Resurrection of the Daleks

Davros is back - Terry Molloy.

‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ is a rollicking, fast paced, stylish piece of Doctor Who. I am very torn after seeing it because for me it was both good and bad at the same time. Let’s start with Mathew Robinson who directed it then, because he did a mighty fine job and my hat is raised to him. On a Doctor Who budget he really made something that if shot on film in widescreen almost looked as if the production values were good enough for a movie.

The script, by Eric Saward, though, has massive holes in it and is very derivative to be honest. It’s not that it’s not well paced, plotted or that the characters are poor, in fact I think the character writing is excellent in this one, but the ideas are just a bit convoluted and pointless? I’m trying to find the right word but that’s all I’ve got right now – never good when you’re criticising writing.

Rodney Bewes guest stars.

So we have a time corridor from the Daleks’ space ship to Earth, 1983. Okay. Why? That seems pointless – the Dalek time ship is hundreds of years in the future. They are holding canisters of a virus that has been destroying them in an abandoned warehouse in London. But wait there is a point to this all, the Daleks are planning to trap the Doctor with the Time Corridor in said warehouse. Well that’s all a bit too much for me.

They have also taken to duplicating humans left right and centre, but employ an apparently non-duplicated human to run them (Lytton). Ok.

Why again? It’s a secret plot to duplicate the Doctor and his companions and send them to Gallifrey to defeat the Time Lords of course. Yet at the same time the main strand of the plot involves rescuing Davros from his cryogenic prison in space, so that he can stop a Movellan virus which has caused the Daleks to lose the fight with these enemies. So basically, exactly the same reason as in ‘Destiny of Daleks’, more or less.

Davros has a little thing he uses to inject people and Daleks with and they become his servants. Hmmmm that’s another wobbly plot device right there. As you can see the plot, at least in my eyes, is very weak. However, the story is enjoyable and exciting despite those issues.

The direction is noticeably snappier than usual, it’s very well cast with Maurice Colbourne from Gangsters as Lytton, Rodney Bewes as Stien, and the recasting of Davros this time to be played by Terry Molloy who really pushes the shouting and craziness. It’s strong performance, but I can’t help but feel that somewhere between this performance and the understated performance of David Gooderson would have been the way to go with Davros. Still, when you play a megalomaniac, you shouldn’t really hold back should you?

The Doctor can't quite kill Davros.

The sets and locations are perfect. The space prison is suitably dark and simple, it looks like it could easily be deconstructed and reconstructed to make different rooms. We see the Doctor’s past lives and companions as the Daleks take a print of his mind too which is good. The Doctor and his companions are at times quite secondary to the story, which I know a lot of people don’t like but I think it works well. Perhaps Peter Davison’s best performance thus far, a great moment when he could kill Davros, doesn’t, gets distracted, the door closes and he doesn’t get another opportunity. Would he have? We see Davros contracting the virus right at the end, but somehow I don’t think that will do him in.

Goodbye Tegan

Mark Strickson as Turlough gets a decent amount of action too, and although still a bit cowardly, he has one of his best stories to date. Which leaves Tegan. Sadly this is Janet Fielding’s last story, but I’m sure she was happy to leave. Even in her final story, she doesn’t get to do much and then just decides she’s had enough at the end, which to be honest doesn’t seem THAT out of the blue, but as it was her last story it would have been nice if it was a story where Tegan took a good chunk of the plot, like Adric and Nyssa before her. I like Tegan, but as is almost always the case with the companions, she was woefully under-utilised and that’s sad because Janet Fielding is an enormously talented actress. Brave heart Tegan, I will miss you!

So it’s a mixed bag this story, and a tough one to give a mark too. I’ve shaved off half a mark for the poor use of Tegan.

6.5/10

Frontios

The Doctor with Platagenent (centre)

Christopher H. Bidmead was asked back by Eric Saward to write another story, and it was his best story by far. A more traditional Who-tale than ‘Logopolis’ and ‘Castrovalva’, ‘Frontios’ again is a strange, single word title stemming from the location of the story. Whilst the similarities don’t end there, at least there’s a decent story here rather than four episodes of exposition of a scientific concept.

