporeal form which, in turn, will eventually leave the human inhabitants with nowhere to go. This time around he has changed his target somewhat and now wants the knowledge in the Doctor's brain. It is really one of the few times that a villain deliberately targets the Doctor for.... um... villainy rather than wanting power, or control, or to kill an enemy.

The acting across the board should also be praised. Tina Packer as scientist Ann Travers displays an independence and sharp mind which would be lacking in many female characters for some years. She also has a wicked line in sarcasm when called on and the scenes of her working with the Doctor are well done as it comes across as two scientific colleagues working together rather than a scientist and a female assistant. Jack Watling is a delight playing the older, cantankerous Professor Travers. He may not actively be given much to do aside from be crotchety but he does do the crotchety extremely well. Even the character of Evans manages to invoke various emotions. On the one hand, it is easy to dislike him for his craven and cowardly nature. On the other hand, at times his craven and cowardly nature is a source of genuine amusement. And Nicholas Courtney... well, his Lethbridge-Stewart is, like Athena, sprung fourth fully formed. The character is locked in place from the moment we meet him and he will not alter drastically over the next several decades. But this is actually a good thing because it's easy to like the military minded Lethbridge-Stewart -- who also can display a nice talent for snark when needed.

The main cast is also firing on all cylinders... or at least as much as the script allows them too. Patrick Troughton is clearly having a ball as the Doctor as he plays the character like a genius child -- incomprehensibly intelligent but easily amused and easily distracted by the things that catch his interest -- often forgetting the danger and threats that surround him. Fraser Hines as Jamie shows himself to be, as always, the Doctor's stalwart companion... as well as being a fighter. Here Jamie is willing to run risks in the hopes of at least being able to accomplish something to keep his friends safe. It is Deborah Watling's Victoria who suffers the much in this script. She does stupid things, she screams a lot, and worst of all, she becomes 'girl hostage'.

And this brings up the areas where the script falls down on the job. For one thing, it goes on far too long -- it could have and should have been cut down to at least four episodes and possibly less. There is at least one entire episode and parts of others which are nothing but characters wandering around in the tunnels. And I do mean *nothing* but wandering around in tunnels. The plot isn't advanced, we don't learn anything new and nothing really happens. It's all rather boring.

The other area where the script falls down is with some of the characters. As I mentioned, Victoria is basically useless... unless you count getting in trouble, getting captured and having to be rescued as useful. In which case you have a warped idea of being useful. Well, I supposed that's useful in a way as a plot contrivance generator but, really, it's just lazy writing. The reporter, Chorley, is also a very poorly drawn character. He starts flipping out at the least provocation and is reduced to 'annoying, bloody idiot' by episode two. Seriously, episode *two* with another four to go.

Aside from that, though, there is little to complain about here. There really isn't a moral message -- neither an obvious one nor a hidden one -- and this isn't one of those stories where the show was trying to reach for some loftier ideas or philosophical discussions. What it is, however, is a great, nail-biting story that will have you on the edge of your seat with tension to spare, stakes as high as they come, and a great, claustrophobic location. Come into my parlor said the spider to the fly....

Grab Bag Reviews: "The Tenth Planet"

Okay, first off, yes, now that Pluto has been demoted from planetary status the title doesn't work anymore.

As for the rest. Well, this episode marked one of those other 'great leaps forwards' for the show. Just as the introduction of the Meddling Monk (in "The Time Meddler") introduced the idea that the Doctor had a 'people' and that others of them could time travel too "The Tenth Planet" introduced the idea of regeneration... the thing that has allowed the show to survive and reinvent itself periodically in order to stay fresh.

This episode would also introduce the series' second most famous repeating villains... the Cybermen.

The first 'regeneration' (although it wasn't termed that at first -- that and the limitations to it would come later) was not without it's controversies.

By 1966 Producer Innes Lloyd had repeated clashes with William Hartnell -- so much so that Lloyd considered replacing Hartnell earlier -- halfway through the 1965-1966 season with the episode "The Celestial Toymaker". As it was, after much discussions, Hartnell agreed it was time to leave and the second serial of the 1966-1967 season was chosen for his departure. There are some rumors that Hartnell was forced out by Lloyd because of their personal disagreements. Officially it was Hartnell's declining health led the production team to convince him it was time to retire from the daily grind of episodic television. The truth of the matter will probably never be known but it was probably a matter of it being a combination of the two. There was no question that Hartnell's memory and health problems caused by his arteriosclerosis were worsening and he frequently missed filming for health reasons. In point of fact, even this, his swan song, suffers due to Hartnell being ill at the time of filming... but more on that later.

The big problem was the question of how did one replace the lead actor in a program like Doctor Who? And make no mistake, the show's popularity had the BBC quite interested in seeing it continue on instead of being cancelled outright.

The writers eventually stumbled onto a simple but genius idea -- since the Doctor was an alien it was simply his nature to change his appearance. At the start the writers envisioned this process as being termed a "renewal" and it would actually involve the Doctor shedding years -- not just changing his face. In this case, the idea was that the Doctor would actually de-age several hundred years during the process.

