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

Day 543: The Horns of Nimon, Episode One

Dear diary,

You’ll need to brace yourself, because this story marks something of a milestone for The 50 Year Diary, and for myself as a fan… because The Horns of Nimon is, I’ve just worked out, the only Doctor Who story left that I’ve never experienced in some way. Obviously, I’ve watched every episode that leads up to this story - you can click back through the blog entries here on Doctor Who Online and read them all (with, in fairness, the exemption of The Highlanders, Episode Four. Though I listened to the Target novel reading of that one, so I’ve still experienced it, he argued). Every story that comes after this one, I’ve seen all or some of.

Now, it has to be said that I’ve still got stories coming up which I’ve sort-of seen, but can’t really claim to have watched - Meglos, for instance. I have the DVD. The story played out in the background when I first bought it, but I was doing something else at the time. Aside from there being something with a cactus, I don’t really know what happens. The same could be said for Terminus. I’ve seen up to the bit where a door (or something) appears in the TARDIS (or something) and that’s all I know. Not sure I’ve ever made it past that bit. The same goes of Warrior’s Gate, which I know I’ve seen, but for all I remember of it, I may as well not have. Still! For all intents and purposes, The Horns of Nimon is officially my last ‘new/old’ Doctor Who story. It should feel momentous! It has to be the single greatest slice of Doctor Who ever produced! It needs to be a fitting capstone for my marathon! So far it’s… Well, it’s alright.

That sounds like I’m being negative, but I’m really not. I genuinely mean it when I describe this story as being ‘all right’. There’s several things in here that I’m enjoying (more on which in a moment), but it’s not exactly the greatest episode that I’ve ever watched of the programme. It’s simply a fairly solid slice of Doctor Who - it’s never going to be anyone’s favourite story, but I doubt that it’s anyone’s least favourite,m either (go on, prove me wrong! There must be someone, somewhere, who can fill both those rolls!)

So: things that I’ve liked about this episode. Well, for a start, there’s the Doctor tinkering with the TARDIS console, and Romana building her own Sonic Screwdriver. During City of Death I mused that I’d never been keen on the Doctor/Romana pairing as an idea. I worried that they’d have the problem Barry Letts always spoke of in regards to Liz - The Doctor needs someone who’s not on his level, so he can explain things. I worried that having Romana around would simply result in two very intelligent people swanning around the universe. Actually, that’s exactly what we’ve got, but it works! I’ve enjoyed them solving problems in a slightly different way (as, for example, in the previous story, where the Doctor is able to leave Romana to do complex things with bits of machinery while he goes off to do other important things).

I love the idea that in the middle of all these adventures, the pair are able to take some time off and have a lazy Sunday afternoon inside the TARDIS just getting on with their hobbies. The Doctor gets to mess around with the workings of his ship, while Romana becomes increasingly used to his way of life, and creates her own Sonic Screwdriver because she’s become accustomed to how useful it can be. It also makes her ‘I’ll need a screwdriver’ line in Nightmare of Eden all the more pertinent! You might remember that during the Second Doctor’s era, I used to track the evolution of the Sonic in the Doctor’s mind before it finally turned up in Fury from the Deep. There’s none of that journey to be had here - Romana realises how much she could do with one, so she builds it. Simple!

Away from the TARDIS, I’m quite keen on the spaceship set. It’s perhaps the greatest over-use of that typical BBC ‘science fiction’ panel that we’ve seen since probably the Pertwee years, but the actual bridge of the ship feels very real to me. Whereas Nightmare of Eden gave us your typical 70s spaceship with lots of flashing buttons and ‘futuristic’ controls, the bridge in this episode is barely held together. It’s a mass of cables, and wires, and it can possibly be best compared to the Ninth Doctor’s TARDIS - where the occupant has had to make modifications and patch things up as he goes, just to keep the ship running. The crew even complain about the dated, failing equipment not being up to task, and it feels so very much like conversations I used to have ten times a week back in my old workplace.

Then, once the ship comes under power failure, we get that familiar ‘camera shake’ while the actors throw themselves around a bit… but the set itself is moving, too! Wires and cables all get thrown around! Things fall off! When it finally goes up in smoke at the end, it genuinely feels as though it’s coming from real equipment finally giving up after years of service. This is closer in style to the types of set we’ll see in the new series - a future that’s far more rooted in reality than the sterile while and chrome visions of years gone by. I always love getting designs like this, so it’s certainly a thumbs up from me!