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

Day 141: The Tenth Planet, Episode Four

Dear diary,

Of all the Doctor Who episodes missing from the BBC's archive, The Tenth Planet Episode Four probably has the most mythical status. It's the one in which William Hartnell changes into Patrick Troughton, of course, but it's also one of those odd ones where we can't very easily trace when the tape went missing. There's no definitive record of its destruction, just the fact that it stopped being around after a certain point.

As I've said, I've never watched The Tenth Planet, so I've never known how justified the status of this episode was. It has to be said that - regeneration aside - there's not a lot in here to make it really stand out from any other episode of the programme around this time. It's quite good, don't get me wrong, but there's nothing all that amazing about it until the final few minutes.

I've always been aware of the resolution to the story - that Mondas ultimately absorbs too much of Earth's power and blows itself up. That's really not the important thing about the story, though. This is often talked about as the very first 'Base Under Siege' tale (something that will be cropping up a lot more in the next four months of this blog!), and that really is the best way to describe it. The appearance of Mondas in the skies, the absorption of power, the Cybermen landing globally, all of that takes second place to the crew of the Snowcap base, and watching them fight off wave after wave of attackers.

It's nice that the Z-Bomb which has been so important since around Episode Two is used as a vital part of keeping our Mondasian friends at bay in this final episode, and I'm sure that the sight of a Cyberman creasing up in pain as he enters the radiation room would have been fantastic. The tele snaps unfortunately miss the shot of his demise (though we do get a great close up of the creature's face), but everything around it looks great.

I really have been won over to the design of the Cybermen throughout this tale, and the shots of them that we do have hear continue to make them look fantastic. There's the one moment when a Cyberman on the radio from Geneva seems to be singing all his lines, but I think I can just about overlook that. Finally, I understand why everyone is always so full of praise for them! On the one had, I'm now quite sorry that they only appear in this one story, but on the other, it gives them a certain charm. They're what William Hartnell's Cybermen looked like.

Now obviously, the thing that gets the most attention in this episode is always going to be the transformation between the First and Second Doctors. I've seen the actual change hundreds of times over the years, but this is the first time that I've ever watched the events leading up to it. The whole thing is played as being very sinister - the Doctor's cryptic mumbling is especially unnerving. 'It's all over,' he slurs, 'that's what you said. But it isn't. It's far from being all over!'. It really is an odd sequence, and no attempt is made to have this as a comforting change over between the two actors. The entire thing is played as a new kind of threat, and worthy of a cliffhanger because it's scary, not simply because it's what we'd now call a 'regeneration'.

I'm really pleased that the change is filtered in right from the start of this story, with the Doctor commenting early on that his body seems to be wearing a bit thin. It makes it all the more rewarding when you know what's coming, and saves it from just being something bolted on to the end of the story. I'll be offering up more general thoughts about William Hartnell's tenure in my 'overview' post (which you should find just above this one in the Doctor Who Online news feed), but I'll say here that I genuinely am sorry to see him go.

7/10 

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

Day 141 Extra: The First Doctor Overview

Dear diary,

Well this feels strange. Posting two diary entries in one day. Am I not all written-out, yet? Those of you who've already read today's regular blog entry (which should be immediately below this post on the DWO news page) will have already seen me reach the end of the William Hartnell era of Doctor Who. I figured that it was fitting, at the end of this first stage, to take a look over the first 141 days of the marathon as a whole, and collate some of my thoughts, before I dust myself down tomorrow, and venture into the Troughton era.

In the sidebar to the right of this entry, you should see an image, with a little 'enlarge' button underneath it. If you click on there, you'll be able to properly ready a list of average scores for the First Doctor stories, listed from the lowest ranking (The Space Museum, in case you hadn't picked up on my natural lack of affinity for it) through to the highest (The War Machines, a fact which surprised even me, frankly).

Do note that on the list, I've omitted Farewell, Great Macedon and The Destroyers, because it wasn't ever actually broadcast, and I've lumped both The Destroyers and (controversially) Mission to the Unknown together as being part of a Dalek spin-off, so I've not counted either of those, either.

During the blog posts for the first season, I used to work out the story average and post it during the final episode of each tale. I stopped doing that from Planet of Giants, mostly because I didn't want to know. I liked the idea of reaching this stage, and seeing how the era rates as a whole. What surprises me is how much some stories I thought I'd really hated have actually averaged out with fairly respectable scores.

I think what's surprised me most is the way that the averages per season have worked out. At the time, it felt like Season Two was a real slog, and that I just didn't enjoy it. As it happens, though, it's come out with an average score of 6.4. That still places it in the last place of the first three seasons (I'm discounting Season Four, since we're only a few episodes in), but it's only barely behind Season One (6.5) and not all that far behind Season Three (6.8). When you throw The Smugglers and The Tenth Planet into the mix, the First Doctor's era averages out at a very respectable 6.5 - placing it smack-bang between 'Above Average' and 'Well Above Average' on the ratings chart I posted way back on Day Four.

Right from the start, the main thing that I wanted out of this marathon was a real connection to the classic series. Over the last ten years, I've found that while I really enjoy the early Doctors, I've never been able to develop any kind of meaningful relationship with either them or the companions of the era. The way I explained it to a friend recently is that when Catherine Tate returned to the series in Partners in Crime, and then remained with it for another twelve consecutive episodes, shown one a week, I built up a proper connection the the character.

When Donna leaves at the end of Journey's End, it's emotional because I'd grown to love the character over the course of that season. I really cared for her, and once she was gone, that was it. I'd seen all of her episodes. The classic series, though, possibly sue to the way that the DVD have been released over the years, has always felt a bit more… interchangeable for me. I know that Sarah Jane Smith joins in The Time Warrior and leaves in The Hand of Fear, and I can pick up any one of her adventures from between those two. But equally, I can watch Death to the Daleks, and then head off to watch Time and the Rani or something.

I wanted to see if watching the series at a set pace - a single episode each day - would help me to form the kind of connection to the old characters that I do with the current ones. Thankfully, the answer is that yes, it does.

It's not always in ways that I've expected, either. From dipping in and out of stories, I'd always regarded Ian and Barbara really highly. I thought the pair were fantastic, and rated them quite highly in my list of favourite companions. When it came to actually spending the time with them from their first episode to their last… I was sick of them! By the time The Chase rolled around, they couldn't leave quickly enough. Conversely, Steven Taylor - a companion I'd never really given much thought to - left before I wanted him to! I'd happily have had a few more episodes with him.

Perhaps the biggest success, though, has been William Hartnell as the Doctor. I'd seen enough of his era in the past to know that I liked the First Doctor, and that I enjoyed his era of stories. He was just one of the 'old' Doctors, though. I could dip in and out and mix his stories with any number of others. There wasn't time to form any kind of attachment. Having now spent 141 days with him, though, I don't really want him to go.

There's been a bit of a back-and-forth going on in my head this last week or so, as I alternate between excitement for Troughton's arrival (I've always thought of him as my favourite classic Doctor), and sadness for the departure of Hartnell. I think now, having reached the moment of the changeover, I'm back in the excited camp. The thing is, I never expected to find myself this attached to the First Doctor, and I'm thrilled, because I feel like I've gotten more from his era by experiencing it in this way.

On the whole, Doctor Who's first three seasons seem to be the most inventive, and wide-reaching ever produced. The budgets are tight, the studios are cramped, every episode tries to do something that they're just not quite capable of… but they pull it off. It's been a pleasure to watch through, and I've never thought higher of this era.

Now, though, it's time to pull out a recorder, don a large hat, and move forward into the Troughton era. I'm excited, for this stage of the blog, to see if he comes out as my favourite still, when I'm watching him in order like this. I don't doubt that it's going to be tricky - with this many missing episodes to wade through - but if it gives me anything like the appreciation for the era that the last 141 days have for Hartnell… I'm in for a real treat.

Now, though, it's time to pull out a recorder, don a large hat, and move forward into the Troughton era. I'm excited, for this stage of the blog, to see if he comes out as my favourite still, when I'm watching him in order like this. I don't doubt that it's going to be tricky - with this many missing episodes to wade through - but if it gives me anything like the appreciation for the era that the last 141 days have for Hartnell… I'm in for a real treat. 

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

Day 140: The Tenth Planet, Episode Three

Dear diary,

Regular readers will know that it’s not just 1960s Doctor Who that I’ve got an interest in, but television from that period in general. Anything from the resumption of broadcasts after the Second World War up to about the end of the 60s is the era of television that takes up the most space on my DVD shelves. Either side of the pond will do me: I’m just as happy to sit down in front of an episode of I Love Lucy or The Honeymooners as I am anything made on these shores.

But the best thing about British TV in this era – for a Doctor Who fan, at least – is spotting those actors that you know from the TARDIS turning up in other things. The Avengers is great for this. Nicholas Courtney turns up in the episode Propellant 23, broadcast just over a year before the start of Doctor Who. While the Doctor, Ian, Barbara and Susan were busy convincing the Thals to take a stand and invade the Dalek city, current companion Anneke Wills was playing the part of Jane Wentworth, dressed as a pussy cat, in the episode Dressed to Kill.

Just a few episodes later and, oh look, it’s Barry Letts’ turn to take a role in the programme. We’ll be hearing more about Letts cropping up in this diary a few months from now. Letts’ Doctor, Jon Pertwee, turns up in the programme in 1967, and the final season in 1969 contains an episode starring both Roger Delgado and Kate O’Mara. It’s a Rani and Master team-up, 16 years early! Even Peter Cushing stars in the episode Return of the Cybernauts! In some parallel world, that’s the title of a Doctor Who episode starring Cushing as human inventor Dr. Who, after his series of movies transferred to TV.

It’s not just Doctor Who actors that turn up in the programme, of course, and it’s just as great when the likes of John Le Mesurier or Penelope Keith are a part of the cast, but there’s a special kind of thrill in seeing these actors you know so well from the world of Doctor Who appearing in something else, usually long before they arrive in our favourite sci-fi show.

Occasionally, as I’ve been watching through this marathon, I’ve taken a bit of a detour in my own time, to watch other programmes from the same week. I’ve dipped in to all-sorts as I’ve gone along, but I don’t tend to mention them here on the blog because, well, you’re here on Doctor Who Online to read about Doctor Who. You’re probably not all that interested in my thoughts on an episode of Coronation Street from mid-1964.

Today, though, I’ve got to mention my detour. A couple of nights ago, having finished up my entry for The Tenth Planet, Episode One, I sat and watched an episode of Adam Adamant Lives! broadcast 8th October 1966 (the Thursday between Tenth Planet One and Two). It’s important because in a small role at the start of the episode, we’ve got TV character actor Patrick Troughton. It’s interesting to see him here, so close to taking on the part of the Doctor. The filming dates aren’t as close together as the broadcast ones are (the episode, D For Destruction, was filmed early September, so about six weeks or so before work began for him on Who), but I think I’m right in saying that this will have been one of the last things broadcast starring him before the regeneration occurred.

I’ve been holding off on watching this episode for a while, now, because I was keen to see it in context of my Doctor Who marathon, and I was hoping I’d have a lot of interesting stuff to say about his performance, and the way it ties in with his time in the TARDIS. As it is, though, he only appears for the first five minutes or so, before disappearing from the rest of the story (though a main character for the remainder is played by Ian Cuthbertson, another alumni of The Avengers, and who will be turning up in Doctor Who about a year from now in my marathon for a role in The Ribos Operation).

The other problem comes from the fact that, having spent the last five months making my way through the First Doctor era of the programme, trying to pin-point the way Troughton plays the part seems impossible! I’m going to be keeping it in mind, though, and hopefully I’ll be able to raise some interesting points about the performances in a few days time, once Troughton has actually taken over.

What was more startling to me, though, watching this episode last night, is how similar Polly Wright is to the character of Georgina Jones in Adam Adamant Lives!. Georgina is the equivalent of the companion in that series, and can only be describes as being ‘fab’. Visually, there’s a striking resemblance between the pair, and she even wears a similar hat in this episode to the one Polly was sporting at the end of The War Machines.

Polly’s first appearance in Doctor Who came just two days after the first episode of Adam Adamant Lives! had appeared on screen back in June – I think it certainly says something about the feel of 1966. Polly and Georgina are both trendy young girls, who find excitement getting caught up in adventure. At this point, Polly (and Ben) are just along for the ride, though they're both growing to enjoy life with the Doctor.

I did wonder what this episode would feel like, being without the Doctor and the first story to really feature the 'Base Under Siege' format, I thought it may end up just being a bit of a runaround, with little actually happening. That's why I've saved my thoughts on the Adam Adamant Lives! episode for today - I figurers there was plenty to talk about for yesterday's episode without chucking all that in.

