We are not amused!
Tooth and Claw was the second episode of the Second Series and the second celebrity historical with Queen Victoria. Victoria is actually played by the same actress who nearly became a companion to the Second Doctor (Samantha in The Faceless Ones) except that she turned it down when offered, presumably due to other commitments, paving the way for Victoria Waterfield in The Evil of the Daleks. I remembered being not overly impressed by this story the first time around, in contrast to most fan reaction, so we'll see if it plays better a second time.
Plot Summary
A group of monks arrive at a country estate called Torchwood House in 1879 and take the household prisoner, locking them in the basement with a creature in a cage. Nearby, the Doctor and Rose land, undershooting their intended target of a 1979 concert. They run into the caravan of Queen Victoria who was forced to abandon the train due to a tree on the tracks. She is now making for Torchwood House to spend the night. The Doctor uses the psychic paper to convince the queen that he has been appointed as Lord Protector over her person and he is invited along.
The group arrives at the house where the monks are posing as staff and the master of the house, Sir Robert, is being forced to assist in their plan. The group is invited in and Sir Robert shows the Queen, the Doctor and Rose the house. The Doctor becomes fascinated by a telescope built by Sir Robert's father who was a close friend of Prince Albert prior to his death and would come up for visits. Sir Robert begins to tell the legend of the wolf but is interrupted by Father Angelo suggesting that everyone freshen up before dinner.
Each person heads to a different room to prepare. The Queen also has a special package locked away for safekeeping. The monks pass out mugs of drugged tea and knock out all the guards, leaving the Queen, Sir Robert, the Doctor, Rose and Captain Reynolds (commander of the Queen's guard) awake. While Rose is dressing for dinner, she discovers a maid named Flora who tells her of what happened. They go to warn the Doctor but are captured by the monks and chained with everyone else in the basement.
At dinner, Sir Robert continues with the story of the wolf, which parallel's the typical werewolf legend. He also notes that his father and Prince Albert indulged in the tales a great deal during his visits and Sir Robert suspects that his father actually believed the legend to be true. He notes that while most of the slaughter was against livestock, once a generation a child would disappear, usually a boy, as well. As they talk, Father Angelo, posing as the butler, moves to the window and begins chanting.
In the basement, a young man is enclosed in the cage but with dilated eyes. Rose recognizes a sign of alien life and communicates with it. It admits to being alien, infecting new bodies as the old ones deteriorate, but does not admit it's origin. The moon begins to break through the clouds and the man begins to change into a wolf. Rose urges everyone to ignore the change and pull on the chain binding them together. In the dining room, the Doctor becomes alarmed at the monk's change and he and Sir Robert leave the room, following the sound of the howls. They open the door just as Rose and the staff pull the chain loose and the werewolf breaks free from it's cage.
Father Angelo disarms Captain Reynolds but Queen Victoria pulls a gun from her purse and shoots him. The gamekeeping staff pull weapons from the cabinet and fire at the werewolf, driving it back. It regroups and kills the gamekeepers and the butler while the rest retreat. Sir Robert's wife and the maids head for the kitchen to escape but find the doors boarded shut and guarded by armed monks. Sir Robert also discovers this in another room and he is shot at while trying to open the windows for Victoria to escape.
The group retreats further in, the Queen retrieving her valuables from the safe and meet Captain Reynolds in the hall. He holds off the werewolf while Sir Robert, the Queen, the Doctor and Rose barricade themselves in the library. The wolf kills Reynolds but does not burst in to the room, instead looking for another way in. The Doctor discovers that the walls are varnished with the oil of mistletoe, something the women notice the monk guards wearing outside. He deduces that the wolf is allergic to mistletoe and that buys them time to look through the books for answers.
The Doctor pulls one book and discovers that the ship from which the wolf landed, crashed over three hundred years ago near the abbey of the monks. He theorizes that only a small sample of the cells survived the crash and took hundred of years to grow into the form it is now. Rose tells how the man, before transforming, spoke of wanting the Queen and to create the empire of the wolf. The Queen produces her hidden treasure, a great diamond that Prince Albert always brought with him to be cut down, suggesting that the wolf might want it. The Doctor realizes Sir Robert's father and Prince Albert had actually been collaborating, planning a trap in case the wolf ever attacked the house.
The werewolf bursts into the room through the skylight and the group runs to the observatory. Sir Robert's wife emerges and throws a bucket of mistletoe tea on the werewolf which causes the creature to retreat. The women return to the kitchen while Sir Robert stands guard outside the observatory room. The Doctor and Rose begin to align the telescope with the moon, the Doctor telling Rose that it is actually a light focusing machine, using the large diamond as the final focus for the moonlight.
