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 Daleks Master Plan"

As I've said before, since it's inception Doctor Who has had problems with scripts and schedules... they can never quite get them balanced. And it was scheduling problems which led to the production team coming up with the bright idea of creating a massive, epic story... and said epic was to create precedents and controversy.

Perhaps the first thing that needs to be said is that, for all intents and purposes, "The Daleks Master Plan" is actually a 13 part story rather than a 12 part one. A single-episode story was created as a kind of prologue to "The Daleks Master Plan" -- making it the first and only stand alone story in the show's history until the program was relaunched in 2005. It also still stands today as the only episode in which neither the Doctor nor any of his companions appear. The prologue was originally created under the working title "The Dalek Cutaway" but when it aired it went out with the official title "Mission to the Unknown". There are some fans and sources out there who still refer to it under the "Cutaway" title.

Interestingly, the prologue aired only to be followed by the four part comedy-adventure-historical "The Myth Makers" instead of having "The Daleks Master Plan" air directly afterwards. "The Myth Makers" marked the departure of Maureen O'Hara who played companion Vicki and the introduction of Adrienne Hill as the new companion, handmaiden of Troy Katarina.

When the BBC released "The Daleks Master Plan" as an audio drama, however, they included "Mission to the Unknown" as the opening -- further proving that, for all intents and purposes, "The Daleks Master Plan" is a 13 part serial and "Mission to the Unknown" is really the first episode.

As "The Daleks Master Plan" started so would the precedent and controversy. Although Hill was chosen and written into the role the producer soon came to think better of the decision. Worried that a character who came from an archaic time would not fit in he told Terry Nation, who was writing "The Daleks Master Plan" to write the character out and insert a temporary female companion who would accompany the Doctor through the rest of the story. There is, therefore, some question of whether or not Katarina counts as a companion. Many fans and official sources from the BBC Doctor Who office tend not to include the character on official companion lists since she did not continue to travel with the Doctor and, in fact, did not even finish out one adventure. Other fans, however, usually claim that anyone who assists the Doctor and travels in the TARDIS is a companion. It is certainly true that the way in which Katarina was introduced to viewers put her clearly in the "companion" category. Had Katarina continued the character would have been the first companion to come from the past rather than the present or the future. As it stood, the first companion to come from the past would be the Second Doctor's stalwart Jamie McCrimmon and the Second Doctor would become the first and only Doctor to travel with two companions who were both from the past. But I digress...

Terry Nation, the creator of the Daleks, had been up to that point the one who had written all of the Dalek stories. Having seen the popularity of his creations he had hopes of developing a spin-off series featuring the Daleks. He soon saw this story as a chance to develop some of his ideas and see how they worked. His original concept for the Dalek series was that there would be agents of a "Space Security Service" who would be the protagonists and oppose the Daleks nefarious schemes. These Space Security Service Agents would be like futuristic James Bonds (in "Mission to the Unknown" Agent Mark Cory even says "Licensed to kill"). To that end Nation introduced three SSS Agents over the course of the story -- Mark Cory, Brett Vyon and Sarah Kingdom. Interestingly, Brett Vyon would be played by Nicholas Courtney in his first Doctor Who role but certainly not his last. Sarah Kingdom was Nation's idea for a 'replacement' female companion and he took his inspiration from the butt-kicking character of Cathy Gale from The Avengers TV series. Nation wanted to introduce a more modern, tougher model for female companions and he had hoped that she would become an ongoing companion but the producer did not take the bait.

Sarah Kingdom, like Katarina, would become one of those characters who are questionably companions. Kingdom (mostly) finished out an adventure with the Doctor and did get to travel in the TARDIS but she did not get to go on traveling with the Doctor. As a result some people claim her others do not.

The final bit of controversy surrounding the story comes from the 7th episode. With the 12 part story it was quickly realized that the seventh installment would actually air on Christmas Day. In Great Britain, unlike here in the United States, it was quite common for TV shows to have new episodes on Christmas Day (here we get re-runs and specials. Bleh.) so it was decided to make the Christmas Day episode a comedy romp befitting the season. There were some, at the time, who apparently felt the jar in tone but really it has been the years after which has seen the single episode take such a hit. Many people really, actively hate this installment for it's light-hearted silliness and feel that it ruins the tone of the rest of the story as a whole. I don't agree but we'll get to that in a minute.