As it happens, though, there's lots and lots I could talk about from today anyway! I'll skim over much of it quickly, to focus on just one point. So, in brief: The Cybermen look fantastic as they move slowly through the blizzard. The 'massacre' of them by their own weapons is also quite effective. I'm absolutely converted to these Cybermen, now. They're lovely. It's nice to see the first use of a ventilation shaft in the series as a way of transporting a companion from 'A' to 'B', even though it's massive! At one point, Barclay announces that he'd never be able to fit through the ventilation shaft. You'd fit a fully-grown Krynoid down that!

The thing that really strikes me, though, is the addition of General Cutler's son to the story. He was introduced late in yesterday's episode, and to begin with I was a little weary of it. In some ways, it felt like the story was trying to have its cake and eat it - you get the shock of 'Zues IV' being blown up, but then they can carry on with the 'we have to get the spaceship back down to Earth' story, because they've sent another one up. As it happens, though, this part of the story becomes one of the most interesting now. It's not often in Doctor Who, at least at this stage in its life, that we see something like this happen. A justification for the base's commander to be behaving so ruthlessly. Here, though, it adds a whole other layer to the idea, and when Cutler throws Ben over the railings, having found him tampering with the rocket, it's all the more believable, because of his personal stake in the situation. It's really great to see this being added, and I'm hoping that there's more like it to come in the future.

7/10 

 DWO's Senior Art Editor and Editorial Team Member, Will Brooks has put together a rather nifty infographic explaining River Song's (rather complicated) time line. Click on the image below for a larger version.

DWO's Senior Art Editor and Editorial Team Member, Will Brooks has put together a rather nifty infographic explaining River Song's (rather complicated) time line. Click the image below for a larger version, or click HERE to open a super high-res copy.

The character of River Song (played by Alex Kingston) first appeared in the 2008 two-part story Silence in the Library / Forest of the Dead, opposite David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor. At the time, she was played as a somewhat mysterious character from the Doctor’s own future, with a battered diary styled to resemble the TARDIS. Following her first appearance, there was a great deal of speculation as to just who River Song may be. In his book The Writer’s Tale, then-current showrunner Russell T Davies even commented that;

“I’ve read [Silence in the Library], and it has a character in it who I’m just sure is the Doctor’s wife (!!!)...”

Since then, River has returned to Doctor Who on several occasions, opposite Matt Smith’s Eleventh Doctor. She’s faced off Weeping Angels (twice!), Daleks, the Silence, and even gets to take the credit for being ‘the woman who killed the Doctor’. Oh, and they get married, of course. 

While River Song’s story has been more closely tied to the most recent few seasons of the programme (and specifically to the Doctors former companions Amy Pond and Rory Williams), we’ve not always encountered her in the same order that she experiences events. 

The above timeline tracks her movements through the Doctor’s life, taking in all their adventures from her birth (in 2011’s A Good Man Goes to War) through to her death in the Library (during her very first appearance in the series). It charts all of her televised adventures with the Doctor, plus the 2012 video game story The Eternity Clock, and scenes made exclusively for the Series Six DVD/Blu-Ray release, plus several unseen adventures that River has recorded in her little blue book.

River’s timeline in relation to the Doctor’s may not be the most straightforward in the programme’s history, but it’s kept us guessing over and over again. The Name of the Doctor sees her finally being able to let go of the man she loves, but not before she promises him that there’s still a few more ‘spoilers’ to come... 

[Sources: DWO; Will Brooks]

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

Day 139: The Tenth Planet, Episode Two

Dear diary,

When people talk about the Cybermen - and, more specifically, about the designs of the Cybermen - the versions seen here in The Tenth Planet always seem to crop up. They appear quite high on the list of 'favourite designs' among many of my friends who are fans of the show. When this design cropped up on the cover of The Silver Turk (one of the Big Finish Eighth Doctor audios) a few years ago, people were falling over themselves with excitement.

Maybe it's because I'm used to everyone banging on about how great this version is that I've never really been able to see it myself. They look pretty good, I guess, but I've just never had that kind of love that other fans seem to hold for these ones. It's perhaps telling that in my Cardiff flat, the Cyberman action figure I keep on display is one from Earthshock (for some reason, beside a Cybermat from Revenge…), and I've got a version from Tomb in a box here somewhere, too. The Tenth Planet figure is in a box way back home in Norwich. That toy, much like this design of Cyberman, is considered 'one of the best', but again, I've never really got it.

It probably didn't help, then, that while I was watching this episode, I had Ellie with me. She wasn't actually paying all that much attention to Doctor Who - to tell the truth, she was the other side of the flat, doing a puzzle - but she was in the room all the same. I'd banged on while we had dinner about why the episode I was watching tonight was a very important one, but I think she was trying to block out most of it. She wasn't able to ignore it, though, when the first Cyberman began to speak. I won't repeat what was said (this is a well-mannered website!), but suffice to say she wasn't impressed with either the design or the voice.

As I watched on, wondering why people always pointed to these as their favourite Cyber-design, I started to really be swayed by the tone of the voices, and the way that the eyes look actually dead when the Cybermen have their mouths open. I found myself starting to find them quite menacing, and the way that they're shot as the enter the base (the way Hartnell follows their legs as they move along a platform is gorgeous) started to really stoke a chord with me. Just as I was starting to realise all the things people love about them, Ellie piped up again. 'Actually,' she announced, 'they sound better like this. It's more enjoyable to listen to'. Hah! Didn't want to watch Doctor Who, but can't help listening along anyway. I must be doing something right.

By the end of the episode, I was completely sold. The reason people love the Tenth Planet Cybermen so much is that, in the actual episodes, they really are fantastic. I'm really hoping that tomorrow I'll find myself falling even further in love with them, but yeah, suffice to say that they've won me over pretty darn quick.

The first (proper) appearance of the Cybermen isn't the most important thing about today's episode, though. At least not by the standards of this marathon. William Hartnell doesn't appear in tomorrow's edition, because he was too unwell to take part. Episode Four of the story doesn't exist in the archives (save for a few brief clips and - mercifully - the actual regeneration itself), which means that I'll be listening to the narrated soundtrack of that one to round out the story… and the First Doctor's era. That means that today is the last time that I get to see William Hartnell take part in a full episode.

(He'll turn up as a cameo in The Three Doctors later in the year, but this is his last proper appearance for me. I'll discuss more about his time in full after Episode Four, in a special 'First Doctor Overview' post, so I'm not going to be getting all nostalgic for his time here and now. All the same, I couldn't let this moment pass without saying something.)

It's a good job, then, that he gets a pretty good part to sink his teeth into here. The Doctor is on fine form, ordering around members of the base, taking quiet satisfaction when he's proved right and no one has believed him, and giving one of the more famous speeches from his era. 'The emotions! Love! Pride! Hate! Fear! Have you no emotions, sir?' is one of those First Doctor moments that fans just know. It's up there with the whole 'One day, I shall come back' speech, and quite rightly so.

8/10 

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

Day 138: The Tenth Planet, Episode One

Dear diary,

RIght then! Here we are! The Tenth Planet! Arguably one of the most important stories in the entire, 50-year history of Doctor Who. Not only is it responsible for the introduction of the Cybermen - who, I'd argue, are one of the most recognisable monsters from the programme, up there with the Daleks - but also the first story to change from one incarnation of the Doctor into another. Without this story, the history of the show could have gone very differently.

And you know what? I've never seen it. Thinking about it now, I'm not quite sure why I've never seen it. I've owned the VHS for almost a decade now, but when I came to watch it today, I had to actually unwrap the tape. That felt novel. It's been a good few years since I've had to unwrap the plastic on a VHS tape. Im sure there's been several occasions over the years where I've sat down with the intention to watch it, but for one reason or another, I've simply never made it through to even starting on the story.

Still, for me here and now on the 138th day of this marathon, it's a good thing that I've never seen the story before. It feels strange to be so far through that I'm almost out of William Hartnell-era Doctor Who, and I'm glad that the last Hartnell story I'll see is the last Hartnell story. It would have been a shame to go out on The Smugglers or something.

So, another story and another new way of doing the titles. Here, they appear on screen following a jumble of letters. It's another attempt to be futuristic and represent computers, as in The War Machines, but here the title and the letters are overlaid to shots of technical equipment, and follow on from a shot of a rocket taking off. It's a different setting to open in, but it works.

More and more lately (since the early part of Season Three) tracking shots that end with the TARDIS materialising have become fairly common. That's not a complaint - they're always done well, and it looks fantastic appearing into the snow-swept landscape on show here. It's also nicely led in following discussion of looking out through the periscope of the base. It's a shame that the inside of the TARDIS isn't really looking up to much at the moment. The doors are the most noticeably damaged bit, with the backs of the top roundels sitting lower than they should, leaving a very obvious gap on the set. It's very noticeable in some shots from The Smugglers of the Doctor and his companions in the ship, and it's a shame to see the same is true of the actual episodes themselves.

Stepping outside, the snow effect really works for the most part. It's at its best during some close-up shots of the regulars, where the thickness of it really does help to sell the effect. It probably helps that because I'm watching on a VHS, with less of a polish that the DVD will have later this year, things are looking a bit rough round the edges - some of the less-well-realised parts of the snow are probably covered up a little.

Elsewhere, many of the effects on show come across as looking a bit like a 1950s B-movie. When the Doctor and friends crowd round a screen and watch as the mysterious Tenth Planet approaches (and just how fast is it spinning? Malaysia comes around twice in about a minute!) it looks pretty hokey. A shame, because I'd have loved this to be the stand-out shot from the episode. In many ways, it feels like a step backward, and I imagine I'd be more forgiving of the effect had it occurred back in Season One. Coming now, though, after stories like The Ark have pulled off better effects as if they were child's play, it's disappointing.

I'll discuss the Cybermen properly tomorrow, once they've fully arrived in the story, but I can't go by without mentioning today's cliffhanger. It's one of those moments that most fans of the series have seen in one shape or another, as the silver giant turns around, pulls off the cloak and kills a couple of guards. It's a striking moment, and easily becomes the best part of the episode. There's a great, lingering close-up on the Cyberman's face, really making sure that the image has bled into your brain for the next week, while you wait to find out what on Earth it is…

6/10 

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

Day 137: The Smugglers, Episode Four

Dear diary,

At the end of all that, Polly has really settled into the idea that they're trapped on the TARDIS from now on. Having retreated back to the ship, she asks the Doctor wether they'll be going forwards or backwards in time next, and it serves as another opportunity for the Doctor to remind us that he has no control over where - or when - they land. Thankfully, Ben does chip in with the hope that it's 1966: I'd worried that we'd see that just swept under the carpet now that they've had a full adventure away from their own time.

Much like The Savages, this is a story that tends to be forgotten when I think about the early years of Doctor Who. It's the penultimate one of the Hartnell era, but it doesn't really have anything all that special about it to help make it stand out from the crowd. At lest The Savages has Steven departing from his life in the TARDIS. While I've enjoyed listening to the story more than I might have expected to, I think it's destined to sink back into that state of simply being forgotten as part of the overall picture.

There's nothing much in here to really latch onto. Most of this episode is spent with people simply talking at each other, and then there's the occasional fight to break things up a little. It doesn't help that by the time we'd reached this episode, I'd pretty much forgotten who most of the characters were, and I'd lost track of who was meant to be the bad guy, and who was the good one - especially by the end when the Doctor's newfound 'moral obligation' means that he's determined to help the Squire, who I think was being treated as something of an enemy a few days ago?

In the end, I turned to Jonathan Morris' handy guide in the recent tele snaps special, but even that didn't help, 'cos I'd forgotten some of the names! Ultimately, I think mush of The Smugglers will have become a blur by the end of this season, the space it currently occupies in my head being taken up by all the other stories to come.

It's a shame, really, because there is a lot to like in the story. Ben and Polly are used well for the most part, and we get a chance to see some of their skills in action. While Polly takes very quickly to the idea of travelling in time, it's good to see Ben being skeptical, and it's great that he still doesn't particularly want to be there at the end. Had this story survived in the archives (or were it to turn up at some stage), I think it would have a much better chance of holding my attention - the location work seen in the tele snaps and the surviving 8mm footage really does make it look like there's a scale on display that we don't often see in Who of this era.

And so, as the Doctor and his new companions look at the scanner, out over the 'coldest place on Earth', we head into the final story for the First Doctor. I'm really not sure how I feel about this…

6/10 

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

Day 136: The Smugglers, Episode Three

Dear diary,

As Polly's screams ring out into the closing theme, I realised that actually, the companions in Doctor Who at this stage don't really scream all that much, do they? Susan, Barbara, and Vicki have all had a couple of them, but they've not been a common part of the series in the way you'd expect, based on the number of jokes made about it. I'm so entrenched in this era of Who, now, that I can't even really remember if the later companions scream lots more than this, or if it's just a myth that's built up over the years.