The next hurdle was to find someone to replace Hartnell. Many actors were considered and a couple were approached but indicated they had no interest in the role. One actor who was high on the list, however, was veteran character actor Patrick Troughton. Troughton was interested but he had one condition -- that he not be asked to try to ape Hartnell's style. Troughton felt that this would be an insult to Hartnell and the work he had done. The production team agreed and the new Doctor was set.

After leaving the show Hartnell continued to act -- particularly on stage where the pace of production was not as taxing as television -- and he reportedly also enjoyed meeting fans who had grown up on his portrayal of the Doctor right up to the end of his life.

Meanwhile, the production team was interested in coming up with new ideas -- particularly ones rooted in real science. They became exposed to the work of scientist Kit Pedler and Pedler became an unofficial scientific advisor to the show as well as being an 'idea man' to generate new concepts to turn into stories. The recent advances in artifical limbs as well as speculation about future advances triggered Pedler to create the Cybermen -- one of his most enduring creations.

So, shall we go and say "hello" to the Cybermen and say "good-bye" to our first Doctor?

The Plot: The Doctor, with companions Ben and Polly, land at an international space agency tracking station at the South Pole in 1986. As they observe a routine flight orbiting the Earth a strange planet suddenly appears near Earth! As the planet wreaks havoc with the space flight and begins draining energy from Earth some of the planet's inhabitants arrive to take over the South Pole station. Part flesh, part robot, but wholly without emotion, the Cybermen have a message for the people of Earth.... "You will be like us."

My Take: This is, again, one of those stories partly missing. The good news is that three out of the four episodes are still in existence. The bad news is that the missing episode is the fourth one with the Doctor's regeneration.

Back in the 1990's the episode was released on VHS by the BBC with the mission fourth part filled in by a condensed reconstruction of the episode using still images and the original audio track. The story was also released as an audio drama with descriptive narration provided by Anneke Wills, the actress who played Polly. I have seen the VHS episode but I own the audio so the audio is what I based this review on. The story has yet to be released on DVD by the BBC but there are rumors that the missing episode might be replaced by animation synced up to the surviving audio.

As for the story... I do have a problem with stories which are set in "the future" which includes my lifetime. Certainly to the writers of the time they had no idea that this story would be still being watched long after 1986 but here we are and seeing their vision of 1986 does give me a chortle to two.

All that aside, there are people who have a problem with the Cybermen's voices in their first appearance. They tend to find them laughable. I don't. Oh, sure, in a couple of places they get a bit too sing-song but other than that I really like the concept that there is still a trace of the organic voice but with an electronic overlay. It reminds the viewers that, chillingly, these were humanoid beings which have now become something other... something horrible.



The voices are both human and inhuman at the same time.

Another nice touch is the fact that the mouths on the Cybermen don't actually move when they speak. Their mouths open and the voices emerge -- as if the voices are coming from something other than their throats.

And the costume design here so nearly works. The ski-mask like face coverings are suitably chilling. They make the Cybermen faceless, anonymous; human in form but with individuality erased. The coverings also put one in mind of mummies and we are invited to wonder what might be underneath -- what horror or inhumanity do these masks cover? Or is there anything left there at all?

The headlamps, however, look like a miner's lamp gone wrong perched on top of some sink pipes and the chest units look like space-age accordions. It's all just a bit too silly looking. I will, however, award points for at least trying something that looks a little different.

Sadly, this is all the best parts of the story. The adventure dissolves into a flawed base-under-siege' plot weighted down with cement bricks in the form of the actors doing bad foreign accents. The "Italian" makes you cringe as they pull out pretty much every stereotype in the books and the "American", General Cutler is so "cowboy" it's nearly beyond words.

And the flaws just go from there. While Pedler may have had a brilliant idea with the Cybermen the rest of the psuedo-science on display is ridiculous. Okay, more ridiculous than usual for Doctor Who. A planetary body coming that close to the Earth would almost certainly impact things like weather and tides not to mention gravity. And that's getting past just the idea that a planet... the size of Earth... can just... appear without someone seeing it coming. Even the telescopes and technology available in 1966 would have been able to see something the size of a planet making it's way into the solar system! I'm willing to suspend a lot of disbelief but this story pushes the weight load past the breaking point.

And then there are the characterization holes. Granted, Hartnell was ill during at least part of the filming and perhaps most of it. He was not able to make it into the studio for the filming of the entire third episode and as such they had to write his character out of the scenes and the Doctor does not appear at all there. Still, the Doctor just simply doesn't do anything in this story. There are no grand speeches, very little taking the moral high ground, little showing off in his traditional role of 'smartest guy in the room', etc. And in point of fact he shows a ridiculous trust that the Cybermen will keep their word. At one point rather cheerfully sending his companion, Polly, off to be a hostage.

It is the other companion, Ben, who gets to save the day. Multiple times actually. Ben isn't stupid but the point of the character is that he was supposed to be a Cockney, Merchant Seaman -- someone who was born without a lot of advantages and who had a basic education. Suddenly here he turns into Sherlock Holmes. He pieces together the tiniest of clues into brilliant deductions and comes up with great plans for saving the day.

And Polly? Polly gets to offer to be useful by making coffee and then later becomes 'girl hostage'. *Sigh*. So much for women's lib. At least she doesn't do a lot of screaming.

