Twice Upon a Time

Oh, Brilliant!

At long last we come to the Christmas special, the end of the Twelfth Doctor era and the end of the Steven Moffat tenure. We also get a full edition of David Bradley as the First Doctor, something speculated at ever since An Adventure in Space and Time but only realized now (coinciding with the release of new Big Finish adventures with David Bradley as the First Doctor). The previews have hinted that this will a comedy so I'm not expecting anything as dramatic or as deep as we've seen with the first couple of Twelfth Doctor Christmas specials. Personally, I'm hoping for something closer to The Husbands of River Song rather than The Return of Doctor Mysterio.

Plot Summary

The First Doctor stumbles out of the Cyberman shuttle and towards his TARDIS, determined not to regenerate. As he moves, he hears a voice out of the snow and moves towards it. He sees the Twelfth Doctor struggling to not regenerate but does not realize it’s a future iteration, though he suspects him of being a fellow Time Lord. As the two talk, time suddenly freezes with snowflakes held in the air in suspension.

Out of the mist of frozen fog stumbles a British Captain from World War I. He had been in a shell hole face to face with a German soldier when time froze for him. He had been approached by a transparent female form and then scanned. However, instead of time reverting when she finished, an error occurred and he was thrown forward to the point of the two Doctors meeting.

The two Doctors take him into the TARDIS, although the First Doctor is shocked when he sees that it's not his TARDIS. It is only after seeing this and further interaction with the Twelfth Doctor that he realizes that the Twelfth Doctor is his future self. Before they can continue their discussion, the TARDIS is grabbed by a crane and hoisted up into a ship hovering overhead.

Upon being deposited into the bay, the First Doctor steps out to investigate while the Captain and Twelfth Doctor monitor from the inside. The transparent female silhouette appears, identifying him as the Doctor of War, to which the First Doctor is appalled. The female figure identifies herself and the ship as Testimony and promises to allow the Doctor to visit with someone if he cooperates with them. Bill emerges from a side corridor and the Twelfth Doctor bursts from the TARDIS to greet her.

Enthused as he is to see her, the Twelfth Doctor is suspicious that she is not the real Bill. Bill explains that Testimony travels through time, gathering the thoughts and memories of people just before their death. It had done so with the Captain but an error occurred causing his time jump. Time would remain frozen until he could be returned to his proper location. The two Doctors conduct their own investigation, suspicious of Testimony's motives and the First Doctor notes that the glass form is modeled after a real woman and not computer generated. This means there is a source behind it all.

The two Doctors, the Captain and Bill release the winch holding the TARDIS and shimmy down. Testimony corrects the fault and begins to haul it back up again. But it is still low enough to the ground that they are able to jump to the ground. The group then enters the First Doctor's TARDIS where the Twelfth Doctor feeds it coordinates to follow.

They end up on the planet Villengard, near the center of the universe. The two Doctors head out while Bill and the Captain stay in the TARDIS. Time has unfrozen in this new location and the Doctors come under fire from a tower. The Twelfth Doctor shows himself and tells the occupant to scan him and realize he is already dying. The firing stops and the Twelfth Doctor heads up while the First Doctor stays below.

In the TARDIS, Bill is revealed to a glass figure just as the lead figure of Testimony, but with Bill's memories up until he was transported away with Heather. She calms the Captain and then leaves the TARDIS where she talks with the First Doctor.

In the tower, the Twelfth Doctor finds Rusty, the Dalek he and Clara "healed" so many years ago, now having created a trap to destroy Daleks who come to kill him. He allows the Doctor access to the Dalek database where he learns that Testimony was a project set up by a scientist on New Earth to collect the memories of the departed so that they could learn and archive them. The Twelfth Doctor is shocked to find their is no malicious intent and then notices that time has frozen again.

Bill comes up the stairs, though the Twelfth Doctor still refuses to recognize her as anything but facsimile. But with no evil to thwart, the two Doctors agree that they must return the Captain to his death. The Captain goes with the Twelfth Doctor in his TARDIS to act as a guide for the First Doctor's TARDIS, as the navigation controls haven't been repaired yet. As they near the point of the Captain's death, the Twelfth Doctor gets an idea.

The two TARDISs land and the Doctors promise the Captain to look in on his family for them. He tells them his name is Archibald Lethbridge-Stewart (grandfather of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart) and the Twelfth Doctor promises that they will look on his family quite a bit. As the Captain settles back to his spot, time resumes and he faces down the German across from him. Before either can fire, they are distracted by the sound of singing from the German lines. A few moments later, the British start singing as well. Men from both sides emerge from the trenches and start interacting. The Captain puts down his gun and whistles for a medic. Germans come over and carry the wounded man back to their lines while the Captain's men help him back to their lines. The Twelfth Doctor had come forward in time by a couple hours, dropping the Captain off just before the start of the Christmas truce, saving his life for at least one more day.

Having talked to both the Twelfth Doctor and Bill, the First Doctor elects to face his fear and subject himself to regeneration. He reenters his TARDIS and uses the fast return switch to return to the south pole. He opens the doors briefly to allow Ben and Polly in before reactivating the TARDIS and collapsing to the floor to regenerate.

The Twelfth Doctor continues to watch the truce, unwilling to regenerate, tired from all the fighting and saving that needs to be done. Bill talks to him about his work, changing her appearance to Clara as well for a short time. A second avatar in the form of Nardole also appears. The two avatars, the first having resumed the Bill form, embrace the Doctor and encourage him to keep going. The Doctor walks back into his TARDIS, leaving them behind.

Seeing more trouble on the monitor, the Doctor tries to keep himself motivated, but decides to give himself over to regeneration for "one more go around." He reminds himself of things the Doctor stands for and things to focus on and regenerates into the Thirteenth Doctor.

The Doctor stumbles forward and sees in the monitor that he has become a woman. She is intrigued by this but on trying to take control of the TARDIS, it rebels. The TARDIS rocks violently with the central column exploding. The Doctor falls backwards and is thrown out of the TARDIS. She falls through the air while watching the interior of the TARDIS continue to explode while hovering in midair.

Analysis

I'm having a slightly difficult time processing how I feel about this episode. I did enjoy it, though I think I would have enjoyed it more if it hadn't had all the BBC America commercial breaks inserted in. But for all the run-around that was done, the was very little plot and an even thinner reason to why the Twelfth Doctor was trying to stop his regeneration. It just felt a bit out of place.

It is my understanding that this story was a last minute stopgap. Because of the work on Broadchurch, Chris Chibnall was unable to take over Doctor Who until 2018 so Steven Moffat was asked to produce Series 10 and did a fine job in my opinion. However, Moffat clearly had things wrapped in such a way that the Doctor would regenerate after being mortally wounded as shown in The Doctor Falls. But it seems that Chris Chibnall asked to not start off his tenure with the Christmas episode, preferring to start from scratch with Series 11. That's fine, but you can see the hole that Moffat suddenly found himself in and I'm not sure he quite gets out of it.

I have no problem with the hesitation of the First Doctor in his regeneration. It fits his personality and he has never regenerated before so a fearful defiance and needing to be coaxed along makes sense. The Twelfth Doctor, by contrast, is the first of a new set of regenerations. He has been almost cavalier with regeneration energy in past stories and given his renegade attitude, he would seem to be the most open to giving up and letting the next version come forth.

I'm also unsure how the Twelfth Doctor could be so energetic as he moves around while trying to repress regeneration. He was blasted with the Cybermen energy weapons and essentially had to have Bill restart the regeneration process for him after he blew them and himself up with the level. This feels a bit more like the regeneration that the Tenth Doctor funneled into creating the hand clone Doctor. A wound that bad has to be dealt with and I have trouble seeing how the Twelfth Doctor could allow the regeneration go forward enough to prevent immediate death but then suppress it enough to have an adventure with his prior self. Yes, explanations are offered, but the seem a little thin to me and it just casts a bit of a shadow on the story.

From a performance standpoint, I highly enjoyed it. The Twelfth Doctor was his usual entertaining self, wanting to embrace Bill but also with a simmering anger at Harmony's synthetic Bill trying to justify herself as the original Bill. I really enjoyed his interaction with the First Doctor, who was done as a nice echo of William Hartnell by David Bradley. I enjoyed it, especially the anachronistic jokes made at his expense. I did wish there could have been a bit more emphasis placed on the First Doctor's better qualities as it was easy to let the sexism or curmudgeonism take point.

I did like David Bradley's version of the First Doctor. It is different than William Hartnell but still good. Bradley is softer and less pointed than Hartnell though I felt that Hartnell held a deeper level of emotion. Bradley always felt like someone playing the Doctor while Hartnell simply was the Doctor. They are both good in their own ways and I thought Bradley played well against the Twelfth Doctor.

Bill was enjoyable but I sided with the Twelfth Doctor that she wasn't really Bill. The avatar Bill was always relaxed, calm and confident. Bill as we knew her in Series Ten was always a roil of emotion: excitable and fearful, filled with wonder. This Bill was much closer to the post regeneration by Heather. It was subtle and an excellent job by Pearle Macke but still a different performance than the Bill we know.

Though he didn't do much, I also enjoyed Captain Lethbridge-Stewart as well. He was mostly the object of distress, though not quite the damsel that is typical of this story. I didn't see it coming but I could see the inspiration from the Brigadier once the name was revealed. He was very much the "stiff upper lip" type that you would expect to be the Brig's grandfather and he was fun to be with especially as he slowly rationalized himself to accept his forthcoming death.

The return of Rusty was amusing but it didn't really have a whole lot of point other than as a neat bit of trivia and a place to run to to avoid Harmony. In fact, the lack of a villain was another small point of problem in this story. There are a number of good stories that don't have villains but this one was trying both to have a villain and not a villain at the same time. Harmony came in and they are initially perceived as hostile, though they change to complacent quickly. Then you have Rusty, who is only a villain while shooting at the Doctor. Then he becomes a reluctant ally. So the story was constantly trying to have someone in the villain role but then pulling the rug out from under it. It didn't quite work for me and it gave the overall story a feeling of running around for no real reason.

