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

Day 683: Time and the Rani, Episode Two

Dear diary,

The Tetraps might well be one of my favourite monster designs from Doctor Who. There's something about them which makes me think that they should be a bit rubbish, but I just can't help but really like them. For a start, the design is quite nice in itself, taking enough from the look of a bat and yet tweaking it enough to make them truly alien. Then the actual masks are fantastic, especially when they have to snarl at people. I've always thought that the work on creating monsters in the McCoy years of the programme is especially good, and it's nice to see that it's a trend which starts right from the very first story. I'm rather keen on the way that the various different point-of-veiw shots are overlaid, then focussing in on specific images. I think this must be the first time since about Doctor Who and the Silurians that a POV shot has impressed me this much by doing something different with it.

I'm not so fond of the Lakertians design, because I'm not entirely sure that they work. I appreciate the attempt to do something a bit different with their make up and design (and the fact that the director has thought to give them a very distinctive way of running, which makes them stand out alongside the other characters) but there's something about them which doesn't appeal to me as much as their furry friends.

This episode seems to have allowed Sylvester McCoy the chance to settle in to the character a bit more, too, and I can't help but wonder if it's because he's no longer having to play amnesia, and because he's been reunite with a real companion, as opposed to thinking that the Rani's disguise made her look anything like Mel. When he finally is reunited with his friend, it feels like the moment that he suddenly becomes the Doctor - having spent a couple of minutes distrusting each other, the Doctor and Mel finally look at each other across a table;

DOCTOR

Mel?

MEL

But you're completely different. Nothing like you were. Face, height, hair, everything's changed.

It's such a lovely moment, and something about it really gels for me. There's a bit of conversation earlier in the scene where the Doctor suddenly remembers something about carrot juice, and it feels like the two of them are already starting to find their groove.

That said… I really can't take to Mel. I'm trying, and she showed a fair bit of promise during Terror of the Vervoids,but something's just really not gelling for me here. I don't know if it's the way that Bonnie Langford is playing her (certainly, this is her weakest performance so far), or just the way that the character is written - she's certainly the archetypal 'screaming' Doctor Who girl, isn't she? I actively had to turn the volume down today while she screamed and screamed at the sight of a Tetrap!