The Two Doctors

I will set her among the gods

The Two Doctors is a real mixed bag. It has some fine location shooting, good interplay between fairly well developed characters, and the return of the Second Doctor. But it also is padded, has some annoying one note villains, and some pretty demeaning interplay between the Sixth Doctor and Peri.

Plot Summary

The Second Doctor and Jamie arrive at a space station on a mission from the Time Lords (season 6B timeframe). There they meet with and old acquaintance of the Doctor's, a geneticist named Dastari. He has altered one of the indigenous peoples (Androgums) and increased her intelligence. Chessene however has plotted with the Sontarans to gain power for herself and the Sontarans capture the station and murder it's inhabitants. They take the Doctor with them along with Chessene, Dastari and the chef Shockeye. The group assembles at a country estate outside Seville, Spain. Jamie manages to escape and hides in the bowels of the station, believing the Doctor to be dead.

The Sixth Doctor and Peri are relaxing when the Doctor feels a ripple of time peril. He decides to visit Dastari to see if he can detect if anything might be amiss with him. They come to the station to find the battle remnants and the computer reprogrammed to kill intruders. They descend into the mainframe and reprogram the computer where they also meet Jamie. From both Jamie and the computer, the Doctor learns what happens and then manages to make psychic contact with himself to learn the Second Doctor's location.

Arriving in the TARDIS, the Sixth Doctor meets with some locals who tell him of a crash near a local estate and also lead him to a place where it can be entered without detection. Peri goes up to the house to create a diversion while the Doctor and the Jamie sneak into the cellar of the house. In the cellar, they are captured by the Sontaran commander Stike who forces the Doctor to prime a time vehicle. It was in attempting to prime this vehicle that the group had captured the Second Doctor alive and experimenting on him. The Sixth Doctor does so, but also sabotages it as well. Jamie wounds Stike and the two escape. Peri also flees but is captured by Shockeye who is obsessed with preparing and eating a human.

Having shaken the pursuers, the Sixth Doctor and Jamie return to the house and find the Second Doctor. They rescue Peri but are forced to flee. With animosty growing, both the Sontarans and the scientist try to double cross each other but Chessene gets the drop first. She mortally wounds Stike and kills his aide. She also decides that since the time vehicle is primed and time is running out, Dastari will convert the Second Doctor to an Androgum as her mate. Shockeye is forced to supply the genetic material. However, he awakes before the procedure is completed and he and a partially converted Second Doctor leave the house to eat in Seville.

All parties, having discovered the disappearance, go to Seville. They find the two at a restaurant where the two locals they met earlier work. Shockeye protests over his money being rejected and kills the waiter. He flees back to the house. The Sixth Doctor and his party find the Second Doctor with the conversion being rejected and returning to his normal self. They leave but are captured by Chessene. All are taken back to the house where Chessene discovers the Sixth Doctor's sabotage and has him fix it. He does, but introduces a second tamper to the machine. The group is tied up while Shockeye is allowed to take Jamie upstairs for preparation.

Dastari is becoming more concerned by Chessene's behavior as she has vowed to kill the Sixth Doctor, potentially provoking a war with the Time Lords. Meanwhile the Sixth Doctor manages to free himself and heads up to free Jamie. Shockeye is prepared and wounds the Sixth Doctor. He does manage to get Jamie free. The Sixth Doctor runs off the estate with Shockeye in pursuit. Dastari sees Chessene lick the blood off the stones from the Sixth Doctor's wounds and realizes that he hasn't changed Chessene at all. He frees the Second Doctor and Peri but is killed by Chessene when she discovers this. She means to kill the Second Doctor and Peri as well, but Jamie disarms her. She flees to the time vehicle which explodes due to the Doctor's sabotage, killing Chessene. The Sixth Doctor meanwhile, discovers moth hunting equipment left by the locals they met earlier. He then surprises Shockeye and kills him by suffocating him with cyanide soaked cotton.

The Doctors meet up again at the house and the Second Doctor departs with Jamie while the Sixth with Peri. The Sixth Doctor also vows to Peri that they will observe a vegetarian diet from now on.

Analysis

As mentioned above, there is a lot to like about this episode. It is written by Robert Holmes and the dialogue flows very nicely. The Second Doctor returns and although his role is small, it's wonderful to see him at the same enjoyable wit as during his own run in the late 60's. The scenery is lovely and the music is very good. Spanish guitar is woven throughout the story with odd offsets now and again to remind you of the alien element.

Despite their very 1980's appearance, I enjoyed Dastari and Chessene as villains. They acted with thought and routinely got the drop on both the Doctor and their erstwhile allies, the Sontarans. Chessene's slow decent back into original nature was well played and the slow dawning of this fact on Dastari made an excellent way of turning him against her as well.

There were shortcomings in the episode though. The Sontarans were a principle problem. They were barely used and then disposed of without any real bearing on the plot. Their makeup was also not very well done and it had a rather cheap looking effect to it. It was another case of where something done in the 1970's actually had a better look to it that something done nearly fifteen years later.

Another problem for me was Shockeye. I feel he was intended to be a comic relief character but it never made much sense as to why he was kept around. I also found his one note obsession regarding food grating at times. His principle use was in getting the party into Seville proper but that whole side quest did nothing except pad the story. I found Shockeye to be boring in that regard and would have preferred more use of the Sontarans or further machinations with Chessene rather than the focus that he pulled.

My final point of criticism is with the Sixth Doctor and Peri. I've not seen all of this season but I have heard of their squabbling. In a vacuum it might be tolerated, but in this story you have the almost brotherly bond between the Second Doctor and Jamie to contrast it. You also have a short period where the Second Doctor interacts with Peri and you see immediately how cordial he is with her. It's creates a huge contrast with how the Sixth Doctor treats Peri (and he's not much better with Jamie) and it gives the impression of an almost abusive relationship between the two. It just adds to the off-putting nature of their scenes together.

If you take it on balance, the good outweighs the bad, although it's easier to write about the bad. I'd watch it again, although there are definitely points where you can check out a bit. But lets be honest, any chance to see the Second Doctor and Robert Holmes can't be a bad effort.

Overall personal score: 3.5 out 5