Manufacturer: Big Finish Productions

Writer: Nicholas Briggs

RRP: £10.99 (CD) / £8.99 (Download)

Release Date: August 2015

Reviewed by: Nick Mellish for Doctor Who Online

“The Doctor reveals to Leela that they’re heading for the planet Telos. And K9 has new masters...

On Telos, in the past, the Second Doctor and Jamie are exploring the ‘tomb of the Cybermen’.

Meanwhile, the Cyber-Controller and Cyber-Planner consolidate their plans. Spare parts from Krelos are being used to construct a mighty Cyber army. The Doctor must be captured.

Out of control, the TARDIS tumbles down a chasm and the Doctor and Leela find themselves caught up in full-scale planetary invasion.”

There is a school of thought that says that big is better, and you can see that in work here: an adventure with the Cybermen! Ah, but let’s go one further: bring in an old companion! But we can do more: make it a sequel to a past adventure! Brilliant. But: no, let’s go further: we can set it during the past adventure! And let’s not just do any old story, no! Let’s set it during a much-loved classic: The Tomb of the Cybermen!

On paper, it probably sells: the Fourth Doctor and Leela meeting Jamie on Telos is a scenario which is going to get a certain type of fan tingling with anticipation, and it’s no great leap to put both Nicholas Briggs and David Richardson in that category seeing as they’ve gone ahead and made this tale.

It’s not the first time that this approach has been taken. We had The Five Companions by Eddie Robson taking place within another story, and it worked really well: it was a neat fit that took advantage of a period within the existing story when it could logically have taken place without too great a pinch of salt.  So, we have previous, and a successful example at that.  You can see why they felt confident enough to go down that road again.  Indeed, we’ve had mixed-up Doctor/Companion tales very recently, too, and sequels to popular stories in the past time and again.  How does it fare here, though?

First things first: the ‘fit’ between new tale and old tale is pretty sloppy, and I’m being generous here.  We get Frazer Hines doing his Troughton impression to try and help gel things, but… well, it sounds good in small doses, but often it just sounds like Frazer Hines pretending to be Patrick Troughton, so the effect is not as seamless as everyone seems to think it is if the Extras to this play are anything to go by.  The fit in with the plot of Tomb itself can conceivably work I suppose, but only at a push and certainly not as smoothly as Robson managed before.  This feels far more like someone desperately trying to squeeze something in than something that clicks; like someone pushing the incorrect part of the jigsaw into the wrong hole. You can make it fit, but it’s a clumsy mess.

Second up: Jamie in a Fourth Doctor story. Now, Jamie seems to continually bump into the ‘wrong’ Doctor whilst facing the Cybermen, so this feels less novel and more old and worn than it should do.  Sadly, again it’s a clumsy fit.  Quite simply, there is no need whatsoever for this tale to take place during Tomb beyond it being set on Telos, which it could be at any time.  It’s been done purely to try and shift CDs and with no regard to the story itself.  We’re looking at quantity over quality with regards to elements here.

Thirdly, the story. Again, it’s pretty poor. Cybermen are nasty to K-9, things happen, technobabble, reset, the end.  It’s dull at best, predictable at worst, and sadly as jaded and boring as the inclusion of Jamie and the notion of setting it within another story.  I understand that Big Finish tend to keep things as they are and the risks are normally minimal and then repeated– the four-by-four format was successful once and so we have it once a year now; a Northern companion worked well, so they’ve been aping Lucie Miller ever since; the false-departure for Charley worked well, so let’s do it again (and again and again…) with Hex! Heck, even the covers tend to stick to a type nowadays and take few risks– but this is about as boring an execution of old tricks that we’ve seen.

We need more, especially after a story in which nothing much happens whatsoever, but what we get here, though it has more incident than Krelos, shows less flair or innovation.  Not a good sign.

More than anything else, this feels like a huge disappointment after how strong this series of The Fourth Doctor Adventures has been.  We’ve had sparks and new things, and then… this.  A story so keen on continuity, it forgets to do anything interesting whatsoever. I really wish Big Finish would stop doing this; it’s utterly without point, and I can’t see who it appeals to.  Certainly not this listener.  I’m only giving it two out of ten because the Cybermen voices are at least pretty good. That’s overly kind of me, though.

 “You will be like us,” say the Cybermen. If that entails being anything like this play, then that is a threat indeed.

Manufacturer: Big Finish Productions

Writer: Nicholas Briggs

RRP: £10.99 (CD) / £8.99 (Download)

Release Date: July 2015

Reviewed by: Nick Mellish for Doctor Who Online

“There are dark skies on Krelos… and something gigantic is descending.

Meanwhile, the Doctor and Leela set off for some fishing in the mountain pools of Krelos. K9 has interfaced with the TARDIS and has reactivated the architectural configuration from the days of the Doctor’s second incarnation. In passing, the Doctor notes it could do with a good clean. And there’s a familiar piece of material snagged on the console.

Far up the mountain, an aged explorer is in trouble. Will the Doctor and Leela be able to save him and his planet? And what is it that K9 has discovered in the TARDIS?”

The Doctor gets up to an awful lot of things when we’re not looking.  We know this from various sources: the Doctor himself, glimpses of downtime in stories such as Midnight, The Romans, Army of Ghosts and Turn Left (it all goes to pot there, but to start with at least, Donna and the Doctor are just having fun exploring an alien market), companions reciting stories not seen on screen (Rose in Boom Town, for example), and the nagging sense that it can’t all be continual peril for the Doctor and his friends, or you wouldn’t go travelling, would you? There are definitely times when the Doctor and his entourage take a break and simply have a good time.

Why, then, have we not seen this in full before? The argument will no doubt be that if nothing much happens, then it’s not going to be the most exciting of tales, but as if that were a gauntlet thrown on the table, Big Finish have decided to try and prove us wrong and The Fate of Krelos is the result.

What happens in this story, then? Well, Leela and the Doctor wander around the TARDIS for a bit and decide to go fishing whilst K-9 is on the blink. They meet the locals and have a jolly.  And that’s it.

It’s a strange tale in that the format actively fights against the story being told.  We need a cliffhanger midway through the tale, one at the end, and a healthy dose of leading-into-the-final-play-this-series-style plot for Return to Telos to work properly. Because Nicholas Briggs, the story’s author, wants to tell a tale where the Doctor and Leela just relax instead of rush around, there is an inherent wrestle between these necessities and Briggs’s desires. So, K-9 is not how he should be but everyone ignores it uncharacteristically because that would kickstart a story.  Likewise, we get a truly horrendous and cringeworthy bit of info-dumping early on where Leela learns about Jamie purely so that she will know who he is come the final play this series. It’s a scene that exists purely to push things forward and stands out all the more than it usually would, such is the lax pace and absence of event surrounding it all.

Things suddenly whirl into action right at the end, again because it is needed by the demands of both Doctor Who as a series and The Fate of Krelos’s position in the running order of this season of adventures. Maybe placed somewhere else other than the penultimate adventure, a tale like this one could have worked, but as it is, we have what would struggle to fit a standard twenty-three-minute-long episode stretched beyond breaking point.

In spite of all this though,I cannot help but admire Briggs for giving this a shot in the first place. Does it work? Not really, but as a one-off experiment, it is at least worthy of merit. The use of Michael Cochrane in the guest cast is a nice touch, too, giving The Fourth Doctor Adventures a sense of continuity with its past (he was brilliant as Colonel Spindleton in the first series) in much the same way that repeated appearances of Bernard Horsfall and his ilk used to do on screen.

Telos beckons now, so hopefully this is but a blip in what has been the best series of adventures for the Fourth Doctor from Big Finish so far. At least Leela knows who Jamie is now… 

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 352: The Web of Fear, Episode Six (Revisited)

Dear diary,

When I first watched this episode, I was a little bit disappointed. Having worked my way through the tangled tunnels of the London Underground, the solution to the story came in as fairly simple on the whole, and very similar to the resolution of The Evil of the Daleks, which hadn’t been all that long ago at the time.

Part of my issue was that the Doctor’s plan in both these stories boiled down to him crossing some wires on the bad guy’s machinery, and taking control of a few ‘foot soldiers’ to do battle for him. I think – as with several elements of these recently recovered stories – being able to see the action has really helped.

Seeing the Yetis turn on each other and begin to fight is actually very effective, and there’s a sense of scale to this episode that’s you don’t really think about when listening to the narrated soundtrack of the story. Until now, only the Covent Garden battle has felt like it escapes the claustrophobia of the tunnels (even the scenes in the Goodge Street bunker have felt cramped and oppressive), but this final episode is filled with a lot more space. Almost as a way of showing this off, they pack the final shots with as many characters as they can – at one point the screen contains the figures of the Doctor, Jamie, Victoria, The Colonel, Anne, Professor Travers, Chorley, and Staff Sergeant Arnold. It’s not the biggest cast we’ve ever had in the show, but it’s a pretty impressive one.

It’s tricky, in this final episode, so say anything much else new or original. I spent six entries praising the story first time around, and all I have to add now is how brilliant the visuals are now that we can properly see them.

If anything, the best thing has simply been the opportunity to watch nine episodes of Patrick Troughton-era Doctor Who that we thought were lost forever. You may have noticed that since The 50 Year Diary reached the 1970s, my average scores have taken a bit of a dip. While I’m enjoying the Pertwee years more than I’d thought I would, it’s still just not doing it for me in the same way that the 1960s episodes did. Getting the chance to dip back into the Troughton years for a bit has been wonderful.

And it’s come along at just the right time. I’m starting to find myself getting a little bit nostalgic for the older episodes again. Maybe it’s having our two former Doctors back again for The Three Doctors the other week, but I’m starting to get a real hankering to watch some of the stories that I’ve already been through. Perhaps oddly, I’m really keen to pop in The Keys of Marinus - and I’ve no idea why!

I’ve absolutely no doubt that there’s more missing episodes out there waiting to be discovered, and that’s all part of the fun.

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Hello all – it’s Will from the future here! For me, it’s Day 374, and I’ve travelled back to tweak this entry, so that you can actually read my revised thoughts on The Web of Fear Episode Five. You see, somehow, this entry of The 50 Year Diary is our very own ‘missing episode’ (and how fitting that it should be for a recently recovered story!)

When I write up the Diary, I do so into an app on my computer designed for diary writing. The idea of it amuses me. The entries are then copied across to the Doctor Who Online website, where they’re formatted, the little sidebar images are added and then they go live for you to see. I go to bed, and when I get up the next morning, it’s time for another episode of Doctor Who.

But somehow, I’ve managed to completely wipe the original posting of this episode. I managed to write over it with another copy of Episode Six. Thankfully, a few readers tweeted and emailed to point out the error, so I headed to my diary app… to find a blank post where Episode Five should be. Lost in the Time Vortex! No idea what I’ve done with it – completely vanished. Luckily, though, all my notes for the episodes are neatly filed away (by which I mean when I run out of room on a bit of paper, I shove it in the cupboard with all the rest), and once you’ve written an entry, you can usually remember what you’d said.

So! With apologies for the delay…

Day 351: The Web of Fear, Episode Five (Revisited)

Dear diary,

The biggest problem with doing a Doctor Who marathon and blogging about it so publicly (The Doctor Who Online News Page receives upwards of 30,000 unique page views every day) is that I can sometimes feel a bit… silly. Not only because - just over 350 days in - I continue to assume that people actually want to read my thoughts on these episodes, but because I sometimes wonder if I should be saying something a bit more meaningful about them. There's several Doctor Who blogs out there on the web that really delve into detail on the series, and analyse each story from a new and unique perspective. I've several books on my shelf that do just the same thing.

And yet, having watched The Web of Fear Episode Five today, the only thing I can think to say is how good the effect at the end looks, when the fungus bursts its way into the base. I don’t recall it making all that much of an effect on me when I first went through this episode (indeed, checking back to my previous entry, I didn’t mention it. A quick look at the tele snaps makes it clear that it’s not all that impressive looking there).

It seems like such a ridiculously silly thing, but the moment the fungus pushes over a table is a highlight. It’s such a simple and uneventful thing but it suddenly makes the fungus look unstoppable. Maybe it’s because it’s so mundane that it holds impact? Or maybe because it just look pretty impressive for some model work?

Overall, I think I came away from this episode with the same general feeling that I did the first time around - that there’s plenty to love, but it does feel like the right time to start drawing towards a conclusion. The highlight is surely the Doctor and Anne working first on the control sphere, and then with the Yeti in the tunnel, and there’s lots of opportunity for Arnold to have some humour, too. The further through the story we get, the more I’m loving him.

Because this episode doesn’t have a whole lot going on that’s holding my interest, I spent the entry for it last time discussing the latter half of my ‘Great Intelligence’ time line. The recovery of the episodes doesn’t throw up any complications to it (Not that I expected they would - the main theories were all worked out based on the dialogue anyway), so I’m quite happy to leave it where things stand. The more I think on it, though, the more I’m keen to actually watch Downtime as a part of the marathon just to see if it all hangs together. What do you think? Worth doing?

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 350: The Web of Fear, Episode Four (Revisited)

Dear diary,

The last time I did this episode, I complained that they were using the Cybermen’s theme - Space Adventure - as the background music for the Yeti attack in Covent Garden, but having not heard it for a few months it is great to hear it again. Curiously, I didn’t make much of a mention of the attack in my first write up for this episode;

”Today’s Yeti attack in Covent Garden is lost somewhat by appearing only on audio - the telesnaps for the scene, coupled with knowledge of Dougie Camfield’s direction, make it look fab - the new style Yeti even look imposing when outside. Last year, the Mirror newspaper published online a load of photos from this scene, with the Yeti menacing a man and his dog - they do look great!”