Like the Tenth Doctor and the departure of Russell T. Davies, I thought the Twelfth Doctor's regeneration was a bit long and self indulgent. I know they wanted to give him a good long speech to have his final say, but I thought it should have been a bit shorter. As entertaining as his final speech to himself was, I thought it would have been more fitting for the Twelfth Doctor to have had a little say and then regenerate after, "Well, what's one more lifetime?" The Twelfth Doctor was arrogant and self possessed but it would have felt more in character to have accepted his fate and left when the decision had been made. As good as the speech was, I thought the moment lost poignancy by lingering as opposed to the Eleventh Doctor's regeneration which gave itself one lingering moment and then moved on.

All that being said, I did enjoy the regeneration and I loved the fact that the Twelfth Doctor's ring dropped off. There was a suspicion that would happen and it was one of those things that was truly symbolic of the passing of the Doctor. I liked the Thirteenth Doctor's appearance and especially the wait for the reveal of her change of sex. I also like that it seems she will keep her native accent, although that could be a problem for me if I'm not fully paying attention. Because of the low tone, I swore she said "Of Berlin" rather than "Oh Brilliant." I'm not sure why the TARDIS took that moment to explode and reject her the way it did but it was reminiscent of the Eleventh Doctor's start so I'll be curious to see what they end up doing with that. I am going to be highly annoyed if the Doctor falls all the way to the ground and then just gets up a la the Tenth Doctor in The End of Time as it would continue to make a mockery of the Fourth Doctor's death in Logopolis but we won't find out until the Fall for that.

Overall, I think I enjoyed it well enough. Moffat's true goodbye was The Husbands of River Song and this was more of an extended coda. Self indulgent and not quite getting out of the holes that had been dug, it was still an enjoyable experience to be with these characters and it gave out the appropriate feels for the season. Most importantly, it whet the appetite for Season Eleven and that's the most important thing.

Overall personal score: 3 out of 5

First Doctor Summary

The First Doctor is obviously a monumental figure for the show as he took the role as defined in it's early form and morphed with it as it moved more towards the show it later became. For this, William Hartnell is given a good deal of credit. Despite this, he is also one of the least popular Doctors due to the perceived "boring" nature of some of his stories. Given how many there were, I think it's impossible not to have some of them be duds as every Doctor has a dud story here and there.

For me personally, I like the First Doctor era, although it has it's slow periods. I think the thing to say about it more than anything else is consistency. When looking over my personal ratings for this era, I noticed that I only had a few stories that dropped into the dud range but I also only had a few stories that got into the high range as well. Most of the stories stayed pretty firmly in the more average range and that seems to fit with the First Doctor. He's competent and his stories are generally entertaining, but often there is nothing that jumps out at you as being particularly noteworthy or catching. Or if you have a story that does have some really good moments, it's tempered with some bad moments as well.

Black and White Doctor Who is a completely different animal than most people are used to. I had my own shock the first time I saw a First Doctor story. It takes a little time to get used to the slower pace and that much of the dynamic action is not done by the Doctor but by the male companion (Ian, Steven or Ben). Yet there is a quiet intelligence and dignity that also comes from the First Doctor that is enjoyable and some of the stories that were told were either entertaining in their own way or though provoking. I like how things progressed into putting the Doctor more front and center in the Second Doctor era, but nature of those stories did begin with the First Doctor, especially once he lost Ian and Barbara.

While I would not rate the First Doctor especially high, I think I like him and a number of his stories better than those of the later era. There is just something about his personality and his interaction with his companions that draws me in. Any problems that you can say about the First Doctor era could be applied in similar fashion to the later Doctor eras (with perhaps the exception of filming in a tiny studio). But the writing is usually good, the acting usually in good form and the limits of the technology can actually help things by covering some of the shortfalls in production. The First Doctor era might be considered a little slow by some but once a person understands the style they are getting in to, it can be a very enjoyable experiences and there is a lot of it to enjoy.

Highest Rated Story: The Time Meddler - 5.0

Lowest Rated Story: The Web Planet - 1.0

Average overall rating: 2.68

An Unearthly Child/100,000 B.C.
The Daleks
The Edge of Destruction
Marco Polo
The Keys of Marinus
The Aztecs
The Sensorites
The Reign of Terror
Planet of Giants
The Dalek Invasion of Earth
The Rescue
The Romans
The Web Planet
The Crusade
The Space Museum
The Chase
The Time Meddler
Galaxy 4
Mission to the Unknown
The Mythmakers
The Daleks' Master Plan: Ep. 1-6
The Daleks' Master Plan: Ep. 7
The Daleks' Master Plan: Ep. 8-12
The Massacre
The Ark
The Celestial Toymaker
The Gunfighters
The Savages
The War Machines
The Smugglers
The Tenth Planet

The Aztecs

You can't change history, not one line!

The Aztecs is one of those stories that I set aside for special purpose. It was the second full story I ever saw after The Masque of Mandragora and it was quite jarring as I had only been exposed to pre-Romana Fourth Doctor stories at that point. You can imagine that going from those to the slow paced, full historical story where the Doctor takes a backseat to both Barbara and Ian was a real shock to the system. It didn't sit that well and I had a rather negative opinion of the story ever since. However, having gotten used to the style of the First Doctor stories, I wanted to give this one another chance and thought it fitting that I should close out the First Doctor with the first story of his that I ever saw.

Plot Summary

The TARDIS arrives in the tomb of an Aztec priest named Yetaxa. Susan examines the mummified body, takes a bracelet off and puts it on. Susan walks back to see the Doctor and Ian while Barbara passes through a hidden door. She is discovered by the priest Autloc who sees her bracelet and believes she is the manifestation of the goddess Yetaxa.

The Doctor, Susan and Ian find Barbara missing and go look for her. They pass through the same hidden door and find that it is a one way door, leaving them trapped outside the tomb and away from the TARDIS. They are also discovered by Autloc who takes them to Barbara. Autloc believes that Barbara has come to alleviate a drought that has plagued them and attends to her. His colleague, Tlotoxl, is more suspicious of them.

Barbara keeps Susan near her as a handmaiden while Ian the Doctor are free to go about the city. The Doctor is taken to the gardens where the older citizens relax and offer wisdom when asked. There the Doctor meets Cameca who knows the son of the man who built the tomb in which Yetaxa is buried. The Doctor asks to meet this man in hopes of finding an entrance back in.

Ian is taken and dressed as a warrior chief as he is the favored of Yetaxa. He is also introduced to Ixta, who will be his rival to decide who is to command the whole army. Tlotoxl informs both of them that they will hold down the man who is to be sacrificed to appease the rain god later that day. Ian then goes to the garden where he warns the Doctor of what is going to happen.

Concerned, the Doctor warns Ian to not interfere and then heads up to see Barbara and warn her to do the same. Horrified, Barbara decides to interfere in hopes that she can destroy this side of the Aztecs and keep their good qualities, potentially preserving them from destruction by the Spanish. She steps out and orders the sacrifice stopped before Tlotoxl can kill the man. Believing he has been dishonored, the sacrifice appeals to Tlotoxl who orders him to throw himself off the pyramid. As he does so, the rain begins to fall.

Angered at Susan's cry during the ceremony, Tlotoxl orders her punished. Barbara overrules him and orders Susan sent to be educated in the customs of the Aztecs. Tlotoxl then accuses Barbara of being a false goddess and vows to destroy her. The Doctor reproaches Barbara for her foolishness and then warns her to play Tlotoxl and Autloc off each other, which she does to buy time.

In the city below, Ian demonstrates cunning and superior knowledge by knocking out Ixta using only a pressure grip technique. Angered by this humiliation, Ixta and Tlotoxl plot revenge by having Ixta kill Ian in single combat. They arrange for the next man to be sacrificed to the gods to request the battle and his request cannot be refused by law. Ian agrees, thinking it will be a non-lethal fight.

Ixta, as the son of the man who built the tomb, is summoned by Cameca to speak with the Doctor. Having been warned by Tlotoxl, Ixta agrees to provide the Doctor with plans of the tomb after his fight. He warns the Doctor that if he loses, he will be shamed and not allowed to speak to anyone for days. The Doctor, unaware that the fight is against Ian, takes a cactus needle and punctures the stem of a plant with it. The sap coats the needle and the Doctor tells Ixta to simply poke his opponent with the needle in the wrist and he will become woozy, allowing Ixta to win easily.

The Doctor heads back to see Barbara, unaware that Tlotoxl had invoked solitude for Barbara during her godhood testing. Barbara warns the Doctor to leave but not before telling him that Ixta's fight is against Ian. The Doctor rushes to warn Ian but is arrested by Tlotoxl's men. Barbara appeals to Autloc who agrees to release him if he was ignorant.

Ian and Ixta begin their fight at sunset. Ian drops Ixta several times but he gets up to reengage. The Doctor is brought in by the guards and he shouts to Ian to warn him. Distracted, Ian lets his guard down, allowing Ixta to stab him with the tainted needle. Ixta gets the drop on a drugged Ian and prepares to kill him. Barbara enters and demands that the contest stop. Tlotoxl refuses and orders Ixta to kill Ian until Barbara takes a knife and holds it to Tlotoxl's throat. Barbara states that if Ian dies, so will Tlotoxl and he orders Ixta to relent.

Autloc orders the Doctor released and he and Barbara retire to the temple. Ixta crows over Ian as he wakes up and Ian reluctantly admits that Ixta's plan was cunning. Ixta claims Ian's friendship but also vows to ultimately kill him to claim mastery of the army. Ixta also informs Tlotoxl of his arrangement with the Doctor, which was a lie as his father left no plans of the temple. As Ixta and Ian walk away, Ian overhears Tlotoxl plotting with the master of herbs Tonila to test Barbara via poison as poison would not hurt a god. Ian gets away from Ixta and warns Barbara in the temple.

Ian hides as he is not supposed to be there when Tlotoxl and Tonila enter with a cup offering atonement and friendship. Ian signals silently for her not to drink it and she offers it to Tlotoxl first as a test of his loyalty to her. When he refuses, she tosses it aside and rebukes them. Tonila runs away but Tlotoxl cowers. Barbara then confesses to him that she is not Yetaxa but will continue to play so to protect herself and her friends. Tlotoxl flees and vows to get proof of her lack of divinity.

