So, which one are you?
In the Tenth Doctor era, it became something of a trope to have a middle of the season two-parter with a classic villain. Rise of the Cyberman and The Age of Steel was the first of these and it reintroduced the Cybermen. Eschewing both Mondas and Telos, the story recreated the Cybermen in an alternate universe with complete freedom to create as desired.
Plot Summary
The Doctor, Mickey and Rose are travelling in the TARDIS when it falls through a crack to a parallel universe. The transfer kills the power of the TARDIS and it materializes in a London where the rich travel in zeppelins and Rose's father is alive and a successful business man. The Doctor mopes about the TARDIS being dead until he discovers a small spark of energy. Using a little of his own regeneration energy, he recharges it which will allow them to leave in 24 hours.
Meanwhile, Rose has connected to the internet and learned that Pete Tyler's company was recently purchased by the Cybus corporation, headed by John Lumic. Lumic, unknown to them, has developed a metal body in which a brain can be installed, creating an alternate reality version of the Cybermen. He is trying to get permission to proceed with creating more but is being denied by the President of Great Britain. Despite the denial, he is proceeding anyway, taking homeless off the street and converting them.
Rose and Mickey rebel against the Doctor's warnings and head off to explore. The Doctor follows Rose, leaving Mickey to wander on his own. While they are walking, the people suddenly freeze and get a news download from their earpods. Concerned over this, the Doctor elects to sneak in to Jackie's 40th birthday party, at which the President will be attending, and investigate.
Mickey goes to his grandmother's house. In his universe, his grandmother died tripping over a loose patch of carpet on the stairs he failed to fix. She is still alive here although his counterpart is named Ricky. She invites him in for tea, having not seen him in a few days, but he is grabbed by a man in a van and sped off. They take him to a safehouse where Ricky is waiting. They are a group called the Preachers who work against Cybus and Lumic's plans. After searching Mickey, they are unsure of what he is but elect to take him along on a planned raid of Jackie's birthday party.
The Doctor and Rose sneak in to the party as staff. The Doctor slips away to pull information from Pete's computer while Rose chats with her parents. Pete let's slip that he and Jackie are separating. She also learns that she was never born in this universe, although they do have a dog named Rose. Meanwhile the Doctor learns of Lumic's Cybermen plans. Before he can leave though, a group of Cybermen assault the house, killing the President. The Cybermen kill or round up the rest of the guests for conversion.
Ricky and his gang try to gun down the Cybermen but their bullets are useless. The gang, the Doctor, Rose and Pete are cornered. The Doctor attempts to surrender but the Cybermen deny this chance due to the resistance. The Doctor discharges the TARDIS power cell he has with him, killing most of the Cybermen and they flee into London. They are pursued by other Cybermen and Ricky is killed in the attack.
With the raid successful, Lumic begins the conversion of London. He activates all earpods, putting people in a trance and having them walk to his factory for cyber-conversion. Seeing this, the Doctor realizes they need to stop it. Pete admits to being a mole inside Cybus, feeding the Prophets information. They divide into three groups: the Doctor and Mrs. Moore (the techie) will use tunnels to enter the complex; Rose and Pete don fake earpods and enter the front door with hypnotized people; Mickey and Jake head to the roof to try and knock out the broadcast signal to the earpods.
The Doctor and Mrs. Moore enter the facility but are spotted at one point and pursued. They disable one Cyberman and the Doctor figures a way to stop them. However, Mrs. Moore is killed and the Doctor taken to see Lumic who has been converted into the Cybercontroller following an attack by his second, Dr. Kendrick.
Pete and Rose successfully enter the facility but Pete is recognized by a Cyberman who used to be Jackie Tyler. Due to Pete's knowledge, he and Rose are also directed to be interrogated by Cybercontrol.
Mickey and Jake successfully infiltrate the airship where the broadcast signal is coming from. Attempting to stop it, they wake a prototype Cyberman. The Cyberman tries to kill them but Mickey is able to use it to knock out the signal to the pods. Awakened to what has happened, the people flee the facility. Mickey also hacks into the security system and observes the Doctor, Pete and Rose with the Cybercontroller.
Aware of Mickey's success, the Doctor instructs him what to do in a mouthy speech to the Cybercontroller. Mickey sends the code for the emotional inhibitor to Rose's phone and the Doctor sends it to the Cybermen. Suddenly aware of what they've become, the Cybermen collapse as their brains are overloaded. The sudden shut down also triggers equipment failure in the factory and it begins to explode.
