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

Day 480: The Invisible Enemy, Episode Two

Dear diary,

This episode has brought me closer to what I’ve always imagined The Invisible Enemy to be like… but it’s not half as bad as I was expecting. The design of the Bi-Al Foundation is just as tacky and rubbish as I was expecting it to be, but that kind of works for it. It suits the setting, and I think the fact that I’m still being pleasantly surprised by the story is helping me to over-look things which I’d normally find off-putting.

And, of course, we’ve finally got the first appearance of K9! It’s funny, looking at this story, thinking that he may have only appeared in this one single tale, and never again. It doesn’t feel right, somehow - possibly because I know what a big part of Doctor Who lore he’s destined to become over the next thirty-odd years. I’ve always found him to be a bit divisive among fandom - you seem to think he’s either one of the best ideas from this period of the programme’s history, or the worst. I don’t have enough knowledge of his appearances over the next few seasons to really give an opinion yet, though, so I’m keen to see how I find his addition to the TARDIS crew.

For now, though, I’m really rather liking him. It seems somewhat fitting that his very first line in the show is ‘Affirmative, Master’, considering it’s the phrase that will come to be most associated with him. It’s also great to see him being paired off with Leela so early on, considering that this particular model of the dog will be departing with he at the end of the season. I wonder if he’s going to be the perfect addition to Leela’s character to see us through the next few stories, watching her evolve before leaving? She’s very much left to her own devices here, with the Doctor spending large chunks of the episode in a self-induced coma, but as ever she’s on fine form. I’m not even going to bother drawing attention to the things I’ve enjoyed from her today - just take it as read that I’ve loved every minute she’s spent on the screen!

As for the story itself… I have to confess that I don’t really know why I’m enjoying it so much. I really just can’t get my head around it! There’s not an awful lot to it (today’s episode essentially consists of the Doctor being taken to hospital, and creating a clone while Leela fights off some standard-issue ‘men with guns’ in the corridor), but I’m really caught up in the events. I think I’m slightly put off by the fact that all this feels simply like build up to the main event: I’ve known for years that this is the story in which the Doctor and his companion get injected into his brain (although I didn’t realise that it was clones of the pair who underwent this process - I’ve spent years wondering how the Doctor was able to be shrub and placed in his own body…), and so everything that’s happened up to now has been almost filler to me.

I’m hoping, now, that following the clones inside the Doctor’s head means that we get yet another change of setting. The fact that Episodes One and Two seem to be set in such vastly different locations has really helped to make the whole story feel a bit more interesting than it really has any right to be, and if we’re switching somewhere new again for Episode Three, then it may help to stop the boredom from setting in. Otherwise, The Invisible Enemy could be in danger of becoming just a generic ‘space’ yarn…