But seeing it on screen does serve to highlight why audio isn’t the best form for this sequence because Camfield is such an action director. Right from the first shot of the Colonel and his men out on the surface and on film, you know what’s about to happen. Is it perfect? Well, no. There’s a few moments when you can see the rather large zips snaking up the backs of the Yeti costumes (Although, all right, you could make the argument that since these creatures are robots, the furry suits are simply added on after and zipped up…).

It’s also a shame that after such a good job is done of making it look like there’s lots of Yeti (and it does! It’s simply the same four outfits being shot from different angles down the street, but it multiplies them brilliantly) we don’t see any laying dead on the floor. I’m thinking in particular of one shot, late in the battle, where the floor behind an advancing Yeti is littered with dead soldiers… and nothing else. Having just watched a grenade attack that seems to take out several of the creatures, it just looks a bit odd.

It’s not a huge complaint, though, because the battle is fantastic. The Yeti really do manage to look scary even when out in the open, and as for the moment when the Colonel and another soldier hide up high in the warehouse and a yeti reaches up to grab the soldier’s foot… well it’s no wonder that this story had a specially made trailer to warn children that the Yeti were scarier than the last time.

They’re not the only things in this story to come across as unnerving, either. Even I was quite put off by the sight of a soldier in a gas mask being pulled back out of the tunnel coated in a layer of web. I was somewhat surprised – when the mask came off – to find that his face was perfectly plain. I think I’d half expected it to be made up somehow.

All the sequences down in the tunnels today have a real air of menace about them, and I think that’s the thing I’m most pleased to see from the recovery of this tale. I’ve always half-doubted the story that the London Underground thought Doctor Who had filmed in their stations without permission, but when you see how good these sets really are, it’s not hard to believe. I had worried that it might be like The Celestial Toymaker, where everyone who’d previously rushed to talk about how good it was suddenly has to back-track pretty sharpish…

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 349: The Web of Fear, Episode Three (Revisited)

Dear diary,

I thought I was clear of the era in which recons were an option! I really debated over how to best tackle today’s episode, because as long-time readers of The 50 Year Diary will be aware, I’m not the world’s biggest fan of recons. I find that I just can’t get caught up in them, and they actively reduce my enjoyment of an episode, more than they help it. I wondered about simply re-listening to the soundtrack of today’s instalment in an attempt to enjoy it more, but since the recon came as part of the complete serial on iTunes it felt silly not to watch it…

Sadly, I still find myself less than impressed by the experience. Several people have commented that this recon isn’t as polished as the one from Loose Cannon, so that may be where I’m going wrong, but the telesnaps really are no substitute for either the original episodes, or the visuals my mind fills in via the soundtrack release. I think coming from eight moving Troughton episodes in a row has spoilt me.

The episode is still quite interesting because it’s the first appearance of the would-be Brigadier. I said of the character last time; ”Interestingly, he's played as something of a 'grey' character here, and we're not entirely sure that we're supposed to trust him. Certainly, if you pointed him out to a viewer watching in 1968 and told them that this man would become the Doctor's best friend through several incarnations, they'd think you were mad,” and it’s even more interesting to watch having just emerged from the latter-half of the Pertwee years, in which he’s very firmly established himself as a part of the Doctor’s life.

What’s surprising to me, though, is that he’s not as different as a character as I’d expected. As I’ve said in the past, I always think of the Doctor and the Brigadier as being the best of friends, but even up to The Three Doctors, there’s a slightly uneasy relationship between the pair. It’s great to go back and see how much of a through-line there is between the Colonel that we meet down here in the tunnels and the one I’ve grown used to since September. Sadly, I can also feel myself enjoying the character (and Nick Courtney’s performance) more here than I do by the time Season Ten rolls around. I think it’s in the next episode that he takes the Doctor’s explanation of a time machine at face value, which will feels like such a relief after the blatant disbelief of anything he displayed during our multi-Doctor team up.

The other thing I drew attention to first time round: ”To put it bluntly, I'm not sure who is working with the Intelligence - and I like that! It's keeping me guessing (and second guessing) at every turn.” I’m still not sure who’s moving around the little Yeti statues at this point, and this surprises me a little. I was chatting to a friend about this story the other day and mused that I couldn’t remember who was behind everything at this stage. I know Travers gets possessed before long (end of tomorrow’s episode?) but I genuinely have no clue for right now.

‘Oh, that’s easy!’ he told me. ‘It’s Staff Sergeant Arnold. He gets taken over when he goes into the web…’ Darn, that’s ruined it for me a bit – a spoiler for a story I’ve already heard! Every time Arnold heads into the tunnels, I expect him to walk into the web and get possessed… but it’s not happened yet! It’s not the Staff Sergeant at this point in the story, so I’m completely lost. Am I just missing something really obvious? Is there some big neon light flashing over the culprit’s head?

But you know what? I kind of like that I still don’t have a clue. It means that the menace is still there, lurking in the darkness of the tunnels, and I’m just as lost as our heroes are at this point!

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 348: The Web of Fear, Episode Two (Revisited)

Dear diary,

“In some ways, this episode is absolutely made to be listened to as just the audio.”

I feel like I should regret saying that, now that I've just sat and watched the episode play out, but actually I think I stand by it. A lot of this episode is just ripe for audio. The dialogue between Jamie and Evans as they look at the Tube maps and emerge into stations is still very descriptive, but I think it's sticking out so much simply because I noticed it last time around.

By the same token, getting to see this one unveils things that I'd not really gotten from the audio. The key thing is the way that Camfield shoots Chorley throughout. You're bout supposed to like the reporter. He's infuriating, rude in places, a coward, a potential suspect once the grip of the Intelligence starts to close in… and yet when you can actually see the man on screen, all of this gets heightened. He's always a presence in the scenes in a way that he simply isn't on the soundtrack. When he questions Jamie and Victoria, the microphone is right up tight into their faces (and taking up a good deal of the shot). He's always hovering in the front of the shot, or hiding in the background chiming in with a quip here or there. When the sound of gunfire and a battle is heard down the end of a telephone, he makes sure to lean in with the microphone to get a good recording of it. It adds a whole new dimension to the character that I'd simply not seen before, and the story is all the better for it.

Now… you'll have to forgive me a bit today. I've just re-read my original entry for this episode, and there's so man things I want to bring up that it's going to sound like I'm simply answering myself. It's like a conversation through time!

“I also spent some time thinking that it was a good job we couldn't see the huge battle between the Yeti and the soldiers, until I remembered that it's a Douglas Camfield episode we're dealing with, and hurried to go through the tele snaps. It's hard to tell, because so many of the snaps catch people mid-action, but the impression I get is that it looked brilliant. The setting really helps, too, the cramped tunnels really helping to give the Yeti a kind of scale that was completely lost out on the Welsh hillside.”

Oh, Douggie. I do love you. My impression was right. The battle was lovely to watch. I was torn between a desire to make notes or simply sit and watch the action with a sense of absolute wonder. I plumped for the latter in the end. It's so wonderfully down from start to finish, and it really does make the Yeti look imposing… and actually quite scary! I can quite imagine being five or six years old and being absolutely struck by this sequence.

It's not just the tunnels that give these creatures a sense of scale, but the skill with which Camfield has shot them. The cameras aimed in their direction are almost exclusively placed low down, shooting up at the beasts, and making them look even bigger than they really are. The cramped tunnel does then help to accentuate this, and they just keep on coming. As if to really hammer the point home, they proceed to batter their way through the pile of explosive charges in a sequence which should look rubbish (no, really, it should. At one point, a Yeti stumbles trying to get over the props, but then it finishes the manoeuvre, straightens up, and carries on. Under a lesser director this could have been another 'Zarbi hits the camera' - well, not quite that bad - but here it seems to add to the threat!)

It's not all praise, though. The Yeti leaving their prisoners and simply wandering off when they think of something better to do seems even more odd on screen, because they really do just walk away when the moment comes, Still, that's a relatively minor niggle at the end of a very lovely sequence…

“I think it's probably a testament to how much I'm enjoying this one that it was fifteen minutes or more before I noticed the complete absence of the Doctor.”

And it's probably rather telling that I didn't notice it again this time around! Well, ok, that's not strictly true. I did notice, but only in the last couple of minutes when attention was drawn to it once more. For the rest of the episode, I was too busy enjoying the rest of the cast.

The one who needs extra special praise from me today is Deborah Watling. I wan't all that fond of Victoria during my first run-though of Season Five. By the time she left at the end of Fury From the Deep, I was rather glad to see the back of her. Now though, with these episodes coming free from all the others around them, I'm rather liking her once more. And I'm enjoying Watling's performance more than I have for a while, too. I think she really does suffer from having so much missing from the archives (not any more! For the first time in 40 years, we've more of her episodes in the archive than not! Hooray!), because when we can watch her performance, it's so much easier to appreciate.

There's two lovely moments from her today. The first has to be when she slowly comes to the realisation of who the blustery old man they're talking to is - while Jamie continues to put his back up and argue back, and beautiful smile breaks out across Victoria's face and she excitedly announces that they're back with Travers. Jamie soon swings round to a similar joyous reaction, but it's not a patch on hers - a simply fantastic piece of acting. After this we've got her listening in on the accusations against the Doctor and quietly excusing herself from the room again to go off in search of him. I'm so pleased that she's given these wonderful moments in the recovered episodes, because I'm pleased to think that I'm not the only person re-evaluating her now…

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 347: The Web of Fear, Episode One (Revisited)

Dear diary,

There was a point during the Troughton years when I really worried that I’d be ruining the series for myself. I was really enjoying the process of watching an episode a day and then writing about it, but what if once I’d finished them all… watched every scrap of Doctor Who… what if I was bored by the thought of ever watching any more? At the same time, I was trying to counter this worry my making a mental list of stories that I’d want re revisit once the marathon was through. Late Season Five ended up being added to the list in something of a chunk – I wanted to do The Enemy of the World a second time to see if I’d get different things from the story already knowing the twists of Episode Six, Fury From the Deep I wanted to hear again away from all the other stories around it, and The Web of Fear was ripe for a second go because – basically – it was bloody good.

Seconds into today’s episode and I’m completely reminded of that fact – it all just looks so good, doesn’t it? This first episode was the one we’ve had from this story for a long time now, so I’ve seen all of these shots before. Like last time, it’s the shot of the TARDIS doors closing as the camera moves back to the right position that really sucks you in, and it’s all uphill from there.

Funnily enough, the direction was the thing I was most drawn to last time I did this story, but I compared it very favourably to the preceding story:

”It's miles ahead of the stuff seen in The Enemy of the World Episode Three (our last surviving episode), and had me completely gripped.”

Now that we can actually watch The Enemy of the World, it’s more a case of just having two wonderfully directed serials in a row, which is a lovely thought. There’s something rather nice about having two stories emerge from 45 years in hiding and both turn out to be so good.

To be honest, that was another worry I had. I kept coming back to what I’d call Tomb of the Cybermen syndrome. A lost Doctor Who ‘classic’ suddenly unearthed after decades hidden away in a foreign television archive, rush released and shown to be… well, received wisdom claims that The Tomb of the Cybermen isn’t as good as everyone thought it was, but it’s still my favourite tale. I really did worry that Web would come out and we’d all go ‘ah…’ and quietly forget the years of desperation for its return.

I’m loathe to just go on about the brilliant direction in this episode, because that’s pretty much all I did the last time around. I’m sure I’ll have plenty of time to talk about it during our four newly recovered bits of the story. Instead, I want to touch on something that I’ve seen cropping up since the return of these stories could add an extra step to my ‘Great Intelligence Timeline’.

I’m not sure where the idea came from, but I’ve seen people musing that The Enemy of the World and The Web of Fear may share a common link – The Great Intelligence is Salamander. Yeah, yeah, I know. Put down that bit of lead piping and hear me out. That was my first reaction, too, but there’s a bit of me that rather likes it. The suggestion is (and I’m tweaking and elaborating to make it fit my earlier timeline) that when Salamander is sucked out into the vortex, he becomes scattered through time and space. This process robs him of his physical form, but also makes him greatly intelligent (see what I did there? Clever, that).

The Doctor himself even says that ‘He's not in a very enviable position, floating around in time and space…’, and you can quite imagine that he would be keen to get back to his own physical form. Maybe from here he finds himself in contact with Padmasambhava, and the rest follows on as I speculated during The Abominable Snowmen and the original entries for this story.

While it needs a bit more hammering into shape to make it totally work, I think I do rather like the idea. Adding in my previous musing that the Great Intelligence might have been behind the scenes, pushing Victoria to leave during the story after this one, it gives Season Five a kind of loose story arc – one which even has an element of ‘timey wimey’ to it, because the TARDIS crew’s first encounter with the Intelligence comes before they’ve even met Salamander.

What do you think? Plausible theory, or just plain nonsense?

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 346: The Enemy of the World, Episode Six (Revisited)

Dear diary,

Oh, I’m so very happy. All the way through this story – no matter how much I’ve been enjoying things – I’ve had something niggling at the back of my mind. Let’s face it, the ‘Doctor vs Salamander’ fight at the end of this episode has long been at the top of many fan’s wish lists when it comes to the missing episodes. It’s Troughton up against Troughton, and as I pointed out when I first did this episode, the single telesnap which shows the pair pretty much nose-to-nose made it look so good.