Then there is also the fact that the very message of the story ends up being undercut by the character of General Cutler. The character starts out as a petty autocrat (whom viewers are apparently not meant to like) and he quickly slides downhill into a maniac. When his own son is put in harm's way Cutler schemes run the risk of irradiating the Earth to destroy the Cybermen's rogue planet. Seriously, he wants to use a bazooka to swat a fly and he doesn't care if he blows up the house in the process as long as the fly dies. Oh, and he intends to do it with the most silly, sci-fi sounding, deus-ex-machina superweapon I think I've ever heard... a "Z-Bomb". I guess since an atom bomb used to be abbreviated "A-Bomb" the other end of the alphabet needed a bomb as well.

But the point is that we, as the viewers, are supposed to be horrified by the idea that the Cybermen have eliminated emotions and consider them troublesome but then Cutler rushes headlong into the act of a madman because of his emotions! Therefore Cutler essentially proves the Cybermen right -- emotions do cause trouble!

Really, if it were not for the Cybermen and the regeneration I would advise skipping this story. It's not well put together and much of it is silly instead of the tension-filled nail biter it was obviously meant to be. The Cybermen are fascinating here though (or at least they are to me) and Hartnell does get a few good scenes in and his regeneration still manages to be filled with mystery and wonder as his Doctor holds onto his life to the bitter end.

Grab Bag Reviews: "Real Time"

And now for something.... a little different.

As I've mentioned before, in 'the Wilderness Years' when Doctor Who was off the air, the BBC licensed out the rights to the show. Book publishing went to billionaire Richard Branson's Virgin media empire and the audio rights went to a company called Big Finish.

Big Finish began doing audio dramas featuring four of the five surviving Doctors -- the Fifth Doctor (Peter Davison), the Sixth Doctor (Colin Baker), the Seventh Doctor (Sylvester McCoy) and the Eighth Doctor (Paul McGann -- who otherwise only got one poorly received TV movie to his name). They also rounded up many of the actors and actresses who played companions in the past to reprise those roles alongside the Doctors.

The idea was that the audios were stories which happened in-between the television serials. Since, by the modern era, the show rarely had serials which were obviously linked this was reasonably plausible. Big Finish, however, also began branching out to introduce new companions which also fell in-between the televised stories. So the Fifth Doctor and companion Peri (Nicola Bryant) picked up an ancient Egyptian princess named Erimem as a traveling companion for a while, the Seventh Doctor picked up a young nurse named Hector, "Hex" Schofield, and the Sixth Doctor picked up, among others, a fifty-five year-old history professor named Evelyn Smythe (played by actress Maggie Stables).

In 2002, the BBC, interested in taking more advantage of the opportunities offered by the web, approached Big Finish with a proposition -- to create an original Doctor Who story which featured a complete audio cast along with limited flash-based animations. Big Finish agreed and a story was created featuring the Sixth Doctor -- Colin Baker. At that time, in the Big Finish audios, Evelyn Smythe was the Sixth Doctor's companion and so she became the Doctor's companion for "Real Time" -- making it the first time a non-canon companion has appeared on a BBC sponsored story. It would also mark a costume change for the Doctor as the animators found the Sixth Doctor's clashing coat impossible to translate to the simplified animations. As such a new, blue coat was designed. This outfit would prove quite popular with fans (gee, I can't imagine why) to the point where it has even been featured as a variant in a Sixth Doctor action figure.

Due to the Internet limitations of the time the story was decided to run in 12 minute parts for a total of 60 minutes. The story was also supposed to take place as near as possible in "real time" -- so a five minute conversation between characters would take up five minutes in the story as well.

"Real Time" can still be found and listened to on the BBC's Classic Doctor Who website HERE. The flash animations no longer seem to work (or at least I can't get them to work) but the audio plays perfectly well and the story doesn't really need the animations to be followed. Fair warning though -- the story has to be played using Real Player. If you don't have Real Player loaded on your computer you might have some problems listening.

And now, on to the review!

The Plot: In the 33rd century two archaeological teams go missing from a strange planet. The last communication from them mentions a temporal wave... and Cybermen. A third team is dispatched to solve the mystery and the Doctor is asked along as an expert in both the Cybermen and time.

The team soon discovers a temporal gateway inside and temple and the expedition leader is pulled through only to be returned mere moments later converted into a Cyberman! The other missing archaeologists have been similarly converted and they converge on the rescue team threatening to kill everyone unless the Doctor gives them the secrets to his TARDIS!

The Doctor knows that with the TARDIS at their control nowhere and nowhen would be safe from the Cybermen. But the stakes are even higher than he realized as he learns that in this time and this place the timeline is in flux and there is a horrible potential past and future for the Earth which could become a reality as well. The Doctor must step very carefully now because the whole of time -- past and future -- rests on his decisions...

My Take: I love audio dramas. I have loved them since I listened to my first Flash Gordon at the age of 16. Modern audio stories get to benefit from bigger and better casts, better recording technology, better sound effects and original music... all of which this story has.

Doing Doctor Who in what basically amounts to an audio format also has the added benefit of not being bound by the limits of technology or budget for special effects. The only limitation to the visuals here is the power of the listener's imagination. Which is actually a mixed blessing... as I'll get into later.