Because of the BBC's policy of wiping tapes when no longer seen as useful (a subject I covered in my review of "The Moonbase") out of all 13 episodes on three full installments and a few clips exist anymore today. Thankfully, however, the audio was saved by fans and the BBC cleaned it up, remastered it, and then released the story as an audio drama with actor Peter Purves, who played companion Steven, providing descriptive narration; which is what I've used for this review.

Now, on with the plot!

The Plot: The Doctor and his companions stumble into the middle of a plot by the Daleks to conquer all of space -- starting with Earth's solar system. Forming an alliance of power-hungry aliens, the Daleks have solidified their position and are ready to attack. Among this alliance is even the Guardian of the Solar System, Mavic Chen, willing to sell out his own human race in the quest for more power.

The Doctor and his friends and allies race through space and time, pursued by many enemies, hoping all the time to find a way of putting an end to the Daleks' plot. If the Doctor does not succeed humanity will fall first and then other alien planets will follow. Even if the Doctor does succeed what will the cost be to himself and those who fight beside him?

My Take: The new series, since the relaunch in 2005, has tried to give each series finale an epic feel and/or scope -- battles with the Daleks, rounding up all the Doctor's companions to fight together, facing down the Master, facing down the Time Lords, etc. But in a way it could never quite reach the kind of epic this story did simply because of the constraints of time.

The length of this story means that we as the audience really get to know these characters well. The villains become more and more villainous and we can trace Mavic Chen's descent into madness and delusion and we become closer to our heroes as well to the point where the deaths of characters make impact. In the end, when Steven mournfully names off their dead friends and allies it really tugs at the heartstrings.

It is true that there is a LOT of padding here. With this many episodes how could there not be? There is a detour to the planet Desperus that serves no purpose except to set up for the death of Katarina and there is another detour to ancient Egypt that serves no purpose period. The TARDIS team travels by spaceship and TARDIS all over the galaxy and through time until the viewer (or in this case listener) gets lost and dizzy.

The padding, though, is at least entertaining padding for the most part. The Doctor's old enemy from "The Time Meddler", the Time Lord known as 'the Monk' (played by comedy actor Peter Butterworth), makes an appearance here and, just as with "The Time Meddler" he and the Doctor play against each other beautifully -- conning and conniving around one another -- setting up plots and traps and then reversing them on one another. Even the notorious 7th episode is actually a lot of fun. It's played for comedy and all of the actors involved seem to have a blast -- particularly when they land in 1920's Hollywood and run rampant on a movie studio. Yes, the tone change is a bit jarring but after six episodes of desperation, dirty dealing and death the 7th comes as a needed breath of fresh air to relieve some of the unrelenting darkness of the story.

and then there is that darkness... While Doctor Who stories have had and continue to have their share of character deaths this story gives us some of the most deaths of what are really main characters... and most of those deaths are not really through enemy action either which adds an extra layer of tragedy Katarina and Sarah sacrifice themselves for the Doctor and Brett is the victim of Sarah's devotion to duty which causes her to never question her orders. As I mentioned earlier, Katarina was introduced to the audience in such a way as it was logical to assume that she was going to be the replacement companion for Vicki. I can only imagine how shocking it was, then, to viewers at the time to see her die. It was, probably, the first real time a 'companion' of the Doctor's died and it brought home this idea that traveling with the Doctor could be fatally dangerous.

There is also a slight theme of anarchy here. Mavic Chen gets away with murder because everyone is conditioned to follow the authority figure and never question anything. Rules and regulations throughout the story cause turmoil and troubles and are shown to be useless and even in many cases favoring the villains. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Steven are agents of chaos. They do not follow orders, they disobey rules and conventions, they do not kowtow to authority figures, and they pass these attitudes on to others such as Brett and Sarah.

