The Stones of Blood

I will plead with my colleague for a swift, painless death for you.

The Stones of Blood is the obligatory Earth segment of The Key to Time season and it is pretty good if wildly varying in tone from episode to episode.

Plot Summary

The Doctor and Romana land on Earth to find the third segment of the Key to Time. The detector leads them to an ancient stone circle which shows evidence of recent blood spill and stone movement, despite the circle being 4,000 years old. In the circle, they meet an old archeologist named Amelia Rumford and her cottage mate, Vivian Fay. Professor Rumford tells a little of the history of the stones and mentions some local Druidic activity, headed by a Mr. de Vries. The Doctor heads down to see him while Romana stays in the circle and assists Professor Rumford and Ms. Fay in their measurements.

De Vries sees the Doctor and is familiar with him due to his knowledge from "the goddess." He welcomes the Doctor into the home, giving him a little history of the stones before knocking him out. Meanwhile, Professor Rumford and Ms. Fay finish their measurements and head back to the cottage. They invite Romana but she declines, preferring to wait for the Doctor. After they leave, Romana hears the Doctor calling to her. Following the sound, she approaches a steep cliff where the Doctor appears and pushes her over. She catches herself on a ledge just below the edge of the cliff.

The Druids assemble to sacrifice the Doctor but Professor Rumford returns and the group flees. She unties the Doctor and the two realize that Romana is missing. The Doctor summons K-9 who tracks down Romana and the Doctor pulls her up. The Doctor and Romana speculate that whoever posed as the Doctor has the third segment of the Key and is using it to change their appearance. The Doctor and K-9 return to de Vries house for more information while Romana heads to Professor Rumford's cottage.

Upon arriving at the house, the Doctor and K-9 find de Vries and his acolyte crushed to death and much of the house destroyed. Investigating, they are attacked by one of the stones, in reality and alien called an Ogri. The Ogri knocks the Doctor out but it is fended off by K-9. He pursues but is damaged in the chase. Romana and Professor Rumford arrive to look through the archives and find the damaged house with the Doctor attempting to fix K-9. Romana takes K-9 back to the TARDIS to complete the repairs while the Doctor and Professor Rumford investigate the house.

The Doctor and Professor Rumford find de Vries worship center and three paintings that had been removed. The paintings are of the same woman in different periods of time and that woman is identical to Ms. Fay. Leaving K-9 to recover in the TARDIS, Romana investigates a light at the circle. She is frozen in a beam by Ms. Fay who then teleports her out of the circle.

The Doctor and Professor Rumford arrive a short time later and is warned off by Ms. Fay just before she too disappears. Investigating, the Doctor deduces that Ms. Fay and Romana have been transported to hyperspace. Retrieving K-9, the Doctor goes to Professor Rumford's cottage and builds a projector that will transport him to hyperspace. The device malfunctions and attracts the attention of the Ogri. Making quick repairs, he orders Professor Rumford to switch the device on every few minutes to allow he and Romana to get back but without burning out the machine. After he disappears, the Ogri attack but are held off by K-9. The Ogri retreat and go kill a couple of campers to refresh themselves. K-9 is also low on power and is unsure if he can fend off another attack.

In hyperspace, the Doctor finds himself on a ship. Most of the crew are dead but he finds Romana in a cell. He frees her and then also unseals a door containing two Megara, justice robots. They determine that the Doctor broke the law by breaking the seals and must be tried. He is convicted in absentia as he and Romana try to flee. However, Vivian Fay goes back and destroys the projector and takes the Ogri with her. Trapped on the ship, the Doctor is granted the right to appeal his conviction.

K-9 walks Professor Rumford on how to repair the projector while the Doctor conducts his trial. He learns that the Megara were to conduct the trial of a wanted criminal who stole the Seal of Diplos. The Doctor surmises that this is Vivian Fay who was able to take over the ship while the Megara were sealed off. With the projector repaired, Romana returns to Earth while the Doctor stalls in his trial. She and Professor Rumford go back to the cottage and there Romana is able to deduce Vivian's alien metabolism. The Doctor runs out of stalls and the trial ends with his sentence being held up.

The Doctor deflects some of the energy that would have been used to kill him into Vivian, knocking them both out. Upon waking, he urges the Megara to probe her memory to ensure no brain damage has occurred. Upon probing, they see that she is the criminal they seek. The Doctor takes Vivian back to Earth, swiping the Seal of Diplos from her neck (the disguised third segment) and the Megara trap Vivian in perpetual imprisonment as a stone in the circle. They also pledge to return the Ogri back to their home planet. The Doctor sends the Megara back to hyperspace before they can take a second attempt and carrying out his own sentence of execution.

The Doctor, Romana and K-9 say goodbye to Professor Rumford before disappearing in the TARDIS. There, the Doctor has Romana assemble the third segment in the Key.

Analysis

This story was all over the place in terms of it's plot. The first two episodes are very Scooby Doo with a dark conspiracy and trying to figure out who the real villain is. The Third Episode is an adventure scramble and the Fourth Episode is then Law & Order in space. None of this is bad though. In fact, the shift in focus helped prevent the story from getting too stale in my opinion.

I can see why Professor Rumford has become a favorite character over the years with a similar type character becoming a companion (for the Sixth Doctor I believe) in some Big Finish plays. She is feisty and enjoyable and doesn't take much guff from the Doctor. She makes for a nice pairing with Romana as well.

Even the Ogri were better realized that I thought they would be. You would think a monster being just a big rock would be rather silly, but the actor's reactions really helped sell the Ogri. One of the best things was the talk and not show of the Ogri attack on de Vries. That left things to the imagination and that also helped make the Ogri seem more beastly. I had a little too much build up from other sources to think that the attack on the campers was particularly horrific so that didn't impress me as much as it has others, but for big rocks, they did well I thought.

If I had a complaint about anything, I think it would be de Vries and the other Druids. They were there as a red herring but I was not overly impressed with the acting of de Vries himself. I also thought that with the knowledge that they were a distraction, the scenes with them were a bit poorly done. Something about them just didn't quite sit right. Once they were out of the way halfway through Episode Two, it felt like the story became smoother and just worked better. I know why they were there, but it just felt better once we could get over that part.

I enjoyed this one and can easily see why it gets rated as either the best or second best story in The Key to Time season. I could also see myself pulling this one off the shelf for a good quick story just about any time. Definitely an enjoyable one.

Overall personal score: 4 out of 5