In the garden, the Doctor sees Cameca with some cocoa beans and offers to make them drinking chocolate. Cameca, pleased, agrees to his proposal. The Doctor returns with two cups of chocolate which they share. Cameca then thanks him for his proposal and the Doctor realizes that the act was that of a marriage proposal. Flustered by what he has accidentally done, the Doctor still manages to learn from Cameca that Ixta's father disappeared a number of years ago after finishing the temple. He later informs Ian that he believes that there is a secret passage from the garden to the tomb and has a guess as to where it is located. Ian agrees to come that night to investigate.

Knowing that Barbara is too cunning, Tlotoxl decides to use her friends against her. He takes the man who is to be sacrificed during the solar eclipse a couple of days from now and takes him to see Susan, who is being educated in the customs of the Aztecs. The sacrifice is impressed with her knowledge and beauty and agrees to take her as his wife for the next few days of his life. Susan balks and refuses. Offended, the sacrifice storms out and Susan is deemed guilty of breaking religious law and sentenced to be punished.

Tlotoxl and Tonila go to see Barbara where Barbara forgives Tonila of his attempt to poison her. They pose the question of punishment to her regarding one of Autloc's acolytes, not revealing that it is Susan. Horrified at the nature of the punishment, Barbara objects and orders the person brought to her during the sacrifice of the eclipse along with her three servants. Tlotoxl readily agrees. Afterwards, Barbara learns from Autloc that Susan is the guilty party and that her punishment is to be carried out before the sacrifice, thwarting her plan of showing that the sun will return after the eclipse without the sacrifice.

Ian slips out of the warrior's quarters at night to meet the Doctor. He is unaware that Ixta has also awoken and is following him. The Doctor shows Ian the panel and Ian manages to lift the stone, revealing a passage. Ian climbs in, taking the Doctor's penlight to explore the passage. Ixta surprises the Doctor and offers to help him replace the stone, which the Doctor claims to have discovered while out for a walk. Ixta informs him that the passage is a means to divert water and tunnel floods on occasion. As he replaces the stone, Ian notices the water rising in the tunnel.

Ian dislodges a stone with graffiti on it and climbs out of the rising water. He follows a passage and emerges from the bier in the tomb where the TARDIS has landed. He takes a thin decorative rope from the mummified body and ties it to the fulcrum of the trick door, allowing the door to be opened from the outside. He takes the other end of the rope and exits the tomb to meet Barbara and the Doctor, who is greatly relieved to see Ian alive.

Ian then sneaks down to the military quarters where Ixta is guarding Susan and boasting about killing Ian. Ian knocks him out and takes Susan back to Barbara. However, although Ian tied the rope well, it takes more strength than they have to lift it. The Doctor realizes they need a pulley but suggests that Ian just go back and reopen the tomb from the other side. He takes Susan as a lookout.

Ian and Susan reach the gardens but before they can move the stone, they find an unconscious Autloc having been attacked from behind with Ian's club. Ian and Susan are immediately arrested by Tlotoxl and Ixta, though Ixta actually attacked Autloc on Tlotoxl's orders, and Autloc proclaims Barbara a false goddess, giving Tlotoxl permission to have them punished before the eclipse ceremony.

Barbara appeals to Autloc once he has recovered, but his faith has been destroyed. He offers to try and save Susan but cannot do anything for Ian. He then goes to see Cameca, who has learned that the Doctor is planning to leave, though regretfully. She offers her help and Autloc gives her his badge of office and title to his possessions to help bribe the guard to free Susan. Autloc then leaves the city to wander in the wilderness to find his faith again.

On the day of the eclipse sacrifice Ian and Susan are taken to a waiting room. Cameca enters and offers the guard the badge to dismiss the guards which he does. She then informs him that she is to take Susan but Ian knocks the guard out while distracted. Susan and Cameca head up to the temple while Ian steals the guard's headdress and joins the sacrifice escort.

Cameca meets the Doctor in the temple where he is finishing a pulley he carved to open the door. He and Cameca say their goodbyes with the Doctor remaining stoic when Cameca asks if she could come with him. He and Susan hide when the guards come to escort Barbara for the sacrifice. Tlotoxl moves to kill Barbara but Ian comes from behind and pins Tlotoxl and his knife.

Tlotoxl calls for Ixta and he flees when Ian faces the new threat. Barbara retreats into the temple and the three of them use the pulley to start opening the door. Ian and Ixta fight with Ian eventually knocking Ixta off the temple, killing him. He then retreats through the door which the Doctor pulls shut, taking the pulley with them.

Tlotoxl moves to try and chase them but the eclipse reaches it's peak and he calls it off to perform the sacrifice, which he believes honors his victory over the false goddess. In the tomb, the Doctor comforts Barbara that the Aztec civilization must die as history says it did but that she did save Autloc from sharing that fate. They enter the TARDIS with the Doctor initially leaving the broach Cameca gave him but then changing his mind and taking it with him.

Analysis

The Aztecs was definitely much better a second time around, but it is still not without some issues. Some of those elements are just products of being a first season story (such as the city-scape backdrop), but there are a number of other things that are conscious choices by the actors or director and some of them just don't quite work.

One of the most basic things to discuss about this story is that it is one of the few stories where the bad guy wins. Tlotolx does not succeed in killing Barbara or Ian, but he does drive them away and Autloc retreats to the wilderness, leaving him free to replace Autloc with someone loyal to him. I think the villain of just about any story would be thrilled with that outcome. Of course, you also have to factor in that even though Tlotoxl is villainous in his actions, he is also right. He is right that Barbara is a false goddess and that she is wrong to try and change their culture via fiat. Distasteful as the Aztec practice of sacrifice may be to Barbara's modern sensibilities, it is still a vital component of their culture and to try and change it while leaving the other aspects alone will not work. If one changes, other changes will radiate outward. This might have been a touch more satisfying if Tlotoxl wasn't quite so sinister in his ways. If he merely moved to expose Barbara and preserve their culture, he would have been more understandable. But Tlotoxl does go out of his way to be as black a character as he can be.

Some of that comes from the take on Tlotoxl. I doubt he was fully written this way so there must have been some discussion between the director and the actor to turn him into Richard III. Tlotoxl even has a hump when none is ever called for so this was a clear choice made outside of the script. I'm of a mixed mind on it because while I enjoyed the performance for the most part, it did feed into one of my principle complaints about the overall story and that was it's treatment as a televised play.

Nearly every aspect of this story put this into more of a play dynamic rather than a regular television story. Tlotoxl has a breaking the fourth wall moment at the end of Episode One, he hams it up the way you would expect in a performance of Richard III and even the staging reminded me strongly of scene i to scene ii transition. Again, the backdrop didn't help much either, but I expected that level of limitation. Of course, they were still finding their feet, but a television story that does little things to remind you that this is staged takes me out of the action far more than it draws me in.

Like most early stories, Ian is front and center in this one. He is "man of action" the whole way and much of the plots and plans require his central involvement. Of course, he also draws a lot of the drama to himself as well. Ixta is an asshole but Ian also goes out of his way to constantly bait him. I'm actually not even sure why Ian constantly does draw attention since he should be trying to deflect attention from himself and Barbara as much as possible. Yet he shows off the ability to disable a man using pressure point techniques (which I doubt the British Army taught to it's National Service members) and also spends far too much time toying with Ixta rather than dispatching him immediately. In the fight at the end of Episode Two, Ian manages to drop Ixta several times, always letting him up to try again until he manages to sting Ian with the cactus needle. Ian, for showing off that technique, should have held Ixta down the first time he flipped him and knocked him out, ending the fight in thirty seconds. Yet it goes on so we can get the cliffhanger. I like Ian and he is important but this is probably the most arrogant and silly we've seen him so far and that is a bit out of character.

Barbara is also somewhat out of character, though she is clearly meant to be shown as empathetic. Still, Barbara is smart enough to know that one can't just cancel out one aspect of a culture and expect the "good side" flourish in the absence of the "bad side." What's more, even if she had succeeded, did she still expect that a flourishing culture would have resisted Cortez's invasion? This is drama to create drama and I don't believe that Barbara would have made such foolish decisions in a vacuum. Nevertheless, her performance is quite good and it allows the further development of the respectful relationship she has with the Doctor. Ian and Susan might have been highly berated by him, but although he does lecture, he does show more empathy towards her and talks softly in how they may work to fix the problem. I do also enjoy the performance she gives when she is in complete control of the situation and not held to any standards that might have affected her earlier situations.

The Doctor is actually rather pleasant in this one. Susan is taken away for two episodes and even when she is around, she is in either Ian or Barbara's company, leaving the Doctor to do as he likes. Despite his ulterior motives in trying to get access to the tomb and back to the TARDIS, his affection for Cameca seems genuine. His comedic reactions when finding out he has actually proposed marriage are quite funny and add some much needed levity to the story as everyone else is very serious. But it is still one of his most pleasant performances and although his involvement is less than future Doctors (as what caught me off guard the first time I saw it) he is still very much involved in the whole plot.

Susan was again the weakest of the group. Carole Ann Ford was on holiday for Episodes Two and Three so her two short scenes were filmed inserts. While she showed herself as independent, expressing the modern idea of choosing a partner for herself, she still went to pieces when confronted with a minor bit of resistance. It makes her whiney and she does effectively nothing in the plan to get back into the tomb. She actually is a liability since it is her punishment for expressing the modern ideas that draw Barbara further into Tlotoxl's plans to destroy her. Once again, the story would have been better without her.

The direction was pretty decent although the lack of space in the studio becomes apparent in the fight scenes, especially the one at the end of Episode Two. But aside from the problem with the fight scene, the pace and manner of the direction was pretty good. Again, there were those play moments, such as the fourth wall break at the end of Episode One, but even with that in mind, there was nothing that I caught as being a problem.