The cast on the whole does an excellent job. Admittedly, Hill's Katarina is somewhat weak sauce. It is understandable that she would be somewhat wide-eyed and innocent but there is a vocal quality she throws into it that makes her sound like a four year-old instead of as a bewildred and awestruck adult. Jean Marsh's Sarah Kingdom is perfectly pitched as she deals with the impossibilites of the Doctor's life and moves from there -- driven all the while by her detrmination to save her home planet and see Chen punished for his trechery. Nicholas Courtney is... well, his Brett Vyon is a bit like his Brigadier only shorter on charm and humor. One does have to love the scene where he tells the Doctor to shut-up much to the Doctor's surprise. Kevin Stoney also makes a lovely bad guy. As far as Doctor Who was concerned, though, he got a little typecast. He appeared in the series a total of three times (the last of those times almost unrecognizable under heavy make-up and prthestics as an alien) with the second appearance being in the Second Doctor story "The Invasion" playing a VERY similar character to Mavic Chen. This, being his first outing, though, has the benefit of originality as he schemes and tries to spin his failures into victories and eventually descends to delusion and madness. For the regular cast William Hartnell is at the top of his game. There are a few blown lines but overall, Hartnell dashes through the script making his Doctor determined, arrogant, funny, witty, defeated, clever, and more by turns. When delivering his dramatic lines his voice rolls like thunder with authority and you are again reminded why, no matter which incarnation, the Doctor is not one to be triffled with. Peter Purves as Steven also gets a chance to really sink his teeth into this story. Purves character of Steven has always been a bit of a departure. Despite being on the series to handle the action sequences the Doctor could not the character has never been depicted as much of a fighter. Instead, Steven was a more sensitive soul. It may have been an odd tack to take but it worked surprisingly well with the character making the more emotional appeals and feeling rather protective of his fellow travelers. It is Steven as the emotional compass who suffers the most of the survivors and provides the sobering conclusion to the adventure.

While the extreme length of the story and some of the back and forth through time and space and oh-so-convenient plot points work against it "The Daleks Master Plan" really does deserve the title "epic". Even the fact that it is in audio format does not hurt it that much as the descriptive narration works with the surviving audio and lets the listener paint the action in their head... a place where there are no wobbly sets or poor special effects. If you're someone who has a long commute or takes driving trips or likes to listen to things at work then "The Daleks Master Plan" is well worth checking out. You can be entertained for hours immersing yourself into a Doctor Who adventure that engages your imagination instead of just your eyes.

Grab Bag Reviews: "The Ghosts of N-Space"

Doctor Who "died" in 1989 when the show was officially put on hiatus but for all practical purposes cancelled. Like a monster in a horror movie though it kept rising from its grave.... Only without all the gore. Or the slaughtering of sexually active teenagers. And with the Doctor not being a monster. Or evil.... Okay, so it isn't the best metaphor but you get the drift.

In 1993 Barry Letts, who had been producer for most of Jon Pertwee's tenure, was tapped to write a whole new audio adventure. Here in America audio dramas had died out in the late 1940's to early 1950's as TV began to supplant radio. In Great Britain, however, the tradition held on and in fact is alive and very well still today. These are generally high-quality productions with full casts and audio effects which air on radio stations. For this 1993 story Letts adapted an idea he had for a Third Doctor script which was never produced in the 1970's. The finished audio drama was title "Paradise of Death" and featured Jon Pertwee, Elizabeth Sladen, and Nicholas Courtney all reprising their roles as the Doctor, Sarah Jane Smith and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart respectively.

The story proved popular enough that Letts ended up writing a second audio drama, "The Ghosts of N-Space" which was broadcast in 1995. Again Pertwee, Sladen and Courtney reprised their roles. It would be the last time Pertwee played the Doctor as he would pass away several months later.

Both of these audio stories were supposed to be set during Pertwee's original run in the 1970's -- somewhere between the TV stories "The Time Warrior" and "Planet of the Spiders". "The Ghosts of N-Space" can be further pinpointed as taking place somewhere between "Death to the Daleks" and "Planet of the Spiders" since Sarah Jane mentions recently running up against the Daleks here.

The Plot: The Brigadier takes some personal time when he is summoned to Italy by a distantly related uncle. Upon arrival he learns that the uncle, owner of a small island off the coast of Sicily and the Castillo on the island, is having trouble from an American mob boss, Max Vilmio, who wants the island and everything on it and will stop at nothing to get it. The Brig also discovers that the Castillo is haunted by a ghost and now plagued by demonic creatures! Concerned, the Brig calls the Doctor to come and investigate.

Meanwhile, Sarah Jane Smith, deciding to give up journalism and write a novel, has traveled to Italy with her friend and former co-worker Jeremy Fitzoliver. When she spies the Brig she and Jeremy decide to follow him and soon become embroiled in the events at the Castillo.

The Doctor discovers that sometime in the past someone opened a rift between our dimension and a limbo dimension known as N-Space. N-Space is populated by demonic creatures and the spirits of the dead who do not "cross over". He reveals that they need to uncover when the rift was first opened and seal it otherwise it will soon open wide and unleash the demonic denizens of N-Space into the world.

As the Doctor and Sarah Jane travel back and forth in time they uncover tragic events in the Castillo's past and learn that Vilmio is more than what he seems and far more dangerous than could ever be imagined. Simultaneously, in the present, the Brig, his uncle, Jeremy, and a rag-tag group of defenders try to prepare for an attack by Vilmio and his men. If they fail the consequences will be catastrophic.