The performances range from good to mediocre -- as does the script really. Colin Baker gets to show off a more tempered version of the Doctor than the one which appeared in the television episodes. To be honest, I used to hate Baker's version of the Doctor until I listened to a few of the audios. The Big Finish writers managed to strike a perfect balance -- still keeping the haughtiness, the arrogance, and the smug superiority but dialing them all back down from '11' and then cutting them with a greater sense of empathy and a deep warmth for his companion. In point of fact, at one point in the story the Doctor remarks upon the "love I hold for Evelyn" -- something that never would have happened in the TV stories where he was too busy insulting the intelligence of his companion there.

Maggie Stables is also quite fine as Evelyn. An older, more measured and feisty companion -- someone who is willing to take the Doctor to task and take him down a peg or two when his arrogance threatens to fly to high. Stables and Baker play off of one another well and comfortably -- which is a sign of the established working relationship the two had by this point in time.

The rest of the cast is where things get a little tricky. Most of the supporting cast are steady but not exceptional with a few missteps where they are obviously overplaying their roles with the misguided thinking that they need to "sell" the part more because the audience cannot see their faces. Probably the weakest link is Yee Jee Soo playing the character of Reece Goddard. Soo already had a history with Doctor Who having appeared in the 1996 made-for-TV movie featuring Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor. Here Soo's tone is almost universally off. He comes across as awfully bright and cheerful most of the time which is just wrong considering most of what is happening in the script.

And then there's the script. It, too, is uneven. Many scenes come off forced -- for example the "banter" between members of the rescue team which is supposed to indicate a warm camaraderie and a long-standing friendship between the characters. Instead it feels false -- an imperfect imitation of real banter. There are also many scenes which go into "info-dump mode" (as I like to call it) where one of the characters suddenly turns into Captain Exposition (insert heroic trumpet fanfare here) imparts a tremendous amount of information -- usually in the form of backstory -- in one huge splat. And the audience's eyes glaze over in response. Of course, some of this might be forgiven due to the time limitations the story was operating under. But really, if the time limitations were hurting that much perhaps a simpler story should have been told.

Where script writer Gary Russell really excels here, though, is in playing around with that central idea of the show: Time. There is non-TARDIS time travel involved, potential alternate timelines which might become the real timeline, and threats to the stability of the past and the future -- all with the Doctor at the heart of it. And isn't that what Doctor Who is supposed to be about?

The sound effects used are also good -- helping to tell the story without overwhelming it. In point of fact they might be too good. And here's where having an active imagination is a curse... as well as being another problem with the script. There is death here. And it's gruesome and horrible even without any visuals. At several points the website warns that there are scenes which might be inappropriate for younger audiences. And that's a problem... on multiple levels.

For one, it shows one of the problems which hit the show in later years as well as one of the problems with a lot of the spin-off media... Doctor Who for an adult audience. Over the course of decades the show had slowly been pushing the envelope. It didn't want to be considered a "kids' show" and it pushed with more sophisticated stories, more stories with themes which resonated with an older audience, etc. By the time the show went off the air it's target audience was far more 'teens and up' than 'whole family viewing'. When it came to the books, many of them also told darker stories with death, destruction, blood, torture, and the like. The BBC may have put "Real Time" on their website but it's audience was definitely not younger computer users.

For another thing... well, it's very off-putting. I'm not a fan of horror movies; they're not my bag of goods and several scenes here skate pretty close to horror movie levels. For example, one of the expedition team members has his head crushed by a Cyberman. He screams in pain and fear for several seconds before the inevitable 'crunch-squish'. Likewise, we listen as another team member is converted into a Cyberman. We hear whirring machinery and his screams going on and on and on until they start taking on an electronic tone and then finally stop. Ugh. Seriously, I sat and shuddered. It was really uncalled for and also, if this had been something shown on TV they never would have gone that far. But somehow not having the visuals is supposed to make it more okay to write something so horrific. Ick. No thank you.

If you're someone like me who hated the Sixth Doctor then this is actually a pretty good place to start to see what kind of Doctor Colin Baker really could have been if only he had been given better scripts. It's also a fascinatingly complex time travel story. Fair warning though -- the story ends on something of a cliffhanger which was never resolved. After this the BBC decided to do all of their web-based stuff in-house and so did not collaborate with Big Finish again and Big Finish decided not to do a sequel of their own. As such this story has officially been labeled as "non-canon" by both the BBC and Big Finish. It also has some scenes not for the faint of heart. If you're curious, though, it's free and a fairly decent waste of an hour's time if for no other reason than a look at what might have been for Colin Baker.

Doctor Who: "The Daleks" Addendum

Any discussion of the serial "The Daleks" should probably include the story's 'younger brother' -- Doctor Who and the Daleks.

Deciding to capitalize on the popularity of both Doctor Who and the Daleks the BBC licensed out the show for the first time in 1965 to a British movie production company. The production company chose to adapt the serial "The Daleks" for it's first movie.

Having a bigger budget, the film company could produce better special effects and also had the benefit of being in color. taking advantage of this, the film company created their own Dalek props and made them in bright, primary colors. As part of a side deal, after the movie was over the BBC was allowed to keep a couple of the movie Daleks and would use them as part of their Dalek stable for years.

The production company kept the original story intact -- in fact, almost completely so -- but they chose to recast the film and change several things about the nature of the Doctor and his companions...