Early on in this episode, I couldn't help but feel a bit sorry for our two newest companions, as they find themselves confronted once again. 'We haven't done anything!', Ben protests. 'We haven't killed anyone, and we haven't smuggled anything!'. At this stage, they were still separated from the Doctor, and I realised how odd it was to see this.

I commented lots on it during the Dodo episodes, that she and Steven would be separated off to have the bulk of the adventure, while the Doctor went off elsewhere to reduce the strain on Hartnell. There, it felt perfectly natural: Steven had been travelling with him for quite some time before it started becoming a common occurrence in the series, so you felt as though he knew what to do. Here, Ben and Polly have only just arrived in their first new time period, and they're already left to fend for themselves.

When the Doctor swans in a few minutes later, it's with a kind of lofty carefreeness. Much like the way he followed after them upon first exiting the TARDIS in Episode One, he's watching his new friends with amusement more than concern. he knows what's going on, and he's enjoying their reactions to things. We've also reached another key point in the evolution of the Doctor's character here, which is important as we draw ever closer to the first regeneration.

During Season One, I found it fun to highlight the various steps in the Doctor's transformation from the insular, grumpy sod we see in An Unearthly Child through to the kind of character he becomes in all his subsequent incarnations. There's several key moments (mostly based around Barbara shouting at him) that lead to our first big revelation in The Dalek Invasion of Earth - that the Doctor will stay and fight the Daleks, because that's the right thing to do.

Here, we see again that he's fully completed his transformation into being 'The Doctor'. It's been there, without much of a song or dance for the most part, ever since that Dalek invasion, but this is the first time in a while that the Doctor has stopped to point out that this is the way he behaves. It plays into the idea of using this story to establish the programme for a new audience - he explains to Ben that they can't just leave for the TARDIS, because he has a 'moral obligation' to stay here and see that things are left safe.

We're close to the Troughton Doctor, now, with his speech about 'some corners of the universe', so it's important to see the First Doctor stepping up and reminding us of who he's become now, in time for his fall under the next story.

7/10 

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

Day 135: The Smugglers, Episode Two

Dear diary,

Before embarking on this episode, I popped in the William Hartnell disc of the Lost in Time collection, so that I could check out some of the surviving bits of The Smugglers on there, and have those in mind while listening through. Most of the clips like this that we have (and, I believe, all of the ones for this story in particular) are the result of censorship cuts in New Zealand when these serials were sold there in the late 1960s.

It would appear that the New Zealand broadcasters had a different view on what was acceptable in a children's series than we did in the UK, and so there's lots of moments from the programme that were cut out - usually only a few seconds here or there. I've seen several of these clips before when the DVD first came out and I savoured all these brief snippets of stories that I may never get the chance to see properly.

Some of the clips always struck me as being a bit odd: a few frames here, or the odd second or two from here, just to lessen the impact. Others seem far more fitting, and I think that might be the case with the clips for this story. The death of Longfoot in Episode One is quite brutal, as the knife lands squarely between his shoulder blades for example. It's ironic, in a way, that the only clips we have of The Smugglers, and of many other missing Doctor Who's only survive because someone once deemed them too much to be broadcast!

The compilation of these clips on the DVD also includes a few minutes of silent 8mm camera footage from the location shoot. It's obviously shot as behind-the-scenes footage either by a member of the crew or by a curious on-looker, as we move from shots of the Doctor being piled onto a cart, to others of pirates reading the day's newspaper, or shots of the BBC cars and vans parked around. This footage comes in handy, though, as another opportunity to see how this story might have looked - the locations really are gorgeous. I'm coupling all of this (and the tele snaps) with my own memories of Cornwall, where the other half and I spent a week last summer. I even keyed The Smugglers up on my phone ready to listen to while we were down there, but I never found the time to actually hear it.

As for the episode itself… well, the winning streak had to end sometime, I suppose. It's not that this is a bad episode, just that it hasn't grabbed me in the way that the last few have. Yesterday, I sang the praises of 'Doctor Who gets kidnapped by pirates' as a hook for a story, but today it seems to have already worn a bit thin. I'm not sure why that is, because there's plenty in here that I really did enjoy.

Ben and Polly, for instance, continue to entertain me, and they're great value when they play the part of witches to escape from imprisonment. They've both got very distinct personalities that work well against each other. There's also the opportunity for some great dialogue between the pair - I love Ben musing that he can't check himself back into the Navy in a 17th century barracks! They're still getting the hang of all this, and so don't settle into things quite as well as the Doctor has.

I don't know what's lacking at the moment, but I'm hoping it turns up tomorrow. I'm keen for the last Hartnell historical to go out with a bang!

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

Day 134: The Smugglers, Episode One

Dear diary,

At this point in its life, Doctor Who has very much dispensed with the idea of basing the historical stories around a particular event or person, in an attempt to be educational, and has instead switched to focus on a generic 'era' of history. A couple of weeks ago we had a tale set simply in 'The Wild West', in which events differed wildly from the real historical facts, and today we've simply been given a historical based around the idea of 'Doctor Who gets kidnapped by pirates'.

It sounds like I'm complaining about this, but that's not the case. While I found myself enjoying the stories that fulfilled the programme's original brief to educate as well as entertain, by the end of Season Two my interest in that type of tale had started to wane a little. Season Three then started out by giving us tales set in Ancient Greece and a period of French history that just wasn't of much interest to me. All in all, the historicals had started to lose any of the stuff that kept me interested, and I found myself looking far more forward to the futuristic tales.

Today, though, has proved that a good historical tale can still work well for the series - it just needs a broader appeal. 'Doctor Who gets kidnapped by pirates' is a perfect pitch to keep me interested at this point, and it allows for a great episode. One of the things that needs to be addressed is the location filming for this story. I'm listening to the soundtrack as usual, with the tele snaps on hand to follow along with.

Following in the footsteps of the last few stories, it once again looks completely unlike Doctor Who. There's scores of location filming for this story, starting with the TARDIS stood just inside a cave mouth on the beach. It's strange to think that we've only recently started having the TARDIS materialise on location as opposed to in the studio somewhere, as has been the norm for much of this marathon so far.

It looks fantastic stood on the shore, and so does the rest of the filming. A number of the early tele snaps for this episode show the action taking place outside, and it gives them a sense of scale that we're not used to in the show. It's odd that an image of a church sat the other side of a field should look so odd, but it's still rare to see such an open space in Doctor Who.

Elsewhere, it's all fairly standard pirate fair. There's some hidden gold stashed away nearby, and a group of ruthless pirates want to get their hands on it. They've got a pirate ship out in the bay, where the Doctor has been taken to meet the captain - who has a hook for a hand! It really works that all of this is so cliched, though. The fun here isn't telling a bold new pirate story, it's seeing what will happen when the TARDIS arrives in a traditional pirate tale. I'm surprised we've not had a talking parrot yet.

I'm pleased to say that the arrival of Ben and Polly to the ship is handled just as well as I was hoping for. I commented the other day that their initial suspicion about the police box was very reminiscent of Ian and Barbara, right back in the pilot episode, and that continues on into their early exchanges with the Doctor here. Indeed, it's so similar in places that I can't help but wonder if Brian Hayles was given the script to An Unearthly Child to work from.

They're astounded by the sheer size of this ship once they've barged their way in, and the Doctor angrily snaps at them. 'What are you doing in here? How dare you?' - Hartnell is even playing it in a way closer to his original style that we've seen since that first season. Much as I've grown to love his cuddlier side over the stories, it's great to see that he can still do the fierce Doctor when called upon.

Ben and Polly react in a similar way to our old schoolteacher friends, too. Polly is more willing to believe that they have travelled in time (she's genuinely disappointed when they see the church and assume that they're still in 1966. Quite how seeing a church is a sign of that I've no idea, though), whereas Ben is skeptical from the very start. There's a logical progression to his character here - in The War Machines he was very respectful to the Doctor because the man is his elder, and appeared to be in control of the situation. At the very least, he seemed to know what was going on. Here, though, he's talking about space/time travel, and telling the sailor he'll not be getting home any time soon. Ben's confidence has been shaken, and I'm looking forward to watching it build back up throughout the story.

As I'd hoped, too, the start of this episode takes the opportunity to remind us all about the premise of the programme (probably for the best - this episode was broadcast following the programme's longest break since the very start), but it does it in less of a heavy-handed way than The Massacre did. The Doctor tells his new companions that he can travel anywhere in time and space, but that he can't personally control where they go. He muses that he thought he was going to be alone again, but we don't get the roll-call of companions this time. Once that's out of the way, given just the right amount of time to breathe, we're off and into the adventure proper.

I'm pleased to see that the streak of strong episodes we've been having is being upheld by The Smugglers, too!

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

Day 133: Daleks: The Destroyers

Dear diary,

Oh, this marathon has changed me. I try not to quote myself too much, but I think today call's for a bit of a flashback. January 6th, 2013. Day Six of The 50 Year Diary. The Daleks, Episode Two…

“My name is Will, and I don't really like the Daleks… Give me a Cyberman any day.”

Why, then, 127 days on, does it bother me so much that the Daleks take a bloody age to show up in this story?! We've got a fantastic cold open, which sets the scene nicely, introduces a couple of characters, then implies a Dalek massacre in which they shout 'Attack and destroy!' a couple of times, and then… nothing! It's a further twenty minutes until we hear another Dalek talking properly. My god, I'm fickle. It's all about the pepper pots, now.

Way back when I was drawing up my schedule for this marathon, at the end of last year, this story and Farewell, Great Macedon were both added in between seasons. Macedon was included because I was interested to know how a story written at the time - but not made - would fit with the established history of the show. It was an interesting experiment, though I know some people weren't keen to see me going 'off book' for the week. Hopefully you won't mind today's little side step, and will be glad to know that I'm not planning any departures from the televised stories when we reach Troughton's Doctor.

The Destroyers was slotted into the schedule because, well, it's always fascinated me. Terry Nation's desire to get the Daleks their own show minus the Doctor is well documented. We're told about various pitches to America, which will be the reason the Daleks soon disappear from this marathon for quite some time. Mission to the Unknown could almost be viewed as a back-door pilot for the series (even if it wasn't made that way).

But then there's The Destroyers. A pilot for a Dalek-based series that actually got approved by the BBC. Sets were under construction to actually produce this one, before the plug was pulled. We very nearly had this series - or, at the very least - this pilot. Is there any wonder it's always been of interest? I figured that this was the best placement for it on my journey because, while it would have been produced and aired some time after Troughton took on the role, it features the return of Jean Marsh as Sara Kingdom, and revolves heavily around the Space Security Agency. It's very much from Season Three.

The story serves very much as a set up to the potential series, reintroducing us to Sara, and bringing in a few other members of the SSS, including Jason Corey, and android Mark Seven. The trio have arrived on an asteroid where a base has recently been attacked by Daleks, and they've captured Sara's brother, David Kingdom. Thankfully, she's not given a chance to kill this one.

What follows gets us fully up to speed on everything we need to know for the series to work. We're given some background on the SSS and the Daleks, and we end with the trio arriving just too late to save David from being taken off-world by the Daleks. In the closing moments, we're given the shocking news that they're planning an invasion of Earth!

It's all a bit lightweight, with the story full of typically Terry Nation set-pieces (of course carnivorous plants play a vital role!), but that's pretty much exactly what you'd want from this series. I want it to be a serial that doesn't take itself too seriously, which you can put on and just enjoy. I imagine that it would have worked well almost as a televised Dan Dare, with several 12-part stories tying into a larger, ongoing narrative. This could have worked especially well if the series had run year-round, like Doctor Who of the time.

Crucially, it feels as though Mission to the Unkown could be an episode taken from this series, used to set up a story in which Sara, Mark, and Corey arrive on Kembel, to stop the Daleks from forming the Galactic council. Mavic Chen could even become a recurring foe throughout the series, discrediting them with Earth! The more I think about everything this series could be, the more I want it to actually exist.

The only problem is that in my mind, it's being made on film, with the production values of some of the ITC serials of the time. Done in that way, The Daleks could be something really very special. I fear, though, from past experience, that being made as a BBC co-production would mean it never quite lives up to what it should be. I can already picture the scene early on, where Jean Marsh narrates that they're 'surrounded' by Daleks. There's be cardboard cut-outs everywhere.

On the whole, I've enjoyed The Destroyers, and I'd have loved to see it made at the time. There's an awful lot of potential in here, and it's a real shame that there won't be any more of it.