My Take: I really do hate to say something bad about a Doctor Who story. I'm no Precious Pollyanna but I usually try to offer constructive criticisms or at least find some good amidst something bad but THIS story... Oh, this is one of the worst stories ever written. Where do I start?!

As an audio drama there are no sets, costumes, camera work or visual effects to critique. On the flip side, though, voices are key to a good audio production. And the voices here are not great.

Pertwee does a good job and, surprisingly, age has not taken a really noticeable toll on his voice. There are a few places where one can tell his voice is not quite what it was but those moments are few and far between. Sladen, likewise, does a solid job although a few times she really over-plays a scene. Courtney, like Pertwee, does not seem to suffer too badly from age and he turns in a very even performance.

That, however, is the last of the good that can be said about the voices. The actor playing the Brig's uncle puts on the most broad, over-the-top, stereotypical Italian accent I've heard outside of Chico Marx.... only Chico was funny.

Also, I had actually thought it was impossible to create a really offensive American accent... I no longer think that. This story doesn't just produce one it produces TWO! Max Vilmio is a children's cartoon villain -- a caricature of a 1930's mobster and as such he cannot be taken seriously and never becomes much of a real threat. He's certainly not the calibre of the usual Doctor Who villains. The second bad accent award goes to the actress playing Vilmio's girlfriend, Maggie. Her also cartoonish, stereotypical, Brooklyn accent just grates on your nerves after 5 seconds. The other voice actors are not bad, just either really too earnest or too bland.

And then there is the script. Urg. The script... First of all, the characters just don't work as a whole. Vilmio, as I stated, never really becomes the menace he's supposed to be. Most of the 'tragic' characters in the past are either fluff-brained idiots or cardboard cut-outs so it is impossible to feel anything for their fate even though we are obviously supposed to. Fitzoliver, who Letts introduced in "Paradise of Death" is a perfect little idiot who is obviously meant to provide some comic relief... but of course he isn't funny and the script itself is so unintentionally funny it doesn't NEED comic relief. Most of the characters are as thin as paper dolls and the little depth we get is more like a 'drive by shooting' characterization. For example, there is a moment between Maggie and Jeremy after Maggie saves his life and we learn about her tragic, abusive childhood and the fact that she has long lived with the uncertain guilt that she might have caused the death of her abusive father. And then very quickly the moment is over, nothing more is said about the incident and Maggie's characterization doesn't change at all.

Even the regular cast does not fare too well as the independent-minded Sarah Jane Smith becomes a bit too much of an old-fashioned female companion with quite a bit of screaming, overemotionalism, and a ridiculous amount of reliance on the Doctor for everything. The Doctor spouts nonsense that is too much like spiritualism for the scientific Doctor. The Brigadier, someone who was usually skeptical of the Doctor's scientific theories, here swallows a load of guff that more like magic than science.

And that brings us to another problem. As I've said before, Doctor Who has long played more in the realm of science-fantasy than science-fiction but this story throws out the 'science' part of the science-fantasy and gives us pure fantasy. Oh, Letts makes some half-hearted attempt to dress things up in a little technobabble but it is thin and doesn't work at all. No matter what the whole story is filled with ghosts, poltergeists, alchemists, demons, hell, purgatory, and astral projection. I've got nothing against such subject matter in fiction... but it doesn't belong in Doctor Who plain and simple and it especially doesn't belong in a Third Doctor story.

The Italian setting serves no real purpose as it does not seem to add anything to the story and, aside from the Brig's Uncle Mario and a couple of supporting characters everyone else is either a terrible American or sounds a proper Brit. Plus, the script has to jump through hoops to give the Brig, a proud Scotsman, an Italian uncle.

There are also entirely too many coincidences. Huge points of the plot revolve around coincidences and Letts even tries to cover for these by introducing the ideas of serendipity and synchronicity to the story but it doesn't work. The amount of conveniences and coincidences required to make everything work stretch credulity until it snaps like a 20 year-old rubber band and on top of that it smacks of lazy or uninspired writing.

And, as a personal nitpick, there is a little swearing here which is just disconcerting because it doesn't feel like it suits the rest of the story. There is also a point where Vilmio calls Maggie a "dumb polack" in an ethnic slur which really goes beyond the pale.