And that’s where my problem came from. I’d seen people praise the way that Episode One of this story was directed. I’d seen the excitement at finally having a date pinned down for events. General consensus was that Salamander's ludicrous accent was far less distracting when you could actually watch the rest of Troughton's performance…

But curiously, no one seemed to be discussing the final scene. Now, admittedly, I've been avoiding threads on the forum specifically dedicated to these recovered stories, but there's been several posts of praise about them showing up on Facebook and Twitter… but not a word spoken about these final few minutes. Ah. The doubt started to grow in my mind. Was no one talking about it because - God forbid - it wasn't very good?

Well, no, of course not. I watched the final scene, and then I went back and watched it again. And then again. And then once more, just for luck. Oh, it's stunning. Brief, yes, but stunning. And it's not just the actual fight that works so well. We've got an actual night shoot! That's rare even deep into the depths of the Pertwee era (remember how shocked I was to see one crop up in The Dæmons? Double it for this). The whole sequence on the beach is stunning, from the way the TARDIS is lit from inside, to Jamie staring out into the night and Salamander stumbling his way up over the dunes.

Once we're inside the TARDIS, things continue to be rather lovely. Salamander indicating to Jamie that he should set them in motion is rather nice (He doesn't actually say anything at this point, so it's hard to enjoy the subtleties of Troughton's performance when you're only listening to the audio), and the way he turns around to see the Doctor stood in the open doors… It's one of those things that will sound weird when I say it - but doesn't he just look so much like the Doctor stood there, staring into his ship? I don't know if it's the direction or what, but it's lovely.

The fight is then rather well done. The single tele snap that promised so much pretty much sums up the entire time they spend occupying the same shot, but I'm pleased to see that it's just as effective on screen as I' hoped. There was a very real danger that this may not hold together, but it's become one of the most striking bits to survive from the 1960s.

And isn't that just a brilliant sentence? Suddenly - wonderfully - we've got The Enemy of the World in its entirety ready to watch and enjoy. Waaaay back when I first did Episode One of this story, I told you a story about how it was my friend Graham's favourite tale ever, and how I was a bit surprised to learn this:

“My disbelief wasn’t because I’d heard bad things about this story, it was mostly just from the fact that, well, I hadn’t really heard anything about it. The sad fact is that The Enemy of the World is one of those stories that people just forget about.”

Since the recovery, these six episodes have had something of a reappraisal. I've seen a number of people commenting that it's now become their new favourite Troughton adventure, and I think a large part of that is because barry Letts was right all along - Episode Three was by far the worst example to survive from this tale. I wonder if people were simply put off it by seeing those twenty-five minutes?

It's not going to be to everyone's tastes (Another friend this week has said he didn't really care for the story, and thought it was a bit of a disappointment), and once the sudden thrill of having it all back wears off, I think it's going to balance out in people's estimations again. It's lovely to see that the recovery has won people over, though. This makes the next story all the more interesting, because The Web of Fear has been a fan favourite for years and years despite being just as missing as this one was. I've seen fewer comments on that tale since the return of the episodes, so I'm keen to see my reaction.

If nothing else, it's Douglas Camfield directing Patrick Troughton again! That may just be the most exciting thing in the world…

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 345: The Enemy of the World, Episode Five (Revisited)

Dear diary,

While I'm aware of the twists and turns in this story from my previous viewing, I can't help but think that the episode descriptions in iTunes are somewhat spoilerific for a first-time viewer. The caption for yesterday's episode opens by saying that 'Giles Kent is revealed to be a traitor, in league with would-be 21st century dictator Salamander.' Except… he isn't revealed to be in league with our evil friend until tomorrow's episode! Today's description is equally as misleading, telling us that the 'traitorous scientist Kent has blown up the research station', but once again, that hasn't happened yet! I do hope that no one had their first viewing of the story ruined by reading these descriptions in advance of watching - they give away some pretty major plot points way in advance!

However, I must confess that I actually learnt something from them today, too! There's a moment when Jamie and Victoria are carried into the research centre on a pair of stretchers, and I suddenly remembered that I didn't know what they'd been up to in the story, but the description for Episode Four confirms that they're not in that episode! Haha! A quick check of my write up for this episode the first time around confirms that I didn't notice it then, either. I spent so long during the 1960s tracking the holidays of the various cast members and yet this one has managed to pass me by twice!

It's rather nice to have them back again here, and given a lovely sequence to dig their teeth into. The questioning scene is fantastic right the way through, and it adds another layer to the relationship between Jamie and Victoria. The way that he cradles her while they're being held at gunpoint is lovely, and his determination to give in rather than see her hurt is touching. The tables then get turned as they question the man they believe to be Salamander, and we're treated to some more of Barry Letts' beautiful direction on the sequence, focussing on several close ups of the pair as they cut back and forth.

You can choose to see this as either clichéd or traditional, but I'm going to have to heap some praise onto Patrick Troughton again. Listening to this story on audio, the switching between his two characters is pulled off mainly by dropping the accent and adding a few more fluffs and stutters to the performance when switching back to the Doctor. On screen it's great to watch him making choices in every movement he makes. We spend a large amount of time today with him dressed as Salamander (indeed, his more traditional outfit doesn't even appear today!), but we're only in doubt as to which one he may be when we're supposed to be. It's a very well considered performance, and a great example of why he's one of the best actors to have been involved in the programme.

I also need to bring attention to how much I'm enjoying Milton Johns as Benik. On audio, I can't say that I ever really payed the character that much attention (I'd sort of lost track of who was who by this point), but he's really quite special on screen. I spent his first couple of episodes actively disliking him - the character simply made my skin crown when he appeared - but then today I realised that you're supposed to feel like that! There's a beautiful line where Jamie muses that Benik must have been a horrible little boy, and he simply replies that he was, but he had a good childhood. Terribly slimy, and one of the nastiest characters the series has ever given us. I'm so glad that I'm able to enjoy his performance all the more now it's available in full…

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 344: The Enemy of the World, Episode Four (Revisited)

Dear diary,

Salamander confirms today that the 'survivors' have been down in the bunker for almost five whole years, which means that they should be headed down there… well… any day now!

When these recovered episodes were released back at the start of October, I went into something of a lockdown while I decided what to do with them in regards to the marathon. I didn't just want to slot them in at the tail-end of Season Seven because it would have been very out of place (and I'd only just parted ways with the Second Doctor about three weeks earlier anyway!), but then I didn't know where to put them. The situation never drifted far from my mind, and people even tweeted me and left messages on the 50 Year Diary Facebook page to ask if I'd be tackling these episodes any time soon. No, I decided, I'd leave them until after the whole marathon was complete, letting me know that there'd still be a few bits of the 1960s waiting for me once I'd reached the finishing line.

Well… it was a nice idea, I guess. The problem is that so many of my friends these days are the kind of people who'd be downloading these episodes the very moment they arrived on iTunes, and suddenly my Facebook and Twitter feeds were filled with people discussing how wonderful they were. There was no way I'd make it all the way through to 2015 before seeing these stories again - it just wouldn't be possible. I made the decision to slot them in here after Troughton's (brief) return to the programme, and then carry on once more. I've still tried to ignore people's discussions of the stories for a while, though, because I wanted to be as unbiassed by outside thoughts as possible. I've even been avoiding the reactions on the forums. Have the tables turned? Is The Enemy of the World now a classic while The Web of Fear is universally panned? I guess I'll be finding out soon enough…

I wasn't able to avoid all mentions of the stories, of course, and there was one particular tweet from Clayton Hickman which caught my eye: “Ooh! We finally have a date (ish) when Enemy of the World is set. Astrid's helicopter license expires in 2018!” Cue a mad panic! Did this tie in with the timeline I'd been using for the stories? I only really touched on it once (During The Space Pirates Episode Three), but as I said back then, I was more than happy going along with the timeline proposed in the second volume of the About Time books.

In that essay, they muse that the Cold War style event that forced the people down into the bunker here happened around about 2025, with the events seen in this story taking place about five years later, which they place contemporaneously with The Wheel in Space. Well now we know that they're about twelve years too late - and as if to rub it in, the shot of the helicopter licence is big and bold and hard to miss! Ah, but why then does the description for the story on iTunes state that 'The Doctor has arrived on Earth in the year 2017 A.D.'?

Well… a discussion about this with a friend earlier today revealed to me that the newspaper found by one of the 'survivors' later on in the story bears the date '2017', but this is then described as being explicitly 'last year'. So there we have it, either the person writing the description got muddled up (or pressed the wrong key), or the survivors have lost track of the days and are out with their counting.

What's nice about having some (almost) firm dates for the story is that everything else still works! I can imagine The Wheel in Space as being somewhere around 2030, and the proposed timeline after that, leading through the Gravitron being installed in 2050, and then the events of The Moonbase in 2070 before another Cold War sets in for the 2080s feels very natural still, and if anything it spaces the stories out a little better. The other thing I rather like - assuming that we say they've been down there since very late 2012ish - is that Salamander could have used all the 'End of the World' myths that were floating around last December as a way to trick them all into believing the war was about to break out and destroy the world. I can imagine him as the leader of a cult, preaching portents of doom!

Anyway, away from dating quibbles, we're back into fine territory here. Within the first few minutes the episode is more visually interesting than Episode Three was - yet more proof that we've been left with the wrong episode for all these years! There's some lovely direction as the Doctor faces off against Kent, including some beautiful close-ups between the pair. Later on we get to watch Salamander's decent into the bunker… and it's like something out of Thunderbirds! The model work is rather nice, and the whole sequence is somewhat grander than I was expecting. I think I was simply picturing a rickety old lift last time around, because I still had this episode in mind with a very noir feel.

Indeed, that means that other areas of today have been something of a let-down for me. As I said first time around:

“I don't think I've ever been as visually connected to one of those soundtracks as I was during the first half of this episode, with the security forces closing in on the Doctor, Kent, and the others. It was like my head was mapping out exactly how I'd direct the scene if it were to be re-made, complete with angled cameras, and shots of our heroes on the run, silhouetted against the alleyway as the guards closed in.”

After The Enemy of the World, the number of missing episode soundtracks I had to listen to were severely reduced, but this episode - along with sections of The Macra Terror - still represent the best visualisations of the series that I ever had during the 1960s section of the marathon. Even now when I think about these scenes, I can picture the way that I saw them the first time around, with the high angles, and a city which to my mind was 1930s New York, complete with heavy film grain and the shadows of German expressionist cinema.

There was no way that the episode would ever live up to that. I don't care how much of a surprise Episodes One and Two turned out to be, or even the futuristic lift system in today's episode, even at the top of his game Barry Letts would be unable to achieve the shots i had in mind on the schedule and budget of a 1960s Doctor Who story. What's sad though is just how much of a let down the actual scenes are. I was braced for something a bit worse than I'd pictured, and when we get a shot of some guards high up on a balcony I did briefly wonder if we might really get some great high-angled images, but it wasn't to be. Ah well, you can't win them all, I guess…

 a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 343: The Enemy of the World, Episode Three (Revisited)

Dear diary,

Over the course of The 50 Year Diary, I try to quote myself as little as possible. While I'm going back and rewatching these two newly-recovered stories, though, it's rather difficult not to do so - a lot of my reaction to them is informed by my own experience of them the first time around. Today is something of a special case, because until recently it was the only episode from The Enemy of the World to exist in the archives, and thus it's the first of the entire marathon that I'll be watching again some months down the line. Unless we get some more missing episodes cropping up in the next year or so (well… you never know…), it will hold this title with only The Web of Fear Episode One. So, this episode, first time around was exciting because it was Doctor Who switching to 625-line video:

“And what a story to feature an upgrade in picture quality! Episode One features a hovercraft and a helicopter on the beach! The second episode ends with the eruption of a volcano! This third episode is full of… well, corridors, decorated with varying types of garish wallpaper. Oh dear. Couldn’t we have had Episode One saved, instead?”

If anything, having the preceding two episodes back in the archives and available to view makes this one seem even more of an oddity. At least last time, I'd been picturing things on a far smaller scale than we've seen was actually the case. This time around, I've just come from being shocked at the balcony scenes yesterday, and all the use of rear-projection to give certain set ups some more scope. To go from all of that to what we see today feels like a real come down, and I think it may have actually harmed this instalment. Barry Letts always said that Episode Three was the weakest of the serial (and thus it was ironic that it was the only one surviving!), and I think I'm seeing that point proved here now.

Still, I'm finding it a bit easier to follow than I did the last time. As I said yesterday, I'd initially been somewhat confused by the events of Episode Two, and this one relies so heavily on it. Being able to now differentiate the characters better means that I can become a little more involved in the story than on the first time around.

I'm also finding that I can appreciate some of the other performances and characters in this episode more this time around. The chef is a great character, and I enjoy every moment he spends on screen. Hiding under the table when he thinks that a battle is breaking out nearby is his highlight, as everything seems to roll on around him while he just shrugs his shoulders. The young guard who dares to ask Astrid out for wine while she's sneaking past him with a fake pass is another great character - very little screen time, and only a handful of lines - but he feels very rounded, and I rather like that.

It's not quite enough, though. I made a point today of not looking at the score I gave the episode last time, because I'm keen for these revisited entries to be very much based on my gut feeling (as though they were being rated as just the regular next episode in the marathon). Having finished the episode, I announced the the (empty) room that it was 'a five or a six'. Having then checked the original entry, I found that last time I gave it a seven. So there we have it - the episode is let down by being among it's more impressive siblings!