Mickey contacts the Doctor, instructing them to head to the roof where he and Jake will get them on the Zeppelin. Mickey lowers a ladder and the three climb aboard. But the Cybercontroller pursues them and begins to climb the ladder as well. The Doctor tosses Pete his sonic screwdriver and Pete uses it to cut the lower part of the ladder. The Cybercontroller falls back to the factory as it explodes.
Afterwards, Rose admits to Pete that he is her father in the alternate universe. Unnerved, Pete leaves vowing to destroy Cybus' other Cyberman factories. Mickey also elects to stay behind as his grandmother is here and he has a new purpose. He is also tired of being a third wheel between Rose and the Doctor. Rose and the Doctor leave, closing the crack behind them. They return to Jackie's apartment where Rose reassures herself with a good hug with her mom.
Analysis
I enjoyed this story, although I've heard others give it more of a middling grade. I don't quite understand this as I thought the Cybermen were scarier and more competent than in most stories of the classic era. There were flaws in the story, but not so bad that I didn't enjoy what I did see.
The story does start a little slow and the Doctor's mopiness at the prospect of being stranded gets annoying after a while. But it doesn't last long and the Doctor is excellent in the rest of the story. The slow periods where the TARDIS team isn't doing much are cut with scenes of Pete and Jackie Tyler as well as John Lumic, so it takes advantage of the dearth of action to at least flesh out character and other set up points for the plot. That at least is nice in that we are treated to needed information in a non-expositional way rather than given a killing time runaround.
The second part is pretty much action from the word go. It is fairly obvious that Ricky and at least one of the redshirts is going to get killed but the interaction between the various teams is nice. It was also good to see them give a bit of a gut punch by converting Jackie and not have the story bog down with the idea of a rescue. The punch is tempered with the fact that this Jackie is a bit more bitchy and as the Doctor is constantly reminding Rose, that is not her actual mother.
One of the best things of the Tenth Doctor era, in my opinion, was the fact that the Doctor was often faced with unpleasant choices. We are treated to reminders in Jackie and the woman who was converted before her wedding day that the Cybermen have real people who are not evil in them. But they have been changed to an evil form and that the only way to stop them is to kill them. It's a good reminder of the tragedy of the situation and that sometimes dark measures do have to be taken for the greater good (the greater good). Of course, the Tenth Doctor has a habit of also overapologizing to emphasize the point in case you miss it and that does get old after a while.
There were some flaws in this story though. As mentioned before, it does start slow and much of Rise of the Cybermen can feel like set up before the full story commences in The Age of Steel. It's not bad, but no one fully enjoys a story that is primarily a set up for the next stage.
Another slightly surprising shortcoming is John Lumic. The actor, Roger Lloyd-Pack, is pretty good and outside of this I know him best as Barty Crouch Sr. from Goblet of Fire (with David Tennant amusingly). His performance here though is rather hammy. He is trying to show the obsessed and slightly mad genius, but it comes across as over-the-top and a bit too mustache twirly.
There are also a couple of moments where drama gives way to reality. After Mrs. Moore and the Doctor examine the Cyberman they felled, a Cyberman is shown standing right behind them to kill Mrs. Moore. Both her and the Doctor should have heard the Cyberman coming from a mile away but it's more dramatic if it sneaks up on them. Similarly, it is never overly clear as to why the factory starts to blow up after the emotional inhibitor is deactivated. We see the Cybermen falling over and in some cases blowing up, but then the factory starts to go for no apparent reason.
In the grand scheme of things, these are rather minor problems that don't overly detract from the overall story. I will warn you that bitchy Rose does make an appearance at times and it's very easy to sympathize with Mickey who is clearly getting the K-9 treatment. In fact, it's worse than it was in School Reunion which doesn't do anything to endear you especially to Rose in this story. A little bit with the Doctor too but he redeems himself easier, especially at the end. I don't think either of these detracts though, since I find Rose bitchy in most of Series Two.
Overall if you're in the mood for a two-parter, this isn't a bad one to sit down with. It's not overly deep; just a good action story with a hint of scariness. Having enjoyable secondary characters like Pete and Mrs. Moore helps get you invested as well. Even Ricky is entertaining with Noel Clarke putting on more of a hard edged effort that still smacks of goofiness. It's fun and worth a repeat watch.
Overall personal score: Rise of the Cybermen - 4 out of 5; The Age of Steel - 4.5 out of 5
No comments:
Post a Comment