Overall, I'd say this was pretty decent but with some small flaws. It is a bit slow to get started but once the plan to get back into the tomb is set in motion towards the end of Episode Two, the story rolls along and draws you in. Unlike other stories, the end doesn't feel rushed and that is appreciated. So it's only real limitations is the play-like aspect and the somewhat unsatisfying feeling of Tlotoxl winning. Even though it's necessary, Tlotoxl getting some level of comeuppance would have been satisfying. Yes Ixta's death felt satisfying, but a setback for Tlotoxl would have felt better. Perhaps if it were clearer that Cortez would be landing in a short span of time and that Tlotoxl would be destroyed through him, that would have sat better, but it's unfortunately vague on how soon it will be before the Spanish invade. So I think I can say that it's a decent story, but not fully satisfying at times.

Overall personal score: 3 out of 5

The Web Planet

Come along! Drop this hairdryer or whatever it is.

The Web Planet is another of those stories that is talked about a great deal in how one has to try and look past the production design to see the story beneath. I have to say that doesn't fill me with a great deal of confidence, but I've been surprised before. This also happens to be the last First Doctor story that I have not watched. I've one more to review after this but it was also both the first First Doctor story I saw and the first classic story I saw in it's entirety after The Mask of Mandragora so I made a point of saving it for last. So feels a bit strange to know that I'm effectively done with the William Hartnell era given how much of the overall archive he takes up.

Plot Summary

The TARDIS is pulled by a strong force to an alien planet. The Doctor attempts to break free by supplying more power but it fails to work. As he does, insectoid aliens emerge and communicate with each other using high frequency. The high frequencies are painful to Vicki and she passes out.

Barbara sees to Vicki while the Doctor and Ian head out to investigate the power drain. Before giving her a sedative, Barbara shows Vicki a gold bracelet given to her by Nero with a promise to tell her about their Roman adventure later. As Vicki drifts off, Barbara feels her arm tugging involuntarily away from her towards the outside.

The Doctor begins to examine the rocks and surrounding area but Ian becomes unnerved when his gold pen disappears out of his hand. They continue to explore, finding an old pyramid structure and something that looks like a pool of water. The Doctor tests it with Ian's tie and finds it filled with acid.

Barbara is pulled by her arm until she slips into a trance and walks out of the TARDIS. Vicki wakes and finds Barbara missing and the doors open. She calls out for her and the echo alerts the Doctor and Ian. They rush back towards the TARDIS but Ian is trapped in webbing. He tells the Doctor to go on. Vicki panics and begins to try and make the TARDIS dematerialize but only succeeds in closing the doors. The Doctor arrives back at the spot and finds the TARDIS gone.

The Doctor goes back and frees Ian from the webbing, reviving him from a stunned state. The Doctor informs Ian of the TARDIS's disappearance but they find evidence that it was dragged away and follow the trail. After walking for a bit, they come across a chrysalis and the Doctor realizes they are on the planet Vortis. He is confused though as Vortis was not supposed to have a moon but several objects can be seen in the sky.

Barbara walks in a trance until she is taken by a moth-like creature called a Menoptra. The creature removes the gold bracelet from her arm and Barbara wakes up. Two other Menoptra debate on whether to kill her, fearing that she will betray their presence to the Zarbi, the ant-like creatures that created the chirping. Barbara manages to get away but runs into a couple of Zarbi who re-hypnotize her with a gold collar. The Zarbi overrun the Menoptra hideout, killing two of the Menoptra but leaving Barbara and the third alive.

Another group of Zarbi bring the TARDIS into their lair where Vicki emerges and is captured. A Zarbi attempts to enter the TARDIS as Vicki left the door open but that seems to put it in great pain. It's cries attract Ian and the Doctor, who shuts the door of the TARDIS. Vicki and Ian are restrained while the Doctor is placed in a cylinder that communicates with him.

A voice in the cylinder accuses them of being agents for the invading Menoptra and tries to destroy the TARDIS. The attack fails and the Doctor counters with an offer to assist in finding the Menoptra fleet with his star charts. The voice agrees, allowing the Doctor access to the TARDIS. Inside, the Doctor devises a plan to stall the voice while Ian goes to find Barbara, who has been taken to the Crater of Needles.

The Doctor pulls out his charts but informs the voice that he cannot search due to the defenses raised. The voice reluctantly agrees to a lowering in the area which allows Ian to work his way though the webbing. The Doctor picks up traffic signals from the Menoptra fleet and hones in on their signal. Meanwhile, Ian is detected and alarm is raised. He manages to get free where he is rescued by a Menoptra. The voice is angry with the Doctor but he plays coy with the information on the Menoptra fleet and it is unwilling to risk losing that information.

Ian learns that the Menoptra, whose name is Vrestin, was stunned in the attack which captured Barbara but escaped. He also learns that the Menoptra and Zarbi lived in peace on Vortis until a force called the Animus came and brainwashed the Zarbi, who are of a lower intelligence level. The Menoptra were driven off the planet to a recently captured moon but now are prepared to fight to drive the Animus away and reclaim Vortis.

Ian and Vrestin travel towards the Crater of Needles to free Barbara and other Menoptra who have been captured. They are pursued by the Zarbi and they hide in a rock crevasse. There is a cave in and Ian and Vrestin fall through a hole into an underground cavern. They are captured by a group of creatures calling themselves Optera. They are fearful of Ian and Vrestin since they are surface dwellers and threaten to kill them. Ian however realizes that the Optera are descendants of Menoptera who fled underground. At the mention of Menoptra, the Optera react as they are worshiped as gods. Vrestin unfurls her wings and requests that the Optera help her and Ian.

At the Crater of Needles, Barbara toils along with several other Menoptra, who've had their wings ripped off, including Hrostar, who was captured with her. They pour vegetation into pools of acid to feed the Animus. Hrostar also informs Barbara of a fleet of Menoptra who are to arrive at the crater to attack the Animus. He is fearful if the Zarbi are aware as their weapons were designed to attack the Animus and not the Zarbi.

Back at the hive, the Doctor's attempts to stall the Animus are making it more angry. It has the Zarbi replace the gold collar on Vicki though the Doctor is able to buy more time with a partial location of the invading fleet. Once the collar is off, the Doctor attempts to short circuit the collar by hooking it up to the projector. The projector short circuits and the Animus finally has enough. It replaces the collar on Vicki and it pulls the exact location of the fleet from the Doctor. With that information, it dispatches the Zarbi and places the Doctor under the same golden collar.

At the end of a work shift, Barbara and Hrostar notice the Zarbi massing towards the attack point of the Menoptra. Fearing for the attack's safety, they attack the lone Zarbi guards, overwhelming them. They make their way up to the top and meet with the initial invasion force. They warn them to leave but they refuse having already been committed. The Zarbi attack and the group is scattered with several rushing into a cave for shelter.

In the cave, they find only one of the original Menoptra attack has escaped along with several de-winged Menoptra. The survivor is despondent but Hrostar rallies them and turns to Barbara for help. They decide to go ahead and try to carry out the attack on the Animus as planned with the isotope weapon the attack force carried.

Also within the tunnels, Ian and Vrestan take command of a group of Optera who are willing to help them. Their group also begins to work its way along the tunnels toward the source of the Animus to try and defeat it. They find their way to cave and break off stalactites to dig their way through a portion where poisonous gas is leaking. One of the Optera uncovers a vein of acid and sacrifices herself by plugging the hole with her body. The others manage to dig a hole and they push further up the tunnels.

At the hive Vicki watches out until the Zarbi are distracted. Her collar had been successfully shorted by the Doctor and she removes his working one. He comes around and forms a new plan with Vicki. One of the Zarbi leave the room and as the second one passes, the Doctor takes the collar and places it around the Zarbi's neck. The collar blocks the Animus' control and it becomes docile, allowing the Doctor to control it with his ring. The Doctor bids it to follow them and uses it as cover to make it look like they are being escorted out. The Doctor and Vicki then make their way with the Zarbi towards the Crater of Needles.

Barbara and the Menoptra make plans in their hiding place when the Doctor, Vicki and the captured Zarbi enter. Together they form a plan where the Doctor and Vicki will take the isotope weapon and try to smuggle it in to the Animus. Barbara and the Menoptra will create a diversion, drawing out the Zarbi and then come in to help the Doctor. The Doctor reluctantly gives his ring to the Menoptra to control the Zarbi as they will be more useful in the attack.

The Doctor and Vicki return to the hive but the Animus has them seized and bound in webbing. It communicates with the Doctor, informing him that for his escape attempt, they will be brought to it and dealt with. Vicki, not hearing this and fearful of capture, hides the isotope weapon in the astral projector. They are then taken to the center of the hive where the Animus blinds them with light and ensnares them in it's roots to absorb their knowledge.

Barbara and the Menoptra successfully draw out the Zarbi, though Hrostar is killed in the feint. With most of the Zarbi out and hunting them, the group makes their way into the hive where they find the TARDIS and the projector. They try to use it to contact the Menoptra fleet but find it isn't working. Checking it, Barbara finds the isotope weapon and the group heads to the center to assist the Doctor.

Ian, Vrostar and the lead Optera find a mesh of roots leading upward at the end of the tunnel. The three climb up though Ian quickly outpaces the other two. As he does so, Barbara and the Menoptra enter the Animus' cavern. It stops it's work on the Doctor and Vicki and attacks this new group. Barbara activates the isotope weapon but cannot get close enough to properly use it. Ian however emerges from a pit just below, distracting the Animus further. Barbara crawls forward and levels the weapon at the heart of the Animus. The radiation kills the creature and the light and resistance fade.

With the Animus gone, the Zarbi return to their docile state and underground streams poke their way back to the surface. Vrostar signals the Menoptra fleet of their victory and instructs them to land. The Optera are also encouraged to come back to the surface where their children may develop wings again and fly as the Menoptra do. With things returning to normal, the Doctor and his party depart in the TARDIS, after the Doctor has recollected his ring.

Analysis

There is a kernel of a good story here, but overall the thing is too bloated, too slow paced and the production is just a bit too far for me to fully take. I think we can applaud taking the risk of doing something this experimental and in the hands of a better director, it might have worked. Here, it just falls a bit flat.