I'm feeling generous, so I'm going to be going with the upper end of my score for the day, and giving this one:

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 342: The Enemy of the World, Episode Two

Dear diary,

The weird thing about going back to do these stories for a second time is seeing how my perceptions have changed in the four-or-so months since I first experienced them. I think that it’s fair to say that my feelings towards the series have cooled a little since Season Seven, and I’m finding myself handing out a lot more ‘average’ scores than I was during the latter half of the 1960s. I means that when I reached the end of yesterday’s episode, I instantly reached for a ‘9/10’. I’d enjoyed it much more than I had any episodes for a while, and a solid 9 placed it firmly in that bracket.

But then I remembered that I’d originally given it a ‘10’. If anything, actually seeing the thing had made it better again. All the action sequences being pulled off spectacularly, the Doctor and his companions interacting so perfectly naturally, and of course some outrageous flirting in a beach house. There’s no way I could mark it lower than full marks, so up to a ‘10’ it went.

It makes it tricky in the long run, though, because I may be rating these revisited episodes slightly lower that I did first time round, and there’d be several reasons for this to happen. For a start – these stories aren’t ‘fresh’ for me anymore. This time around, I know the twists in Salamander’s story. Next week, while I’m making my way through the webbed tunnels of the London Underground, I’ll know every beat of the great Intelligence’s plans. On the one hand, I might find it exciting to enjoy them in a different way, with the prior knowledge of what’s to come, but on the other it may well lessen the impact in a way that seeing the visuals can’t make up for. What I’m trying to say is that I’m still going to be giving these episodes my honest gut reaction when it comes to a final score, and I’m looking forward to seeing how that may have changed since my first viewing.

Today’s episode is another perfect example of the visuals actively helping a story in my estimations, though, because seeing this one has really benefitted the tale. It’s funny just how much I can remember about where I was during these episodes the first time around. During yesterday’s episode, I could pin-point exactly the bit of road I’d been crossing when I first heard Salamander’s speech about the crop growth. For today, I can recall listening to the scene of Jamie ‘saving’ Salamander while I’d been going through the self-serve tills at the supermarket… and then listening to it again five minutes later when I realised that I’d not got a clue what was actually happening in the episode.

In total, I’d listened to bits of this episode three times last time and I still didn’t quite have my head around what was going on and who was who. It didn’t help that I thought Astrid’s surname was ‘Ferrier’, when that’s actually the name of a completely different character. No wonder I’d confused myself! Seeing everything happen makes it much clearer – and also reveals a kind of scope that I’d not imagined for the tale.

I assumed that all of Salamander’s conference (plus Jamie ‘saving’ him, and the final scene as they looked out over the volcanic destruction) were taking place in an office. For some reason, on first listen, this story took on a very ‘noir’ tone in my mind, and I’d pictured this office almost in the style of your stereotypical 1940s Hollywood private eye. To be honest, while it did the job, I’d never imagined that it would look as good as the actual set. These scenes take place out on a balcony, surrounded by foliage, and a very nice set beyond the facade of the house, too. It’s quite a large set – helped somewhat by some clever rear-projection, which I’ll come to in a moment – and it’s far more impressive than I’d have guessed.

Then we’ve got the scenes on the park bench. These don’t work quite so well with the rear-projection technique (if anything, it makes the bench look as though it’s been plonked in the corner of the studio as an afterthought – a shame for a location we spend a fair bit of time in), but it’s great to see Barry Letts playing around with things like this even in his first contribution to the programme. Having sat though his first few seasons at the helm of Doctor Who, I’ve grown used to his pioneering work with CSO, and this feels very much like a fore-runner of all that.

Perhaps the biggest revelation of all, though, is Troughton. In my original write up for this episode back in July, I said ’towards the end of today’s episode, I thought about the fact we'd not had that much Troughton in this one, except that we had, just not in his usual form’. On audio, this is because he’s doing an accent so different to his own (today’s highlight: ‘Is not so good, boys, is not so good!’), but even when we can see him on the screen it doesn’t feel like he’s really here. His performance as Salamander is fantastic, and it only serves to remind me why I love him so much. There’s a great moment where he makes a joke about Ferrier, and then snaps at her to get him a drink. The way he moves his eyes, and the scorn that comes out in the performance… it’s stunning. Seconds later he snaps his fingers for a guard and one comes running. I thought I’d experienced so much of the 1960s, but these few episodes coming back really does show that so much is lost when we can’t see these performances – I can’t wait to see what other little gems get unearthed over the next few days…

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 341: The Enemy of the World, Episode One (Revisited)

Dear diary,

Will Brooks sits in front of the control panel at Doctor Who Online. It may sound impressive and futuristic, but it's really held together by sticky tape and a couple of old washing up liquid bottles. Satisfied, he hits the 'publish' button for The Three Doctors Episode Four, and prepares to get on with the rest of the evening, having completed his daily dose of Doctor Who. It's then, as he grabs his coat and prepares to leave, that he finds himself caught up in something more unusual than he's used to. The hairs stand up on the back of his arms, a ringing enters his head, and he feels himself start to fade away and out of existence. Nearby, people report his final words carried on the wind - whatever's happening is making him giddy, apparently.

Well would you look at that. It would seem that - somehow - I've been scooped up by the Time Lords when they returned Patrick Troughton to his proper place in the timeline (the late 1960s on BBC1, as it happens). I seem to have ended up a little earlier in the time stream than he came from, which places me smack-bang in the middle of Season Five. You can see where I'm going with this, can't you? Go on, keep up the charade with me for the next twelve days - it's the 12th of July 2013. There's still a sun in the sky. You've no idea that Peter Capaldi will be taking on the guise of the Doctor. The revelations and thrills of the 50th anniversary special are still a distant dream…

It all seemed so perfect. Here I was, finally undertaking a proper Doctor Who marathon. After years of telling myself that I'd do it one day, I'd suddenly found myself not simply watching all of the series in order, but blogging about it daily on one of the web's biggest websites devoted to the subject, with a fair number of people reading along and being incredibly kind about the whole thing. Better than that: I was approaching the end of the William Hartnell era. I'd come too far now, there was no going back. And then things got even better. Not only would I be making my way through the Patrick Troughton years - home to the Doctor I'd always considered my favourite - but suddenly there was a lot more of it than ever before. The Enemy of the World and The Web of Fear back in the archives where they belong, and just in time for me to enjoy them for the very first time!

And then it all went a bit… wrong. I made my way through Season Four, and ventured off to The Tomb of the Cybermen. I ventured to Tibet and fought off the Ice Warriors. There was no time left. I'd reached The Enemy of the World… and it still wasn't available. I delayed viewing that day for as long as possible, just in case, and then grudgingly hit the 'play' button for the narrated soundtrack. Thankfully, the first episode was - frankly - brilliant, and there was no time to muse on it, I was too busy being caught up with hovercrafts, and helicopters, and doubles of the Doctor. There were Mexican accents galore, plenty of action, and more happening in 25 minutes that I could have ever dreamed of.

Following Patrick Troughton's brief return in The Three Doctors with the recently returned episodes was on the cards from the moment it became apparent that the announcement was to hit in October. Timing-wise, it gave me a good excuse to slip them in to the marathon without having to wait until the very end. There was no way I'd ever have held off watching these two stories for another 18 months - I'd enjoyed them too much the first time around. It also gives me a great opportunity to keep tracking how different Troughton's performance is between his own era and the return in 1972.

In my initial write up of this episode, I stated:

“I spent a while listening to these scenes thankful that this episode didn't exist in the archives, because it all sounded pretty good, and there was no way that the visuals would live up to the same standard… but then the tele snaps make the scene look just as epic as I'd hoped.”

Thankfully, seeing the scene in question (The Doctor and his companions being chased by gun-wielding strangers before being picked up in a helicopter and flown off over the ocean) makes it even better than it looked via the telesnaps. It's some of the finest direction work that we've had in the series so far and I'm somewhat surprised, as Barry Letts' directorial work in the current era hasn't really been making all that much of an impact on me. There's one particular shot taken fromthe helicopter as it flies out to sea that's very impressive, and it looks almost too good to be wasted on something like Doctor Who.

What the moving visuals give the story most though is the little interactions between the Doctor and his companions, especially Jamie. You'll no doubt recall that by the middle of Season Six, I'd rather had enough of Jamie. He seemed to have out-stayed his welcome in the series, and I was increasingly ready to see the show move on to something new. Dropping back down here in the middle of their time together makes it all seem fantastic again, though. There's a beautiful moment on the beach where the Doctor tells his companions that a hovercraft is a ship that can travel on the land and Jamie replies that he's too old for 'fairy tales'.

On audio, it's just a nice little bit of interplay, in which the Doctor introduces two companions from history to a futuristic machine. Seen in the recovered episode, Jamie gives the Doctor a little push on the shoulder as he delivers his line, and the pair grin widely throughout the exchange. They really come across as two best friends travelling through time and space together. Something else I've seen mentioned a lot since the episode was released is how much of a flirt the Doctor's being with Astrid - and it's true! Troughton, you old dog!

And as if all of this wasn't fantastic enough, it gives me an excuse to start saying 'Allo Bruce! What are you doing here, eh?' again.

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 260 Extra: The Second Doctor Overview

Dear diary,

I can't begin to tell you how happy I am. Way back at the end of last year, when I was first starting to get ready for The 50 Year Diary, I was most looking forward to the Patrick Troughton years.

He'd always been my favourite Doctor, based on the surviving stories of his that I'd seen, and I was really looking forward to actually making my way through all he had to offer. I'd dabbled with the missing episodes from time to time, watching the odd recon if it could hold my attention, or listening to a soundtrack here or there, but now I'd have a reason to actually stick with it, and really enjoy it.

But then I started to worry. The further I got into the William Hartnell years, the more I found myself enjoying him as the Doctor. Watching the programme at the rate of one episode a day way working perfectly for one of my main aims - I was forming an actual bond with the older characters. It's tricky to do when you can dip in and out of the stories on DVD whenever you like and in any old order. I wanted to really grow attached to them in the same way you do when a new series airs.

So as we came to the tail-end of Season Three and things started to fall into place for Troughton's arrival, I started to panic. What if, having grown so used to Hartnell, I'd find I didn't really care all that much for a silly new Doctor? Could my love for his Second incarnation be completely destroyed by seeing them all in this way? Even more crucially, would my favourite story of all time - The Tomb of the Cybermen - suddenly seem rubbish compared to all the other stories I'd found myself really enjoying?

Well no. Of course not. It seems obvious from here, having just finished Episode Ten of The War Games, that I love Patrick Troughton because he's a genuinely brilliant Doctor. There's a reason that every Doctor since has fallen in love with him and borrowed a little bit of his performance. And it didn't matter if I'd found myself really enjoying the likes of The War Machines, or The Dalek Invasion of Earth, because The Tomb of the Cybermen is still fantastic anyway.

What really surprised me is just how much I enjoyed Troughton's first season. Because so much of it is missing from the archives, stories from Season Four are often forgotten. Everyone thinks of the three key stories (The Tenth Planet, The Power of the Daleks, and The Evil of the Daleks) and then forgets all the adventures with the Macra, the Cybermen on the Moon, or the Fish People. I'm just as guilty of it - I'd never really payed the season that much attention.

It's a crying shame that we can't see more of it, because there's a lot to love in there, and I think these stories would be held in higher regard if we were able to stick the DVDs in as simply as we can many other stories (though this is becoming closer to a reality even as I type, with three of the stories lined up for release in the near future).

Season Five, on the other hand, which I was expecting to really love, fell a little bit flat for me. Individually, several episodes rated very well, but by the end of the run I was really starting to flag. Poor Fury From the Deep is probably deserving of a much better score than I've given it, but I was simply washed out by that whole format by the time it rolled around. It's definitely high on my list for a rematch once the marathon is over. Surprisingly, and likely due to the fact that I loved both Tomb and The Web of Fear so much, this season currently holds the highest average rating - 7.2.

And then we come to Season Six. Being mostly complete in the archive, it's the one that everyone hails as the best of Troughton's three years, and it's the stories from this period that helped me to first fall in love with the Second Doctor. While I've liked many bits of it, the overall score has been brought down a little by my utter contempt for The Dominators (and I promise that I'll stop banging on about it now that I'm done with the 1960s) and my disappointment during The Space Pirates.

As a whole, the era comes in with a very respectable rating of 6.8, putting it a little ahead of the First Doctor. Troughton's stories have currently taken the top four spots on my ratings table of all the stories so far, but he's also gathered a few at the other end of the scoreboard, filling the bottom three spaces, too.

And now it's onto the 1970s. I've made no secret as I've gone along that the next decade (and the Third Doctor's era in particular) has never been a favourite of mine, but I'm actually really excited to be moving on. I'm ready for the programme to do something different, and the success of stories like The Web of Fear and The Invasion have actually geared me up ready for the next massive change.

Whereas with The Tenth Planet, it felt right to move straight onto the next episode the following day, here it feels like there should be a bit more of a gap. Maybe it's because it's such a clean break, with the departure of the Doctor, both his companions, and the programme moving into the new decade with the introduction of colour to the adventures? That's not how the marathon works, though, so it's right on to Spearhead From Space in the morning, and (perhaps surprisingly) I can't wait!

