Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start...
Day 583: Castrovalva, Episode Two
Dear diary,
There are very few bits of music from ‘classic’ Doctor Who that I can hum off the top of my head. The ‘Space Adventure’ theme that was so typical of the Cybermen in the 1960s is one of them. The ‘UNIT Theme’ from The Invasion (among others) is another one, and the music that accompanies Tom Baker’s regeneration scene, as the camera moves down from the girder to find out hero laying in the grass is another. Although I know these ones well enough to hum them while doing the dishes, the theme from this story is the only one which I occasionally find stuck in my head at the most unusual of moments. Oh, you know the one I mean: do de do de do, do, de do.... I rather like it, and there’s something about it that just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
Last season, I mentioned that this period of the programme feels autumnal to me. For some reason, I simply equate it with that tail- end-of-the-year feeling, and perhaps none mores that this tale. I can’t even begin to describe why to you, but I watched this episode with a huge feeling of nostalgia - it just makes me feel comfortable. I can remember the first time I saw this story. It was some time before the DVD came out, and I hadn’t been a fan for all that long. I’d say it was probably around 2005, but it could even be as late as 2006. In the farmhouse I grew up in, I’d converted one of the back bedrooms into my own sitting room, moving in a massive old book case, and a couple of old armchairs when the suite of furniture downstairs had been replaced. This became my den. The walls were covered with posters of anything and everything, and the shelves were filled with as much ‘geeky’ stuff as I could lay my hands on.
Oh, I loved that room. The absolute pride of it was the growing collection of Doctor Who stories sat upon the bookcase. It was an odd assortment - a mixture of VHS and DVD, with the stories slotted in to match broadcast order. I used to pick up odd tapes from charity shops, or make lists of ones from adverts in Doctor Who Magazine to hand around for my birthday, or Christmas. I can’t recall how long I’d actually owned Castrovalva, but it had been on the shelf for a while before I decided to watch it for the first time. What followed was one of the happiest times I’ve ever had watching Doctor Who. I made myself a drink and something to eat, curled up in one of the armchairs with a big quilt wrapped around me, and settled in to enjoy Peter Davison’s first story.
And you know what? I loved it. I loved every god damn minute of it. There was something about it all that just really appealed to me. I was at that stage which most fans go through, where a story largely set in the TARDIS was awesome, because it meant that we got to explore the Doctor’s ship, and when we finally reached the woodlands of Castrovalva itself, they resembled the gardens outside where I’d go for walks. I lapped up every minute of the story, and it’s that feeling that’s coming back to me now when I watch it again (I think this is probably the first time I’ve seen it since then).
I wonder, though, if the happy memory of that first viewing is effecting how much I’m liking this one? I’m happily sitting through it, enjoying the story, but with a sneaking suspicion that it might not actually be all that... good. Today’s episode features a long segment in which two characters we barely know wheel a cabinet around the woods, for instance! It’s still not the most thrilling way to introduce a new Doctor! Patrick Troughton got to face off with the Daleks, Jon Pertwee had the Autons to contend with, plus a military organisation, and the benefit of film, while Tom Baker was wrestling with a Giant Robot by this point! Everything seems to be just that bit too... slow for me.
But it’s ok, because I’ve got faith. The whole set up changes from this next episode, and we’re off into the city itself with a whole new cast of characters. It’s hard to remember that aside from the guards at the very start of the story, we’ve only actually seen the regulars so far (Anthony Ainley might as well count as a ‘regular’ from now), so I think some new blood will give the story a boost. I’ve tried to temper today’s score to allow for the fact that a lot of my enjoyment currently is simply that glowing sense of nostalgia...