Audio drama should have been a perfect fit for something like Doctor Who since it allows a script to be unfettered by the limitations of budget and special effects. A simple basic description and the listener can let their own imagination create the costumes and the sets and the special effects -- it's the cheapest type of production imaginable, the human mind is. And this, in particular, should have been a treat by bringing together Pertwee, Courtney and Sladen twenty years after they left the roles and giving fans an extra dose of the Third Doctor. Instead it all falls apart and dissolves into a mess. There is an extra layer of disappointment here as well since it was Pertwee's last turn as the Doctor. One can't help but wish he had gone out on a triumphant note.

Unless you are an ultra-fan or a completist it is best to just skip this story. Since the story has never officially been recognized as Doctor Who canon it's safe to just pretend like "The Ghosts of N-Space" never existed.

Grab Bag Reviews: "Battlefield"

The Seventh Doctor's era was the swan song for the series for about 15 years (sort-of). The era had actually started somewhat badly with Colin Baker's tenure seeing ratings tumbling and Baker himself taking a lot of the heat for the failure. When Baker was fired from the job the production team sought out a new actor to play the Doctor. They found Sylvester McCoy -- a Shakespearean trained actor who happened, at the time, to be doing mostly a quasi-vaudeville revue. Originally his version of the Doctor was to be seen as somewhat befuddled -- dropping malapropisms everywhere. By the time "Battlefield" rolled around, however, this characterization was dropped for a version of the Doctor who used a disarming exterior to hide the fact that he was actually a master manipulator and schemer with something of a dark side. Sadly, ratings were still below where the BBC wanted them and there were those within the company who were sharpening their knives to cut it out no matter what.

At the time "Battlefield" was filmed the production team had heard rumblings that the series might be put on hiatus or even cancelled outright but they made the decision to continue on as if expecting to be renewed for the next season. At least they did for the most part. The opening sequence in the TARDIS is notably dark and sharp-eyed viewers will notice that there seems to be something wrong with the TARDIS walls. This is because the "walls" are, in fact, painted sheets. The set walls had been damaged and the production team opted not to have the expense of re-building them as the remaining scripts in the season didn't really call for much in the way of TARDIS interior shots.

As it happened, it was during the next story in production, "Survival" that the team learned that they would be allowed to finish out the season and then would be put on "hiatus". Most of the cast and crew believed that the so-called "hiatus" would be permanent. They were more or less right.

The story is also rather a tribute to the Third Doctor's era, with the inclusion of UNIT (United Nations Intelligence Task Force, complete with the blue berets this time), Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, and even the Third Doctor's yellow roadster nicknamed 'Bessie'.

The Plot: The Doctor and his young companion, Ace, receive a strange distress call and land on Earth sometime in the near future after 1988. Also summoned to Earth by the call are two groups of knights from a parallel dimension where the rise and fall of Camelot were rather more real. One group proves loyal to King Arthur while the other group are followers of the sorceress Morgaine. With a mixture of magic of futuristic technology these two forces pick a new battlefield and await the restoration of King Arthur. Adding to the commotion, a UNIT force is in the area trying to relieve a nuclear missile convoy which got off the road and bogged down near a lake. When the Doctor shows up UNIT immediately calls in a retired Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and he joins a new Brigadier -- Winifred Bambera. The forces in this war are small but the stakes are incredibly high. If the Doctor cannot stop the fighting then the planet itself may become a barren cinder.

My Take: I have to admit, when I was younger I thought "Battlefield" was a bit of a sub-par story. It seemed a bit too trite and a little too self-referential and self-reverent of the show's own past. Upon watching it again I find that I was more than a bit harsh on it.

I also have to say that the Seventh Doctor's era had the version of the theme song that I hate the most. It's too.... 'fiddly'.

It should be mentioned that this DVD comes with two copies of the episode -- the original as broadcast and a second version with some cut scenes added back in, enhanced visual effects and sound effects and all of the episode breaks taken out so the whole thing plays like a two-hour movie.

Getting down to brass tacks... The story itself is a mix of good and bad things. This new version of UNIT displays a rather conscious effort to put the U.N. in UNIT and while the diversity is nice it also feels a little bit forced with a French helicopter pilot, a Polish second-in-command, and at least one Czech officer as well. Fans were probably surprised to hear characters talking about "The Brigadier" and then not only NOT having Lethbridge-Stewart appear on the screen but have it actually be a black woman. Angela Bruce as Bambera is one of the best things about the new UNIT. She's tough and smart but without being annoying and is a shot in the arm for Women's equality. She also proves herself a capable leader and a capable warrior as well.