7/10 

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

Day 132: The War Machines, Episode Four

Dear diary,

The notes for this story have only taken up a single side of paper in my notebook, because I've mostly been enjoying The War Machines too much to break away and write things. There's one note that keep reappearing, though. At the top of Episodes One, Three, and Four, I've scrawled 'Titles' (Actually, under today's episode, it's down as 'TITLES!!!!').

The War Machines is one of those rare 20th-century Who stories that breaks away from the usual format for its episode title. Here, we're given the title and the episode number in a 'computer' font (we all know which font that is, even if you've never seen the story), as they arrive on screen in what can only be described as a 'computerised' way. Right from the word 'go', we're being told that this is a story about computers and technology.

It's important to remember that this is only the second story to have one big title, as opposed to a name for each individual episode. There was a style guide for that, established right from the very start of the programme. The opening titles sequence dies away, and we're given an image over which the title - and then the writer's credit - will sit. For a time during Seasons One and Two, the action on screen would pause, and the actors would hold their pose, while the text appeared.

The same layout was used for The Savages, as confirmed by the tele snaps for Episodes Two and Three. It would appear that the episode number was simply added as an additional caption between the two standard ones. This, then, is the first opportunity for the programme to experiment with overall titles, and to start looking at a way to do them from now on.

I can't say I particularly like the titles for The War Machines any more or any less than the regular ones, and the same can be said for stories like The War Games which also employ different title styles. Equally, there's nothing wrong with doing them in this unusual manner, either. It just doesn't make all that much of a difference to me!

The other note that I've had scrawled at the top of several episodes over the last week is 'Ian Stuart Black'. The Savages and The War Machines is the first example in Doctor Who history of a writer being responsible for two consecutive stories (though Terry Nation came very close right at the start of the first season). In fairness, Black was only brought in to do a redraft of The War Machines, it having already gone through a version or two. As a fan of 1960s television in general, and not just Doctor Who, Black's name appears in the credits to several of the DVDs on my shelf, and I've alway been quite keen on his work. I'm pleased to see that my enjoyment has carried over to his Who writing, and I'm looking forward to The Macra Terror more now that I've realised it's Black's third script for the programme.

A couple of times over the last few days, I've compared Ben and Polly coming into the show as feeling like a new start, and I've linked it to the addition of Jenna-Louise Coleman to the current series of Who. I wasn't until today that I realised there were more similarities between the two eras than I'd ever thought about. Both get their breath of fresh air in a story that brings the Doctor back to modern-day London, and the enemy is based in the most modern building in the city (The Post Office Tower and the Shard aren't likely to be compared very often, but there's certainly a link here!).

On both occasions, the enemy is ultimately defeated when the Doctor reprogrammed their soldiers (he sends the War Machine to destroy WOTAN, and reprograms one of the 'Spoon Heads' to go confront Celia Imrie), and he picks up a new companion - or two, in Hartnell's case - along the way. All we need is to see the First Doctor ride an anti-grab motorbike up the side of the tower, and the comparison is complete!

It's strange, given how alien all of this story felt in the first couple of episodes, that the First Doctor looks so completely right as he strolls along a street to confront the War Machine. Shortly after, there's a shot of the Doctor in the back of a car and whereas before it seemed totally odd to see him in a taxi, now it just feels very natural. I think it has to be a success of the story that it all holds together so, so, well. And we've got the first real hint of something that we'll see far more later on in the programme - the Doctor slipping away as soon as things are complete, before he can be questioned or congratulated.

It's nice to see him waiting around outside the TARDIS for Dodo at the end, as I'd worried that having vanished mid-way though the story, she'd be instantly brushed under the carpet as we move on to the next set of companions. It's also interesting to see the Doctor feeling rather put out that Dodo simply 'sends her love' after everything that he's shown her through time and space. It's reminiscent of the departure of Ian and Barbara, in that the Doctor is a little hurt they would choose a normal life over one with him.

And Ben and Polly really do feel like such a breath of fresh air at the end. It's great the way that they get caught back up with the Doctor - 'Shh, watch him! I'm sure there's something strange about that police box…' - and it's very much in the style of that very first introduction to the ship right back in An Unearthly Child. I'm hoping that it's a sign (along with not showing their reaction upon entering the ship) that we'll be seeing the introduction of two new companions used to take stock and reintroduce the series again.

The Third Season has been something of a revolving door for companions (We've had Vicki, Steven, Katarina, Sara, Dodo, and now Ben and Polly since the start of Galaxy 4), so the way that they work within the series hasn't been as developed as it was in the first two years. Dodo serves as the best example, being introduced in the midsts of a massive info-dump.

Still, The War Machines has been a massive high for the series - the highest I've rated a story so far! - and a fantastic way to end this this run of adventures. I'm taking another slight side-step tomorrow (for one day only, though, promise!), and then we're down to the dying days of the First Doctor. An interesting time indeed!

8/10 

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

Day 131: The War Machines, Episode Three

Dear diary,

Five or six years ago, probably around the time that The War Machines was released on DVD, I remember creating a custom War machine figure, in scale with the Character Options figure range. It was before they'd made any of the classic Doctors, so I probably paired it up on the shelf with a Tenth Doctor toy. It wasn't very good, as customs go. I seem to recall that it was made from a Coco Pops box, coated in tin-foil.

The whole reason that I'd even bothered to make one is the same reason that I wonder fairly regularly when we're going to get an official War Machine figure from Character - they're freaking awesome!

The thing that often gets forgotten with the War Machines, or at least it's often forgotten by me, is the sheer size of the things. The Daleks at this point in the series' history are quite short. That has a charm of its own, but then you're faced up against one of these machines and it's huge! It's a good foot or so taller than many members of the cast, and that really helps to sell it as something of a threat.

The other thing of note with them is the amount of detail included. It's seen clearest on the segment of Blue Peter included on the DVD, in which Christopher Trace examines one of the machines up close. It's all fairly basic by today's standards, but it's still pretty impressive when immersed in this part of the programme's history. There's flashing banks of computers on the side of the creature, some kind of optical 'eye' built into the front, two guns coming out of the sides and the big metal 'fists', too, which get put to a fair bit of use in this episode.

The one thing that I'd always failed to notice, though, is the face. Oh yes, the War Machine has a face. It's right at the top of the thing, with the number on the machine forming the nose, and the long, dark box posing as the mouth. Once you've seen it, it's impossible to un-see. As if that wasn't enough, they then cut back to WOTAN, and he's got a face, too! Ah, I've ruined a great design for myself, now.

Seriously, though, Character Options. I'm waiting to give you my money. Make a War Machine! Give them little number stickers like you did with the Voc Robots! I'd form a little army of them on my shelf!

I can only imagine the impact that these things had on the viewers back in the day. A large chunk of the episode is given over to demonstrating just how powerful the machine is, first as it terrorises Ben again in a cliffhanger reprise, and then as it takes on the army by itself for the last third of the story. We've never seen a fight sequence quite like this in the show, so it really makes an impact.

The only downside to having such a long sequence is that we see several things over and over again. This is partly a result of the episode being patched back together to cover a few missing parts (though I'm not sure I'd have noticed them so much had I not foolishly watched a documentary on how it was done!), and partly the result of them jus twanging to show it off.

There's a great moment in the warehouse when the War Machine crashes through a pile of crates and sends them scattering as it just powers on. Unfortunately, by the time it's reached the street outside, it seems to go out of its way to knock over smaller piles of boxes almost to show that it can. It's the equivalent of a teen who's lost a fight kicking over a bin as he retreats. Y'know, just to prove that he's still 'hard'.

I think you can just about forgive it, though, because the fight really is fantastic in places. It also leads to one of the best cliffhangers that we've seen so far, when the army retreats to safety, and the Doctor stands tall, looking fantastic in his hat and cloak, squaring up to the machine. The camera pulls into a close-up on William Hartnell, and it's possibly the best he's ever looked. A shame that the picture seems a tad over-exposed, here, but it's still a great moment.

The War Machines is still very much Ben's story at this stage. Polly gets plenty to do in this episode, under the control of WOTAN, and Anneke Wills gets a chance to show us what she can do (The moment that she realises she's let Ben escape because he was her friend is lovely), but she's still only just involved. Ben's the one performing all of the companion role at this stage, and it's still fantastic to see. Just as Steven came along and washed Ian clean from my mind, I have a sneaking suspicion that Ben may do the same to our space pilot!

It's also nice to see Dodo getting a brief mention. It's only in passing, and it comes again as the Doctor worries about Ben and Polly, but it's nice to see that she's not been completely forgotten just yet.

8/10 

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

Day 130: The War Machines, Episode Two

Dear diary,

When you think of companion pairings with the Doctor, there are two which only exist as an 'and'. You've got Ian and Barbara, and now Ben and Polly. Now, I've seen plenty of Ian and Bab's adventures before I embarked on this marathon, so those two have always had quite distinct personalities in my mind. Ben and Polly though have always seemed fused together in my mind - you can't have one without the other.

If I did have to pick the one that's more prominent, though, I think I'd go for Polly. I think it's simply because unlike Michael Craze, who plays Ben, Anneke Wills (Polly) is still with us. She's quite prominent in the Doctor Who world, providing linking narration for some of the soundtracks, turning up in Big Finish plays (and not always as Polly - in the days before the Companion Chronicles range allowed us new adventures with the first few Doctors, Wills played Lady Louisa Pollard, mother of Eighth Doctor companion Charley), on DVD commentaries and on special features. She makes hundreds of appearances at Doctor Who conventions, and is all-round a lovely person.

I've only met her the once, when running a signing with Terry Molloy about five years ago. A woman arrived at the desk to ask if she could cut in and say hello to her 'old friend' Terry. Imagine our surprise when we realised that it was Polly Wright! Still, the fact that she's so ubiquitous within Who means that she's always felt like the half of the 'and' pairing that's stronger.

So it's surprising to watch today's episode, in which Polly has little to do but general secretary things, and it's Ben who fulfills the role of the Doctor's companion more actively. He's sent off to scour the part of the city where the tramp has been killed, and to see if he can find anything out that may help them discover what's really going on. He even gets to take centre stage for the cliffhanger, as a War Machine advances on him.

It's good, too, because Ben's actually great, isn't he? Craze's accent if fantastic and refreshing (Dodo's was a bit of a shock to begin with, but it was firmly RP by the end), and I'm hoping they don't tune it down. It's also interesting to see Ben treating the Doctor with respect simply because he's an older gentleman, and that's what Ben has always been taught to do. I'm really pleased that he's breaking himself out of the 'Ben and Polly' mould so early, with a great opportunity to shine.

It's following Ben out to the warehouse in Covent garden that gives us today's opportunity to see how strange this story is. Forget alien planets, or the Wild West, this is where the series is most alien to me. Right in the heart of central London in the swinging sixties. There's a scene early on in the episode when the Doctor gets into a taxi with his companions, and it's bizarre. It's not what the show does at this point, so I really don't know how to take it! It's looking great, though.

Oh, but Dodo. Poor, poor Dodo. I knew that this was her last episode, and that she ends up turfed from the story with little more than a cursory wave of the hand, but how desperate does the Doctor sound to get rid of her? When he tells Ben that Dodo is feeling 'a little under the weather', the sailor hopes that she'll be ok. The Doctor cuts him off, though, proclaiming that she'll be fine, and he's more worried about Polly, anyway. There we are, then. I guess he's made his decision!

Jackie Lane doesn't even get much of a chance to do much in her goodbye. Apart from trying to tempt the Doctor off in the wrong direction, and some general 'hypnotised' acting, that's her lot, and she's off to the country. A real shame. Dodo's only been a short-term companion by comparison to some of the other's we've has, but it's a pity not to see her given a proper send off.

But the city is under attack, and Doctor Who is still required (see? It is his name in this point of the programme! Doctor Who is required)!

8/10 

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

Day 129: The War Machines, Episode One

Dear diary,

The War Machines is one of those strange Doctor Who stories that I always think of being very fond of, but don't think I've actually ever watched all the way through. If I have seen it right to the end, then I doubt that I was paying proper attention to it. I was probably using it for background noise.

And yet, this one has always had an effect on me. Whenever I go to London, I always keep an eye out for the BT tower, and i think my fascination with it comes partly from this story. The rest of my interest comes from a general love of the 1960s as a decade. It's easy enough to look back on it with rose-tinted glasses, but there's a lot about that age that I really love, and it gets summed up perfectly by Tony Benn in a special feature about the tower on this DVD: 'confidence was so high, people really did believe that they could do anything'.