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 260: The War Games, Episode Ten

Dear diary,

'They'll forget me, won't they?' the Doctor asks solemnly, as he watches Jamie and Zoe led away and sent back to their rightful places in time and space. For me, the departures here pack more weight than just about any other that the series has ever witnessed. Much of this episode is a masterclass in building towards this, and the star of the show, put simply, is Patrick Troughton.

He's well aware that it's futile to try and evade the Time Lords. He knows that his companions have had their day and that their memories will be wiped. Their last desperate attempt to make a break for the TARDIS is simply the Doctor's way of getting his friends to the right place, so that they can be sent away with the minimum amount of fuss. It's evident from the simple way that Troughton plays the scene, with a sense of childish excitement, over-the-top in the way that people always think his Doctor is. It's patently obvious that he's well aware of their fate, and if anything he seems to be surprised that they're allowed to remember at least one adventure.

What surprised me is how the departures were followed up. I've seen the story before, so I knew that we got little scenes showing Jamie and Zoe’s returns to their own times but having now seen it in context - following on from every other episode made before it, they pack an even greater punch. And look! There's Clare Jenkins returning as Tanya to greet Zoe on her return to the Wheel! You'd almost expect something like that in the modern series, but in 1969? Tanya appeared for six episodes a whole year ago, but they've brought her back and recreated a part of the Wheel set, just to see Zoe off. Added to that, you've got that final line of hers - 'I thought I'd forgotten something important... but it's nothing.'

That, right there, is the saddest line in the history of Doctor Who. Zoe has learned so much, and evolved as a character hugely since she first came aboard the TARDIS. She's been through all those wonderful adventures (and The Dominators) but now she'll never be able to remember them. Worse than that - they're brushed off as not being important. The thing that gets me is that Jamie's return to Scotland isn't half as emotional. They play that as dropping him back off and watching him get right back into trouble again. Typical Jamie!

The downside to this decision is that Jamie's departure doesn't hit me half as hard as Zoe's does, even though he's been a part of my everyday life since way back at the end of May. It's fair to say that I'd started to go off him by the middle of the Sixth Season (it's the same trouble I had with Ian and Barbara when they started to out-stay their welcome, too), but I'd grown fond of him again by the time he's led away in today's episode. I don't feel the same sadness to see him go which is a real shame when his departure should really get to me.

Elsewhere, we get to enjoy something of a celebration of Doctor Who's last few years, with the Doctor projecting some mental images of his most fearsome foes (though he starts with the Quarks? Really?), we get plenty of messing around with the TARDIS as they try to escape the Time Lords, and we even get to see some footage from The Web of Fear and Fury From the Deep to illustrate their landings. It's a great way to tie up the era, and say goodbye to this phase of the programme.

I'm also really pleased to see just how effective the Time Lords themselves are in this episode. Over the years, they've become somewhat diluted to the point that they're almost a bit of a joke in the 1980s, but here they're absolutely terrifying. All that build up in the last episode was entirely justified by their appearance today - you'd really not want to run into this lot on a bad day. I remember someone once commenting that the Time Lords deserved to lose in the Time War because they were so horrible - the Daleks would never be as harsh as to wipe Jamie and Zoe's memories!

Their most effective moment comes during the Trial of the War Lord, in which his cool, calm, and collected exterior (which reminds me more and more of Steve Jobs with each passing episode) is completely shattered simply by having them stare at him. It's clear that they're performing some kind of mental torture on the man in order to make his speak, but watching this figure recoil in horror and scream his head off (and perhaps more significantly, watching his glasses - the absolute icon of his image - fall from his face throughout this moment) is extremely powerful.

As an episode, it's not really as good as the last few that we've watched. There's plenty of lovely moments, and it's a brilliant way to end the era (and, indeed, the decade), but it's mostly tying up the loose ends from the previous nine weeks. I'd completely forgotten that the War Lord had his guards turn up to make an escape attempt at one point, and recalled most of the episode being given over to the trial of the Doctor. Still, it's a great way to end the story, and entirely worth the long wait. 

And that's it! The last episode of monochrome Doctor Who. I can't really describe how massive it feels to be standing at this side of the 1960s, and realising that I've experienced every episode along the way.

There have been plenty of ups and downs, but when you look back at these first six seasons as the bedrock, there's no surprise that this is a programme still going from strength to strength all this time later. Inventive, funny, scary, absolutely bonkers, but absolutely brilliant. And now it's all change. From tomorrow, I'll be venturing into the 1970s, and one of my least favourite periods of the programme. I'm hoping that watching through in order will help to overturn my views on the era in the same way that it has for this decade (for better or worse!), but I think it's a whole new challenge.

Frankly, I can't wait.

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 259: The War Games, Episode Nine

Dear diary,

Had it been invented by this time, the end of this episode would have been the TARDIS' Cloister Bell sounding, and the Doctor's hand slid slowly away from the lock. As is becoming common for this story, we've got another one of those cliffhangers that joins the club of 'the best ever'. It's a stunning example of how to do it today, and I think this must be the most powerful cliffhanger of the entire black and white era. Forget the mysterious shadow on the sand outside the police box, the sink plunger creeping into view, or even the Doctor's seeming change of sides in the last episode - this is an absolute blinder.

We've been drip-fed hints about the Time Lords more and more as this story has progressed, but today's episode is all leading up to these final few moments. The War Chief teases the Doctor that calling them will mean the end for both of them, but you can really feel his fear when he realises that the Doctor really is going to go through with it. Everything about them is built up to be mysterious and sinister, right down to the Doctor going into a kind of trance and mentally building a box as a means to contact them. The War Lord hammers it home as he quips that the Doctor will wish he were dead rather than meet them, and then turns fearful himself as an ominous noise grows louder and he simply exclaims that they're coming...

Perhaps the thing that sells the threat more than any other, though, is how quickly and desperately the Doctor is willing to abandon Jamie and Zoe just to get away from the Central Zone in time and save his own skin. We've not seen a selfish side to the Doctor like this since Season One, and it really hits home. It's the way that he simply tells them that they'll be sent home, and he's sorry but he has to go... after everything they've been through together (especially Jamie!), that hurts. It's stunning, and really makes the stakes seem higher than ever before.

It helps that we don't actually see the Time Lords at all in this episode. I could of course remember this cliffhanger (even if the rest of the episode was practically like new to me!), but I had a vague image of the final shot being a trio of Time Lords staring down at the Doctor and his friends. I'm glad that was a false memory, because it's so much more effective to be left with that huge sense of anticipation. After all that build up, all that teasing, all that threat... we have to wait a whole week to find out what they're really like. Well, I don't, thankfully. I'll be tuning in tomorrow. With a cliffhanger this good, I'm really thankful to be pacing myself like this - I'm desperate to go on and watch the last 25 minutes, but I like that I have to wait. Tomorrow is going to go slooow...

Since they depart in this episode, I want to take a moment and sing the praises of two members of the guest cast. David Savile as Lieutenant Carstairs has been fantastic throughout, and I've really enjoyed him being a part of the team. It does somewhat beg the question though as to why he isn't counted as a companion when people do count Sara Kingdom. I decided, having watched The Daleks' Master Plan that she belonged on the official role call, and I'm wondering if I might add Carstairs to my list, too. True, he doesn't meet any of the traditional criteria, but he does travel in a TARDIS of sorts, and visits several time periods with the Doctor (technically). Aside from all that, he's bloody brilliant, so there.

Edward Brayshaw also turns in a brilliant performance as the War Chief, and it's sad to think that he won't be turning up in any other stories. I don't recall having a strong opinion on his either way when he was in The Reign of Terror, but here he's one of the main players across the story, and he's impressed me right from the get-go. I can't let the character die without mentioning the often-debated idea that the War Chief could be an early incarnation of the Master. Personally, I'm not sure if I like the idea, but I can see why it might be appealing. For now, I'm thinking that he probably isn't, but I might review that decision once the character starts to turn up more regularly from Season Eight. If anything, the War Chief has the better-crafted beard, so that's something, I guess!

I also need to mention James Bree as the Security Officer (I think his role might have actually been the 'Security Chief', putting him on an equal footing with his enemy, but I've called him this all along, so it's a little late to back out now...). Again, he's been on fine form throughout, and I've enjoyed the almost childish rivalry between him and the War Chief. I think it's a triumph of both performances that you cheer for both of them at some point in today's episode. When the Security Officer played the recording out and gets the proof he's so desperately wanted, we're really pleased to see him finally take the upper hand. But then when we watch him gunned down by his mortal foe, I was glad to see him get his just desserts! Maybe I'm just trying to side with the winning team?

Right then. Tomorrow's the big one. It sounds silly when you consider that this is only a TV programme (and one made almost half a century ago at that!) but I've genuinely got butterflies in my stomach. We're about to hit perhaps the biggest change that the programme ever sees, and tomorrow is that final episode of normality before everything changes. It feels like a really big deal, and The War Games has done all it can to ramp up that sense of occasion with every passing episode. I'm a huge mixture of excited and terrified to be reaching the end of the 1960s, but if anything, it's been one hell of a journey to get to this point...

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 258: The War Games, Episode Eight

Dear diary,

...Bloody hell. That could possibly be one of the best episodes that we've ever had. I'd started to worry that the story was beginning to feel a little bit padded out, and the fact that the Doctor had cooked up a plan to save the day in Episode Seven (of ten) left me a bit concerned about what was left to come. While parts of today's episode could be described as padding (and there's a whole host of comedy accents back again, including a Mexican who ends each line with 'eh?'. It's almost as though they're celebrating every little bit of the Troughton era all in one!), it really is a perfectly crafted 25- minutes.

We get to see a bit more of the various War Zones (though they all seem to look suspiciously like other war zones...) as the Resistance begin their coordinated attack, and it works really well. It's strange how seeing them take out a couple of communication units, coupled with an increasing rate of telephone calls and little flags on a map can make things seem so large-scale, but it does! It perhaps helps that when they destroy these things, they do it with a real vigour. The smashing up of the Roman Zone's screen puts the prop well beyond repair, while the explosion in the Crimean Zone is one of the programme's best.

We only see seven or eight members of the Resistance in this episode, but somehow it feels like we've got a whole army building up, ready to launch the attack. The one thing that does seem to be a bit of a shame is the lack of Lady Jennifer. She departed a few episodes ago to look after some wounded soldiers, and I keep waiting for her to return to the story, but it's looking increasingly as though it's not going to happen. Excitedly, I seem to have forgotten all of this from my previous viewing, so I really have no idea of where things are headed from here.

I'm surprised that I can't remember very much about any of this stage in the story because the cliffhanger at the end has to be the very best we've ever had. I've already stated my love for the cliffhangers in this story on more than one occasion, but this one in particular is stunning. We know that the Doctor is being put to the test, and that he's being forced to bring the leaders of the Resistance to the Central Zone, but I was fully expecting him to have some kind of get-out plan. As it is, the episode ends with that wonderful shout; 'Stand still! Don't move! You are completely surrounded!'

You could almost be forgiven for thinking that the Doctor really has gone over to the other side. Everything here is played as though the War Chief is the first Time Lord that the Doctor's encountered since leaving his home world, and you could really believe that he's managed to tempt him into being a part of the plans. The whole scene in which they converse, each stood on opposite sides of the War Table (for want of a better term), is flawless - it's almost as though all the battles and planning and stuff is there to keep Zoe and Jamie entertained while the Doctor goes off to have a 'grown up' talk in the other room.

He was at his best earlier in the story when commandeering the use of a military transport and bursting his way into the prison, but here he's on the absolute top of his game once more, in a completely different way. We get confirmation that the Security Officer's suspicions have been right all along and that the Doctor is one of these mysterious 'Time Lord' characters, and Troughton plays the scene with a quiet reserve. The actual revelation is almost brushed under the carpet - simply slipped into the conversation along with so many other little things that have become such an important part of Doctor Who's mythology over the years (is this the first time that they explicitly state that the Doctor stole the TARDIS? I've just watched through all of the 1960s stories in order, but it's such an obvious part of the narrative to me in 2013 that I honestly couldn't tell you wether it's been brought up or not at this stage).

'I had every right to leave,' the Doctor points out, and adds that he had his own reasons for doing so. People talk a lot these days about 'story arcs' and playing a long game with plot threads, but this is one that's been running for six whole years, dating right back to the very first episode in which the Doctor tells Ian and Barbara that he and Susan are cut off from their own people. We get some more references to it around Season Three in the Doctor's beautiful speech when Steven storms out, but it's largely been in the background since William Hartnell left. We even get the first hint that the Doctor may try to contact the Time Lords and alert them to what's happening here, but we're told that he won't because he risks giving himself away, too.

And yet it's funny to think that all these revelations - things which will go on to shape the series over the next forty-something years - came in the lowest rated episode of the 1960s! Worse that that, this will remain the lowest-rated episode of Doctor Who as a whole until Battlefield Part One takes the crown twenty years later! It's bizarre, but almost fitting considering the way that the revelations are treated so casually in the story that they should enter the programme in such an understated way.

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 257: The War Games, Episode Seven

Dear diary,

I like that we finally get the introduction of the War Lord this late in to the story. It almost feels like a shot in the arm when things were in danger of becoming a little stale. Philip Madoc turns in a fantastic performance here, and I'd completely forgotten that we last saw him only a few weeks ago in The Krotons. Maybe it’s the addition of a beard? Either that or most characters are just blurring into one as I watch more and more Doctor Who (is it telling that I can’t remember his name from that story?).

The downside to the addition of this character – the brains of the operation as it were – is that it really serves to highlight just how incompetent the War Chief and the Security Officer are. We’ve had several episodes in which the Doctor and his companions are able to run around, continually managing to overcome any attempt to suppress them, but seeing the War Lord’s reaction to the news really compounds the mountain of errors that have been occurring in his absence.