Turlough at work

A rust-proof, solid cast adds to some pretty good design work (bar the Tractators), and it all comes together to make an exciting adventure which pace and energy. The production got off to a horrific staff when the actor booked to play Mr Range was brutally murdered the day of his costume fitting, and the actors recall that hanging over the production, which it surely would. However the whole team deserve kudos for pulling it all together in the wake of such a tragedy.

Bidmead’s fascination with the TARDIS hadn’t waned, it plays an important role in this story. I’m trying to think of a single Peter Davison story which doesn’t feature a TARDIS scene, and at the moment I’m coming up blank. So there’s some phaffing about going on at the start as the TARDIS gets pulled down towards Frontios. And then the TARDIS ends up in pieces scattered around the tunnels of Fronitos.

The Doctor is trapped!

The plan of the Tractators is a little like the Daleks’ plan to pilot Earth around as a big space ship. Which is their plan for Frontios too. They use a strange machine to make the tunnels, and they require a human operator which is merely a plot device I guess. The Tractators are presented as burrowing insects (albeit not the most convincing ones), so I think making the machine responsible for the tunnelling was a strange choice by the author.

Tractators at work.

He uses Turlough very well, and Mark Strickson turns out a fine performance as a companion losing their mind. He’s a decent foil for the Doctor, with an added pinch of cowardice yet displays bravery at times too, especially in ‘Frontios’. It is a bit convenient plotwise that Turlough has a race-memory of the Tractators which slowly reveals the way to defeat them and their leader, the Gravis, but it’s easy enough to overlook.

It’s a very moody piece and there are some great, strong characters such as Plantagenant (Jeff Rawle), the colony leader, and his 2IC, Rudge, played by Onedin Line and Carry On veteran, Peter Gilmore. Sadly Tegan’s character is getting lost with no development whatsoever. Janet Fielding always puts in a good performance, but they never write any changes in her character, nothing since ‘Snakedance’.

The sets are rather stylish in places, and generally good. The stuff which is supposed to be ‘outside’ on

Frontios is done better than say ‘Snakedance’, the lighting is worked to better suit the location. The mixing of tunnels and the TARDIS is great. The only disappointment is the Tractators, bigger than humans but shelled insects. It’s fair to say that they were never going to be well realised, it was asking too much. Their arms are just basically hands which look terrible and are the worst part of a bad costume. The movement is hampered by the costume two, with no legs – or should I say one? But they don’t hop, they shuffle everywhere. Hard to take seriously a monster which if you pushed over – and that looked pretty easy to me to do, they wouldn’t be able to get back up.

So that is ‘Frontios’, a well written, exciting piece with just a couple of issues.

7.5/10

The Awakening

Glyn Houston

As two-parters go, this is the best of the ones from this era by a long shot. It was originally a four-parter, and that becomes obvious in the final ten minutes where things move like lightening, but nevertheless Eric Pringle’s script is solid and we are given a good ‘filler’ story far better than ‘The King’s Demons’ or ‘Black Orchid.

Denis Lil with more hair than last time...

Not only that, but Glyn Houston (‘The Hand of Fear’) and Denis Lil (‘The Image of the Fendahl’ and the show ‘Survivors’) make good guest appearances. It’s got an interesting concept – a creature made strong by the evil of a man, the Malice itself I think looks ok even if it clearly is a big polystyrene face, and considering the story was allocated barely any budget at all (there are very few sets you will notice) it is a pretty successful attempt at a short story.

They could have well made it three parts I think, because the ending is difficult to understand and very rushed, and ‘Warriors of the Deep’ could have had an episode cut I think, but the budget wouldn’t have worked out that way I expect.

Janet Fielding dressed as the May Queen.

The village where it was shot was perfect, rather like the one in ‘The Android Invasion’. It was a great chance to wear period costumes in a modern day setting I imagine! I am unsure why the power of the Malice didn’t affect everyone in Little Hodcombe, other than that would have put pay to the whole storyline I expect because they’d be no resolution possible!

The Malice

Some of the effects weren’t great – but yet the little blue pixels dotted around the place were reasonably effective. I disliked the ending, where the whole village basically was bundled into the TARDIS, although watching green slime spew out of the Malice was a highlight. It was all very rushed so I’m not 100% sure how the Doctor defeated the Malice in the

end. The main evil in Little Hodcombe was destroyed, and that was feeding the Malice who was then in turn

All aboard the TARDIS!

controlling many of the villagers. I think. Or were some just over zealous and listened to everything Sir George Hutchinson said? As I said, in two parts it doesn’t get explained very well. Very similar situation to ‘Snakedance’ which ended similarly, with a hasty expansion of the explanation added to the next story.