1960s London, in particular, is a magical place. People talk of 'Swinging London', and it's really an image that's stuck, fifty years on. It's a decade that's symbolised by freedom and fashion. I think that's why I've got a bit of an affinity towards this story, because The War Machines takes Doctor Who - another icon of the 60's, along with the Beatles - and places it right in the heart of the city, just as the decade is about to explode. England won the World Cup mere weeks after this story went out.

Right from the start, when the Doctor and Dodo step out of the TARDIS and onto a London street, it feels vibrant and new. I said yesterday that the arrival of Jenna-Louise Coleman to the new series had given it a new lease of life, and this story seems to be doing the same thing for Season Three. Steven has gone, and by the end of this story, Dodo will have departed, too. We're off onto a new phase of the programme.

Ben and Polly signify this perfectly - the pair of them light up the screen from the moment they start sharing it. It's telling that I'd forgotten Polly was ever Professor Brett's assistant in this story, I thought she came ready made as a companion pair with Ben at the nightclub. It adds something to it, though, seeing them meet for the first time, knowing that they're about to share a number of adventures in time and space.

Dodo doesn't fare quite so well, sadly. She's good fun to begin with, having a laugh with the Doctor (there's a really wonderful moment early on, when the Doctor has set off for the tower, and she chases after him up the street. As she catches up with him, they link arms and smile at each other. Never has the idea of Dodo as a replacement granddaughter felt more suitable), and being excited to be back in her own time and place.

There's an element of Rose Tyler to her, here. In The End of the World, having returned to Earth to be reassured by the Doctor that everything is ok, all Rose can think about is how much she wants some chips. It's nice! It's normal! All those adventures, out among the stars, they're fantastic. There's nothing like getting back home, though. It's that same feeling you get after a long holiday away. Dodo really did just stumble into the TARDIS the last time it landed here (is that why the Doctor made that 'out of order' sign?), and she's seen so much since then, but now she's back. Lovely.

In some ways, it feels obvious that she'll be leaving in this story. She's back home in her own time, her own city… There's a couple of obvious replacements hanging out with her down at the Inferno club. It's a shame I know she's not going to get the exit she deserves. And it looks like she's not going to get a chance to shine too much as a character before she goes, either. She spends parts of this episode complaining about a headache, before being taken under the control of Wotan, and sent off to do his bidding. A shame, yes, but it's good fun to watch. We've never had a companion hypnotised like this before, and Jackie Lane is making the most of it, doing it brilliantly.

…Hm? Sorry? What? Oh, no, it's ok. We don't have to talk about that bit of the story. It's fine.

Oh, all right, then. You know the bit. “Doctor Who is required”. It's a moment that causes a fair bit of controversy among fans who scream as loud as possible that his name isn't 'Doctor Who' (it doesn't half wind up my other half when I tell her that's his name). The thing is, at this point in the programme, it is his name! There's no getting away from it!

For as long as Gerry Davies is sitting in the script editor's chair, the lead character in this programme is called 'Doctor Who', and there's nothing we can do about it. I can't say it particularly bothers me, but I'm interested to know what others think. Leave a comment, or a tweet, or pop over to the 50 Year Diary Facebook page and let me know what you think.

Is it his name? At least for now? Does it drive you mad when people call him 'Doctor Who'? I'm genuinely interested to know!

Is it his name? At least for now? Does it drive you mad when people call him 'Doctor Who'? I'm genuinely interested to know! 

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

Day 128: The Savages, Episode Four

Dear diary,

Susan and David fell in love, sharing special moments in the heat of a Dalek conquest. Ian and Barbara spent almost two years trying to get back home, and finally managed it in a fully-functional Dalek time machine. Vicki remained in ancient Troy to convince her love that she hadn't betrayed him.

Katarina sacrificed herself to give her friends a chance at escape. Brett Vyon was wrongly shot down in cold blood by his own sister in the pursuit of justice, and she then met her fate when brought up against the might of the Daleks' Time Destructor.

Steven Taylor… was pretty much booted off the TARDIS when the Doctor saw an opportunity to get rid of him. Ah. Something's not right, there. When I started this story, I said that one of the two things I knew about it was that Steven departed in Episode Four. Had I not known that, though, and had just been watching through blindly… I don't think I'd have known this was his final tale. There's nothing wrong with the reasons for his departure: The Savages have seen enough from him to want him as their leader, and the Doctor concurs. But it comes from nowhere, and looking at the tele snaps, Steven himself even looks confused by the way things are unfolding.

Every time a companion has left the series so far (or, at least, in the case of the 'regular' companions, for which there;s no debate over), I've praised how well it's been handled. There's always plenty of little hints in the story that the time has come, and when we reach the end it only feels natural that they should be on the wrong side of the TARDIS doors when it departs. What this story needed was a few instances of Steven musing that there was a 'better way' to rule this planet, and a solution that would allow the two peoples of the world to live in peace.

We needed a few more moments of his imparting wisdom to the Savages, really stepping up and showing them that he knew what he was doing. As it is, we know he'll probably make a pretty good job of things, because we've been following his journey for some time now, but they've only known him for a few days! It's a shame to see the age of 'sudden departures' coming into play here (and even more prominently in the next story), knowing that it will stretch out across a good deal more companion exits in the future.

Before listening to this episode, I heard a Peter Purves interview online. I think it had been cobbled together from a number of sources, but it was pretty well done, and I certainly enjoyed it. In the interview, Peter made a statement that I've heard him say on a number of occasions before now - that he'd like the Doctor to return to the world of the Savages, and find that Steven has become a total despot. The more I think about it, the more I really like the idea, and I think it could work. It's almost needed as a counter balance to the sudden departure - Steven just doesn't know what he's doing, so he makes things worse. I'd love to hear something like this… maybe Peter needs to pitch the idea to Big Finish?

I'll speak about this episode as a whole in a moment, but first I want to just take a moment to think over how fantastic Steven has been in the series. For years and years, now, I've always simply listed Ian as being my favourite First Doctor companion. Having done his stories in order, followed by Stevens, though, I think it's fair to say that my allegiance has switched. I think it has something to do with the length of time that both characters have stayed with the TARDIS. By the end of Ian and Barbara's time in the series, I was just sick of them. I'd stopped enjoying their adventures, and I think it had a negative effect on the Second Series for me.

Steven has stuck around for just about half as long as those two did, and he leaves now with me wanting to see a bit more from him. I'm not really ready for him to go. Even if it's just another story or two, to round out the season, I'm keen to have more from him. That, I think, is the secret. Get the companion out before i tire of them. A similar thing happened with Amy Pond - while I was never overly keen on her from the beginning, by the time that Season Seven rolled around I'd just had enough. I didn't care about the character. Now that we've embarked on this second half of the series, with Janna-Louise lighting up the screen every week, it feels fresh and new. Fantastic.

On the whole, I think The Savages has been something of a surprise. It's never been a story that people often speak about, but rather just lump it in as part of the 'missing' episodes. It hasn't got the reputation of something like Marco Polo or The Web of Fear to pull it out from the crowd. Having just had a look at the DWM 'Mighty 200' poll from 2009, in which readers were asked to rate all the stories up to that point, The Savages came in at #162. Out of 200! Even Love & Monsters came in nine places higher, and a large proportion of fandom seems to hate that story!

I have to wonder if it simply is a case that people just don't know about this story. That's pretty much the boat I was in, knowing it was there at the end of Season Three, but not really knowing what it was about. In many ways, it's Doctor Who by numbers: and there's lots of similarities to other tales throughout (I've compared it to bits of The Keys of Marinus, The Space Museum, The Celestial Toymaker, and The Gunfighters over the last few days), and there's bits of it that will crop up so many times in the future of the programme (mostly the look of the TARDIS stood in the quarry) that it feels a bit like we've seen it all before… but everything here is done really very well!

I'm so desperately keen to give this episode an '8'. I've really enjoyed it on the whole, and the scene of people trashing the lab must have looked fantastic, but I just can't bring myself to do it. Letting Steven go so suddenly and with no warning is too unforgivable. I'll be lowering the score a little, but moving The Savages right up my list of 'stories I'd love to see recovered soon please'. Seems like a fair trade-off to me.

7/10 

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

Day 127: The Savages, Episode Three

Dear diary,

You can sort of tell that we’re reaching the tail-end of William Hartnell’s time in the role, now. In the first couple of years, ‘holiday spotting’ was something that each character went through for maybe two episodes a season. Usually, it was a case of seeing which regular had the least screen-time, and spent it away from the others. Now, the Doctor is taking more and more time away from the screen. He is in this episode, but he doesn’t really do a whole lot more than groan a bit.

I made a similar point during The Gunfighters, that the Doctor seemed to be carrying less and less of the action – and obviously The Celestial Toymaker sees him invisible for a large chunk of the time. There’s a real sense of the Doctor (and Hartnell) starting to slow up, which is a real shame. After the heights he’s hit at points recently (I’m thinking mostly of how fantastic he looks during some of The Time Meddler and Masterplan) I’m sad to see him being whittled down.

It means that we’ve got today, as in The Celestial Toymaker, a chance to think about replacing him. There we had the suggestion that he may come back as a different actor, here it’s seeing how another actor may take on the part, while still playing it in the style of Hartnell himself. Frederick Jaeger does a great job of impersonating the Doctor: I was stood giggling to myself for a while as it happened. It really is spot-on as impressions go, and it works quite well. It’s an interesting idea for the transference, though are we to assume that this doesn’t happen when they transfer the Savages? It’s only because the Doctor is a time traveller, or at least a ‘higher’ life form?

Fun as it is to see here on this occasion, I can’t imagine anyone playing the part as Hartnell’s Doctor for any sustained period of time. It’s a very good impression, but it’s just not him. The biggest shame is that, after today, we’ve only got another thirteen episodes before he leaves, so I want to soak up as much Hartnell as I can before then – to misquote the Tenth Doctor, I don’t want him to go!

Still, Hartnell not being in the episode much means that Peter Purves and Jackie Lane are left to carry the majority of the episode. The Wife in Space blog once made a point that they ‘should have called the show Ian’. At this stage, they might as well be calling it Steven. It wouldn't last all that long (I know he's off in the next episode, even if this story has yet to signpost it!), but it's good enough, 'cos I'm still really liking Steven as a companion.

I was worrying yesterday that things were about to take a sharp downturn, with not enough plot to sustain the remaining 50-minute running time of the story. Thankfully, that's not yet happened, and it's been averted by clever use of… Episode Three Syndrome!?! I'm sure I've spoken about this before, but I always think that three episodes is the optimum length for most of 20th-century Doctor Who. There's more than a few of the four-part stories that could stand to lose about an episode's worth of material from the latter half.

I tend to call it 'Episode Three Syndrome' - that feeling that you need to fill twenty-five minutes of screen time before the climax, so you mostly have the characters running up and down corridors, getting captured and escaping, and ending the episode in more-or-less the same position that they started in.

Here, all of that happens. Steven and Dodo are pursued by the guards all the way to the cave homes of the Savages, who help to shelter them, and lead them down a tunnel in an attempt to hide. They're followed all the way, though, until a guard has them cornered… and they escape! They hurry back to the city to free the Doctor, who is still begin held in the lab. They retrieve him, take him out into the corridor, where they're then gassed and are under threat from a deadly gas.

Most of this could probably have come at the start of Episode Four in a (very) condensed form: Steven and Dodo are helped by a Savage to enter the city, they rescue the Doctor, but then get gassed. It really works, though. It allows us to see more of the Savages as a people and helps to give them more depth. It's also a good thing that the tele snaps make their caves look impressive. We've seen Christopher barry directing in caves before, and he's always done a good job of it, but this looks much better than I'm used to.

And then all the stuff in the corridor at the end looks fantastic, too. I've already praised the design of this corridor in previous entries, but it looks great with the smoke billowing down it. The scene is then enhanced by William Hartnell's performance. I know I've said all he really does is stumble around and groan a lot, but looking at the tele snaps… how un-nerving does he look? There's one particular shot (It's the fourth one from the end of page 65 in the new DWM special, for anyone following along at home), where he's stood between Steven and Dodo, and he's completely out of it.

It almost looks as though he's had a stroke, and it's a state that we've never seen the Doctor in before. It'd unsettling, and really helps to sell the threat of the transference to us. Forget the Daleks, this is what you should be scared of. Anything that can do this to the Doctor is not good…

7/10 

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

Day 126: The Savages, Episode Two

Dear diary,

Worryingly, I’m about to compare this story to The Space Museum. Yes! I can feel your collective shudder as you read that. What I mean is that there’s several elements common to both of these stories. Not particularly in-depth ones, but a few all the same. The main thing is that you’ve a group of ‘leaders’ (The Moroks/The Elders) and a group of people ready to rise up against them (The Xerons/The Savages). Were Vicki here, she’d have incited a rebellion by now. I’m guessing that’s going to be Steven or Dodo’s role before too long.

