Revenge of the Cybermen

Harry Sullivan is an imbecile!

I had a hankering to watch a story with Harry Sullivan in it for some reason and was a bit disappointed to find that I've written my reactions on most of his stories already. I'm saving The Sontaran Experiment for when I want a quick one so that left Terror of the Zygons and this one. I wasn't quite feeling Zygons so I opted to go for this one, which I think is a little better than it usually gets credit for. If you've seen the documentary short about it, it's probably definitely better than Philip Hinchcliff thinks it is.

Plot Summary

The Doctor, Harry and Sarah arrive back on Nerva Beacon thousands of years after they left, when it was being used as an actual satellite beacon for passing spacecraft. They arrive before the TARDIS has materialized in their time and head out to explore the beacon while they wait. As they open the doors to the transmat room, a dead body falls through the open door. Harry estimates that he has been dead for over a week although putrification has not set in. The find the corridor littered with bodies in a similar fashion.

Elsewhere on the beacon the communications man, Warner, warns off several approaching ship with a notice of plague quarantine. Base Commander Stevenson has orders from Earth to warn off all other ships until aid arrives from Earth. Aside from him and Warner, the only two others on the beacon are the second-in-command Lester, and a civilian professor named Kellman. Stevenson and Lester detect a warning signal as the Doctor and his companions break through the quarantine door and they head out to investigate.
Kellman walks into the control room and they discuss an asteroid that has recently passed into the system and has seemingly been caught in the orbit of Jupiter. Warner is pretty sure he has just received an aborted transmission from the asteroid, but Kellman tells him to ignore it as he has taken a study of the asteroid and found nothing of interest. Shortly afterward, Warner is attacked by a metallic snake-like object while Kellman watches. After Warner is down, Kellman steals the tape recording of the transmission.

On the asteroid, which is actually the planetoid Voga, were the inhabitants live in caves below the surface, a transmission was made but the caller was killed before anything else came through. The authorization to kill came from Vorus, a young military minded man. He is in league with an elder named Magrik and together are hatching a plan to be able to return to the surface and have formed a league with the Cybermen and have a human agent on the beacon.

Steven and Lester confront the Doctor and his companions. Before they can explain, Kellman comes up and claims that Warner is a victim of the plague. The Doctor then poses themselves as a medical team from Earth and go to examine him. Harry, Sarah and Lester take Warner back to the crew quarters while Stevenson and the Doctor stay in the communications room. The Doctor notes the metallic scratches on the wall and the stolen tape. He points these out to Stevenson who is dumbstruck.

The Doctor then asks about Kellman and Stevenson informs him that he is studying the planetoid he named Voga which was captured by Jupiter about fifty years ago. The Doctor recognizes the name and immediately suspects the Cybermen as they were involved in a war with Voga years ago. He then dashes out to examine Warner. Warner has just died with Harry unable to help him. The Doctor examines his neck and finds small puncture wounds and tells Harry he has been poisoned.

All this is observed by Kellman via a special camera system hidden in his quarters. He then pulls a device out and sends a coded signal to a Cyber scout ship holding in space. He leaves the room and the Doctor breaks in to examine it. He finds the communicator and the monitoring equipment. Kellman comes back and the Doctor hides under the bed. Seeing the disturbed room, Kellman electrifies the floor, leaves and locks the door. The Doctor steps out and the shock causes him to jump on to the bed and also starts a fire. He crawls over to the counter using the closet door and unlocks the door using his sonic screwdriver to escape.

Left alone in the crew quarters, Sarah watches a news feed from Earth, unaware that a snake-like Cybermat is approaching. She turns off the feed just as the Cybermat leaps at her. She grabs it and tries to hold it off as it tries to sting her. It does sting her just as the Doctor arrives and shuts it down with his sonic. He carries her into the transmat room as Harry, Stevenson and Lester arrive, drawn by Sarah's screams.

The Doctor gives Sarah to Harry and prepares to transmat them down to Voga as the transport will distillate the poison from Sarah's system. He finds the control mechanism sabotaged with one piece missing. He informs Stevenson and Lester that Kellman is in league with the Cybermen and has done it. He manages to hotwire the controls to send Harry and Sarah down but without the device, cannot bring them back.

In the caves of Voga, Sarah comes back to full health but they are arrested by a Vogan patrol. They are taken to Vorus but he is interrupted in his interrogation by Tyrum, the head of the ruling council, who summons him back to the city. Harry and Sarah are then chained up for further interrogation.