In the movie version the Doctor, played by Peter Cushing (yes, Governor Tarkin himself), is a kindly, fully human, absent-minded inventor literally named "Doctor Who". He lives with his two granddaughters -- Barbara Who and Susan Who. Yeah, I know, it sounds like the output from another "Doctor" -- Doctor Seuss. But anyway.... So one night, Barbara's boyfriend Ian comes over and the Doctor decides to show off his latest invention -- a machine that can travel in time and space -- that the Doctor has named Tardis. No, not THE TARDIS, the ship's name is simply Tardis. Like how Han Solo's ship is named the Millennium Falcon.

So, as you can imagine, the ship takes off accidentally and lands on Skaro where events play out pretty much as they did in the original story. The biggest differences are that Peter Cushing's Doctor is a more kindly soul than Hartnell's at that point and the character of Ian was transformed into a bumbling idiot.

It's an entertaining enough little movie but it is very definitely not canon to the TV show. The humor is pretty heavy-handed... particularly the way Roy Castle, the actor playing Ian, does it.

This one was never really a favorite of mine. Despite the problems I had with the original serial I still found it a better story than the movie despite the fact that the movie is almost word for word the same as the serial. There are just differences in tone and action which give the serial more weight.

If you're curious, though, the whole movie can be watched, free and legal, on YouTube. You have to put up with a few commercials but what the heck... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNasJyxNZ-o&feature=fvwrel

The movie was also released on DVD several years back so you can probably find it on Netflix or something if you don't want to slog through the commercials.

Grab Bag Reviews: "The Daleks"

Ah-ha! Here we go then... the first appearance of the monsters which would come to define and symbolize Doctor Who. There is not a single incarnation of the Doctor who has not faced the Daleks at least once with the exception of the Eighth Doctor... unless you count the audio stories... but that's another story. Anyway... DALEKS!!!

It was still only 1963 and at the time of filming the first episode of the series hadn't even aired yet. Doctor Who, however, was already suffering from some of the problems with late scripts which would plague the show intermittently for years. As such, a script from a relative newcomer to writing for science fiction TV was pushed up to be the second serial of the series. The writer was Terry Nation.

Producer Verity Lambert was also taking a chance on Nation's script. The department head, and her boss, Sydney Newman, had made it clear from the start that he wanted "no bug-eyed monsters" on Doctor Who. Newman was well aware of the show's science fiction elements but he felt it would be detrimental to the program to include alien monsters. Lambert, however, was in need of a finished script to shoot and she also believed very strongly in Nation's story.

For his part, in later interviews Nation claimed that he wrote the script intending for it to educate children on the dangers of fascism. Nation had lived through WW II and was aware that the generation of children who would be watching the show would grow up only knowing the war though history books. As such he wanted an allegory to teach them the dangers of extreme viewpoints and to stand up against those views when they found them. Because of this, over the years, even more would be made of the ties between Nazism and the Daleks in later stories... particularly "Genesis of the Daleks".

Set designers, prop makers, and costumers also got their first crash course in Doctor Who sci-fi as they created the planet Skaro, the costumes for the humanoid Thals, the city of the Daleks and, of course, the Daleks themselves. It is a testament to their skill that, other than a little tweaking, the design has remained largely the same for over 47 years. And it should be noted that, although Nation gave some basic descriptions of the Daleks in his script it was the prop designer who truly designed the look of the Daleks.

When the first episode of the serial aired Sydney Newman was quite angry to find that his rule against "bug-eyed monsters" seemed to have been ignored. A few weeks later, however, when the audience figures came in and it was apparent that Daleks were the talk of the town he issued a written apology to Lambert and promised to allow her to make the decisions on what was best for the show.

The Daleks were a hit and they would go on to menace time and time again.

But is that first episode all it's cracked up to be? Or is it merely enshrined in viewer's hearts because it was the first?

The Plot: The Doctor, his granddaughter Susan and his still recently kidnapped Ian and Barbara land on a strange, alien planet. Disappointed at not being returned to Earth, Ian and Barbara still join in the exploration... for a time. When the Doctor wants to investigate a strange city, however, the others refuse and insist they leave the planet. The Doctor sabotages the TARDIS in order to get his way but upon arriving in the city the explorers are taken prisoner by the Daleks! The group also realizes that they are suffering from radiation poisoning but that there is another race of beings on the planet -- the Thals -- and that the Thals left them drugs to cure them back at the ship!

Susan retrieves the drugs and meets one of the Thals, who informs her that the Thals wish to make peace with the Daleks. Susan delivers this message back to the Daleks and the Daleks agree to peace... or so it seems. The time and space travelers soon learn it is all a trap for the Thals and they helped lure the Thals into it!

Upon escaping the Daleks the Doctor soon learns that a part vital to the TARDIS was left behind in the Dalek city. They must stage a raid to get it back but can they count on the help of the pacifistic Thals? Even if they get the help can the now primitive Thals stand a chance against the technically superior Daleks? And meanwhile, what plans are the Daleks hatching to remove the Thals from the face of the planet forever?

My Take: With this being a very early story in the series there is still a sense of the writers and actors getting their legs under them a bit. There are also some striking characterizations which would change over time and so viewers might find these interesting precursors for what would come.