All of the insects had some level of flaw but if things had been directed a bit better, they might have gone alright. Probably the best example of this is the Zarbi. We had seen the use of large ants before with Planet of Giants and although they didn't move as they were dead, there was an acceptable suspension of disbelief with them. Here, that suspension was a bit too much to swallow whenever the human legs of the Zarbi controllers were seen. It worked much better in the few shots where the Zarbi are low enough that these legs are not seen. Then you believe them as giant ants. But when the shots include the whole mass, you see human legs manipulating while the six ant legs just hang out in mid-air. That's a level of disbelief that no one can overcome. I suppose they might have hoped that the smeared lenses might have masked that, but again, the director did nothing to aid the situation by often getting things directly lined up so that the legs were right there.

The smeared lens themselves didn't bother me as I respected the effort to make it look like the atmosphere was different. I think it actually helped with some of the insect effects, which might have been the point. As for the other insects, I didn't have any problem with the Menoptra. I thought those costumes worked fairly well and the wing design was nice. I didn't care for the constant hand movement but that was a minor distraction. The Optera on the other hand were most irritating. They have six legs shown but they just hop around. I also didn't like the stunted, almost pidgin-English they were speaking. I'm guessing it was to make them seem more primitive (like Tonto) but it just came across as labored and annoying.

There are some other issues that were of the director's purview and I'm curious as to whether he could have altered them or not. There is a lot of background noise in this story. Some is obvious and very difficult to alter, like the clank of feet on the boards. That's a problem in a lot of stories and it's something that you learn to tune out. But there are a few instances of other people talking or making sounds off-stage as well as a few other instances of things bumping into cameras or shots including things that should be offstage. It's just looks and sounds like an amateur production and instead of pumping up the story, it downgrades it.

One thing I can say from a positive point of view is about the actors themselves. I thought everyone did well, even the guest cast when they were clearly not given much to work with. The Doctor was pretty good and I think the sheen of The Romans is still on him as he is rather light-hearted throughout the story, even at dire points. His only moments of hardness are when he is looking out for Vicki and at times, even when threatened by the Animus, he seems almost playful. I would have liked to not be the damsel in distress at the end but he did a lot to set up things so I can't quibble too much with that.

Of the four principles, I would argue the Vicki draws the short straw. She doesn't do a whole lot through most of the story and seems a little more paralyzed by fear than in other stories. Granted, she comes out of it in the second half but that is a bit of a slow development. Her rescue of the Doctor from the golden collar is about the only real action she gets. She does hide the isotope device but it's more of a lucky chance that Barbara recovers it and not any significant foresight on her part. On a more visceral level, I also have to say that I didn't care for Vicki's haircut, but that's rather petty.

Ian and Barbara traded roles through the story. Barbara didn't get much to do while Ian was his typical action man in the first half, though some of that is due to the fact that Jacqueline Hill was on vacation in Episode Three. However starting in Episode Four, the tables are turned. Ian fades into the background and Barbara jumps to the fore. It is Barbara the makes the plans and she is the one that delivers the killing blow against the Animus. William Russell never actually went on vacation but I think that if his scenes had been pre-filmed, he could have easily taken a week off with a minimum of effort on the show's part.

The trade off in Ian and Barbara's strength is reflective of certain flaws in the story. This is a bloated story, something that the writer probably envisioned being four or five episodes but was told to make it six. This meant that instead of having Ian and Vrostar reunite with Barbara and form a combined Menoptra force, we are given the Optera. Yet the Optera do nothing. They refrain from killing Ian and Vrostar and they lead Ian back to where the Animus is, resulting in the death of one of their own. It's very reminiscent of the Thals taking Ian and Barbara for a real attack on the Dalek city in The Daleks, but in that case, you got to know the Thals and they were vital in the overall attack. Here, the Optera are just shoved in and do nothing except act as guides. Ian himself does almost nothing except add to the distraction which allows Barbara to deliver the killing blow and the Optera don't even make it to the surface until the Animus is dead. They do nothing and add nothing and could easily have been cut.

Much of the back and forth could also have been cut as well. The Doctor and Vicki didn't need to find Barbara, especially as Barbara carried the isotope weapon into battle anyway. There are at least two different rallying speeches given before the various parties foray into battle and neither one is really needed. They give a little character depth but are just there for padding. Remove all that superfluous stuff and I think this would have been a tight and fairly action-packed four part story with the interesting twist of it being bugs rather than the random primitives that we get in several other stories.

If you carve away the fat, there is some interesting writing. I think the Doctor has good moments as well as Barbara. I think the characters of Vrostar and Hrostar were reasonably well done and portrayed well, even if they get into a bit too much exposition. I even think the Animus was a decent villain, a dark force that was partially plant like but not truly explained. It only mattered that it was evil and it had control over the Zarbi. Perhaps a little simple but in a story about overthrowing an evil dictator, why give that much depth to the villain? Again, there is potential in this story that is lost in its execution.

I applaud the ambition of this story, but the first major problem is that it should have been given to an innovative director rather than someone who was more of a point and shoot director. He had moments but this story needed more imagination that he was able to give. The second is the bloat. I would imagine that for the money that had to be poured into the sets and costumes, a minimum of six parts was demanded. So the fat is added and that drags this story down immensely. It does not have enough depth to justify anything other than a revolutionary action story and slowing it down only makes the flaws and limitations of the production values stand out that much more. I would not call it the worst First Doctor story, but it is a slog to get through and it's easy to find your mind wandering rather than keeping an eye on the screen.

Overall personal score: 1.5 out of 5

An Adventure in Space and Time

With the conclusion of The Doctor Falls revealing that David Bradley will be appearing as the First Doctor, I finally broke down and bought a copy of An Adventure in Space and Time so I could finally see it. Despite this story being out for over three years, I couldn't find a copy to rent or borrow in all that time. Even buying was a bit limited as copies formatted for North America were somewhat hard to find. But I got a blue-ray edition and finally enjoyed what everyone else had been enjoying for a much longer time.

The story covers the basic outline of the creation of the show by Sidney Newman, his giving the running of the show to Verity Lambert and it's progress as William Hartnell both grows in popularity as the Doctor and also suffers health effects from the rigors of the work. It is obviously a simplified version with several people coalesced into a single individual or other people just given the minimalist treatment.

The folding of several people is very common and rather understandable, although usually they stick with people who are alive the whole time. Towards the end of the movie, Mervin Pinfield is shown discussing the need to replace William Hartnell with Sidney Newman, despite the fact that Pinfield had died a year earlier, but odds are pretty good that not a lot of folks in the audience would have been aware of that.

Overall, it was quite enjoyable. I thought David Bradley did a good job showing the transformation that William Hartnell went through, both in an enjoyment of his popularity (and finally being given a role outside of his normal casting) and in the degradation he underwent as the overwork and unhealthy habits of the 60's consumed him. Much like the show, although it starts with the focus on Newman and Lambert, the major driver of the story is Hartnell. I enjoy the stuff without Hartnell, but he is the key driver in the whole thing, the constant while so much changes around him.
I was actually surprised that some of the other cast didn't get as much screen time. After Hartnell, the cast member who was shown the most was actually Carol Ann Ford, with an extra little nod given to the spat she had with Hartnell near the beginning of filming of Marco Polo. Although, I wonder if some of that was just so that Mark Gatiss could recreate a bit of the Marco Polo set, as that is rather famous for it's elaborateness and that it is lost. But very little attention is given to William Russell or Jacqueline Hill outside of the suggestion that Jacqueline Hill might have gotten the job as Barbara due to a friendship with Verity Lambert.

Almost nothing is said about companions after that. We are treated to a few brief scenes detailing the passage of time with the only notation of the latest companions being the exterior photo shoots. Once Maureen O'Brien is introduced as Carol Ann Ford's replacement, most of the in set shots are dropped save for a couple of Hartnell by himself. If you didn't know, you wouldn't realize that the next shot is Peter Purves and Jackie Lane (Stephen and Dodo) followed by Michael Craze and Anneke Wills (Ben and Polly).

I was also a little surprised that very little mention was made of Hartnell's not getting on with the production teams that followed Verity Lambert. You get a hint of it as he gets annoyed with people trying to get the scene going and he is correcting them about not getting the props or scene right but the period after Verity leaves is heavily condensed and jumps quickly towards the end, focusing mostly on Hartnell's failing health and especially his memory problems.

The one thing that I thought was rather odd from a continuity standpoint was when Mrs. Hartnell came to see Verity about scaling back Bill's workload and Verity noting that she would pass it on to her successor. What's odd is that in the background, you can see several folks in Menoptra costumes, indicating that they are working on The Web Planet. While I don't doubt that Verity might have gone ahead and submitted a resignation letter by this point (second half of Season Two), her goodbye party seems to have taken place shortly after this (again, Menoptra costumes). Verity Lambert rather famously left after filming Mission to the Unknown, which was at the end of the recording block, even though it and Galaxy 4 kicked off Season Three. I say famously because the goodbye photos of the actors in costume from the Dalek/alien council are the only known evidence of what those costumes looked like. I suspect that Mark Gatiss was limited on budget and couldn't recreate that scene with similar costumes and instead opted for the The Web Planet as it would also have been distinctive.

Despite these historical quibbles, it flows very well. The only thing I would change is something that I understand for the time but it dates the story and that is the appearance of Matt Smith at the end. It's a nice scene, especially as this went out just before the 50th anniversary special, but as we are now anticipating the Thirteenth (and first female) Doctor, seeing Hartnell look across the console to see the Eleventh Doctor just makes it feel a little dated instead of the complete time capsule that it should be. It's a small thing but it is still something that I would like to have gotten rid of.

Nevertheless, it's still very enjoyable and an excellent bit of reenactment. It's also an excellent way to expose a new person or perhaps someone who has only seen the new series, to the older stories, especially in the Hartnell era which can be difficult to get into if you're not aware of how both TV was made and how stories were told in those days. But a very good story overall and I can only give it the best compliment I can think of, which is that I wish I could have seen more backstory and watched it continue to see how things progressed in the Patrick Troughton era.

The Daleks

Make no attempt to capture the prisoners. They are to be exterminated!