Stevenson and Lester manage to get the drop on Kellman and arrest him. They threaten him with execution Kellman continues to deny everything. The Doctor however manages to get one of the Cybermat control devices and threatens to attack him with it. Kellman panics and gives up the missing component, allowing the Doctor to repair the transmat.

Tyrum informs Vorus that has become aware of his flouting of the law of secrecy and is dispatching militia to take over for Vorus' forces. They will fight if Vorus resists. Vorus becomes angry at the threat to his plans and heads back. He orders Magrik to send a patrol to kill the humans so as to avoid evidence of his plans falling into Tyrum's hands.

Harry, having noticed the chains are made of gold, manages to get him and Sarah free of them just before Magrik's squad arrives. They run through the tunnels but are eventually cornered by the squad. But the squad itself is surrounded by Tyrum's militia and they surrender, taking Harry and Sarah to see Tyrum. Harry and Sarah tell Tryum all the know while Vorus and his men have retreated to a hall and entrenched themselves. Tryum elects to wait and allow Vorus to remain where he is.

On the station, the Doctor fixes the transmat but notices that Harry and Sarah have gone out of range. His investigations are interrupted by an approaching ship that ignores their warnings to stay away. The Doctor realizes that it's the Cybermen. He tries to manually jam the door but they force it open. Stevenson and Lester fire on the Cybermen but are shot down by them. The Doctor also tries to run but he is shot by the Cybermen as well. Kellman emerges and asks the Cybermen not to kill them as they may be useful. The Cyberleader agrees.

The Cybermen bring aboard bombs that they will strap on to the Doctor, Stevenson and Lester. They will then walk to the center of Voga where the bombs will detonate, destroying the planet. Kellman requests to go on ahead and scout and the Cyberleader agrees. The Doctor breaks free for a moment but is quickly recaptured.

Kellman transmats down and is captured by Tyrum's militia while trying to see Vorus. He informs Tyrum, Sarah and Harry about Vorus' plan to lure the Cybermen aboard Nerva Beacon and then destroy it with a missile. Tyrum heads up to the mines with the three humans to interrogate Vorus about the missile. On the way, Sarah manages to sneak away, intending to warn the Doctor about the missile.

The Doctor, Stevenson and Lester are equipped with bombs with the buckles booby trapped to ensure they cannot remove them. Two Cybermen are sent with them to monitor their progress and fulfill the mission if they fail. After transmating down, the Cybermen are pulled into battle with Tyrum's militia while the Doctor, Stevenson and Lester make their way down towards the center of the planet on their own, the Doctor attempting to think of a way out of their situation.

Tyrum and Vorus make a truce and their forces combine to fight the Cybermen, attempting to buy time for the missile launch, which is being equipped with the warhead. Tyrum recalls a service tunnel that would allow them to get ahead of the Doctor's party and stop them.

Sarah manages to get behind the Cybermen, who are engaged with the Vogan in battle and transmats herself back to the station, unaware that the Doctor is already on Voga. She sneaks away and listens as the Cyberleader monitors the battle and the Doctor's party's progress to the center of Voga.

Harry and Kellman find the service shaft and crawl down but find their way partially blocked by a cave in. They start to shift the rock, unaware that the Doctor is on the other side, also trying to clear the rock while Stevenson and Lester rest. Their combined efforts cause the loose rock to collapse. Harry is thrown backwards but Kellman is crushed to death. The Doctor is also knocked out. Harry sees him and after checking his vitals, tries to remove the bomb but Lester stops him.

The Doctor wakes and tells Stevenson to head to the center while he, Harry and Lester take out the two Cybermen on Voga with gold dust. The three of them crawl on to a ledge and when the Cybermen walk beneath them they leap down, attempting to push the gold dust into their chest vent units. The Cybermen however knock them backwards and they drop the dust. They run away and then Lester jumps down next to the Cybermen and undoes his harness, activating the booby trap. The explosion kills him and the two Cybermen but does not destroy the bomb control. The Doctor takes the control and deactivates the control for the bombs and the booby trap, allowing him to take off the harness.

On the beacon, the Cyberleader sees the deactivation of the radar scope. He attempts to manually activate the bombs. Sarah rushes out to stop him but is restrained by other Cybermen. The Cyberleader activates the bombs but the Doctor has already deactivated them. The Cyberleader then interrogates Sarah, learning about the planned rocket launch. The Cyberleader surmises that as the rocket has not yet fired, it must be malfunctioning and plans to load Nerva Beacon with explosives and then crash it at a high rate of speed into a fissure on Voga. The explosion should rip the planet apart per his calculations.