"The Daleks" features a very different Doctor than the one we would become used to. Here the Doctor is a conniving [insert somewhat impolite term for a person born outside the bounds of marriage] as well as somewhat cold and uncaring towards his unwilling companions -- for example, at one point the Doctor is quite ready to go off and leave the missing Barbara without a single concern for her welfare. This aspect of the Doctor's personality would be changed with the very next story ("Edge of Destruction") but for "The Daleks" it is still in place. Of course it is interesting in that the Doctor's selfish actions put himself and Susan in danger and he is forced to admit to Ian and Barbara that he is at fault here and has no one to blame but himself -- a nice little moment of thaw for the cantankerous old coot and a hint of the changes to come.

Taking the first several serials as a whole -- from "An Unearthly Child" to "Marco Polo" viewers actually see a character arc for the Doctor. Not only is he self-centered, egotistical, and lacking empathy, he also lacks the impulse to help and interfere. Last year fans were treated to an all-new Doctor who proclaimed that bringing down the government was what he did but here we have a Doctor who declares that that the Thal's predicament isn't any of their affair and they're all just better off leaving. Of course, by the end, we see him actually kind of revelling in what he has done -- encouraging the Thals and promising to stop by and visit them at some point in the future to see how they are getting along. He warms considerably to the point where he becomes more recognizable as the Doctor.

Ian and Barbara also get the meatier character parts with this story. They are disheartened at not being brought back home immediately, they are fearful that they might not get back home at all, and they are increasingly adrift with nothing familiar to cling to except each other. Those scenes between the two actors have a ring of truth and a feeling of real emotion to them. Sadly, they are all too short and never really come up again. Jacqueline Hill's Barbara, however, gets a hinted romance with one of the Thals that is also tentative and rather sweet. The fact that the writers had to downplay the plot element because of the child target audience of the show actually works in its favor -- making it light instead of heavy-handed as most other emotional beats are here.

And therein lies one of the problems with the script -- Terry Nation goes rather heavy-handed on most of the elements. For example, it takes the "outsiders" of Ian, Barbara, Susan and the Doctor to teach the Thals to stand up for themselves -- gotta love that whiff of old-fashioned colonial attitude there. And when the Thals state that they would simply retreat if the Daleks attacked Ian and Barbara are rather horrified by the idea... this of course being a clumsy and thinly veiled attack on former British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain who went down in infamy for taking an appeasement approach to Nazi Germany. Viewers are also hammered with the idea that the Daleks hate the Thals for no good reason -- merely a dislike of "the Other" -- which is, again, an overly simplistic view of the practices of Nazi Germany. Although Nation was trying to put forth the dangers of radical fascism and the need to oppose them to children the message is sent home with rather more force than is required even for kids to get the idea.

There is one scene which, despite being as heavy handed as the rest, which still manages to soar with some lovely moral ambiguity and that is the scene in which the time travelers discuss getting the Thals to help them. Ian and Susan take the ground that it isn't right to ask the Thals to die for them and the Doctor and (surprisingly) Barbara take a more practical view that if they don't ask the Thals for help them they are condemning themselves to die or at the very least to being stranded on the planet for the rest of their lives. There is actually a good moral discussion here as it is pointed out that Ian and the Doctor have a moral duty to those in their charge but at the same time they also have a moral duty to not try to coerce the Thals into giving up their lives for something that will not benefit them.

For their part, the actors playing the Thals also get their meatiest moments around this discussion. There is something that actually feels rather right in their clinging to pacifism and even when they decide to go to war they do so with caution and deliberation rather than anger or vengeance.

It really is a bit of a shame, though, that almost all of the really interesting stuff -- the characterizations, fascinating dialogue, and moral discussions all come right smack in the middle of the serial... and most of the rest of the serial is like watching someone play a video game.

No, seriously, I realized it as I was watching the last two parts of the serial -- the whole thing seems like the levels of a video game... only with some really boring dialogue. And therein lies the second and third problems with this story -- it's formulaic and padded. Even with only one serial in existence before this one a pattern is starting to emerge -- our heroes get captured, our heroes escape, our heroes have to return to their captors, our heroes have to solve a problem or put a wrong right then they can leave. The trek to the Dalek city that Ian, Barbara and the Thals have to make leading up to the climax of this story really adds nothing to the overall tale. It provides some action/adventure bits but aside from that it doesn't really give us anything new about the Thals or about Ian and Barbara or even the Doctor and Susan. "The Daleks" ended up stretching for seven episodes and the padding quite frankly shows. Entire episodes where our heroes are stuck in a Dalek cell doing little but rehashing the stuff we already know or have already been shown (usually the rule is "show don't tell" or "tell don't show" the rule is never "tell and show"), entire episodes that don't really add anything to the overall story, etc. "The Daleks" probably could have been a really excellent four part story, maybe five parts but at seven parts it overstays it's welcome by far.

There are some other things which help offset the plotting problems. For one, while some of the special effects are not the best in the world the set designers really did a good job with the Dalek city. The low, asymmetrical doorways tell viewers immediately that the inhabitants of this city are not human in shape. They also lead to a palpable feeling of claustrophobia -- a sense that our heroes are trapped even before they really end up trapped. There is also some nice model work and the costumes for the Thals seem nicely alien. And the Daleks. Ah yes, the Daleks. Now, after the passage of all this time, it's rather impossible to imagine them looking or sounding any other way, really. For the time period, however, the design was quite revolutionary and looked like nothing else out there... and probably inspired many a mock Dalek battle at the dinner table using salt and pepper shakers.