Then there’s the Doctor being strapped down and prepared for an experiment. In The Space Museum, it works as a threat because we’ve already seen the outcome – the Doctor and his friends frozen in the glass display cases. Here, the threat comes from having just watched the experiment performed on Nanina, and having seen the after-effects of the experiment on Wylda, who’s left to ‘recover’ outside the city.

There's also the fact that there's no easily identifiable 'monsters' in either of these two stories. In both cases, we're very much presented with a side of 'good' and 'bad', but there's no rubber suits on display, and no monster-of-the-week to latch onto. In some ways, it feels like this could be a historical story - there just happens to be a laboratory of advanced equipment and some light guns dropped in.

Thankfully, I’m enjoying this story more than I did The Space Museum. Today is a bit of a step down from yesterday (but then we’ve yet to have two 9/10 days in a row in this marathon, so it doesn’t come as a massive surprise), but it’s still kept me interested.

One of the things that I’m really enjoying is the look of this tale. Regular readers will know that I tend to experience the missing episodes by listening to the narrated soundtracks (recons tend to let my mind wander too much), so often my idea of what a story looks like is based on any surviving episodes, half-remembered photos from the tales, or simply what my head decides to come up with. The Myth Makers, for example was entirely in my mind, with the exception of the horse, which I can remember from plenty of promo images.

This time around, though, I’m supplementing the soundtracks by having a look through the recent First Doctor tele-snap special from the guys at DWM. I’m not sticking slavishly to following along the images in time with the soundtrack, it’s more of a case where I listen to the episode and have a glance over them. Occasionally, I've nipped over to the BBC's Doctor Who website, where they're available at a larger size.

And some of them are gorgeous! That corridor down to the lab is stunning (and there’s plenty of photos of it, too. I keep waiting for one to show it up as being awful, but it hasn’t happened yet. Hooray!). The design of the savages is pretty great, too. They’re one of those images from Doctor Who that I was always aware of but didn’t really know anything about them. When the story began, I figured that they were the Elders. Here they are, though, and they look fantastic. Bizarre, yes. Unsettling, perhaps. But great!

(Actually, in some ways, I'm a bit saddened that they aren't the Elders. In my mind, these strange, ancient men were savages who lived on a barren planet - most of the photos show them in the shrubbery - and that the story was going to involve them. Now I've experienced half the tale, I really love the idea of these people tracking the Doctor across time and space using primitive technology! Ah well.)

The tele-snaps also show plenty of the location filming from Doctor Who’s first alien quarry planet. From what we can see, it looks pretty impressive, and it actually works! It's on display better in the first episode than it is here today, but I'm really taken aback by it - Doctor Who's quarry planets are the stuff comedians have joked about for years, but they've nailed it on the first attempt!

The images don’t really give much of an indication of how the piece will have been directed, but thinking back over Chris Barry’s previous work, I can’t remember being floored by it. I’m choosing to imagine it as directed by Douggie Camfield instead – his camera work in those corridors would be gorgeous! That's not to say that Christopher Barry wouldn't have done a great job with it - but since I've got the free-reign to imagine…!

My worry now is where the story may go from here. It’s been quite a strong start, and the cliffhanger is pretty good as well (it’s always of interest when the Doctor is incapacitated like this, and separated from his companions – and, therefore, from help!). The danger is that rebellion seems the next logical step for the story, but I don’t know wether that’ll be enough to fill the next 50 minutes. The Space Museum didn’t really hold a great deal of interest for me once the rebellion started, so I’m concerned for the future of this one…

7/10 

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

Day 125: The Savages, Episode One

Dear diary,

The recently released Doctor Who Magazine special, which reprints a number of First Doctor-era teles naps (which I’m using to supplement the narrated soundtrack for this story) features an introduction for this story by Jonathan Morris, which describes The Savages as having 'the dubious distinction of being the lest-known Doctor Who story’. You know what? He’s not wrong.

There’s several eras of Doctor Who with which I’m not all that familiar. I can rattle off the order of stories pretty well for the most part, but Seasons Fifteen and Seventeen often get a bit muddled in my mind, for example. Ditto the latter few bits of the Hartnell era. I know now that it runs Savages / War Machines / Smugglers / Tenth Planet, but for a long time, this one and The Smugglers were pretty interchangeable in my mind. They both begin with ‘S’, they come at the tail end of the First Doctor’s tenure, and they don’t exist at all. Easily forgotten.

Add to that the fact that I don’t really know anything about this story - it features some people in heavy ‘old age’ make up, and Steven departs, that’s all I could tell you – and it doesn’t really shoot very high on my list of most anticipated stories. Which is a shame, really, because this first episode is brilliant!

I love it when this happens. I’ve sat down to listen to the first episode, not really knowing what to expect from the story, and I’ve been gripped from the word ‘go’. There’s a lot of the feeling of a Season One story in here – the Doctor and his companions arrive on a strange alien world which may not be where they think it is. The Doctor goes to explore (a concept that I praised quite a lot during An Unearthly Child and The Daleks), before they’re captured by the natives.

Once inside their city, the trio are treated like royalty. In many ways, it put me in mind of Morpheton from The Keys of Marinus, and despite what you might be thinking… that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Enough time has passed since then for me to quite enjoy it feeling similar in tone.

Crucially, though, there’s an added extra level to the proceedings here. The Elders of this civilisation aren’t just reacting to the arrival of the Doctor and his companions – they’ve been actively waiting for it: Plotting the TARDIS’ journey across time and space, and predicting his arrival (Interesting, since the ship until now has seemed fairly random in its landings. Is there a greater pattern to them that we perhaps can’t see?). It even leads to a great title being given to the Doctor - ‘You are known to us as the Traveller From Beyond Time’ – which helps to mythologise him even more to these people. It’s an interesting twist in the format, and one which really helped to drag me in pretty quick. I’ll be interested to see where they’re going with this, and if we discover any more about the way they’ve followed the Doctor’s adventures up to now (maybe they can pick up BBC transmissions, and his arrival was signposted by that week’s Radio Times?)

Steven and Dodo are paired away from the Doctor again, here. Surely they must be the companion team that spend the least amount of time actually with the Doctor? They’re relatively close-knit during The Ark, but spend only about ten minutes of The Celestial Toymaker together, and not a great deal more in The Gunfighters. Here, they’ve been separated as soon as we’re done with the cliffhanger reprise, and only briefly reunited later on.

It’s probably a good thing, then that they get plenty to do anyway. It’s through this pair that we first get our real exposure to the titular savages, and its via their tour of the city that we really get to see that there’s something sinister going on that’s neatly tucked away behind all this gloss and happiness. The best way I could think of describing it when Peter Purves’ narration talks of a guard slipping out of a concealed door was the ‘Utilidors’ at Disneyland – a hidden network of tunnels and staff areas tucked away from prying eyes for the use of the staff and accessed through secret doors dotted right across the park.

I’m hoping that the rest of the story continues in this vein – the Hartnell tale that I – probably – know the least about, and it could turn out to be the surprise hit of the run!

9/10 

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

Day 124: The O.K. Corral (The Gunfighters, Episode Four)

Dear diary,

The big draw of this episode, of course, was always going to be the gunfight. I don't know all that much about the 'Wild' West, but I know enough to understand that in a Western film, the O.K. Corral is associated with a big fight. I also understand enough about Doctor Who in this period to know that it'll either be a triumph or a real letdown.

Thankfully, it comes out as the former. It doesn't hurt that it's all been done on film, and therefor instantly looks better than it could have done in Riverside studios. The real star of the gunfight surely has to be Doc Holliday, who really comes into his own here. Throughout the story, he's been used as a kind of comic relief. From pulling the Doctor's tooth in Episode One, through to being 'held up' by Dodo in yesterday's episode, he's never really carried too much of a threat.

And yet we keep having characters turn up to seek revenge against him for being a cold killer. The story opens with the Clantons out to get him, and Johnny Ringo joins in at the halfway point. We've seen the Doc kill before now and he spent some time at the start of the tale manipulating people into thinking that our Doctor was him, so that people could shoot first and he'd slip away scott-free.

Here, though, we finally get to see some of his true personality. During the gunfight, he's cooler than Johnny Ringo! We even get to see that demonstrated when he kills the man. The whole sequence is well played, and really tense - it's everything that you'd expect from a Western gunfight. It's almost a shame that the Doctor doesn't keep Holliday's 'Wanted' poster, though. I like the idea that he'd have kept it hung up in the TARDIS somewhere.

Speaking of the Doctor, I've yet to mention just how good he looks in this story. His costume has always been about right for this era, but it's surprising how much the addition of a stetson and a Sheriff's badge makes it look spot-on. It could have been designed especially for this story and it wouldn't look out of place. It's also surprising how comfortable the Doctor looks in the Old West. There's a moment in the Sheriff's office where he's leaning against a pillar and he looks more cool and relaxed than I think we've ever seen him.

On the whole, it's fair to say that this story easily defies its long-standing reputation as 'The Worst Doctor Who Story Ever'. With the exception of Episode Two (which may have just been an off-day for me), I've been hooked right the way through. There's been a perfect mix of comedy and drama, and it really does surprise me that it took them until last year's A Town Called Mercy to return to this type of setting - it suits the programme so well! It's the kind of place I can imagine the series going in the 1980's very easily, and I'm a bit saddened that it never happened!

Perhaps most notably, though, this is the last time in the classic run that the series uses individual titles for each episode! I have to admit that I've never really thought all that much of them: it was just something that the programme did for the first couple of years, and then dropped out of doing. Having actually watched all these episodes like this… I've realised how much I like having the individual titles! It adds something fun to the end of the episodes, and I'm going to be missing those 'Next Episode' captions.

But for today, we do have a 'Next Episode' caption, so for the last ('official') time…

Next Episode: Dr. Who and the Savages

Next Episode: Dr. Who and the Savages 

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

Day 123: Johnny Ringo (The Gunfighters, Episode Three)

Dear diary,

One of the things that often seems to be cited for people disliking The Gunfighters is the singing narration. I can't say it's really been bothering me too much (if anything, it adds a certain amount of character, and certainly makes the story stand out!), but today's episode is starting to try my patience with the idea - there's an awful lot of recapping everything we've just watched.

This episode is also home to the best use of the singing narration, though. It comes once we've seen Charlie the barman shot, and the narration plays out over a shot of his lifeless body slumped across the bar. The camera pulls back slowly from the image, toward the top of the stairs. It really leaves Charlie's death to linger, in a way that many in the series don't.

His death, along with that of Warren at the end, and one of Doc Holliday's 'old friends' off screen really paint a picture of the Wild West being a dangerous place - just as dangerous as any alien planet that the TARDIS might land on. It's great to see this, and I have to admit that I'm enjoying the period more than I thought I would - I've never been the biggest fan of Westerns (there's nothing wrong with them, I've just never been all that keen), but this one is really drawing me in.

It helps, I think, that the sets are so nice. I think I'm right in saying that this was the first time a Western of this scale was mounted as a fully studio-bound production in the UK, but I don't think you can tell. The style of the piece certainly feels like a stereotypical Western, and all the right boxes are being ticked. The only thing I could take issue with is that the hotel the Doc, Kate, and Dodo stay at has a corridor set that's near identical to one from a Fawlty Towers story. That doesn't half lower the tension.

Praise also has to be given to the man this episode takes its name from - Johnny Ringo. He's, again, fairly stereotypical as a 'bad' cowboy, dressed head-to-toe in black, strolling into the Last Chance Saloon and lighting his cigarette over one of the lamps. He says very few words to begin with, but it's enough to leave Charlie quivering in his presence… and then he shoots him dead anyway.

He's arrived in the tale at just the right moment, in time to perk things up for me a bit when things were in danger of dragging on. He brings with him a new backstory for Kate, and a new angle towards the various vendettas against Doc Holliday. The next episode's title gives a good indication as to what's coming, but I must confess that, as has often been the case with historicals of late, I've not got much knowledge of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Frankly, anything could happen and I'd be none the wiser.

Next Episode: The O.K. Corral

Next Episode: The O.K. Corral 

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

Day 122: Don't Shoot the Pianist (The Gunfighters, Episode Two)

Dear diary,

I think The Gunfighters is going to be one of those odd ones where I don't quite know what to make of it. Yesterday's episode was pretty good, and I enjoyed it, but today… I just couldn't really get into it. In the end, I watched the first 15 minutes a bit half-heartedly, went away for an hour or so before dragging myself back to finish the episode off. I don't know what happened, but it did the trick - I was really caught up in the last ten minutes of the story!