This is the story that really kicked things off. Whatever one thinks of An Unearthly Child now, it didn't really grab the public in ways that the BBC wanted. It was the following story that grabbed the public attention and kicked off Dalekmania. Of course, this story is also known for being heavily padded and of the First Doctor still being in his crotchety mode. But can the story as a whole rise up and still be entertaining to a modern audience?

Plot Summary

The Doctor and crew arrive on an alien planet, unaware that the radiation meter has crept up into the danger zone. They exit the TARDIS and find themselves in a petrified jungle where the trees have been turned into brittle stone. The explore a bit more and discover a city over the ridge which also seems devoid of life. The Doctor wants to explore it but cannot due to the approach of dark. The group heads back to the TARDIS. On the way, Susan is touched on the shoulder by an alien hand. She panics and lurches back to the group but both the Doctor and Ian believe that she imagined it.

Inside the TARDIS, Susan mopes a bit though Barbara telling her that she believes her comforts her some. The Doctor treats Ian and Barbara to some food but their meal is interrupted by a knocking sound outside. They turn on the scanner but find nothing there. Unnerved, the other three insist on leaving. Annoyed, the Doctor starts to take off but he loosens the fluid link below the console. The TARDIS fails to take off and he claims to just discover the fault. He also claims that they will have to refill the fluid link with mercury and the only place to find it will be the city.

In the morning they prepare to head down to the city and find a box containing glass vials filled with fluid. Susan puts them in the TARDIS and they set out. They reach the city some time later, all of them starting to suffer from radiation sickness. They split up to explore and Barbara becomes separated by a series of closing doors. She is trapped in an elevator and when it opens, she is captured by an unseen creature.

When Barbara fails to return to the rendezvous point, the other three go to look for her. In the city, they find scientific equipment monitoring the radiation levels and realize that they're suffering from radiation sickness. The Doctor also admits that the fluid link works fine but the Doctor made up the story about needing mercury because he wanted to visit the city. They leave the room but find themselves surrounded by Daleks. The Daleks order them to move but Ian tries to make a break for it. The Daleks shoot him, temporarily paralyzing him from the waist down. The Daleks make the Doctor and Susan drag Ian into a cell where Barbara had already been taken.

Believing the Doctor and his party to be Thals, their planetary enemy, the Daleks pull the Doctor out and interrogate him. The Doctor learns about the neutron war between the Daleks and the Thals while the Daleks realize that the Doctor is not actually a Thal. They also learn that he might have anti-radiation chemicals which the Daleks believe they will need if they are ever to leave the city. They tell the Doctor that one of their party may go to the TARDIS to get the chemicals while the rest stay as hostages.

Ian wants to go but the feeling in his legs has not fully come back and both the Doctor and Barbara are starting to suffer from the advanced stages of the radiation sickness. Ultimately, Susan goes and despite some frights, makes it back to the TARDIS and collects the vials. Upon leaving the TARDIS, she meets a Thal called Alydon. He tells her that he left the chemicals for them and gives her a second box upon learning that they are currently being held by the Daleks.

As Susan returns, the Daleks change their minds about letting the humans die as they might have some value. They seize one of the boxes but allow Susan to keep the second and she distributes the chemical to everyone, allowing them to return to full health. She tells the other three that the Thals have been forced to leave their settlement due to drought and are currently looking for food. They hope to sign a peace treaty with the Daleks in exchange for food. The Daleks overhear this and decide to set a trap to destroy the Thals.

Susan is pulled from her cell and told to write a letter to the Thals including promises of food and mutual cooperation. Susan realizes that the Daleks have been monitoring their conversations in the cell but believes they are sincere in their talk of a truce. However the Doctor is not so convinced and decides they must take action to escape.

The Doctor and Ian stage a fight where Susan leaps on Ian's back and while elevated, destroys the camera watching them. The Daleks suspect it was deliberate but opt to leave them alone. Free to talk, the Doctor figures out that the Daleks are drawing power via static electricity in the floor. They figure that if they can get a Dalek on to the plastic cloak Alydon gave Susan, it will kill the power to the Dalek.

When a Dalek enters to bring them food, Ian jams the door. The Dalek reenters and Barbara blinds it with mud made from dirt that adhered to Susan's shoe. Ian and the Doctor then drag the Dalek onto the cloak where it goes inert. They pull out the mutant inside and Ian climbs in the casing. He then escorts them down the hall and into the elevator as though taking them to the council.

After the main door closes, the trio tries to get Ian out but he find the latch stuck. Meanwhile a passing Dalek informed the council of the prisoners approach and learns that this was actually an escape attempt. The alarm is sounded and other Daleks come and begin to cut through the door. The trio is sent up the elevator while Ian tries to get out. Upon reaching the surface, the Doctor sends the elevator back for Ian, who just manages to get out and in the elevator before the Daleks break through and destroy his casing.

The Daleks pursue them up the elevator but Barbara and Susan send a large rock down the shaft and destroy the elevator and the pursing Dalek. They also spy a group of Thals coming to meet with the Daleks. Unable to get their attention, Ian goes to warn the Thals while the Doctor and the women make their way back to the TARDIS.

The Thal leader, Temmosus, enters the room and offers the Daleks peace. As he begins to invite the other Thals in, Ian leaps out and yells that it's a trap. The Daleks emerge from their hiding places and kill Temmosus. They shoot at Ian and the retreating Thals but only succeed in wounding a couple of them.

Back at the TARDIS, the group prepares to leave but they discover that the fluid link is still in the city as the Daleks had taken it from Ian. Knowing that they will have to fight the Daleks, they try to convince the Thals to fight with them. Alydon, who has become the new leader, refuses until Ian spurs him to anger by suggesting he could get what he needs by trading a woman Alydon fancies, Dyoni, to the Daleks. Alydon knows it's a trick but he attacks Ian anyway and realizes that fighting and dying would be better than living in meager cowardice.

Back in the Dalek city, the Daleks begin to distribute their replication of the Thal's anti-radiation drugs. However, the drug begins to kill the Daleks and they cease implementation. They counteract the drugs with more radiation exposure and most of the Daleks recover. They decide that since radiation levels on the planet are steadily dropping, they must introduce more radiation to the planet and prepare to set off a new neutron bomb.

Alydon, the Doctor, Ian, and another Thal named Ganatus devise a two part attack plan. Ganatus and a group of the Thals with Ian and Barbara will travel through the swamps at the rear of the city and sneak in through the mountains to catch the Daleks by surprise. The Doctor, Susan, Alydon and the rest of the Thals will distract and disrupt the Daleks with feinting tactics at the front of the city. After three days, they will attack the front and meet in the middle.

Gantus leads his group through the swamps where they discover pipes leading from the lake to the city. Figuring the Daleks are pumping their water from the lake, the decide to follow the pipes. However, one of the Thals is attacked and sucked under the lake while filling the water bags.

The remaining group enters the mountain caves a treks through. Ganatus' brother, Antodus, becomes increasingly fearful and wants to turn back. Ganatus tries to restrain him but a sudden cave-in causes both men to fall back. The cave-in blocks their escape and the group presses forward knowing it's their only way out.

Distracting the Dalek cameras with mirrors, the Doctor, Susan and Alydon sneak into the city, destroying antennae and cameras. They find a control box for the power and the Doctor works to short-circuit the system. He sends Alydon back to move the mirrors to a new location and then destroys the box. Pleased with himself, he fails to move quickly and he and Susan are captured by a Dalek patrol sent to investigate.

In the caves, Ganatus and Barbara find an opening that leads to an underground river. The river cuts off their path but they can see another tunnel on the far side. Ian and Ganatus leap across the chasm to investigate and find that it leads back towards the city. They then have all the others leap across with them. However, Antodus mistimes his jump and slips down the cliff face, his safety rope threatening to drag Ian down with him. Antodus then cuts the rope and falls to his death while Ganatus pull Ian back up the cliff.

The Doctor and Susan are taken into the city and held in a room just off the control room. The Daleks are diverting the radiation from their nuclear reactors into a storage device and will release that into the atmosphere rather than setting off a new neutron bomb. The Doctor offers to show the Daleks the TARDIS and how it works in exchange for not releasing the radiation and setting them free. The Daleks however decide that they will simply examine his ship without his help if necessary.

Alydon gathers up the Thals and attacks the city, using the Doctor's knock out of the detection equipment as cover. He meets up with Ganatus' group, who has just emerged from the tunnels in the water pumping area, and the separate groups all converge on the Dalek control room. The Daleks are counting down the release of the radiation but are distracted by the Thal attack. One Dalek is pushed into the power relay which both electrocutes the Dalek and also cuts the power to the rest of the Daleks throughout the city. Without the power, the Daleks simply cease to function, leaving the mutants trapped in cases that cannot support them.

The groups return to the forest with the fluid link and the equipment the Daleks used to grow food. They each say their goodbyes, with Ganatus lingering a bit with Barbara, and then leave in the TARDIS. As the TARDIS takes off, it suddenly lurches violently, throwing everyone inside to the ground.

Analysis

Because Terry Nation had a tendency to recycle various parts of his story elements, it has become a bit fashionable among fans to dismiss all of his work as just the same thing. However, there is something rather unique in the original Dalek story and when you go back and watch it with an open mind, it is actually quite good. Yes, there are elements that come up in later stories and yes it is rather padded, but it almost surprising as how well it holds up as a story and you can see how Dalekmania blossomed in it's wake.

One of the things that I think is very important to enjoying this story is understanding it's context. Unlike most of the other First Doctor stories, this one has Ian and Barbara still pretty pissed at the Doctor for abducting him as well as the Doctor being closer to his nastier self as seen in the caveman adventure (which did not get notes from Sidney Newman). Therefore, there is a natural tension that arises and Ian's attitude of either not trusting or being openly angry towards the Doctor is completely understandable.

The Doctor is better in this story than in the previous one. Yes he sabotages the ship, but not in any meaningful way and there is an inherent curiosity that is appealing in him. He also is clearly the idea man for though Ian and Susan actually carry things out, it is the Doctor that comes up with the various concepts, showing that they must think their way out of the situation rather than just use brute force.