Still, it holds up ok without shining overly brightly.

6.5/10

Warriors of the Deep

Jokingly called ‘Warriors of the Cheap’ by fans, ‘Warriors of the Deep’ actually, for the most part, looks like a good deal of money was spent on it, but it just wasn’t quite enough to cover the bad bits – the wobbly rubber door, the Myrka and to a lesser extent the Sea Devils and Silurians. We have a large set, though overlit and maybe not exactly right for the story I think it’s a good set that works. For me, the greatest issues are with the story, as always. Johnny Byrnes is not my favourite writer, as I have alluded to in the past. The thing is - I think this is his best story.

Maddox in the Sync machine with Ian McCulloch

Doesn’t mean I think this is a good story, mind you!

So what did I like? Well, two power blocks poised to blow each other up in 2084? The cold war was still very much alive when the story was written, and I wouldn’t have a hard time believing we could end up there again. I liked the idea of the ‘sync operator’ and the character Maddox, the espionage, and I feel that if Byrnes had concentrated on that and got rid of the Silurians and Sea Devils, it would have been a great script. But, he didn’t.

Not convinced by these Sea Devils

The Silurians are written even more one-dimensionally than in their first story. Apparently Ikhtar, the leader, survived which seems unlikely. So all the story is essentially about is a very slow invasion of an underwater base, a declaration of war and a very bad monster. The two power blocks are merely a setting for the story and little else, and mores the pity that they are. The costumes for the Silurians are ok, the ones for the Sea Devil, with added armour, are a bit dodgier and it’s twice as obvious as it was in ‘The Sea Devils’ that the actors’ heads are in the necks.

Solow (Ingrid Pitt) and the Myrka

Why did they decide to bring them both back? Well, JNT was in the mood for bringing things back – he had been since ‘Earthshock’. It’s just a pity they didn’t use them in an interesting way because the idea behind the Silurians and Sea Devils is interesting. Instead we have over an episode of them just slowly taking over the sea base. The direction is so rushed by Pennant Roberts, because they lost two weeks of production time thanks to a general election at the time, that these long sequences look ridiculous. It’s basically ‘stand in a line two metres from the Sea Devils. Shoot at them. They shoot at you. Eventually most of the humans die and one or two retreat’. And then it gets repeated scene after scene.

I won’t go into the Myrka. I feel for

the effects team and Marr Irvine because with no time or money (they were still adding paint as filming went on) it was never going to work. And then it was shot out in the open in bright white corridors. It could not have possibly worked. Some bits just needed to be scrapped altogether. Byrnes asked a lot of the production team, and then two weeks were taken from them. It’s a real pity because so much of ‘Warriors of the Deep’ looks really good, slick and like money was spent on it. We have some underwater scenes and ripping end to episode one when the Doctor appears to have drowned. A lot of the model work is good too.

Then we have a guest cast featuring Ian McCulloch, from ‘Survivors’ fame, who gives a great performance, balancing out Ingrid Pitt’s return to Doctor Who where she has no idea what she’s saying half the time and dies inexplicably trying to karate-kick the Myrka. Now that is definitely one of the most bizarre (and to be honest, bad) sequences in Who-history. Peter Davison is in full control as the Doctor by now which is nice, Janet Fielding doesn’t get a lot to do, Mark Strickson as Turlough gets a bit more. He’s quite cowardly in this one actually, but that flip flops a bit.

I just think there was an opportunity missed here to make a really interesting futuristic political thriller.

4.5/10

The Five Doctors

Tegan and the Doctor at the Eye of Orion

Carole Ann Ford as Susan with a NEW First Doctor.

After twenty years, it was time for a one-off special, and in the vein of ‘The Three Doctors’, ‘The Five Doctors’ provides an entertaining, fun story to celebrate a very special milestone. The fact that Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee were in it is a little bit magical. Tom Baker declined (in the end), and I must admit I think it might have been a little strange if he was in it. The use of the ‘Shada’ clips was a clever way around it and allowed the story to be called ‘The Five Doctors’. Add to that Richard Hundrell’s First Doctor, (Hartnell sadly passed away in 1975), and the thing works brilliantly. Hundrell is NOT William Hartnell, but similar in many ways whilst putting his own mark on the part as well.