There's still an awful lot to like about all of this - Peter Purves is still on top form playing up the comedy in the situation. His American accent may not be great, but it's fun enough to listen to, and it's a darn sight better than many of the others that we've got on display. It's a shame that Dodo isn't being given much to do, though. She spends most of this episode locked up in her hotel room asking questions to further the plot quicker.

Actually, while I've briefly mentioned it… why have they got hotel rooms? The TARDIS is parked just up the street, and at the point yesterday that they decided to book them there was nothing preventing them from returning to the ship. It also came before the Doctor decided that this could be something of a holiday, so it's not as though they'd made an active choice to stay outside the ship. Not that it really matters, of course, but it just seems like an odd excuse to give Dodo her hiding place.

I'm growing to quite like the guest cast in all this, too. Doc Holliday was good enough yesterday during the scene where he pulled the Doctor's tooth (are Time Lord teeth just like human ones? I guess they must be…), but he continues to be great here. Praise especially to the moment he comes down the stairs of the Last Chance Saloon, admits that he's the Doc, and shoots a cowboy. It's moments like that one that helped to bring me back into it toward the end of the episode.

Wyatt Earp is making less of an impression on me (and it doesn't help that every time he turns up on screen, I can't help but wonder why his 'Alien Attax' card is so much more common than the others. I must have about ten of him!), but he's providing a nice sounding board for Hartnell. There's some great dialogue for the Doctor again today ('People keep giving me guns, and I do wish they wouldn't!'), and Hartnell gets to pull a priceless facial expression over the closing credits.

For now, I'm willing to say that I still disagree with the 'worst story ever' moniker (really, Jeremy? Worse that The Space Museum? Really?), but I'm hoping that the second half is as engaging as the latter part of today's episode - I don't want this to be one of those tales that becomes a struggle to enjoy.

Next Episode: Johnny Ringo

Next Episode: Johnny Ringo 

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

Day 121: A Holiday for the Doctor (The Gunfighters, Episode One)

Dear diary,

“To the pain that is a toothache,
the Doctor's not immune,
Now there'll be blood upon the sawdust,
at the Last Chance Saloon”

Ah, The Gunfighters. The worst Doctor Who story of all time. That's the common thinking, isn't it? The story was pretty much declared as the worst in the mid-70s (based on low viewing figures, I believe) and that label has kind of stuck over the years. As with much of Season Three, I've never seen it, so I'll be making my mind up as I go along over the next few days.

It has to be said, if we're basing things on this first episode alone, we're far from scraping rock bottom. We're firmly back in comedy territory now, and it works. It's hard to believe that this is the same show that only a handful of episodes back gave us something dark like The Massacre - we've swung wildly in another direction here.

There's humour to be found almost from the off, with Steven and Dodo thrilled by where they've landed. It's nice to see that, actually, as it's become rare of late. Often, the format this year has been 'Where are we Doctor? Oh really? Let's get on with the adventure, then!'. The reaction here puts me in mind of Barbara's happiness at meeting Marco Polo, or finding herself in an Aztec temple - it helps to make the companions seem real.

Dodo's pretty quick to go an raid the TARDIS wardrobe again (though Steven's gone for something pretty outlandish today, too), and it seems more-and-more as though that's her gimmick. She models the outfits available to the discerning time/space traveller. It seems an odd thing to say, but I like that they actively have to go and change once they realise where they are - it, again, makes it feel like they're exploring rather than just being dumped down somewhere and heading off to take part in the story.

In the End of the Line documentary on this DVD, Peter Purves comments that he “hated [The Gunfighters] so much” when they were making it (though he's changed his mind since then). It seems strange, because he's on fine form here. Steven tries so hard to fit in as a rough, tough cowboy, but he's constantly undermined when he trips over his spurs, or the step to the Saloon. Purves is given a chance to be really quite funny here, and that's nice to see.

The same can be said for Jackie Lane - this might be the best we've seen from her so far. I think it's fair to say that Dodo is even more useless than you remember while playing the Toymaker's games in The Celestial Toymaker, so it's nice to see her given more of a chance to shine here. The song that Steven and Dodo perform at the end of the episode (one of the things people often complain about in relation to the story) is fantastically fun, and the pair are working really well together.

Hartnell's being given plenty of comedy here, too, and it's fun to watch him during his encounter at the dentist. It's not been all that long since I spent a few days dealing with a dreadful toothache, so I can quite easily sympathise with the Doctor's pain. My notes for the episode are filled with little bits from that dentist scene that I could quote at you, but let's just say that I really enjoyed it.

One quote I can't let pass without mention though is his comment to Steven and Dodo in regards to their cover stories: “You can't walk in to a Western town and say you're from Outer Space!” - Love it.

Next Episode: Don't Shoot the Pianist

Next Episode: Don't Shoot the Pianist 

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

Day 120: The Final Test (The Celestial Toymaker, Episode Four)

Dear diary,

Well! How stunning! The shot of the TARDIS atop the pedestal, all lit from behind by fierce beams of lights, the electrified floor that glimmered beneath a thin layer of dry ice, the jagged triangles formed of a dark, black quartz, with numbers set into them… That's surely the best that anything in Doctor Who has looked up to now!

Hm? Sorry, what? No, no. That's definitely what those 'TARDIS hopscotch' scenes looked like. They did. Promise. You must be thinking of something else. Yeah, that's it.

…Oh, alright. I'll admit it. I cheated. At the time of writing… I've not watched The Final Test. No, I've not given up on the experiment. The Celestial Toymaker hasn't beaten me into submission. The truth of the matter is that I came home today, got ready to cue up the episode and then… well… I didn't. I did the washing up instead. With the soundtrack plugged in. I listened to it, instead. Don't worry, I'm going to go and have a look at the episode in a moment, but I wanted to see how it fared without my being influenced by the visuals, before I actually saw them.

I enjoyed it more than I did the previous episode, but I wonder if that's down to me forcing myself to imagine the most fantastic set I possibly could for today. In many ways, there's nothing different in today's episode compared to anything from the last three. The escape from the Toymaker's realm was quite well done, but it came a bit out of nowhere, and almost seemed a little bit… easy for my liking.

Still, I've found plenty to enjoy in the episode. Cyril really is good fun, and there are mannerisms in his voice that remind me somewhat of Patrick Troughton as the Doctor. Elsewhere, the music throughout the story has been quite good, and it's no exception here.

But now comes the hard part. The Lost in Time DVD is cued up in the drive, and it's time to see what this episode actually looked like. I'll be back in a bit…

(You can imagine some kind of musical interlude here, if you like. Or just a fade to black before I return)

I'm somewhat intrigued. My intention was to watch a few key bits from the episode - a bit of the hopscotch game, a little of the Doctor and the Toymaker in the Trilogic room and the ending of the episode - just enough to give me a fair idea of how the episode looked. Thing is… I ended up watching it all! The full 25 minutes! And you know what the weirdest thing is? I think seeing it has improved my score by at least a couple of marks…

Let's get the negative out of the way first. It really does look pretty cheap. The hopscotch game certainly isn't as grand on screen as it was in my head, but even so, it's better than I remembered it being. For a start, there were actual raised platforms. In my head, I'd convinced myself that the episode itself featured just triangles marked out on the floor in tape. Perhaps the worst room has to be the one the Doctor has been stuck in all this time. The Dolls House is pretty grand (and much larger than I'd imagined! I assumed that they dolls grew to human size, but I get the impression from this that they must have always been so!), but the room is very bare. The tiny screen set into the wall is a particular disappointment - especially after the large back-projections seen back in The Daleks' Master Plan.

But then there's several things that are improved by seeing the episode for real. The performances of Michael Gough as the Toymaker, and Peter Stephens as Cyril are fantastic - they're really the things that drew me into the episode and kept me watching for the full running time. I mused the other day that I didn't really get the fascination with bringing the Toymaker back to the series in later years, but the chance to pit Michael Gough against another Doctor is pretty tempting.

If you'd told me a few days ago that I'd end up doing one episode of The Celestial Toymaker twice in one evening, I'd have assumed that I'd be calling it quits with the experiment, the blog, and Doctor Who as a whole. I'm stunned.

(It was looking like a 5/10 based solely on the audio)

Next Episode: A Holiday for the Doctor

Next Episode: A Holiday for the Doctor 

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

Day 119: The Dancing Floor (The Celestial Toymaker, Episode Three)

Dear diary,

What on Earth must Dodo think she's walked in to? She took to the Ark and the Monoids and the idea of time/space travel pretty easily (I think she was mostly distracted by the TARDIS wardrobe), but now… The Celestial Toymaker is quite unlike anything that the programme has ever attempted before, and it's an odd introduction for her to life in the TARDIS so early in her journey.

In some ways, this seems to be Season Three's 'sideways' story (in the same way that The Edge of Destruction wasn't really a futuristic story, and the first episode of The Space Museum was an interesting idea in stepping sideways in time, before it became a tedious, cardigan-eating bore), but even when you think of it as being in the same bed as those two stories, it's something of a curiosity.

The first two episodes have just about skirted by on leaving me baffled by the time the end credits rolled. They weren't the most accomplished episodes in Doctor Who history, but they were just about passable. Eventually though - and really, that means 'today' - it wears a bit thin. It has helped that, because I'm not watching a recon, I can imagine these episodes looking however I want to. My only frame of reference is a dimly-remembered few bits of the fourth episode, but I've somewhat pushed those to the back of my mind while listening. Indeed, now I'm not sure how much of my memory of that episode is me remembering and how much is me making it up in my head.

The other thing that I keep coming back to (and you'll have to forgive me for bringing this up a third day running, but frankly I'm too bemused by this story to really write a great deal more) is that it could be a really dark and sinister piece. Between yesterday's episode and today's, I re-watched The End of the Line on the DVD for The Gunfighters. It's a documentary about the production of Doctor Who's Third Season (and, really, one of the best in the entire range - I've seen it three or four times already this year, and I'd not be surprised to find myself sticking it back on once I've finished with the season), and it goes into the rather torturous gestation of this tale.

The short version is that because this season saw the production team in a state of turbulence (three different producers and a few different script editors before the year is out), this story somewhat fell through the cracks, caught between two teams with very different ideas. It's the first script to be written by Brian Hayles, and a story is told in the documentary is that, having gotten about half-way through, Hayles called the production team and told them he didn't think he could continue with the script - because he was scaring himself writing it. Donald Tosh goes on to talk of how the story originally was all to do with playing with people's minds and manipulating them: and there's still a few elements of that in here.

It's clearest in Episode One, when Steven sees images of himself displayed on a screen. The Doctor tells him it's only displaying the images to him, and that it's drawing them from Steven's own mind. It would perhaps be interesting - and especially from a budget-saving point of view - to have the guest characters in this story drawn from Steven's mind, too. So we could have a Dhravin appear at one point, or a Dalek. Even a Monoid. That might be interesting enough. Imagine Steven and Dodo entering the Dancing Floor to find a group of Daleks sat there, guarding the TARDIS and dancing around. I'm sure Terry Nation would have vetoed it, but it's an interesting thought.

Then there's the idea that the contestants Steven and Dodo actually are playing against are people like them - who've become trapped here in the Toymaker's realm and are now playing for their freedom. It's an interesting idea, and while it starts to get explored here (with Steven and Dodo debating what they actually are). it never goes quite far enough for my liking.

The Toymaker himself is growing in potential for a character, too. There's a point here when he could be very sinister: telling two of his 'dolls' that if they fail him, he will break them. He demonstrates by smashing a plate, but it would be so much more effective had he broken another failed pawn.

And tomorrow, I move back into the world of the existing episode, so any opportunity to imagine how good this could look will be out the window, and I'll get a real eye-opener to the world of the Toymaker…

Next Episode: The Final Test

Next Episode: The Final Test 

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

Day 118: The Hall of Dolls (The Celestial Toymaker, Episode Two)

Dear diary,

This isn't, perhaps, going to be a popular statement… but I can see why The Celestial Toymaker spent so long being considered as one of the greats. Oi! Come back! Don't close the tab! Hear me out!

In the days when you can't see the story, or hear it (heck, even the novelisation wasn't released until June 1986, a little over twenty years from broadcast), this must have sounded brilliant. Take this episode, for example. If I were to describe it to you as Steven and Dodo having to choose the right chair, by using dolls to test them out, but six of the chairs have horrible consequences…

Oh, all right. It still sounds naff. But it shouldn't, because there's some quite creepy moments in here. One of the dolls gets cut clean in half when it's placed on a chair. Another is electrocuted as Dodo throws it up onto the chair. It doesn't sound great when you can hear it on the soundtrack, and it probably didn't look great to watch, but the idea of it… that's pretty solid.