I think the best moment has to be the argument between the Chief and the Officer, as they blame each other for each successive problem, only for the War Lord to cut in an announce that if they can’t get along, they’ll simply be replaced. There’s something cool, calm and collected about him, and when he does lose it and shout at them it really cuts through.

Although I’ve been enjoying the last few episodes, it feels like today we’re finally starting to move towards some kind of conclusion. I’ve commented all along that the Doctor seems to know that this is too big for him to manage, but even here, just three episodes from the end of the1960s, there’s no indication of just how big the shake up to the programme is going to be. If anything, it looks like the Doctor has it all sussed out. Until the last couple of minutes, when the guards turn up and take him away, he’s completely in control of the situation. They’ve gotten together a fair number of the resistance group, the chateau has been secured in its own separate time zone so they can’t be attacked by the various armies gathering outside, and they’ve got the deprocessing machine, ready to convert any soldier from outside. Even on top of that, the Doctor is pretty sure that he can replicate the technology given enough time (how? It’s not like he can easily pick up parts from the 1917 zone!), so that it can convert whole groups of soldiers at a time.

It seems as if we’ve got our solution all worked out and ready to go. I can’t really remember what happens from here (until the cliffhanger to Episode Nine), so I’m hoping it’s suitably grand enough to justify the Doctor having to go all the way and call in the Time Lords for help.

Something I do have to mention today is the name of the alien’s time machines. All the way through these entries for The War Games, I’ve been referring to it simply as a ‘TARDIS’, but of course I know that’s not what they call it. ‘SIDRAT’ has always been the term used to describe them (see what they did there?), but the only mention of the name on screen is in this episode in which it’s pronounced ‘side-rat’. I have to say that despite that being their ‘official’ name, I’m just not that fond of it. I’m pretty sure that one of the novels even gives the description of what ‘SIDRAT’ stands for, but it just doesn’t work for me.

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start...

Dear diary,

It's strange how my priorities have shifted in the last six days. During Episode One, I was really glad to be seeing something akin to an old-style 'historical' story, with the minimum amount of science fiction involved. As the story has gone on, though, I've found myself enjoying the sci-fi more and more, and now I'm more interested in what's going on in the Central Zone than I am with any of the stuff in the Civil War area.

It's great to see the Doctor using the Sonic Screwdriver again here, and for an application other than unscrewing things. It's interesting to note that he struggles with another method of getting the wall panel removed to begin with (he talks of reversing the magnetic forcefield, but stops short of mentioning any neutron flows...), and it's actually Zoe who suggests that the Sonic Screwdriver might be of use here. Maybe my assumptions all along that the Doctor simply hasn't developed the device to the point that it can fulfil the magic-wand like qualities it's capable of these days are completely wrong? Could it be that he actually designed it simply to remove screws (that's what it's been used for in 50% of its appearances so far!) and it's not until now that he starts to think there might be other applications for it? I think it was the Doctor who thought to cut through the wall with it in The Dominators, so maybe it's a combination of the two? It's not quite there yet in terms of the 'software', for want of a better word, so he doesn't immediately think to use it when a situation arises?

Forget all that, though, because today's episode is home to a far more important moment - it's the first mention we've had in the series of 'Time Lords'. It's mentioned in passing, just as a single line in the middle of a greater conversation about the War Chief. It's chucked in as part of a reference to the fact that he's an alien to these people as much as he is to everyone else, and they're described as his people. There's absolutely no indication that there's anything important about the line, and that makes this one of the rare times that I'm glad to have former knowledge about the programme.

Usually, I'm complaining that knowing all about this stuff means that I don't get to experience events with the sense of excitement a new viewer might. Here, knowing how significant that line is, I can sit back and enjoy being ahead of the game, watching as they start to draw all the threads together, leading to the Doctor's capture at the end of the story. Like the references earlier on to the Doctor hoping his suspicions about what's going on could be wrong, it's great to know what's just coming up on the horizon. 

I'm also pleased to see Zoe being sent off back to one of the war zones, while the Doctor remains behind with Jamie. It's great to have him spending some quality time with both of his companions before they get separated, and having had several episodes in which he gets to interact with Zoe's superior logic, we end today with Troughton and Hines gurning as the ceiling presses down on them. It's like they're letting us enjoy the pairings one final time before they're so cruelly snatched away from us...

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 255: The War Games, Episode Five

Dear diary,

When the Doctor and Zoe first stepped out of the ‘TARDIS’ and into the Central Control Zone, I was a bit... surprised by the decor. Obviously, I’ve seen The War Games before, so I know what it looks like once they’re out of the various wars, but a bit of time away from the story really hammers the design in. It’s almost like the story is screaming at you: ‘This is the last Doctor Who of the 1960s!’

And yet, I really like it! The room they take Zoe to for interrogation today, with it’s huge black-and-white circle pattern on the wall, looks really striking, and in hindsight, they could almost be making the most of the departure from the monochrome era. The rest of the Central Zone sets are pretty unique as well, and I think a particular favourite has to be the way that the corridors are arranged. The odd banks of shaped 'partitions' create a pretty interesting effect, and somehow they're making it genuinely feel as though we're moving down different corridors, even though it's clear that they're simply changing the position of the camera. I think it's simply that it's not a long, thin set, but a much wider one. The use of the ramp down to where their time machines arrive helps with this sense of scale, too, and creates more opportunities for dramatic shots. Adding the height to the sets in this way has become more and more common over the last few seasons, but the stories from The Seeds of Death on have made it especially clear, and it really does add something.

The style used for the Central Zone extends out across all the other areas of design, too. I’m a big fan of the futuristic guns (the way the different squares flash as the weapon fires kept me amused. I've got a simple mind at times), though the guard's uniforms are perhaps less successful... I'm not all that keen on the way that the controls for their technology work either. While it's a good idea in principal, it does somewhat give the effect of those felt art sets you can pick up in a pound shop...

It’s brilliant that we’ve got David Maloney back for this one, too, since he did such a great job with The Krotons. It’s like with the more recent series, when the director who impresses the production team the most during the regular run gets invited back to do the special Christmas episode. Much of this particular episode has been pretty run-of-the-mill stuff, direction-wise, but there's been some lovely visual flourishes throughout the story so far.

For me, the highlight of today's episode has probably got to be the Doctor himself. Troughton really is on fine form for his last story, and they're showing off as many sides to this incarnation as possible before we see him bow out for good. Both yesterday and today we're being shown the fiercely intelligent side to him, as he tricks his way into finding the information that he requires. Yesterday he managed to get a scientist to give him all the information needed to remove the 'programming' from a soldier's mind, and today he manages to get the same scientist - who even points out that there's a warrant out for the Doctor's arrest! - to help get Carstairs back to normal.

Aside from that, we've got Zoe's interrogation scene. It's a wonderfully written piece, and I love the way Padbury plays her responses to the questions, with a sense of real desperation that she just doesn't know the answers. In some ways, it's a shame that we don't get a proper date of birth pinned down for her, aside from the repeated statement that she was born 'in the 21st century' and that she comes from the 21st century (which, if nothing else, is another nail in the coffin for the idea that The Wheel in Space takes place in the year 2000).

I'm a little sorry that I've already mentioned just how great the cliffhangers are in this story, though, because today's provides another real blow - Jamie and the rebels emerge from the time machine and are instantly gunned down! They're really not giving the companions an easy ride on their way out...

a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 254: The War Games, Episode Four

Dear diary,

In June 1966, Peter Cushing went into a radio studio to record a 23- minute pilot for a potential Doctor Who radio series. This first episode - Journey into Time - serves as a brief introduction to the series as a whole, featuring a loose retelling of An Unearthly Child Episode One, complete with Susan baffling her teachers at school. The story differs after that and it's a boy from Susan's school who ends up stumbling into the TARDIS and being whisked off into time and space. The episode is written by Malcolm Hulke, one of his earliest contributions to the franchise, and ends with the Doctor, Susan, and Mike finding themselves caught in the American Revolution, surrounded at gunpoint by a group of soldiers.

It's not a million miles away from the American civil war that Jamie and Lady Jennifer have spent today's episode in, and the cliffhanger could be right out of The War Games, too. I'm surprised in some ways that we've never had this kind of setting in the series before now - it seems like such an obvious period of history to explore, and if The Space Pirates taught us anything, it's that the production team aren't afraid of filling six episodes with 'American' accents.

Sadly, Jamie and Lady Jennifer are relegated today into the role of filling out the episode. Their entire twenty-five minutes is spent being captured by and then escaping from different groups of soldiers. First they're tied up by the North, and set free by the South. Then the German commander turns up and uses his hypnotising monocle (that's not a sentence you often type) to have them tied back up again. A resistance fighter then sets them free, before they're rounded back up and brought back to the barn again. They just can't catch a break!

It could dent the quality of the episode that it's been reduced to such a runaround, but thankfully the Doctor and Zoe are given a far more interesting storyline to follow as they make their way into the headquarters of the war zone operation. All the stuff aboard the 'TARDIS' (look, I know it's not been identified as actually being one on screen, only being like one, but it's easier to keep typing than 'bigger-on-the-inside-space-and-time-machine') is fantastic, and the idea of seeing all the different soldiers lined up in their different compartments, waiting to be deployed, is a great concept. I'd love to see what a modern budget could do with this - a whole army waiting to be taken to the front line. I'm also glad that the Romans here make an effort to go round the back of the set and make multiple passes across the screen. At the end of yesterday's episode, when the American troops were deployed, Zoe commented on there being 'so many' of them, when only about five had actually turned up.

The real meat of the episode comes in the form of Lieutenant Carstairs' 'reprocessing'. I've never noticed it before now, but it's almost like a preview of what's going to be happening to Jamie and Zoe at the end of the story - he recognises the Doctor in the crowd, and then his mind is wiped leaving him with only memories of their earliest encounters, when he still believes the Doctor and Zoe to be German spies. I'm so glad that I've spotted it on this occasion, as it feels almost like the episode is foreshadowing future events, and really hammers home the fact that we're running out of time for this TARDIS team.

David Savile turns in a simply flawless performance as Carstairs in this episode, and really makes it sinister when he 'turns' on his friends. 'These are my brother officers,' he confirms, looking around the room of students, before fixing his gaze squarely on our heroes; 'Except those two people! They're German spies!' Even better is his simple exchange with Zoe during the cliffhanger moments - 'you're a German spy. It's my duty to shoot you.'

More and more, there's suggestions building that the Doctor really is out of his depth this time. Today's addition to that plot line is his response to Zoe's question as to who else could have a TARDIS-like machine, and he comments that there is an answer to that, but that he really hopes it's not the one he's thinking of. It's no wonder I'd always thought of this story as being some epic of the 1960s - it's fantastic, and treating itself as such...

Don't forget to 'like' the 50 Year Diary Facebook page - I'll be asking about your favourite Troughton stories this time next week!

8/10 

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 253: The War Games, Episode Three

All the cliffhangers in this one are really good, aren’t they? The Doctor tied up before a firing squad as the first shot sounds. The ambulance emerging from the fog only for our heroes to be chased down by a group of angry Romans (they were probably still annoyed at the Doctor for burning down their city). Now we can add the Doctor and Zoe being swept off by a mysterious TARDIS-like machine, leaving Jamie and Lady Jennifer behind in the American Civil War.

If anything, I’d say that today’s closing moments need another couple of seconds before they cut, as it’s a little abrupt here, but the impact is still in tact. It’s another one of those times that I’m glad I’ve not seen this story in such a long time, because while I can recall the major plot revelations, I can’t remember each story beat along the way. I’d forgotten completely that the Doctor and Zoe were taken away in the ‘TARDIS’, so it came as a great surprise.

The thing that I’m enjoying the most at the moment is the very real sense that the Doctor is already a little out of his depth here. He’s soldiering on anyway and just carrying on with things, trying to investigate exactly what’s happening, but he doesn’t really have a clue. When the ‘TARDIS’ arrives in the barn, he looks so confused by what’s happening that it really sells the moment to me.

I’m also finding myself really dawn to Lady Jennifer and Lieutenant Carstairs. It really shouldn’t work giving the Doctor – in effect – four companions for his final story, but they’re such well crafted characters that you can’t help but fall for them instantly. All the business with Carstairs trying to distract another soldier while the Doctor blows up a safe is fab (and it gives a chance for Troughton and Hines to light up the screen again, too), and his sacrifice to help the others get away is actually quite moving.

The story is evolving at a nice pace, too. We’re barely a third of the way through, and yet nothing is feeling too stretched out at this stage. Episode One plays out as pretty much a standard historical, but with the addition of a mysterious hidden video screen, and with some handy hypnotic glasses. There’s something of a subplot about people forgetting chunks of time, and the court marshal is a bit suspect, but there’s nothing all that out there.

The second episode builds on the elements from the first and then adds in a redcoat out of his time, and then hits you with the Romans at the end. Today, we’re introduced to the map of all the war zones (though conveniently, they only draw attention to the wars that we’ve seen and the American zone that we’re about to visit) and then the Central Zone, policed by a sinister man answering to the ominous ‘War Lord’. In some stories, taking this long to reveal all these elements would be something of a slog, but everything else in The War Games is of such a good standard that I’m really enjoying the pace. If anything, I’m slightly sad to be moving away from the First World War setting – it’s so well realised and this TARDIS team suit it to a tee.