All the companions are pretty good in this one, even Susan. I noted Ian's attitude towards the Doctor but you can see the good man and natural leader pretty much throughout the story. It is also interesting to see that Barbara, who doesn't get as much to do in this story, is already starting to become the Doctor's favorite. She is the one who sides with the Doctor against Ian in provoking the Thals, even though Ian is right. In The Edge of Destruction, it is Barbara who the Doctor specifically makes up with after the events in the TARDIS. Her little dabble with Ganatus is nice but even from this point you know she is Ian's woman. Still it provides a nice reminder that Barbara is a fairly young woman and not defaulting completely into the mom role.

Susan is more of a mixed bag in this story but it certainly is better than her previous one. I think what gets to me most about her is that Carol Ann Ford is clearly in her early twenties and should be playing a character in her mid-to-late teens. However, her dialogue and dialogue about her is more geared towards a character that is closer to ten. I could easily imagine my own daughter (who is eleven) saying these lines and acting like Susan does. She is responsible in a group but so easily hysterical when forced to do something on her own. If Susan was as stroppy a teenager as we might expect, she should have been more independent and less fearful, even with the night run to the TARDIS. I can understand why her character was reduced to a young girl in the movie version. Again her overall performance isn't bad, but the contrast in written age and actual age is just strikes a sour note here and there.

One of the things that really surprised me when I was rewatching this is how different the Daleks were compared to their usual state. I think we have gotten used to Daleks that are rant-y and near insane with hate. Here you have cold and calculating Daleks. They kill with impunity but they have a cold logic that also keeps them from killing indiscriminately. The Daleks as originally written actually are far closer to the scheming David Whitaker Daleks of Power of the Daleks and Evil of the Daleks than they are of even Terry Nation's other Dalek scripts.

My suspicion is that in this original treatment, the Daleks are just written as another alien race and given a cold, logical style. In the next appearance of the Daleks (The Dalek Invasion of Earth) Nation turned them into a Nazi parallel and I think he never went away from that, which caused the Daleks to lose some of that conniving quality that only reappeared when someone else wrote them.

I find it fascinating that the Daleks are not actually taken in by nearly any of the deceptions tried against them. They know the cameras are knocked out deliberately by the prisoners, they are aware of the infiltrations into the city and even the escape attempt they cotton on to fairly quickly. It is only their limitations to the city and their underestimating of the potential damage these things can do that really harms them.

The Thals are a little generic and a touch boring but not in an overly objectional way. Fortunately, there are very few scenes with them by themselves as those scenes just don't grab you. I should even put a caveat there as the worst offender is Dyoni. The actress seems a bit unsure of how to play the character and ends up being a bit more aloof that I think is needed. Temmosus is actually somewhat interesting given how few scenes he gets as he is the pure optimist, choosing to try peace rather than war. Alydon is more of a blend but I think that style of character was done better as Taron in Planet of the Daleks.

Since I have introduced the concept of the Thals being a bit dull, let's talk about the limitation of this story and that is its padding. Granted, your appreciation of this story is going to be far different if you actually space it out over seven weeks rather than watch it in one or two sittings as most modern fans do. That emphasizes the padding and makes it so much more noticeable. I ended watching this in two sittings and got through Episode Five before I had to stop and the only part that bothered me was Episode Two where they were in the cell. Going back the next day, even the famously drawn out crevasse jump scene in Episode Six didn't feel that bad and I'm sure would have been very tense for the kids watching.

These two instances led me to think that the padding that Terry Nation puts in is only that heavily noticeable when there is no movement. I don't think he does people sitting and talking very well the way Malcolm Hulke or Robert Holmes does. Nation is a writer that is entertaining when things are moving. So even the crevasse scene is not that bad because there is movement and you know that someone is going to fall. It gains tension even if it is too much time paid to. But having the four sit around dying of radiation poisoning while Ian tries to get his legs to work and also convince Susan that she has to go to the TARDIS just gets dull. Contrast that scene to a similar one in Episode Three where they are all working together to escape and even though it is again them confined in a room and talking, there is action in the form of a plan taking shape and stuff being done to implement that plan.

There are two other points that really bother me from a story standpoint. The first is that Alydon joins Ian's team after they emerge from the mountains. If Alydon was able to do that, it effectively means that the entire journey through the swamp and the mountains (with two deaths to beat) was totally pointless. Ian's team gained no advantage if a Thal group that came through a frontal assault was able to join and work with them. It might be argued that the Daleks became aware of Ian's team in the city and that caused them to redirect their defenses which allowed Alydon's team to get in, but that is not made clear. I think it would have worked better if we had seen Alydon's team attack the control room, grabbing the Dalek's attention and then having Ian's team attack and getting the drop on the Daleks as the plan was more originally constructed.

My other objection is the oddity of the Daleks not being aware of their need for radiation. You would think that after several hundred years, the Daleks would have come up with their own anti-radiation treatments and figured out that their physiology had adapted to the radiation long before this. It is this lack of drugs or understanding of their physiology that both drives the plot in Episode Two and then provides the added danger of the countdown (which is rather unnecessary) in Episodes Six and Seven. It's just something added that makes no real sense and don't really add anything to the overall plot of the story.

Going back to the positive side, I think the end of Episode One where an unseen Dalek except for the plunger approaching Barbara is one of the best cliffhangers in the scene. It is played very well by Jacqueline Hill and when done on top of the already disorienting cinematography of her being cut off and herded deeper in, it must have scared the kids watching immeasurably. You can also tell that it was a second go around because there is a different reaction in the recap at the start of Episode Two and it just doesn't work as well in ratcheting up the tension. But the one in Episode One is excellent.

On that note, the design and direction are quite good in this story. Even though a lot of sets are reused, they do it in such a way that it really disguises the reuse. The action flows well and you get very good performances out of nearly all the actors. I think you could show this story to a more modern audience and they would have a measure of respect for the way it looks and their objections would be restricted to story and pacing which is just so different in today's television.

Overall I would say that this is a good story, better than what is generally expected. Because there is so much repetition with Nation, I think fans feel they have the measure of this story and prejudge it based on their knowledge of other stories. They also object to the obvious padding and while that does drag the story at a few points, it is moves pretty well. I wouldn't have a problem sitting down with this one again in the near future but I also think that if you were going to expose a new fan to this, it would be better done in smaller chunks, only one or two episodes at a time to allow them to digest it. It might make the padded nature of it seem like less of a slog if they are not used to that format.

Overall personal score: 4 out of 5

The Ark

They were treated like slaves. Is it no wonder that when they got the chance they repaid you in kind?

The Ark is a story that I don't know much about other than that the principle aliens are the Monoids and that it is divided into two halves with the cliffhanger of Episode Two being the statue with a Monoid head. I've never heard anyone speak highly of it so I'm expecting a story that rather mundane. Usually if a story is openly bad, it gets a little extra attention just for that. Forgettable stories just fade into the ether.

Plot Summary

The TARDIS lands in the midst of a jungle filled with Earth creatures. Dodo, who is suffering from a cold, assumes they've landed in a zoo and goes wandering off. Steven follows her, chastising her for being so cavalier. The Doctor also believes they are in a zoo of some kind but notes a metallic sky and mechanical vibration in the floor.

They have actually landed on a ship and in the crew area, a trial is being held regarding a crewman who endangered the lives of others both human and the alien Monoids, who escaped to Earth from their own dying world and are now travelling with these humans who are escaping the dying Earth. The defendant is found guilty and placed into a machine that shrinks him to a microscopic level where he is then frozen and placed into storage. One Monoid enters and informs the court that strangers have arrived and a group of Monoids go to investigate.

The Doctor and his party become aware of the search party and duck into a cave to avoid them. Once past, they walk out and into the inhabited part of the ship, with the Doctor realizing they are on a ship. The Monoid search party finds them and they are taken to the Commander.

The Commander welcomes them and explains their history and their goal of traveling to a world seven hundred years travel away. Most of the human colonists have been shrunk and frozen, leaving a small group to breed and man the ship along with the Monoids. The group is also shown a statue being built as a symbol of unity among the crew.

As they talk, the Commander begins to feel a bit ill. As his fever grows, a flatbed cart is driven in by a Monoid with another Monoid on it. Both the Monoid and the Commander have contracted Dodo's cold and their lack of immunity is making it worse than for Dodo. The Monoid dies and the Commander becomes incoherent. The deputy commander, Zentos, accuses the Doctor's party of being agents of the planet they intend to colonize and orders them arrested.

As the cold spreads, Zentos orders the Doctor, Dodo and Steven to be put on trial as saboteurs. Steven elects to be the representative at the court with a man named Rhos and the Commander's daughter Millium acting as defense. During the trial, word comes that a human has died from the illness and the crowd declares the defendants guilty and to be executed by being ejected into space. Also during the trial, Steven falls ill from the cold and is taken back to the cell.

Millium goes to her father and rouses him enough to order that the Doctor be given a chance to find a cure for the illness and that Steven is to be the test subject. If he fails, they will be executed. The Doctor readily accepts and has Dodo and the Monoids bring him ingredients from the TARDIS and the animals in the jungle. Working with both the human scientists and a Monoid technician, the Doctor synthesizes a cure and injects Steven with it. His fever spikes briefly and then breaks. Dodo heads out to inform the others and the cure is passed out to all the others.

Apologetic, Zentos releases them and wishes them well on their travels. The three leave in the TARDIS only to have it reappear in the same place. Confused, they walk out to look for the people they just met and find the space nearly empty. They do find the statue has been completed, only instead of being a man like the plans, it has the face of a Monoid.

The Doctor investigates the empty control room to find it fully automated. He also discovers that the Monoids have taken over and are now using the humans as slaves. The Doctor, Dodo and Steven are discovered by the Monoid second-in-command who takes them to the Monoid leader. The leader recognizes them as the same travelers from the past. He also relates that Dodo's cold mutated after they left, weakening the humans and Monoids in it's wake. The Monoids, encouraged by the humans to improve themselves, learned to make weapons and rose up in a violent revolution.