Otherwise, I'm still not sure what to make of this story. This particular episode is usually the one that people hold up as being appalling because of the use of the 'n-word'. Obviously, it's not something that's comfortable to have in here, but it's a fact of the matter that it appeared this way at the time, 47 years ago, and that we've moved on from it. A friend made a good point the other day, though. Were this episode to be returned to the BBC's archives, what would they do about it? On the soundtrack it's covered by Purves' narration (indeed, I didn't even realise until later on that it had been spoken over), but the episode itself may not have that option. I'm guessing that the Restoration Team would just cover it cleverly in some way.

But setting that aside, I think I'm still more baffled by this story than I am actively bored by it. Today's episode was listened to while I did the washing up, and I spent most of the time wondering what on Earth they were thinking by making a story like this. It's really unlike anything that we've seen in the series, and it's not something that we'll ever really see again.

And then I got to thinking about the fact that people are always so keen to bring the Celestial Toymaker back. He's in one of the novels, a few of the Big Finish audios (played, superbly, by David Bailie. If you've not heard his performance then you really need to. Off to the Big Finish website with you!), the first of the Eighth Doctor's DWM comic strips. There was even a planned return to the programme in the 1980s (again, available from Big Finish now).

I couldn't get my head around why people were so keen to bring him back, but I think it is simply the fact that the idea behind him is a solid one. He's a God. A powerful God who gets terribly bored and draws people like the Doctor to his realm to entertain him. Done well (and this story perhaps isn't the best example of that), he could be a very good character.

And so we move to Episode Three. I'm still a little surprised by my own reaction to the story - as I said yesterday, I'd been dreading this one. Tomorrow's my last opportunity to picture the Toymaker's realm entirely in my mind as opposed to what I can see in the surviving final part, so hopefully it'll give me plenty of imagery that can only work well away from this serial's budget…

Next Episode: The Dancing Floor

Next Episode: The Dancing Floor 

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

Day 117: The Celestial Toyroom (The Celestial Toymaker, Episode One)

Dear diary,

Ohh, I've been dreading this one. So far (with the occasional blip here or there), Season Three has been doing pretty well. The boredom that had started to seep in with Season Two has dissipated, and I'm really enjoying the programme at the moment. But then there's The Celestial Toymaker. For a long long time, this story had a golden reputation. People would fall over themselves to take credit for it.

But then the fourth episode was found.

Overnight, people changed their stories to pin the credit on somebody else. Anybody else. As long as it wasn't them. I'm guessing you can understand why I've not been too keen to reach this one. Thing is, though, I've not seen the fourth episode. I know some of the various criticisms that get levelled at it, but I've yet to witness them first-hand. And it actually seems to be doing the trick.

By the time this episode ended, by which time I'd expected to be sobbing and wondering if it was too late to drop out of this diary, I was more intrigued than anything else. I'm not sure I've actually got a clue what's really going on (it didn't help that the moment the rules of Steven and Dodo's game were announced happened to coincide with me reaching the self-service till in Asda), but I think I've enjoyed it.

One of the things that gets said a lot about the fourth episode is that the story simply looks cheap. Here, again, is the benefit of listening to this one as an audio - I don't know! It could look great! There's a moment in this one, where the Toymaker tells the Doctor and his companions that they can go back to the TARDIS if they want. Peter Purves' narration then explains a screen showing them hundreds of TARDISes.

That's how he described it, yet my mind automatically went for lots and lots of police boxes revolving around them. We already know that they're in an octagonal room with no features, so what if the walls of the room are suddenly lined with facsimiles of the ship? In my mind, that scene looked great.

They seem to be trying to inject a lot of tension into this story, too. Early on, the Doctor warns Steven and Dodo that nothing here is 'just for fun', and we later find out that the Doctor has visited the Toymaker's realm before. We're told that he didn't stay long enough on that occasion to play any of the games, but it's interesting to find a place like this that the Doctor actively knows of - and a place that he's scared of. It really helps to sell the threat to us, and isn't something we've seen before.

Even the ending of the episode sounds quite sinister, with the lights dimming, claps of thunder, and the clowns being reduced to lifeless mannequins which then shrink back down to the size of dolls. The narration describes Dodo as shuddering as she leaves the room, and in my mind at least, it's a pretty creepy scene.

Ah, Dodo. She really is just a companion, now, There's no attempt to suggest that she's new to all this TARDIS travel stuff. Right at the start of the episode (or to be more exact, at the very end of the last episode), she emerges from the wardrobe again, thrilled with her latest discovery. It's 'fab', apparently. When they think they've arrived in an empty place, she's keen to move on to somewhere more exciting. It really is a shame that she's not being given more of a character so far.

Still, it's a much better start than I'd feared to this story - even if it is all in my head so far. Here's hoping things don't go too awry before the last episode rolls around!

Next Episode: The Hall of Dolls

Next Episode: The Hall of Dolls 

DWO’s spoiler-free preview of episode 7.11 The Crimson Horror:

“When the end of days is come, and judgement rains down upon us all...”

When Madame Vastra, Jenny, and Strax are alerted to a spate of strange deaths in the north of England, it’s the last sight of a dead man that grabs their attentions. Sweetville has been established as a place for people to come and repent, opting for a chance to be saved from the coming apocalypse. But there’s something sinister at the heart of this ‘perfect’ community, and the Paternoster Row team aren’t the only ones intrigued by the mystery of Mrs Gillyflower and her ‘silent partner’, Mr Sweet... 

Having made such a hit as a team in The Snowmen last Christmas, the return of Vastra, Jenny, and Strax has been one of the most anticipated points of the 2013 series. Thankfully, Mark Gatiss’ The Crimson Horror does not disappoint. 

The story in places almost serves as a ‘Doctor-lite’ episode, with much of the early focus of the episode being squarely on the guest cast. We almost open mid-story for the Doctor and Clara, and discover the secrets of Sweetville through the eyes of our returning heroes, as they make their way deeper into the sinister new mill, uncovering secrets as they go. Vastra’s advice of how to find the Doctor - to ignore any ‘keep out’ sign, and actively look for danger - is fitting, and it’s wonderful to see these characters given room to breathe. 

The stand out has to be Dan Starkey, returning as Strax for a third time. As during the christmas episode, the character is played purely for comic relief, but all his humour hits just the right spot. The more we see of the trio together, the more we’re desperate for them to front their own spin-off series. This episode seems to perfectly showcase that they could carry it off, with mysteries being brought to their attention, ready to be investigated. 

The other major guest stars for The Crimson Horror come in the form of Diana Rigg and her daughter Rachel Stirling. They play mother and daughter in the episode, too, with Rigg taking on the part of Mrs Gillyflower, owner of the new Sweetville Mill, and her blind daughter, Ada. The pair are fantastic casting and really set the screen alight when they share it.

The direction of the episode, by Saul Metzstein (who also directed our unusual Victorian investigators last Christmas), is as fantastic as we’ve come to expect from him, and there’s an interesting use of flashbacks to catch us up with the story when needed. 

The only question now... when will Vastra, Jenny, and Strax be getting their own spin-off?

Five things to look out for...

1) “Did you think I’d forgotten you, dear monster?”

2) “Just when you think your favourite lock-picking Victorian chamber maid will never turn up!”

3) “Brave heart, Clara...”

4) “Horse! You have failed in your mission!”

5) “I’m the Doctor, you’re nuts, and I’m going to stop you.



[Sources: DWO; Will Brooks]

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

Day 116: The Bomb (The Ark, Episode Four)

Dear diary,

After everything I said yesterday, the Monoids actually look really good here! The scenes where they emerge from the jungle on Refusis and attack the others is fantastic. Yes, they're a slightly silly idea, and yes they don't quite work as well as they might have hoped, but I'm completely won around. It'd be interesting to see a modern take on them. Has anyone drawn up any designs for a re-imagined Monoid?

I find that this is another one of those episodes where I'm left with very little to say. Over the last three days, I've praised the direction, the design, the story… and all of that's waiting to be talked up again here. Stories like this are tricky, because you really don't quite know what to talk about without repeating yourself. A lot.

It's fair to say that the story suffers one of its few less successful effects here, when the Monoids leave the Ark and head for the planet. The shot of the shuttles leaving the ship is plagued by some very obvious wires, but I think it's a case of falling back on my old argument - the original broadcast wouldn't have been on a screen as big as this, or with a picture as clear as this.

There's a wonderful special feature on The Ark DVD, during which Peter Purves talks about the way that the programme would have been seen back in 1966. They show the image on a tiny TV set, and with the contrast up high - just as it would have been when first shown. The shot they use is the opening scene, where the Monoid turns to the camera and it's our first introduction to this world. It looks great. I wonder if I can play with the settings on the Mac and watch an episode in a worse quality than the DVD affords, just to see how it might have looked? That would be an interesting experiment for maybe an episode that's not particularly well regarded.

On the whole, I've rather enjoyed The Ark. It's not a particularly stand-out story in the way some others the season might be, but there's a lot in there to be praised, and I'm surprised it's not considered more popular. I don wonder, though, if it may work a little better were it given the Mission to the Unknown treatment: splitting it apart. Would the story be given any more impact if they had their two episodes dealing with Dodo's cold, left as we see here, and then headed off to another story. They could even move on and do the Celestial Toymaker story - the final few minutes of today's episode would tag onto the end of Episode Two quite well.

Then, having spent four weeks away, they could return to the Ark, and Dodo could still do her whole 'Oh, look! They've completed the statue! Do you remember, last time we were here, they said it would take 700 years…' and play the story out just the same. It might be nice to see the story given a bit more space to breathe like that, and give the real impression that time has passed for the Ark, by making time pass for us. I guess that can jut be one of those 'what ifs'.

Next Episode: The Celestial Toyroom

Next Episode: The Celestial Toyroom 

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

Day 115: The Return (The Ark, Episode Three)

Dear diary,

I've mentioned before that Season Three is something of a weak point in my early Doctor Who knowledge. I've not seen much of it before, and only really know the overall 'gimmicks' of the stories. The cliffhanger for yesterday, for example, is the main thing I know about this story. It's telling that today we've touched down on the planet Refusis 2, and I didn't know we were going to! I thought the whole story took place on the Ark, and reached the planet right at the very end, in time for the Guardians to take their place on the new world.

It was a bit exciting, then, when the Doctor, Dodo, a Monoid and his personal slave were bearded into a shuttle and sent down to scout out the planet first. What would they find? Arid desert? Beautiful countryside? A quarry? A studio set? Oh, of course. It's a jungle. Full of invisible creatures. Didn't we do this not all that long ago?

I think what frustrates me is that I know they can do a good jungle set on the show in this era. Heck, I quite liked the one we got in The Chase, but then it was bettered by The Daleks' Master Plan and the first two episodes of this story. Yes, it's a lovely design again, but… I want to see something new! Doctor Who has always been very good at re-using its good ideas over and over, but it doesn't really work when it comes so quickly in succession like this.

Still, there's a lot to like in this episode. Imison as director continues to impress - there's several 'effects' shots in this instalment and they're all pulled off very well. From the magically appearing food, through to the invisible creatures moving around, and the explosion of the capsule at the end, there's a lot to enjoy and it's really helping push this story along. It's the first time, I think, that we've had so many effects like this all in one episode, and just as par-for-the-course. It really makes The Ark stick out from the stories we've had leading up to it.

There's also still a number of design choices being made in this episode that I'm really liking. Quite aside from the jungle itself, and the sets for the Ark, which are still just as nice (though we see less of the scope, now), I really love the capsule that the Doctor and co use to descend to the planet. I love the way the door opens, with the wall folding away and the seat overturning to form steps - though you'd need to be careful if you were the one sitting there. I wonder how many accidents those things have caused over the centuries?

Oh, alright then. I'm going to have to discuss the Monoids properly at some point, aren't I? They've never been the most well-regarded creatures in Doctor Who history, and I think it's fair to say that they're not the greatest design on show in this story. That said, I do sort-of like them, and they look better in some shots here than they have before. I've often thought it strange to build an entire monster around the idea that you could make the eyes move by wiggling your tongue around a bit, but it does work on some occasions.

The voices are something of a let-down, though, Having had them evolve from speechless beings into this, I don't know what I was expecting. We seem to have ended up with 'generic evil alien' voices, not all that far removed from Mechanoids or Daleks. I am keen on the way that Monoid One keeps gesticulating, though. It's almost a throwback to the way they communicated before, and that works quite well.

Mind you, the less said about the 'Security Kitchen' the better…

Next Episode: The Bomb

Next Episode: The Bomb