Then Carole Ann Ford, Lis Sladen and Nicholas Courtney came back to reprise their roles, with cameos from Caroline John, Richard Franklin, Wendy Padbury and Fraser Hines. Plus Daleks, Cybermen, Yeti and Athony Ainley as the Master. It really was a celebration of all that had come before in the previous 20 years. A tough task for Terrance Dicks, but one he did a great job with considering all the things he had to include. His writing is very natural, and whilst it feels quite different from recent stories, it was a true ‘Doctor Who’ tale from a man who knows the show as well as anyone.

Jon Pertwee is also back.

I won’t go into the behind-the-scenes issues with Robert Holmes and the likes here, I will just look at this 90 minute special, which was slightly extended on the version I saw on the DVD. To the short comings firstly. It was sad to see Borusa turned into the bad guy, and Peter Moffat cast him with the fourth actor in as many stories (Philip Latham) who seems evil from the get-go to be honest. So this turn to the dark side was telegraphed and with the Borusas we have seen previously, it is rather hard to believe as well. Paul Jericho is back as the Castellan, getting brutally

And Pat Troughton!

shot on Borusa’s orders, and the garish Gallifrey/capitol sets are also back with a vengeance. Borusa also gets some crazy headwear at one point. A couple of dodgy direction points here and there – Susan spraining her ankle was perhaps more a nod to this oft-used plot device rather than anything else, but it’s not done or directed convincingly. When the Third Doctor meets Sarah, he pulls her up a slight incline using a cable and Bessie. To be frank it looks ridiculous and something else should have been done in my opinion if they couldn’t convince.

A couple of old companions cameo.

Aside from that, what’s not to like? Okay, the script isn’t amazing, ground-breaking stuff, but it didn’t need to be. It needed to provide something for all appearing Doctors to do, which it did admirably, and it needed to wrap things up nicely. It also did

that. The principle location, Wales, was a good choice. Certainly better than a quarry! Then we have a new TARDIS console, a huge step up from the previous one which had been used, I think, since Graham Williams took the reins, and to be honest was a poor cousin to the original console first seen in 1963.

It’s a wonderful nod to the past, Peter Davison gets a good run as ‘the Doctor’, as he should have. I agree with some disappointment that it would have been nice to have the Doctors sharing more screen time together. Pertwee and Troughton again are great together but they don’t  get that much of a chance. They both still retain what they originally brought to the role brilliantly, even if Troughton is a little more understated than he was in ‘The Three Doctors’. He is ten years older of course.

What else is there to say? This ticks a lot of boxes for me. Much better than the general feel of Season 20 too, which was rather bland at times despite the Guardian stories being rather solid.

8.5/10

The King's Demons

Gerald Flood as bad King John

Some stories don’t need as many words to sum up as others. This is one of those stories. ‘The King’s Demons’ is Terence ‘it’s only Doctor Who’ Dudley’s last script for the show thankfully. It’s starts well enough, King John (Gerald Flood) is visiting a castle in the north of England somewhere even though he is also in London. The King is in fact Kamelion, a robot the Master found of Zeraphax who can change his appearance. Hence the name.

Can you see through the disguise?

It’s a two-parter, which don’t appear to work very well in the Davison era. Come the 15-minute mark of the second episode the writer seems to realise that there’s very little time left and everything gets wrapped up as quickly as possible. The Master spends most of the first episode disguised (badly) as a the King’s (French) champion. So far in every Davison story he’s appeared in he’s had a disguise. Groan. Gerald Flood hams it to the max. Tegan complains how cold it is for pretty much the entire story. The locals hate then like then hate the Doctor again. But no connection with any character is made by the Doctor or his companions. Turlough does very little.

The Doctor and Master grapple for control over Kamelion.

It’s not the worst of the season, it has a good look, sets are solid, costumes fantastic, but at two episodes and a very weak plotline – the Master wants to change history by preventing Magna Carta from being signed, so he’s trying to discredit King John by having Kamelion do wacky things, this story falls far short of what it could have been. In fact it still has me going until the reveal of the robot, which was a real robot, albeit one that didn’t work very well.