The Doctor learns of the rocket as it is now ready for launch and Sarah's attempt to rescue him on the beacon. He tells Vorus to give him fifteen minutes to try and rescue Sarah and then to fire the rocket. Vorus reluctantly agrees and the Doctor transmats back up the beacon. He arrives to find Sarah alone in the control room as the Cybermen are retrieving explosives from their ship. He unties her and then finds one of the deactivated Cybermats. He swaps out the toxin for gold dust and sics it on a Cyberman, who collapses. He tries to do it again in the control room and does manage to kill another Cyberman but they are captured by other Cybermen. They are tied up in the control room while the Cyberleader activates the controls propelling the beacon toward Voga. The Cybermen then leave for their ship.

Impatient, Vorus paces angrily. As the timer nears zero, they observe the station moving towards them. Vorus orders Magrik to fire the rocket but Tyrus shoots him before he can activate it. Vorus then steps in. Stevenson tries to stop him but Vorus knocks him down. Tyrus shoots him as well, but Vorus is able to fire the rocket before he dies.

Seeing the rocket launch, the Doctor and Sarah manage to slip out of their bonds. However the Doctor finds the controls are jammed. He calls over the radio and walks Stevenson through the controls of the rocket. Stevenson manages to redirect the rocket away from the beacon just before impact. The swerve takes it in line with the Cyberman ship and destroys it.

With the immediate danger past, the Doctor finds the manual control and uses it to override the lock on the guidance system. He manages to pull the beacon out of it's descent just before crashing on Voga and stabilizes it's orbit once again.

As the beacon rises, the TARDIS materializes in the control room. The Doctor immediately enters and checks the systems. Harry transmats back to the beacon to congratulate the Doctor and Sarah. The Doctor emerges and informs them that he's been called back by the Brigadier and is leaving. Stunned by the suddenness of it, Sarah and Harry run into the TARDIS just as the Doctor is activating the controls.

Analysis

There are some flaws in this story with regard to production and acting, but for the most part, it actually hangs together for the first three episodes. It's when Episode Four comes up that most of the stuff in this story goes to pot and I think most of that blame goes to too many people giving input and then realizing they've written themselves into a corner. As such, characters suddenly start acting differently and making choices you wouldn't expect after the first three episodes.

About the only character who is consistent through the story is the Doctor. This is the Fourth Doctor very much in The Ark and Space vein where he is very alien and odd, but without the anger that crops up in Season 13 stories. The Doctor cares for those around him but at the same time has a casual indifference about him as well. About the only dire action you ever seem him take is to try and keep the Cybermen from boarding Nerva Beacon at the end of Episode Two and then his direct attack on the Cybermen early in Episode Four. Still, he has a nice balance. He has a serious to convey the threat but still cracks jokes here and there. But there is also enough restraint so that the jokes don't go too over the top and are, in fact, a way of getting under the enemy's skin a bit.

Speaking of getting under skin, one of the primary criticisms of this story is that in their previous stories, the Cybermen had been very emotionless yet the Cyberleader is very emotional. Almost every word he says is dripping with anger or relish. At no point does he ever sound like the emotionless drones he has around him. Instead he seems to take sadistic enjoyment from how his plan is progressing. He also seems to express frustration when something doesn't go according to plan.

I generally don't mind this as one of the limitations of the Cybermen was the lack of a leader figure that could banter with the Doctor the way Davros came to for the Daleks. That the leader would retain emotions also doesn't bother me as I could see that as a functional adaptation for leadership. Where it does bother me is when it becomes a plot convenience in Episode Four. After Sarah has been captured and she has told them about the rocket, there is no reason to keep her alive and the Cybermen should have dispensed with her. Instead, the Cyberleader goes into Bond villain mode, going so far as to crack a joke about Sarah getting a good view of Voga when the station crashes. He does this again when he leaves the Doctor and Sarah tied up after the bombs have been planted. This was the line that was too far for me because it went against even what a Cyberleader should have seen as the logic course of action. This was taking pleasure in torture for the sake of the pleasure.

