Will Brooks’ 50 Year Diary - watching Doctor Who one episode a day from the very start...
Day 687: Paradise Towers, Episode Two
Dear diary,
Over the last few days, there’s been something wrong that I simply couldn’t put my finger on. Something just didn’t feel right about the episodes I’ve been watching, and I’m coming away from them really unsure about the scores I’m giving. On the one hand it seems like I’m being too harsh on them, but on the other I know I’m rating in the same way I always do. And then last night, I finally found time to sit down and watch the Last Chance Saloon documentary on the DVD for Time and the Rani and finally managed to figure out what isn’t working for me - it’s Sylvester McCoy.
I’ve mentioned in the last few days that he’s not quite playing the role of the Doctor here in the way that he will over the next couple of seasons, but I don’t think I’d really considered that it could be the barrier stopping me from getting completely in to the stories. It’s not the only problem, I can’t place the blame entirely at Sylv’s door, but I think it’s what’s been putting me off. What helped me realise this was the way that Sylvester talks about Season Twenty-Four in the documentary, and specifically the way that he approached the part;
”I remember from Patrick Troughton that he’d been light-hearted in many ways, and comedic, and that was what attracted to me. I mean, I’d done straight drama as well, but a lot of my kind of natural instincts are towards comedy. You might be surprised to hear this, but it is! And so, I went for the comedic choices. And, I think, wrongly when I look back. Too many, it was too many.”
There have been several occasions in the last few days where I’ve mentioned Sylvester settling in to the role, but what I think I really mean is that there’s glimmers coming through of the Seventh Doctor I know from later seasons - an incarnation I like more than the impish clown we’ve got on screen at the moment. It’s a strange position to be in, really, because I’ve never had it before. The first six Doctors I’ve taken to immediately (even Pertwee, whose era I was dreading, and Davison, who perhaps took until his second season to really ‘find’ the Doctor he wanted to play), but this version of the Seventh Doctor isn’t quite doing it for me at the moment. I’m interested, now, to see if I start taking to him during the latter half of this season, or if it might take until next year.
As I’ve said above, the Doctor isn’t the only thing putting me off this story. As with Time and the Rani, the production team seem to be aiming this at a directly ‘kids show’ audience again, and sets which should be the bread-and-butter of the BBC design department don’t come across as well as I’d have liked. The actual run-down corridors of Paradise Towers are rather nice, and they largely work for me (some of the large windows against which McCoy is silhouetted in parts of this episode look lovely), but then we cut back to Mel in the flat with the cannibals, and it all starts to fall apart a little.
Still, tomorrow’s another day, and I’m still determined to like some of this season!