Characters are somewhat one-dimensional, but solidly played except for flood who goes too far

camping it up like crazy. As the Master’s only appearance this season, and his previous story ‘Time-Flight’ (which this story references without explaining how the Master escaped) I would have hoped for better for Anthony Ainley. Very hard it seems to tell a good story over two parts.
4/10

Enlightenment

This is the most highly rated story of the season, and it’s easy to see why. It’s a very stylish four episodes of Doctor Who directed by Fiona Cumming and written by Barbara Clegg. It tells the story of the ‘Eternals’, beings that live outside time, immortal beings, sailing boats inspired by Earth in space in a race for ‘Enlightenment’. It’s well cast and expertly directed. It’s a story which doesn’t have a lot of points where as an audience member you question the reality of what you are watching, so you believe in the world of the story.

However, to me it falls short of being a classic. Why? Because the script appears to lack a level that it COULD have. It’s basically a very linear storyline and not one with a lot of twists. It resolves the story of Turlough trying to kill the Doctor, but not in a convincing way. Plus the two Guardians walk around with birds on their heads. What WAS the designer of those costumes thinking?

Janet Fielding, Lynda Baron and Peter Davison.

On the DVD a shorter and presumably tighter version of the story is presented along with the broadcast version. In this case I went with the broadcast version. The sets are polished and beautiful. The model work for the time and budget is excellent. The cast has some wonderful performances. I’d like to start with Tony Caunter as Jackson. There are many humans aboard each ship, kidnapped from the appropriate time on Earth. Jackson doesn’t drink the rum, so he is aware of everything that’s going on. I understand his part was expanded on after the first draft of the script. I really would have liked to see this character feature more in the story. He doesn’t really appear in the second half of the story, but worked very well with Turlough.

Publicity still with Leee John in the middle.

Mark Strickson gets a good run in this tale, as it is wrapping up the whole ‘trying to kill the Doctor’ thing which has got a little old by now. He tries to gain the confidence of ‘Wrack’, played by Lynda Baron. I think the casting was great but perhaps she could have toned it down at places. The Episode three cliff-hanger features hey laughing down the barrel of the camera which to be honest was just too OTT. Her offsider, ansell played by Leee John was a poor, stunt piece of casting and the character is very distracting and the actor does not appear to be taking it seriously.

Janet Fielding also has a good go, with the Eternal Marriner (Christopher Brown) showing a somewhat lustful interest in Tegan. She gets to wear a hell of a beautiful dress, which people remember for…. Anyways. It’s a good run for both companions and in fact the Doctor does take a bit of a back seat for the best part of this story.

However, as good as it all is, I feel it’s lacking something. ‘Terminus’ has many more issues than this story, yet watching it I cared more for the characters. There was something to work out. At the end of the day, the prize is ‘Enlightenment’, which is… enlightenment. Meaning great power for the winner of it. But why? Not really explained. Why Turlough ends up with it is not clear other than narratively they needed him to. Then when he sweeps it over to the Black Guardian the Black Guardian is destroyed by it for some reason, even though he wanted it, but he’s not really destroyed of course. Valentine Dyall’s appearances have been interesting over the course of the three stories. Like Wrack, the Black Guardian laughed evilly a lot and got angry a lot but basically did nothing.

The biggest issue with ‘Enlightenment’ is though as visually stimulating as it is, there’s an awful lot of nothing going on. Four episodes is more than enough to detail the story of a race through space, but what we get is about three or four points – two ships destroyed and a party aboard the Buccaneer. I feel in some ways it’s a missed opportunity.

So this sounds pretty negative. It shouldn’t be.  It’s a great example of Doctor Who, the look is superb, I just feel that there could have been MORE. That it’s something of a missed chance to make one of the most sensational Doctor Who tales of all.

7.5/10

Terminus

The second part of the ‘Black Guardian Trilogy’, three unrelated stories which get interrupted by Valentine Dyall’s booming voice as the Black Guardian as Turlough tries to manoeuvre himself into a position to kill the Doctor (and of course he fails to kill him every time), ‘Terminus’ gets stuck in the middle and appears to be a not very well regarded Doctor Who tale.

Liza Goddard.