I do need to give a slight cheer for the return of the Doctor’s Sonic Screwdriver, used here again to undo a screw. It’s telling that the device isn’t mentioned when he’s trying to break into a safe (though Jamie does make a joke about a tuning fork, referring back to The Space Pirates, which was a lovely touch), so it really isn’t built for breaking locks at this stage. If anything, it’s now making The Dominators look like the odd one out in terms of the Sonic’s uses, but I’m glad we’ve had one last appearance from it for the Second Doctor. 

a

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 252: The War Games, Episode Two

Dear diary,

We've spent so much time lately stuck in scientific bases and out on alien worlds that you really do forget just how good the BBC are at creating a historical drama. Every detail of the sets and costumes in the last two episodes has been so spot on that it's a real treat to look at. It also means that when things do start to go a bit strange, and we find video screens built into the walls, they're all the more jarring and carry a much greater impact - because they look so out of place amongst all this period detail.

The locations for the story are lovely, too, especially the buildings around the Doctor's firing squad (of all the times to be admiring architecture!). I grew up on a farm with several buildings in a similar style, so it looks like just the sort of place I used to imagine Doctor Who adventures taking place. Were this a bad episode, details like the sets would be something to help bring it up a point or two in my estimations, but The War Games is still thundering along - the gorgeous design is just a bonus.

No sooner are we out of the cliffhanger to yesterday's episode (a real stunner, too, and another one to consider placing on a list of 'best ever'), than we get another shock reveal in the form of a TARDIS arriving in the General's office. It's key to remember that the last time we saw a TARDIS other than the Doctor's was during The Daleks' Master Plan, and that was over three years ago. It comes as a real shock even, I'm glad to say, to me. It's been so long since I've watched The War Games that I'd remembered these other time machines not turning up until the latter half of the tale. It came as a complete surprise, and that just made the whole thing better.

Then we've got the use of the General's glasses when he's hypnotising people. In yesterday's episode, when they're used to the very first time, it's done as he starts to read some papers. It's all framed as to suggest that the glasses just happened to go on before the need to hypnotise. As the story has gone on, it's become clearer that they're integral to the hypnotism process. It's also great to see Lady Jennifer and Lieutenant Carstairs start to break free of their own brainwashing, having seen it seeded in since their first meeting.

It almost serves to show the impact that the Doctor can have just by turning up somewhere. He's well aware that things aren't quite what they seem to be, but he's still piecing it all together. Meanwhile, his mere presence in this area has brought together two people who may never have met, and caused them to think differently. It's the great strength that this Doctor has displayed many times before and it's good to see it being used one last time before he bows out.

Elsewhere in the episode, Troughton is on absolutely blazing form. When he halts a car simply by standing in the middle of the road and shouting at the driver, it signals the start of one of his best ever performances as he smashes through the next few scenes with his volume control up to maximum. I often find myself quoting the Seventh Doctor when he says that you just need to 'act as if you own the place' to get through unquestioned (indeed, trying that once got me onto the set of a proper Doctor Who episode for a full afternoon as they filmed, but that's a story for another day), and it's this idea that's being shown at its best here.

Wendy Padbury deserves some praise again, too; she's really a brilliant foil for Troughton's Doctor, and after all my musing earlier this season that I'd like to see him traveling alone with her, I'm glad to see that the production team have obviously had similar thoughts, and keep pairing them off. If there's one thing I'm going to miss by the time this story is over, it's the developing relationship between the two.

After all that, we're sent on our way with another stunning cliffhanger, as the ambulance disappears into a strange void of smoke, and then reappears out in the English countryside, ready to be set upon by Romans. Obviously, I know what's going on, but I can only imagine how odd this must have seemed at the time. We've not had a historical story in ages and now there's two for the price of one (and there's even a redcoat thrown in for good measure!). 

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 251: The War Games, Episode One

Dear diary,

It's May 2006, and I've taken my friend Ben with me to Holt out on the Norfolk coast, where they're having a big Doctor Who celebration. Later that evening we'll settle down to watch The Idiot's Lantern play out on TV, but for now we're stood in the middle of a high street taken over by an attempt to break the world record for the number of Daleks gathered together in one place. I don't think they quite managed it.

Truth be told, the day was a bit rubbish, I seem to recall. Someone had dropped us off there in the morning, and wouldn't be back to collect us for hours. An early highlight was meeting Colin Baker, who surely has to be one of the nicest people ever connected to the series in any way, shape, or form, but then everything else was just a bit naff. There were plenty of stalls selling tat, none of which appealed to me, and I remember spending about an hour sat on a step somewhere while we tried to think of something to do.

The day got considerably better when we found a particular stall that was selling Doctor Who video tapes. It's funny how some things stick in your mind so clearly, but this is one of them. It was quite a small set up, a stall bordered with a rusty metal frame and covered with a blue tarpaulin on three sides and the top. They had loads of tapes spread out on the front desk, with more piled up on those cheap shelving units you can pick up in Argos all along the back. It was heaving with people, and you had to fight your way through the crowd a bit to reach the front and look through the collection.

I'd pooled my money for a few weeks in the hope that I might be able to buy something on this day out, and so far it had remained firmly in my wallet. Suddenly, I had the opportunity to spend it ten times over. All these VHS tapes, all these stories that we're miles away from any kind of DVD release! I can't remember all the ones I looked at - I must have picked up loads while trying to make my decision - but then I caught sight of one particular set up on the top shelf at the back.

The Time Lord Collection. A sturdy cardboard box wrapped around The Three Doctors, which I already had on DVD so wasn't that exciting, The Deadly Assassain, which was supposed to be a really good Tom Baker story in which he fights the Master on Gallifrey, and... no? Surely not? It can't be... a double tape release of The War Games, the epic ten-part Second Doctor story which introduced the TIme Lords to the series and saw Patrick Troughton's departure?!?!

It's strange, in 2013, with only a few DVD releases left before everything is easily available to pick up for a few pounds on Amazon, to explain just how exciting this was. I'd picked up one or two video tapes of the old stories on Ebay over the years, but they were usually the ones that went cheap - and thus weren't the ones with the best of reputations. Indeed, I took a flyer for the company selling the tapes on this day and handed out a highlighted version to family members when they asked what I'd like for my birthday that year.

The War Games had been released in 1990, and then again as part of this box set in about 2002. I think it was a limited edition, but I just wasn't aware of that kind of thing back then. To me, it was simply a chance to own The War Games. This story - mores perhaps than any other - was like a Holy Grail. It's ten episodes long! It's the first introduction of the Time Lords. The Second Doctor regenerates. I could type on for a half a million words and I'd never be able to accurately tell you how thrilling the thought of owning this box set was.

But it was out of my price range. Only by about £10 or so, but still. Thankfully, it was Ben to the rescue. I'd successfully managed to get him into the stuff they were currently showing on TV with David Tennant and Billie Piper, but he had zero interest in any of the old stuff. Indeed, Ben is one of the pair I spoke of during The Tomb of the Cybermen, who'd had the audacity to laugh at the silver giants! Ben stumped up the extra cash (for which I'm still thankful, seven years on) and I purchased this magnificent set.

If anything, it made the last few hours of the day go even slower. Not only had we now been round everything there was to see at this particular day out, but now I was holding a copy of The War Games in my hands, and simply couldn't wait to get home and watch it. I explained to Ben just how important this story was to the history of the series, but I don't think he really cared. I decided that I would ration the story out; no more than one episode a day (that sounds familiar), so that I could really make the most of it. Of course, that all went out the window once I'd gotten it home and put it in the video player because it was fantastic.

And, d'you know what? It still is. I've tried something of an experiment with today's episode, because I happen to be visiting Mum's house at the exact point that I should be sitting down to watch this one. So often throughout the course of the 1960s episodes, I've commented about how different it would have looked on an old telly compared to being on my Mac screen, so today I've hooked up an old VHS player to an old telly (it's from the early 80s, but I think it's about as close as I'm going to get) and popped in the VHS. The DVD is waiting at home for me in freshly restored glory, using better prints than were available to the VHS release, but I planned to have something really insightful and fascinating to say about the process of watching the episode in this way.

And I've completely failed! Because apart from noting that - yes - Patrick Troughton's face does actually look terrifying when you see it emerging from the title sequence on an old CRT screen, I've just been entirely swept up in the story, and I've not made a single other note about the way it looks on this old screen. Typical. If you want, you can pretend that I've said something really interesting here about it all.

Oh, but it is brilliant, this episode, isn't it? Right from the moment we see the TARDIS' materialisation in the reflection of a puddle on the muddy battlefield up to the second the Doctor scrunches up his face before a firing squad and a shot gets fired... every single bit of this episode is sheer brilliance.

I'm surprised to find how pleased I am to see the TARDIS back in history. We've not been anywhere before the 1960s since way back in The Abominable Snowmen, and I didn't think I'd been missing travels back into the past, but actually it feels fresh and different. It's probably helped by being an era that's so close to living memory (even more so on the original broadcast) and it makes it all feel that much more real.

This is especially true of the threat running through the episode. When the Doctor parts company with Zoe to be taken to a cell, he gives her a gentle kiss on the head and mutters 'Goodbye, my dear.' It's a simple moment, but it's so touching. Forget being stuck inside the Kroton's ship, or fighting the Karkus in the Land of Fiction, this is real, and there's an honest sense of danger to it all. The same can be said for the moment that Zoe breaks in to steal the set of keys. It feels far more dangerous than anything else in Season Six has - perhaps more than anything else in the Second Doctor's era. Being somewhere as sombre as the First World War, and being the final story for all three of our regulars, it all feels far, far, more true.

I could rattle on for ages about this episode, and the Doctor Who Online news page would disappear under a wave of my gushing with praise, so I'll stop now. There's another nine days to go with this one, so I'm sure there'll be plenty of time for me to say everything I could possibly want about The War Games.

For now, I'll settle for saying that I'm so happy that the story can produce this kind of emotion in me, all these years later, and having sat through so many other episodes already this year. This one really is something very special indeed.

For now, I'll settle for saying that I'm so happy that the story can produce this kind of emotion in me, all these years later, and having sat through so many other episodes already this year. This one really is something very special indeed. 

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 250: The Space Pirates, Episode Six

Dear diary,

And just like that, I've run out of missing Doctor Who episodes. It all seems so easy in retrospect, and actually 106 missing episodes doesn't feel like a massive amount when you think about just how many I've actually been able to watch. I sort of suspect that I should have a bit of a celebration or something to celebrate this key milestone, but it's The Space Pirates, so the era of missing episodes goes out with more of a whimper than a bang.

I think part of the problem I've had with the story is that I'm just not all that engaged with the situation. In The Seeds of Death, it felt as though the Doctor and his companions were willing to throw themselves into the line of danger in an attempt to help because they really wanted to do so. Here, the only reason that they're helping anyone is because they've been separated from the TARDIS, and have gotten swept along with events.

It means that when the situation is getting desperate and we're watching a (really long) countdown to an explosion, everything just feels a bit dull. I don't care about the situation, so I'm not that bothered by anything that's happening. It's an interesting feeling in some ways. I always know that the Doctor and his companions are going to get out of the danger (well, unless it's a regeneration story or something like Earthshock), but part of the fun is watching how they make their escape. It's about the Doctor being clever, or his companions being vital. Today, I know that they're not going to get blown up and I don't care how they get out of it, because it boils down to something as mundane (!) as diffusing a bomb.

As I've said before, I'm really disappointed by The Space Pirates. Based on the first couple of episodes, I was so looking forward to standing out from the crowd and proudly declaring a liking for the tale, but it's just not to be. I wonder if its reputation might be better had more episodes survived, or if more were to show up? The surviving Episode Two was rather good, and it gave me lots of little visual cues to enjoy. Because of the slower pacing throughout the rest of the tale, the audio just doesn't really help. Having something to look at (even if it is metal hair) would really benefit the tale.

It still doesn't deserve the title of the worst story of the 1960s, though, I don't think. The Dominators was much worse than this - and I could see all of that one!

Though I've joked about it above, this really is a pretty significant moment in the marathon for me. One of the things that's always been off putting about the idea of a Doctor Who marathon is the fact that such a large chunk of the early years is marred by huge gaps. I tiptoed into Season Three with a bit of a worry, because i genuinely didn't know how I'd cope with so many bits of the programme being missing, and getting stuck in a cycle of moving between the soundtracks, surviving episodes and back again.

As it is, I've really enjoyed it. The sheer quality of a lot of stories from this era has really helped to make the task more manageable, and in some ways it's gong to be a shame to leave behind the narration from the soundtracks. Season Six has been a nice way of easing back into actually sitting down to watch an episode properly again, which I have to confess has felt a bit alien so many days in a row!

Still, despite everything, I really do hold out hope that more will be returned to the archive at some point in the future - and I've absolutely no doubt that it will. These things always turn up in the strangest of places and just when you're not expecting it. Now that I'm ten episodes away from the end of the 1960s, it's sods law that some will be turning up any day now…

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 249: The Space Pirates, Episode Five

Dear diary,

I can't seem to make my mind up with this story. Every so often, I think I've worked out what's going on, and then I change my mind and they do something different anyway. For much of Episode Two, I kept switching between believing that Milo Clancy was definitely not in league with the pirates, to deciding that he definitely was. Even now, when it seems pretty clear that he's on the side of the law (even if it's grudgingly), I keep expecting them to throw a curve ball and make him the leader of the pirates anyway.