Overall, while "The Daleks" definitely holds a place in Who history it suffers from the passage of time and too much padding. Still, there are some really great moments here and it is interesting to see the origins of the show's most iconic monsters. I'd say definitely give this one a watch... but keep the remote control handy to fast forward through the boring parts.

Grab Bag Reviews: "Enlightenment"

Ah, so this one is a little late. It just took a little while to get through a lot of the DVD extras... and I have to say that this release is really packed with a number of extras which add to the flavor of the story.

"Enlightenment" is a bit of an odd story in a couple of ways. For one thing, despite the fact that Doctor Who began under a woman producer and those early days and points thereafter saw several women directors, the show didn't have a script written by a woman until this serial in 1983. For another thing, the show's script editor at the time, Eric Saward, had expressed a preference for stories which were more firmly science fiction rather than science fantasy and "Enlightenment" would prove to be almost entirely fantasy and allegory.

There was quite a bit going on for Doctor Who when Barbara Clegg's initial script idea came in. Producer Jonathan Nathan-Turner (yep, it's J N-T time again!) and Saward had been recently mining the history of the show for story ideas and they had hit upon bringing back the White and Black Guardians from the Tom Baker years, choosing to have the Black Guardian finally seeking his revenge against the Doctor. To cement the plot they even had the original actors reprise their roles -- Cyril Luckham as the White Guardian and Valentine Dyall as the Black Guardian. At the same time, J N-T had come to the conclusion that the character of Nyssa (played by actress Sarah Sutton) had run her course and wanted to replace her with a new companion during the 1982-1983 season.

Back when the character of Adric was being developed for Tom Baker's last season the idea was to create a character who was an "Artful Dodger" type -- a charming thief with a bit of the con artist to him as well. That changed before the character was finally brought to the page but J N-T never quite let go of the idea of having a companion who was less than pure as the driven snow.

In the 1982-1983 season J N-T finally got his wish. Enter Turlough.

Turlough was to be a young alien who had been exiled to Earth for reasons which remained mysterious up until the character's swan song. While still not the "Artful Dodger" type Turlough was definitely not the usual fare for the Doctor's companions. A weasel who tended to blame others for his own mistakes and was perfectly willing to rat people out in order to save his own skin. Young actor Mark Strickson was hired for the role and while he had a certain amount of leeway in the interpretation of the character the broad strokes were already set. J N-T and Saward also tied the character directly in with the Black Guardian.

As the season started to draw to a close in the spring of 1983 it was decided to wrap up the Black Guardian story arc and wrap up Turlough's character arc at the same time. This resulted in three serials which have collectively become known as "The Black Guardian Trilogy". The arc began with "Mawdryn Undead", continued in "Terminus" and then Barbara Clegg was asked to wrap everything up with her story "Enlightement". This meant that she had to add extra elements to her original story idea.

With all of this, did Clegg's story rise to the challenge of fitting in all of the required elements and telling a good story at the same time? Let's take a look....

The Plot: The Doctor, sent on a cryptic mission by the White Guardian, lands the TARDIS on an Edwardian era racing yacht. All is not as it seems, however, as the yacht is one of several boats from different time periods all racing... though space! The race proves to be a contest of powerful, immortal beings known as Eternals. The Eternals, however, lack original thought and imagination and so have picked up Earthlings to crew the ships. Their minds clouded and drugged the Eternals are free to plunder the humans' imaginations to give themsleves life and shape.

Every race has a prize though and in the case that prize is "enlightenment" -- ultimate knowledge. The Doctor must make sure that no eternal wins the race and claims the prize because ultimate knowledge combined with the Eternals' near-limitless power would spell disaster. But how can the Doctor hobble a race that is happening in space? And how does sone beat immortal beings which can read even a Time Lord's thoughts?

As if that were not enough, the Doctor's compaions have their own struggles. Tegan finds herself the recipient of unwanted and unwelcome attention from one of the Eternals and Turlough learns that, when dealing with the Black Guardian, failure can be fatal.

Only one thing is certain in this game... there will be triumph and loss and the losses may be very grave indeed.

My Take: "Enlightenment" is a very deceptive story. Reading the synopsis above it sounds as thought there is a lot involved here and yet, while watching the story, nothing ever seems really confusing. The plot sweeps you up and carries you along with the tide... the solar tide in this case.
Barbara Clegg's script really brings back something that had begun to disappear from the stories around this time period... magic. The scripts had lost a lot of that soaring sense of wonder which captured fans' hearts in the first place. "Enlightenment" gives viewers back that amazement and does so in a story that breaks many of the established "rules" for the series.

For one thing, the Eternals are pretty much literally magical beings. Oh sure, the script never calls them that and there are some off-hand remarks about the Eternals being cosmic entities but the truth is quite clear... we're pretty much dealing with gods here in the mythical sense.