Also on the subject of things taking a left turn in Episode Four we have Sarah and Harry. Both Harry and Sarah do fairly well for themselves, although with not that much to do in the first couple of episodes. Sarah gets bit at the end of Episode One so she and Harry go down to Voga where they are made prisoners. But there you have Harry showing initiative in getting out of the gold chains, getting a bit of fun little banter between him and Sarah as well. Similarly you have Sarah taking the reins and heading back to Nerva Beacon to try and save the Doctor in Episode Three. It's not much to do but you see the people we've come to know over the course of Season 12.

Then you have Episode Four. Sarah goes from being a strong willed, if slightly overmatched, go getter to being this emotional wuss. She runs out screaming no when the Cyberleader is about to detonate the bombs, knowing that it will only result in her death or capture and do nothing to stop him. She then sits and is sad as a bound damsel in distress until the Doctor shows up to rescue her. In both instances she does absolutely nothing to try and think her way out of the situation. Even if the situation hadn't worked and rescue by the Doctor was her only hope, she should have at least been shown trying to think of a way out or shown actively trying to escape. Instead she becomes generic damsel companion and that just stinks.

Similarly, Harry goes from being a helpful man of action to being a dumb form of comic relief in Episode Four. The cave in, the killing of Kellman and near explosion of the Doctor are played as though he's a moron who should have been aware of all the potential repercussions despite being that making no sense. He then sounds like a total moron when filling the Doctor in on everything that has happened, going so far as pass over Kellman's death as though mentioning that it rained yesterday. Later he plays captain obvious with Sarah about the beacon crashing into Voga in what I think is supposed to be a funny moment. No where to be found is the reliable and hard working person found in earlier stories. Instead we are given an inept clown that is completely unaware and uncaring about the surroundings. They went so overboard in an attempt for comic relief that it just made him into a shell of his former character.

Kellman wasn't too bad as a fake-out villain for the first two episodes. He had a bad moment when threatened by the Cybermat as his acting took a major swing downward. I don't know who gave him lessons in fear acting, but his style was not good. But aside from that, he worked fairly well. His motivations were always a bit unclear though. I guess he was offered a large payment of gold by the Vogan or he either had strong feelings about destroying the Cybermen. Neither is explained very well. In fact a better explanation is given of his story that is fed to the Cybermen. I would have liked a bit more backstory with Kellman rather than his random killing off in Episode Three. In fact, that seems cheap and unearned. He should have had some role in the final confrontation and to be left out after being crushed in a rockslide is a bit unsatisfying.

I didn't have a problem with the Vogans for the most part. Yes their masks were a bit cheap looking and the acting got a little Shakespearean over-the-top but they worked for the most part. What got me was that they spent nearly an episode and a half getting slaughtered by two Cybermen and not changing their tactics. You would think they might have had some sort of explosives, grenades or the like, to use against the Cybermen. Lester proved a simple explosion could take them out so there is no reason to believe the Vogans shouldn't have been able to toss a grenade barrage and take them out. Or if they didn't have high explosives, why didn't they have any of the "glitter guns" leftover from the previous Cyberman war? Are we to believe they supplied volumes of gold to humans in their war against the Cybermen and didn't take any anti-Cyberman weapons for themselves? It just doesn't make any sense. The Cybermen should have cut through the Vogan's initial defensive line but someone should have run back for advanced weapons and taken the Cybermen out in a secondary attack. It's a logical flaw that just bugged me, despite how impressive the battle scenes looked.

The action direction was fairly decent as it did a fairly good job of disguising the fact that the same actors and locations were being used over and over again. It still made it look as though the Cybermen were driving further into Voga and killing many Vogans while doing it. The non-action scenes were a bit flatter and some of the effects were just downright bad. I think my biggest dislike was actually the Cybermats with the long snake-like bodies. I think the Cybermats were more effective and creepy when they were the small, mouse-like objects seen in The Tomb of the Cybermen. Making them bigger actually made them seem less likely to move unobtrusively through Nerva Beacon. I also made their leap ups on to the neck and chests of their victims look that much more fake.

Overall, I don't think this is terrible as many others put it, but it's not especially good either. It starts off well enough and I think for about two and half to three episodes, I can hang with it but Episode Four is just a real let down given what it does. It's also a bit of a crash as far as the season goes, coming down from the highs of The Ark in Space and Genesis of the Daleks but that's a larger scope view which I try to avoid. I think if you showed this story to anyone under the age of twelve, they would really like it as it is right up the alley of that age group, but for anyone else, the flaws will stick out and just be a bit of a come down. Watchable in a pinch, but probably last on the list of choices for it's season.

Overall personal score: 2 out of 5