The writer is Steve Gallagher – who gave us ‘Warrior’s Gate’, my favourite Season 18 story, and to be honest I also liked ‘Terminus’ a lot too. If there are genuine criticisms to be levelled at the story, aside from the radiation armour sounding plastic and making a lot of noise, it’s that the story seems to be missing an element of action. It does date a bit too, some of the costumes are very of the period, but having said that I really liked the look of the story despite some of the costume impracticalities.

This is the final story for Sarah Sutton as Nyssa, and this exit is handled much better than Romana’s thankfully. Gallagher is an ‘ideas’ man, and presents us with several interesting ideas in ‘Terminus’. We deal with the Universe’s unwanted sick, a space ship fixed to the centre of the Universe and slavery. Not to mention  a drug dependency as the Venir require a drug called ‘Hyrdomil’ to survive. Interestingly this drug appears in the form of a green glow-stick, the likes of which were used in ‘Snakedance’ as lanterns. It seems the season for glowsticks!

The story as I said has its drawbacks. Turlough and Tegan are basically superfluous to the plot, trapped under grates and separated from the action and the Doctor for basically the whole story. Turlough (Mark Strickson) is constantly in contact with the Black Guardian and ends up back in the TARDIS. Gallagher was very unhappy with the ‘Garm’, a big dog-creature who facilitates the treatment for Lazar’s disease, intended to mirror leprosy. He didn’t want the thing to be seen, yet the story was reworked to feature the beast heavily and I don’t think, for the time, it looked too bad. There are certainly worse monsters in Doctor Who.

The Doctor fights a Venir

The plot is interesting but not over-complicated. The engines are due to start up, but they are not safe and will induce a huge explosion if they start up. The only thing that doesn’t quite work is the idea of Terminus being able to time travel. This was expositional as the whole idea was the previous explosion started the Universe, but it’s very unclear how old Terminus is, who built it and for what. It seems the company found Terminus and decided to use the dangerous radiation leaks there to cure the Lazars.

Nyssa contracts the disease, and is cured by the treatment which sometimes kills. It is an experience which affects her greatly and leads to her decision to stay and help. It’s a progression through the story and not a sudden decision which is good plotting for once. As a viewer I felt a real empathy for the whole situation, it was well cast, and although it certainly wasn’t a ‘fun’ story I really appreciated what they were trying to do. The direction could have been snappier – they were running way short on time during the shooting apparently due to a strike and lost a lot of time. I found there were moments of pointless violence on behalf of the Venir, but I presume they were all basically criminals who were sentenced to be slaves. And they were completely reliant on the Hydromil.

Although this is missing the edge of humour that ‘Warrior’s Gate’ had, I do think that Steven Gallagher’s second script for Doctor Who has a lot of merit.

8/10

Mawdryn Undead

The Brig is back!

A story which plays a lot with time, Peter Grimwade was given a second chance and despite the story being complicated, he makes a much better fist of his second tale than his first. We see the return of the Brigadier after it seems like forever, which is nice, even though he was originally supposed to be in UNIT in the early 1980s (Sarah Jane once said she was from the 1980s) and yet in 1977 he looks a good 10-15 years older than when we last saw him. So if I was only interested in Doctor Who cannon I would have to give this story a big fail, but I’m kinder than that.

It is another loopy story with some nice touches in the scenes mirroring each other in 1983 and 1977. The idea of two Brigadiers, the way when they touch the day is saved, the build up is excellent. We have a new companion too in Turlough, the return of the Black Guardian, we have a lot in this one, and for the most part it works.

Strange that they wanted to go back to three companions, or indeed a male companion. Turlough seems very old for school, but is perfectly pitched by Mark Strickson and is clearly no Adric-replacement. Then we have the great David Collings (previously appeared in ‘Revenge of the Cybermen’ and ‘Robots of Death’, another great piece of casting, as Mawdryn, a member of a race who cannot die stuck on a space ship going nowhere. I really like most of the elements, and for the most part they come together pretty well.