Then there is the fact that the Eternals are not your typical villains for Doctor Who. Captain Striker and Marriner of the Edwaardian racing yacht are creepy, yes, but overall hospitable and even helpful to the Doctor and his companions... when it suits them. The closest thing to a normal villain is the pirate ship's captain -- Wrack. Even at that her motivations are simple and eerily immature. Unlike other villains who have appeared on the series she does not seek to conquer Earth or part of the universe or the galaxy. She doesn't want to rule over people, nor does she hate other beings and want to see them destroyed or assimilated. She does not want to colonize other worlds either. Instead, all she wants is to relieve her boredom. All she wants is the power to entertain herself. It is the Eternal's lack of scale and context, their inability to understand compassion, and their superiority which make them dangerous. They seem less "evil" and more like a three year old with a potentially loaded handgun... only on a cosmic scale.

This ties into the allegory that Clegg was making in her story. At one point the Black Guardian says that the Eternals have no understanding of good and evil but that enlightenment will change that. This is obviously a metaphor for the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden from the biblical story in Genesis.

Clegg even goes farther -- painting them not just devoid of understanding of basic morality and compassion but also showing them to be completely devoid of original thought. They have lived so long and lost so much, or never had it to begin with, that they actually need Ephemerals so that they can raid their minds for new ideas and to give themselves shape, form, and something at feels at least a little like real life.

This theme also is highlighted in Tegan's character story with the Eternal, Marriner. She is disconcerted by his lack of humanity and disturbed by his ability to read minds but at the same time there is a kind of twisted romance to the plot. Marriner seems to woo Tegan with many of the words and forms which are usually used in romances but he does not understand love -- his focus is instead about living vicariously through Tegan's thoughts. Women have long been heard to say that they want a man who is interested in them for their minds but Clegg turns that into something literal here... and it comes off as cold and creepy and even more inhuman.

If there is a real villainous figure here it is the Black Guardian and his feature in Turlough's character arc also contains some religious/moral overtones. There are elements of Faust> in the tale as Turlough comes to regret his bargain as he realizes near death that evil simply doesn't care. This throws the Doctor into the position of the agent of good in offering rescue and forgiveness.

All is not perfect with the script, however. Despite the fact that Clegg says on the DVD extras that she was familiar with the character of Tegan her writing doesn't really capture that character well. The bold, spirited woman is really missing here and in her place is a character who is timid and unusually frightened in this situation.

There are a few other problems as well... mostly with the performances. Valentine Dyall's his first appearance as the character in 1979 lasted something less than five minutes so it was hard to see how he would have played the character back then. Reprising the role in 1983 he had a greater opportunity to flesh things out... and not always in a good way. To be fair, his rich, dark, voice was perfect for the character and he is obviously having a ball playing it but he's having a bit too much fun. Dyall overplays nearly every scene he's in. In point of fact on more than one occasion he actually laughs with one of the most staged, over-the-top, supervillain style laughs I've ever heard (and I grew up watching the Superfriends so that should tell you something). He actually goes "Nyaha-ha-ha-ha-ha". At that point you just can't help bursting out laughing and there goes every drop of menace the character is supposed to exhude out the window.

The other over-the-top perpetrator here is Mark Strickson. Overall, Stickson honestly did a good job with Turlough. Strickson's own long, thin face was perfect for conveying the character's weasely, cowardly nature and most of the time he perfectly pitched the character's superiority complex and snide nature. In his scenes with Dyall here, though, he not only dials the angst up to 11 he rips the knob off and blasts it into outer space. It really takes all of the steam out of the scenes.

A lot of people also like to complain about the character of Captain Wrack as played by Lynda Baron claiming that she, too is over the top. I suppose she is... a little... but I actually find her portrayal not that disconcerting. It is theatrical but it is also coming from a character which seems naturally theatrical -- someone who adores spectacle and who relishes playing to every trope and stereotype she can find.

There is some padding to the script as well but it isn't necessarily all that noticeable -- particularly thanks to the set designers and costumers who really went to town for this story. "Enlightenment" was entirely studio filmed -- no outside recording at all -- and yet you really don't notice it. Unlike other studio-bound stories this one never feels claustrophobic or like it's spinning it's wheels in the same corridors. The sets really make the audience feel like they are looking at the cabins and corridors of actual sailing ships. The costumes are equally authentic (well, mostly, and even when they aren't precisely authentic they are, at least, stylish) and both costumes and sets have weathered the passage of time well. The same can't be said of the special effects but even then the show was at least trying to push the limits of their special effects budget at the time and they aren't that bad.

But this brings us to the biggest and flashiest extra on this DVD set... A whole new cut of the story with updated special effects designed and envisioned by the original director of the story. Make no mistake about it, the new special effects really are spiffy (except a few which don't come off very well) and help flush out certain parts of the story. There are also a few new musical cues added which are appropriately grandiose and epic and add to the scale but there is another cost to this... there are scenes cut. Some of the scenes are quite rightly cut -- not really adding anything to the action -- but there are other scenes which actually detract from some of the color of the characters and even, in one case, character development. For example, a scene between the Doctor and Turlough which starts to show the idea that Turlough has changed enough that earning the Doctor's disapproval actually bothers him is cut in the special edition. Because of this both the original and the special editions have their positives and negatives but one cannot be said to be superior to the other. Watch and enjoy both.

And "Enlightenment" definitely goes on my list of "Doctor Who stories which everyone should see". It is filled with intriguing ideas and concepts, it breaks out of the standard mold for the series and it provides some nice character developments all told within a highly entertaining and imaginative story.