The wolf recovers and kills Sir Robert before bursting into the room. It scratches the Queen as the Doctor finishes aligning the machine. A beam of moonlight comes out and hits the wolf, paralyzing it. He tightens the beam through the diamond and the wolf evaporates through overexposure to the light.
The Queen knights the Doctor and Rose for their services and then banishes them from the realm due to their cavalier and un-Godly attitude towards things of the planets and stars. She also takes the Torchwood House from Sir Robert's widow who doesn't want it anymore to establish the Torchwood Institute to defend against alien menaces, including the Doctor. The Doctor and Rose return to the TARDIS, speculating that the Queen has become infected with the werewolf DNA and that it is reaffirming itself in the Royal family.
Analysis
This story is a bit of a mixed bag for me. On one hand, it is a fast paced adventure story with an interesting and more energetic take on Queen Victoria. On the other hand, it breaks it's own tension in the wrong places, is rather poorly directed and retains too much flab on the end that could have been better served elsewhere.
The Doctor is pretty good in this one, although he is rather light-hearted through the whole adventure. It's an odd shift with the next story being School Reunion and the darker Doctor persona comes through. I also wish there had been a little more time and volume devoted to the Doctor explaining the werewolf. He passes it off very quickly, mostly mumbling and I couldn't even begin to tell you what he said other than light transference. But still, he was enjoyable especially in the direct adventure parts. I did also like the nod to Jamie, allowing David Tennant to use his natural Scottish accent for a time.
I did not like Rose in this one. In fact, this story may be one of the strongest examples of my dislike for Rose. She is cavalier in this story to the point of being just a brat. One of the best scenes is Queen Victoria telling off Rose for cracking a joke when their lives are at risk and a man has just died to save them. It shows a real detachment from Rose. She is confident that the Doctor will save her and the situation in general so minor deaths and the overall tension of the situation are flippancies to her.
She also instigates a moment I didn't like in the Doctor where he also breaks the mood by having a moment with Rose about how cool it is to be encountering a werewolf. Even Doctor's who had flippant attitudes, such as the Fourth Doctor, would have respect over people who were killed, especially in his defense. It's an unfortunate attitude to be seen in the Tenth Doctor and Rose only feeds into that.
I liked Queen Victoria, especially when she acted against type. She is often depicted in history as a stogy sourpuss and it was nice to see her portrayed as a robust and relatively independent woman, though still tenderhearted, especially where Prince Albert is concerned. I enjoyed that she went so far as to kill Father Angelo, although had hesitation and remorse about it. It's only at the end of the story where she reverts back into type that she gets boring. I especially disliked the heavy-handed bit of exposition regarding the establishment of Torchwood. I thought that section poorly written and not very well acted either.
Most of the rest of the cast was decent, although not memorable. That's not unusual, but I thought it a bit of a waste with Father Angelo. After showing such fortitude in the first half of the story, to simply stand there while Victoria shoots him seemed highly anti-climatic. It also would have solved the problem of adding a little color to the villain. The werewolf worked fine as the monster, and I thought the CGI pretty good for the time, but the werewolf also has no personality, meaning no depth from a villain standpoint. I think Doctor Who works better when the villain has more color and thought, which Father Angelo could have provided. Having a unkillable beastie makes for a one-note villain that gets a bit tired after a while. To be fair, this is a somewhat common complaint anytime a werewolf is used as a villain in any medium.
I did not like the camera work in this story. In the beginning, the monks enter and go very kung-fu on the people of the house, but the cutting is so disjointed that it is just a horrible mishmash of faces and people falling over. There is a similar overuse of close ups throughout the story and when a longshot is actually used, you feel almost a sense of relief, even if that longshot shows the wolf advancing up a hallway. Outside of these, there wasn't much else to note, as most of the shots were fairly static and didn't provide much else to draw you in, relying on the overall story to do that instead.
The story itself was fine with the fast pace of a running from a monster providing the bulk of the it. It indulged in the most common clichés of monster stories including having a strongman believing that he has killed the monster be instead killed by it and having it be vulnerable to a common thing, allowing the heroes the time they need to figure out how to defeat it. If you are in the mood for a simple run around, that works fine. If you want more depth (a la Midnight), this will disappoint you.
The ending also disappointed me. Victoria's reversion of personality I think was supposed to be funny, but it didn't really work for me, especially after having been through the adventure. I also didn't care for the casual dismissal of the Royal family being werewolves. Not that I care about them, but they just spent the whole story defeating an evil monster who reveled in death and destruction. To pass off that the entity survived and reestablish itself a hundred years later in a joke fashion undercut the whole theme of the story.
I also thought it rather silly about turning hemophilia into a joke about werewolves, both in its attitude and logic. Seven of Victoria's nine children were married by the time this would have happened so to suggest that a blood disease would have passed to them at the time when she already had a number of grandchildren makes no sense whatsoever. Given the tragic deaths of several of her descendants due to hemophilia and the implications of the disease, it's also in somewhat poor taste to pass it off as a lycanthropic affliction. It's a lame joke at the current royal's expense that does offer a genuine detraction to the overall story.