David Collings must have felt he was still on the Sandminer from ‘Robots of Death’, the space ship was decked out in Art-Deco and didn’t look too bad. Ok, the exterior was very poor and unbelievable but you can forgive that by choosing the new CGI effects on the DVD menu. They are a good idea because the 80s effects used are seriously distracting and garish, especially the pattern behind the Black Guardian, played by the returning Valentine Dyall. Apparently he didn’t know what was going on for much of the production, and I can see that but he is perfectly cast in a sadly two-dimensional villain. They might as well have used the Master, but I’m glad they didn’t. Does the Black Guardian storyline add a lot to the rest of the story? I don’t think so to be fair, it would have worked just as well without him.

David Collings as Mawdryn.

Mark Strickson, Valentine Dyall and those 80s special effects!

It is a little slow in places, there does seem to be an awful lot of shots of people wandering around the space ship watching the automatic lights pop on and off. I think a trick was missed too. Nyssa and Tegan find a man they think is the Doctor (it’s Mawdryn) burned in the capsule, and take him back on board the TARDIS. He says he is the Doctor and is regenerating. But then we see the Doctor in a different time zone conversing with the Brigadier. A great scene by the way – flashbacks to earlier adventures featured, which is rare. BUT what if the audience DIDN’T know either? Maybe we have a new Doctor? With spaghetti on his head….

Probably wouldn’t have worked but I think it’s a nice idea. This story is not perfect, but it is a nice idea. The aliens move around brilliantly in there strange foam costumes like Daleks – they don’t appear to have feet. I liked that. The design was pretty good too even with the spaghetti. It’s very timey-wimey, but in a good way, and if you over look the cannon-stuff, the plot holds together very well.

The original plan was to bring back Ian Chesterton, which I would have loved to see (instead of the Brigadier), but when he proved unavailable the script was altered to suit Nicholas Courtney returning as the Brigadier, and it worked very well. The Brig is a classic Who character after all.

All in all, it’s fun but could do with a bit of a snip here and there. And definitely opt for the new CGI effects on your DVD.

7/10

Snakedance

Martin Clunes as Lon with Collette O'Neil

‘Snakedance’ is Christopher Bailey’s sequel to ‘Kinda’, and although it’s not as thought-provoking or skilfully crafted as the first story, it’s a decent piece with some lovely characters and superb acting, which makes it generally enjoyable even if it still suffers from unconvincing snakes and a very confusing ending which really needed to be explained but wasn’t

John Carson (second from left)

Martin Clunes heads an all-star guest cast as the son of the Federator who wears quite the most ridiculous costume I’ve ever seen – a sort of short white dress with blue clouds on it. Hmmm, yes very fetching. His mother, Tanha, is played by Collette O’Neil, also a very good performance but special mention must go to John Carson as Ambril, whose reactions to the Doctor and general disposition are a real hoot.

Janet Fielding gets to do a bit more of the evil voice and evil acting, even if she comes across as a whining wimp in the first few scenes at the thought of the Mara returning. I thought Adric had left? Maybe she was filling the breach.  I like the ideas, and some of the sets too. The image they went for was Morocco inspired like a huge bazaar. Tents and colours abound.

My issue is seriously with the lighting.

It’s always hard to light for exterior when shooting multi-camera on a set, but this is very poor. I always feel like it’s a set. Even the cycloramas on the stuff that was filmed belies the actual location of filming – they are white! The set is a bit polystyrene too. The inside of the palace or wherever the Federators’ wife and son are staying is good, and I LOVED the six faces of delusion mask (brilliant moment in the story).

Manussan street

Snake finale with Janet Fielding

So it was a real mixed bag. Some stuff is downright creepy, the scenes in the hall of mirrors are some of the best from a writing and directing point of view. And then we hit the end. The Doctor communicates in the middle of a supposed desert with Dogon, the old high priest or some telepathically and goes back to the cave. The Mara appears, the Doctor holds out a small crystal and does something unexplained with his mind and he kills the Mara. In the next story he explains the Mara can only be killed between stages of its becoming or some waffle like that, but I was just left wondering why the Mara lost.

Costumes are a bit much really. Lots of layers, yet

apparently we are close to a desert. Also, everything looks clean and new. Much as I like the colour purple, perhaps tan and brown would have given a better sense of the location? It’s just so… so… so studio. And you get no concept of the full town, where the palace is or anything, or how far from the desert the town is either.

But it’s a lot of fun but it really is like watching a play. The designer Jan Spoczynski was very wrong for the show it seems. Enjoyable story thanks to the cast.

6.5/10