Then you've got Madeleine Issigri and her metal hair (though, for some reason, as I listened through today's episode, I kept picturing her as Miss Kelly from The Seeds of Death). From the moment she first turned up in the story I'd decided that she must be working with the pirates, then I figured that was too easy so started to think otherwise. Now it would appear that she is working with them, but only because she's in too deep now to withdraw. I rather like that. I'd assume that she was in it simply for the money (we've been told several times that the old Argonite mines are all but dried up, meaning that she's head of a dying company), but it turns out that she entered this operation with the best of intentions, when it was a simple 'salvage mission'.

As if that wasn't enough, you've then got the reveal today that her father - a man we've been told is dead - is alive and… he isn't well, but he's a live at least, and locked up in his old study not all that far away. I have to confess that I knew he was going to be turning up at some point, because I read an article in Nothing at the End of the Lane a few days ago all about the costumes in this story, and there's an image of his in there. Still, it makes for a nice reveal, and adds yet another layer to everything.

The problem with all this is that I've sort of lost track of who's chasing who. I know that the pirates are planning to set Clancy, the Doctor, Jamie, Zoe, and Dom all free in the LIZ 79, with the intention of sending it up for the Space Corps to find, but I'm not now sure if the Space Corps are still after Clancy or not. They discuss it a lot today as they try to piece the puzzle all together, but I'm sorry to say that they left me behind somewhere along the route.

One of the things that I am really enjoying about The Space Pirates is that we've got Jack May in as General Hermack. May is often familiar for playing Simms the butler in Adam Adamant Lives!, a series that I've got a lot of love for (indeed, I watched an episode a few months ago during The Tenth Planet to see Patrick Troughton's last acting work before becoming the Doctor. How fitting that May should then turn up in Doctor Who so close to Troughton's departure!), and it's great to see him here. I also didn't realise until today that May was also the voice of Igor in Count Duckula, a series that I was only praising a few weeks ago during The Invasion! It's a small world, British telly, innit?

And I think that's one of the key things about this marathon for me. For man years, my interest in archive television only really stretched as far as Doctor Who. I'd make the occasional excursion into Green Acres, but in terms of British television, it was all about the TARDIS. When I watched an old episode of Doctor Who then, for the most part, the actors were only familiar to me from that story, and nothing else. In some ways, I rather liked that. I quite enjoyed the fact that all of the Doctors were simply the Doctor, for example. I didn't know them as anyone else (though it blew my mind when I realised that Partrick Troughton was the priest in The Omen).

Over the last few years, though, my tastes have changed and I've taken quite a liking to lots of archive telly. I'd say at least half of my shelf is made up of series made before the 1970s. It's meant that as we've gone along, there have been plenty of instances of people turning up in the series that I know better from somewhere else, and I've really enjoyed that. It's not simply confined to the actors, either. Verity Lambert was producer of the previously mentioned Adam Adamant Lives!. Sydney Newman was the creator of The Avengers. Many of the writers have turned up across a great many of these different programmes, and it's been fun to watch their style crop up in all these different formats.

In a little under two weeks, I'll be exploding into colour with Spearhead From Space, and moving onto the 1970s. It's an era of British TV than I'm far less familiar with. Of all the titles on my shelves only three were made in the 1970s - Whodunnit (hosted from Season Two by Jon Pertwee, so there is still at least one connection!), the 1970s volume of Coronation Street, and the Morcambe and Wise box set. I'm hoping to use the marathon as a chance to explore other television as I go along (though I'll probably not be keeping much of a track about it in this blog - you're here to read about my journey through Doctor Who, after all!), but I am going to miss being in an era which I have such a strong love for. It's been an interesting experience, and it's helped to make the marathon all the richer.

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 248: The Space Pirates, Episode Four

Dear diary,

As anyone who's been reading these entries for a while will know, I'm really not the biggest fan of missing episode recons. For one reason or another, they usually fail to hold my attention, and the ticker-tape descriptions of the action move far too quickly for me to get me head around. With the odd exception for an animated instalment, or occasionally dipping my toe into the world of the recon (I couldn't actually get through Marco Polo without watching one - how times change!), I've experienced pretty much all the missing episodes in the form of the narrated soundtracks.

It's been a perfectly good way of going through the stories, and I really don't feel that I've missed out on my thing by going the purely audio route a lot of the time. They're all incredibly well produced, with fantastic linking narration (even if the script for The Space Pirates' narration really is going out in a blaze of glory. At one point today, Hines takes great delight in opening a scene with the words 'the Doctor is busily twanging his tuning fork…' Is he indeed!?), and they've been great to listen to on my way home from work each day, lasting just long enough to end as I step through the door, or thereabouts.

But last night, having not enjoyed Episode Three of The Space Pirates as much as I had Episode One, and realising that this really is the end of an important stage in the marathon, I felt all nostalgic. I decided that before I move on to the era in which everything exists in the archives, I needed to give reckons one last chance to prove themselves. I'll admit, there were one or two selfish reasons for it, too. The Space Pirates is one of the Doctor Who stories with the least surviving visual material, no tele snaps, and there's even a few characters we don't have any photos of. I wanted to see how a recon would cope with such a situation.

The answer, it seems, is 'pretty well'. I did have a moment, about three minutes in where I decided that it just wasn't going to work, so muted the recon and keyed up the right place in the soundtrack so that I could actually follow what on Earth was happening. I think I probably looked like a bit of an idiot sat in front of the computer screen with my headphones plugged into my phone, but there we go.

The reconstruction overcomes the lack of available images by creating plenty of its own, and pretty cleverly, too. There's several shots of the Doctor, Jamie, and Zoe taken from the surviving second episode of the story, and some which I'm pretty sure are taken from elsewhere. One particular image of Milo Clancy came up so frequently that I worried the image may be burned onto the screen for good, but it did the job. For the actual space pirates themselves, the recon used CGI people. I have to confess that it's not a style of CGI that I've ever really liked, but it works pretty well in this instance.

Sadly, watching it in this form hasn't really helped me enjoy the story any better. I'm genuinely quite disappointed, because having enjoyed the first third after years of being told how rubbish the tale was, I was hoping to be all contradictory, stand proud and say how much I liked it. And there is an awful lot to like! Troughton is - of course - on fine form, and there's a wonderful moment after their fall in the cliffhanger resolution in which he moans in pain and produces a handful of drawing pins that he's landed on. When Zoe asks him what he's carrying the pins for, the Doctor replies simply; 'I like drawing pins!' If anything, it put me in mind of the Second Doctor we had back in Season Four, who is a little bit weird, a little bit 'kooky', but completely loveable, and totally 'the Doctor'.

It's a shame to see him using his tuning fork as a means to break out of their cell, as I was hoping the Sonic Screwdriver was here to stay after it had turned up for a second appearance in The Dominators. Maybe he still hasn't managed to work out all the kinks in the design, and it just won't work on locks yet? It's either that, or the door is made from wood (which, for all we know, it might have been).

Things seem to have gone off the rails a little, it's true, but The Space Pirates is still not as bad as everyone would have you believe. I'm hoping we can make it through the next two episodes relatively unscathed, and it might be able to redeem itself just a bit…

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 247: The Space Pirates, Episode Three

Dear diary,

Something that I've always really enjoyed about the Troughton era is that it spends so much time looking at the future that's just within reach of the audience. Many of the adventures over the course of the last three seasons have taken us into the Twenty-First Century, which at the time must have felt remote and distant enough to really be 'out there'.

It's conceivable, though, that a ten year old watching in the late 1960s would be around to witness mankind's evolution into the type of world we see in these stories, in which the weather for the entire planet is controlled from the Moon, goods and people can be teleported across the globe in a split second, and we'd have all manner of high tech space stations in near-Earth orbit, just ripe for a Cyberman invasion.

Admittedly, it can be a bit tricky to tie everything together from time to time, and the dates given to these stories from years of 'fan wisdom' don't always make the task easier. The second volume of the About Time series makes a pretty good stab at it, and I've had their timeline in mind as I've moved through the last few months. It gives placements to stories such as The Enemy of the World, The Wheel in Space, The Moonbase, and stretching out beyond this era of the programme, Warriors of the Deep (placing them in that order, chronologically, starting from around 2030 and moving through the the 2084 stated on screen for Warriors).

It's in a more recent book - A History of the Universe in 100 Objects, by James Goss and Steve Tribe - that Milo Clancy and the era of Argonite mining is really slotted into the equation. It speculates that the political troubles of the 2080s are what gives rise to the era of lawless spacefaring we've heard spoken of in this story. Clancy likely left the Earth at about the same time the Silurians and the Sea Devils were teaming up to fight the Fifth Doctor, and then the Space Corps were set up far more recently, after the turn of the century.

While I'm not a fan who spends a great deal of time obsessing over making sure that everything 'fits' absolutely within the Doctor Who universe (for a programme that's lasted in some shape or form for half a century, with literally thousands of stories told in all different media it would be entirely impossible for everything to click), I'll admit that it's nice when there's a kind of internal consistency like this.

I'm sorry to report that this episode hasn't really grabbed me in the same way the first couple did, but there's still plenty to be going on with. I think the main thing I'm enjoying is the fact that Zoe is still being used as… well… Zoe. Back during The Wheel in Space, I considered that her character would probably have been washed down the TARDIS' waste system before long and we'd end up with Victoria in all but name.

Actually, though, she's faring pretty well on the whole. Her intelligence has been a key part of the plot in every story so far (with the possible exception of The Dominators, but you know what? That was weeks ago, and I can't actually remember anything other than the drilling scenes towards the end), wether it be in the form of blowing up an annoying computer or - as in today's episode - working out the best way to get the TARDIS back. It's great to see her coming across so well, and I'm finding myself really enjoying Wendy Padbury more and more. I'm so glad, as it's moments with her, Patrick Troughton, and Frazer Hines that really do help to perk up even the most lacklustre of episodes.

Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start... 

Day 246: The Space Pirates, Episode Two

Dear diary,

I believe that I'm going a little bit against the grain when I say that I really enjoyed today's episode! It turns out that the visuals to The Space Pirates really do help it. I'm eve so pleased, because when I put the Lost in Time disc into the drive today I had to really fight myself to not select The Web of Fear Episode One from the menu instead.

The first thing to note is that, despite my complaints about the effects shots of the beacons exploding yesterday (which are housed on the same DVD, as a special feature), the spaceship models on show here are actually rather good. I'm somewhat surprised by the clarity of the shots, too - I thought all the stuff on the Lost in Time sets was unrestored, but they look really sharp. The designs of the spaceships are nothing particularly unusual, they're your standard sci-fi fare, but they look fab and they're filmed very nicely indeed. My only real complaint is that the background to all these bits is just solid black. Would it have killed them to poke a few pins through the backdrop and create some stars? I think it would really add to the effect.

Elsewhere, we've got the introduction of Milo Clancy to proceedings. He comes in for a bit of stick amongst Doctor Who fans (as do many members of the cast from this story) because of the accent, but you know what? I love him, too! Haha! He comes across as totally normal amongst all the high tech spaceship stuff on display. It's highlighted in one very simple moment when he gets a call to his ship, and rather than moving his breakfast, standing up and walking over to receive it, he simply shuffles his chair closer to where he needs to be. It seems like such a ridiculous, insignificant thing (and it is, really), but it adds something very real to the character.

His dialogue is all tailored in such a way that you can't help but enjoy his presence in a scene, too. It must be the kind of thing people talk about when they discuss Robert Holmes' writing being so good. My personal favourite has to be when Clancy - mid conversation with his captors - asks if he can blow his nose, or if that's an offence, too. It's the kind of sarcasm that you'd expect to get in this type of situation, but which most science fiction takes itself too seriously to include.

I also love that they've dressed him simply as an old west prospector. In The Seeds of Death, they set out to show us that we're in the future by making everyone where the same style of 'futuristic' uniform, and then mark out the Professor as being a bit of a rebel by giving him a kind of futuristic cardigan to wear over the top. There's a shot in today's episode when Clancy is surrounded by the crew of the Space Corps, and he looks so out of place by being dressed so casually.

If anything, it puts you on his side at this stage; all the other characters look ridiculous, playing at space cowboys with their ridiculous collars and uniforms. Clancy looks like he's just milling along, trying to get by and enjoying himself. It's only in the cliffhanger that we really turn against him, even though by they stage we've had it more-or-less confirmed to us that he's working with the pirates. Thankfully it gives an already great cliffhanger even more impact, when he simply walks in to the beacon and shoots Jamie.

Yesterday, I made a reference to Revelation of the Daleks and mused that people often complained about how long it took the Doctor and Peri to actually get involved in the action of that story, meeting up with the rest of the cast and such like. I only brought it up because it took the TARDIS so long to arrive in this story, and it seemed an apt comparison. Truth be told, I almost didn't mention it, because I knew someone would pipe up and complain that in that story it took them until the second episode to actually interact with our main guest characters.

Well this one's an even slower burner! Although the Doctor and his friends find themselves shot at by members of the Space Corps in Episode One, and then encounter Clancy making his way inside the beacon at the conclusion of today's episode, they still haven't gotten caught up with the main characters here. It's going to be Episode Three now before our regulars are really caught up with events, making this surely one of the longest lead ins for the Doctor ever.

In short: this is brilliant stuff. There was even a point when I thought the episode might be heading for an 8/10, but I'm afraid that anything that includes a woman wearing a wig made of metal isn't going to reach quite that high. It had to be said, though, it's tricky looking at that costume without picturing the ivory headpiece from Community.