The plot is a bit of a mix and yet, somehow it all hangs together. It is a study on war and peace and honor in battle and yet manages to tack on an anti-nuclear polemic that actually works, as nuclear weapons are framed as a coward's weapon -- a killing without honor. There is also a sub-plot of the Doctor's future catching up with him. To the denizens from the alternate dimension the Doctor is known as "Merlin" but as the Doctor tells Ace, he is not Merlin... yet. But he might be someday. For now though, there are characters who know of his possible future while that future remains shrouded in mystery for him. It's a bit of the Timey-Wimeyness that Steven Moffat has gone back to in the recent series. On top of all that, the extended version of the story has another running plot of Ace and the Brigadier butting heads as Lethbridge-Stewart's old-fashioned attitude toward women tends to rankle Ace and she also feels that being the Doctor's companion is HER job now, not the Brig's.

The writer, Ben Aaronovitch, had intended to kill Lethbridge-Stewart in the story but in the end just couldn't do it. In a way this worked out for the best because fans have gotten to keep the old Brig around (and Courtney has reprised his role in a couple of Doctor Who audio stories as well as an episode of the spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures) and in addition it actually becomes a surprise. The foreshadowing of the Brig's death is so sledgehammer obvious that we expect it and then find the tables turned on us!

The dialogue has some real triumphs. Great, quotable lines and sequences with a real Shakespearean flair. There are also moments, though, when things fall down. There is a lot of name dropping of Third Doctor friends and enemies which serve no purpose in the story other than to have their names dropped. It seems very forced and awkward when it happens.

The characters are also, on the whole, a delight. Angela Bruce has great chemistry with Marcus Gilbert, the actor playing the knight Ancelyn, and Gilbert infuses the role with charm and humor... and he's pretty easy on the eyes too so there's that. Nicholas Courtney had reprised his role as the Brigadier twice during the Fifth Doctor's era and here he slips back into it as easily as putting on a comfortable pair of shoes. Jean Marsh, who was a Doctor Who veteran turns in a surprisingly unexpected turn as Morgaine. At times she is a straightforward baddie but then she can turn on a dime and transform Morgaine into a concerned parent or inject pathos into a scene so that we actually feel sorry for the character. The actor playing Mordred, though... well, he does the best he can with the role but many of his lines are written so very over-the-top and his part is nothing but a 2 dimensional villain without any of Morgaine's twists.

The regular cast of Sophie Aldred as Ace and Sylvester McCoy as the Doctor turn in great performances. In particular, Aldred does a good job at showing Ace making a friend in a girl close to her own age. It rather points up the normality of such friendships which Ace misses by traveling with the Doctor. McCoy, for his part, brings drama and gravitas and the ability to move easily from a lighthearted attitude to a man you would not want as your enemy.

I don't often mention the music but here I feel I must. Back in the early 1980's the production team dumped series composer Dudley Simpson in order to have all of the show's music produced by the BBC's Radiophonic Workshop -- which was primarily into electronic and synthesizer music. The stuff they create here is sometimes quite good but at other times it is entirely too jaunty and just wrong not only for the scenes but the story itself.

While I do encourage seeing the original story as it aired, the second disk with the enhanced story is a very nice addition. While some of the added scenes somewhat interrupt the flow of the story most of them are really welcome additions. The conflict between Ace and the Brigadier, for example, adds some depth to the story. There are also sequences which help tie the Brig to Morgaine and Ancelyn -- that show the Brig as as old war-horse, who doesn't really like battle but by God when called to fight he will do so with honor... for both the living and the dead.

The enhanced special effects as well as the new sound effects are also helpful. The knights' supposedly futuristic guns which, in the original, only shot silly-looking sparks now have ray beams and many audio effects help fill-in plot holes. the one area I didn't care for it was in one crucial scene where Sylvester McCoy as the Seventh Doctor runs into a battlefield and should to stop the fighting. In the original it is all Sylvester McCoy letting loose with a Shakespearean roar but in the enhanced version an effect is added to McCoy's voice. I much prefer the unadulterated version as the "enhanced" version implies that the Doctor is employing some kind of device or technique to stop the fight where the original makes it clear that the Doctor is doing this just with his sheer personality.

On the whole, even the anti-nuclear message still holds up. While one can still hear some old, Cold War overtones here and there most of the points hold true in our world today. Just as the issues of war and peace and honor also hold true. There is a tribute to the past of the series while looking towards the future, there is charm and excitement and complex characters, great scenes and great dialogue. "Battlefield" is well worth the time.