The three are sent to the security kitchen to assist in the preparation of food. The Doctor and Steven rally the humans to try and rise up against the Monoids but they are beaten back and one is killed by reinforcements. The Doctor and Dodo are taken out of the kitchen with Steven left as a promise of good behavior.

Approaching the planet Refusis II, the Monoids launch a landing craft with the Monoid second-in-command, his human slave, the Doctor and Dodo. They explore the planet but see no one. They do find a castle and enter it. The Monoid begins to destroy things to get the inhabitants attention but he is stopped by an invisible power. The Doctor calmly talks with the Refusian and learns they were altered into beings of energy by a solar flare impacting their planet. They welcome new inhabitants, so long as they are peaceful, and have taken steps to build shelters for them, including the castle.

Back on the ship, the Monoids plan to land on the planet and colonize it once they have a report. They also plan to blow up the Ark and all it's inhabitants with a bomb in the statue, ridding themselves of the remaining humans. One of the slaves overhears this and runs to the kitchen to warn the others.

This plan is also let slip by the second-in-command to his slave and Dodo. The slave tries to fight him but is shot down. The Monoid continues back to the landing craft, unaware that he is being followed by a Refusian. He signals the Ark but before he can relate the information about the Refusians, the Refusian blows up the landing craft, killing the second-in-command and leaving the Doctor and Dodo stranded on the planet.

Concerned over the failure of communications with Two, the lead Monoid orders that all Monoids, including the preserved ones, head down to the planet. However, Monoid Four believes that they should stay on the Ark and begins to foment dissent among some of the Monoids.

Knowing that they need to find the bomb, Steven and the others watch the Monoids prepare to depart. One man, Maharis, sneaks out after finishing loading the pods with the Monoid colonist trays and releases the others from the kitchen. After the Monoids depart the ship, they begin to scour the ship for the bomb.

On the planet, the Doctor and Dodo hide while the Monoids look for Two and the inhabitants of the planet. The Doctor and Dodo sneak aboard one landing craft and signal the Ark. The Doctor and Steven devise a plan where they will keep looking for the bomb while the Doctor tries to get it's location from the Monoids. As an added distraction, the Doctor has the Refusian he has been in contact with, take the landing craft back to the Ark.

The Doctor and Dodo surrender to the Monoids and the Monoids are equally dumbfounded by the landing craft departing when they cannot see anyone flying it. Interrogated by Monoid One, the Doctor insists that he and Dodo have not seen anyone. Unnerved, Monoid Four openly defies the leader and leads some of the Monoids back to the pods with the intention of taking the Ark elsewhere. Monoid One gloats that as the bomb is in the statue, he will find it difficult to move, allowing the Doctor to learn of it's location. Monoid One then gathers his followers to deal with Monoid Four's insubordination.

On the Ark, Maharis decides to take the landing craft back to Refusis to help the Doctor. Another collaborator, Dassuk, insists on going along and they head down. They land to see the Monoids in a firefight with each other. Dassuk tries to give himself to them but he is shot down. Maharis and those that accompanied him run to the castle where they tell the lone Monoid guard that Monoid One has sent for him to help in the fight.

Unguarded, the humans and the Doctor make their way back to the landing craft where the Doctor signals Steven that the bomb is in the statue. On board, the Refusian uses he powers to levitate the statue to the landing bay and Steven and another human named Venussa launch it into space where it explodes harmlessly.

The humans come down to the planet where they disarm the few surviving Monoids, Monoids One and Four having been killed in the fight. The Refusians allow them to colonize the planet so long as the two species live in peace. The Doctor chastises the humans noting that their ancestors enslaved the Monoids, embittering them towards the humans. If they treat each other as equals, they will live well together.

The Doctor, Steven and Dodo depart in the TARDIS. While in flight, the Doctor has a slight cough and as he does so, he begins to become invisible. Steven asks if this is similar to the Refusians but the Doctor informs him that he believes they are under attack from a more powerful source.

Analysis

I think The Ark can best be described as something that is there as it is not overly engaging. I do think that the second half of the story is better than the first, but neither is particularly engaging.

I think unquestionably the best thing about this story is the Doctor. The Doctor is calm, collected and inquisitive. He aims to help and doesn't get flustered, even when things go against him. He is also quite proactive, which is somewhat unusual for the First Doctor. Steven still takes the lead on much of the action but the Doctor goes out of his way to do things on his own. He actively petitions to help cure the plague in the first half, he instigates the feelings of rebellion in the second and actively works to thwart the Monoids and lend as much aid as possible to Steven in finding the bomb. He does all this with a chipper sense of adventure that is sometimes lacking with the First Doctor and it is enjoyable.

I'm not much for linguistics and it's been a while since I watched The Massacre so Dodo's switch from a more working class accent to the posh version was entirely lost on me. She was okay in this story though a bit dim. I got the feeling that she was intended to be more of a comic relief type of character, especially when dealing with the cold in the first half. In the second, she took a more subservient role to the Doctor and behaved more or less as the average 60's female companion: look nice and don't get in the Doctor's way. I didn't have a problem with it but there was nothing particularly catching about it either.

Steven was typical Steven. He took on a slightly exasperated parent tone when dealing with Dodo in Episode One, which did amuse me as Vicki had a similar tone when dealing with Steven in The Time Meddler. But once things got real, he settled down into his usual role. Episode Two didn't give him much other than the trial at the beginning but in the second half of the story, he went into typical action-man mode, going so far as to metaphorically slapping around the human slaves. He did well, but again, there wasn't much outside of what I would have expected. It was Steven being Steven and he did it well but nothing outside of that.

If there was a point where this story really fell down it was in the acting of the guest cast. This is more so in the first half. I actually didn't have a problem with the Monoids as I thought they were reasonably well designed and did about as well as you would expect a man in a suit to do. As such, when they were the focus in the second half, shortfalls in the acting did not register as much.

The real problems came with the human crew. The worst offender I thought was the Commander who falls ill at the end of Episode One. He has one good moment where a criminal is put into storage. After that, his delivery is terrible and he doesn't seem to know which direction he should take himself. Mellium is okay but she is every bland 60's female guest actor. She has her moments of stilted delivery and just standing about looking pretty which makes her quite uninteresting. Similarly Zentos is every zealous over-reactionary we've seen before. He chews the scenery while proclaiming the Doctor and his companions to be evil with no proof. He stands in a position of self-righteousness only to be humbled later as we have seen so many times before. If the acting doesn't get you, the genericness of the characters will.

There is a bit of an improvement in the second half as all the human characters seem to be portrayed by better actors, but there is so little time devoted to them, that it is impossible to care about them. I actually lost track of who was who at one point because all the men just seemed to look like each other. I guess that should be expected when you start with a relatively small genetic pool and then look forward seven hundred years, but it made the story just that much more difficult to follow. The standout was Venussa, not only because she was a woman but also because she seemed to be a slightly better actress and seemed to be the most enthusiastic about the revolution.

It's actually a bit of a shame that more time could not have been devoted to them because there was an interesting angle could have been explored about the collaborators and their relationship with the Monoids and then back to the humans. It's glossed over in a bit of a hasty way in this story with only the one die-hard collaborator who is gunned down by his masters when he surprises them.

Another thing that bugged me about this story is the nature of the plague that developed. Dodo has a generic cold, a bout of the sniffles essentially when they land. I can understand it felling the inhabitants of the Ark and being nastier there as they are lacking the level of immunity that Dodo and Steven have. However, even without that immunity, death from a cold seems like an extreme reaction. What's more, Steven catches the disease but instead of having symptoms like Dodo, the virus has apparently mutated in the span of a few hours to fell him during the trial. This makes no sense as the base level germ should have been the same to what he was exposed to in the TARDIS. At one point when hiding, Steven had his hand over Dodo's mouth to keep her quiet so he has been more than exposed to the germ. Yet, rather than having an immunity to it, he is felled just as bad as the others. Even if he had not yet fully gotten Dodo's cold, he should have displayed symptoms similar to hers, given his own build up of immunities over the years. A slight fever maybe but it should have essentially been a runny nose, watery eyes and sneezing.

I would argue that the disease is not Dodo's cold but in fact some other germ that they've been exposed to and brought with them. The Doctor is immune because of his different physiology and Dodo does not get it because her cold has her immune system working harder and it repels the bulk of the infection without any significant effects. The passengers are felled first because of their lack of prior immunities but then Steven goes down with similar symptoms, demonstrating that it is a different bug. At least, that's how I like to think of it.

Jumping back to the Monoids, I rather liked the design even if the Beatles haircuts are a bit much. I would also note that despite what the Doctor says in Episode Four, there isn't a lot of evidence showing the Monoids as slaves in the first two episodes. Monoid One even goes so far as to mock the humans for encouraging their learning which allowed them to rise up. I thought it rather a weak sauce to make the idea of peace a little easier at the end by implying the humans were just as guilty as the Monoids, despite there being no evidence in the story of that guilt. It is actually a Monoid death that prompts Zentos to have the Doctor and his companions arrested, which doesn't seem like the actions of a slave master. I think it would have worked a bit better if the Monoids felt like they were being oppressed and the Doctor telling both sides they needed to talk to each other rather than just have the Doctor pronounce guilt on the humans, mitigating the Monoid's actions.

One positive point was the model work. Both the model statue and the ships were quite well done and I thought that was good work for the time. All the sets really were well done, although the idea of a "security kitchen" is a little dumb. I'm also not sure a real elephant was necessary to convey the feeling of the Ark, but it did add a nice little bit of extra flair.

I'm a bit indifferent about the Refusians. They were a literal Deus Ex Machina with the added benefit of being invisible so you save money on design. The story worked well enough with them, though the addition of god-like beings did make the Monoids seem like much more adept villains that normal. Or the humans as just that much more pathetic. Take you choice there.

If you can get past the faults of the first two episodes, this story isn't terrible. I wouldn't recommend it as a first run on the First Doctor era as there are much better stories out there. But it has some good points and at least a bit of fun adventure in the second half. The concept is definitely sound and one that should be played with more often (such as is implied in The Face of Evil) but this is more of a first draft effort.

Overall personal score: 2 out of 5