In the end, I'd have to say my reservation in going back to this was somewhat justified. It wasn't terrible and I generally enjoyed the chase part, but the rest of the story just didn't do it for me. That one of the main characters made herself somewhat painful to watch in the story didn't help in it's passing. This is a quick adventure story to put on the background if you're in a certain mood. Not horrible, but I'd say the bad outweighs the good in this case.
Overall personal score: 1.5 out of 5
Monday, January 9, 2017
Friday, January 6, 2017
Time and the Rani
Time and tide wait for the snowman.
Time and the Rani might be considered the worst Doctor Who story ever. To be fair to it though, it was slapped together extremely quickly with no time for script editing nor any budget. They also did not get Colin Baker back to do a regeneration scene, not surprising given how insultingly he was dismissed. Still, it does exist as it's own thing and must stand on it's own merit.
Plot Summary
The TARDIS is pursued by the Rani and forced to crash on the planet Lakertya. An explosion on the TARDIS causes him to regenerate as the Rani forces her way in and takes him prisoner, leaving Mel behind. The Doctor wakes later in the Rani's lab and tries to fight his way out but he is knocked out by her Tetrap servant. She then injects him with a chemical to inflict short term amnesia.
One of the locals, Ikona, captures Mel believing her to be allied with the Rani. He intends a hostage swap with the Rani for the Lakertyan leader Beyus, who is being forced to assist her. One of the other Lakertyans attempt to escape the Rani but is killed in a bubble trap. Mel prevents Ikona from falling into a similar trap and he realizes that she is telling the truth about not being allied with the Rani. The two of them make their way into a disused pipe to hide from the Rani's guards.
The Rani disguises herself as Mel and as the Doctor comes to, she convinces him that he was working on a machine in the lab and injured in the explosion which caused him to regenerate. Confused by the memory loss, he assumes it's part of the regeneration crisis and begins to work on the machine. But he is easily distracted and eventually realizes he is lacking the proper equipment. The Rani, losing patience with the Doctor's antics, suggests they head back to the TARDIS to gather the equipment.
As they walk back, the Doctor begins to regain his memory and is also becoming more suspicious of "Mel". Entering the TARDIS, he picks a new outfit and then begins to hunt for the needed equipment. On the monitor, they spy the real Mel trying to get back to the TARDIS, although the Rani tries to convince the Doctor that she is the Rani. As Mel approaches, she stumbles and is caught in a bubble trap. She floats away and lands on the edge of a lake, the bubble being slightly trapped so that it doesn't roll on the detonator. Ikona follows Mel and frees her from the trap.
The Doctor and the Rani return to the lab where the Doctor discovers a flaw in the machine. The Rani leaves to get a replacement part while he continues to work. Mel and Ikona run into Faroon, Beyus' wife. They tell her what happened to her and Beyus' daughter and Faroon is determined to tell Beyus in person. She walks into the Rani's fortress. Mel is determined to follow and Ikona creates a distraction for the Tetrap guard, allowing her to get in.
Mel meets the Doctor but he initially believes her to be the Rani while she is confused about his new appearance. They check each other's pulses to see if they are telling the truth and realize the deception. They meet with Beyus and Faroon, discovering that the Rani has captured some of Earth's greatest scientific minds and is holding them in suspended animation. She has also reserved a space for the Doctor.
Outside, the distracted Tetrap guard captures the Rani, believing her to be Mel. He frees her upon realizing his mistake and escorts her to her TARDIS where she retrieves the needed materials. She heads back and Mel and Faroon hide. The Doctor pretends as though he still thinks she's Mel, but the Rani quickly guesses that he has discerned the truth.
The Doctor flees and tries to hide in the Tetrap lair where he is quickly surrounded by the creatures. But Beyus activates the feeding system and releases the Doctor. He sends the Doctor out but also tells him to go to the leisure center of his people to understand why he obeys the Rani. He tries to stop the Doctor when the Doctor takes a piece of equipment from the Rani's machine but the Doctor knocks him down and escapes. He meets Ikona outside who saves him from an attacking Tetrap and takes him to the Lakertyan city.
Outside, Faroon returns to the city and Mel tries to get back to the TARDIS but is captured by the Tetraps. She is brought back to the Rani and held as a hostage until the Doctor returns the stolen piece of equipment.
Inside the leisure center, which Ikona is disdainful of, the Doctor discovers a sphere installed by the Rani. The Rani, learning of the Doctor's arrival and warning against helping him, opens a panel in the sphere releasing several deadly insects. They sting and kill two Lakertyans while the rest flee. Outside, a Tetrap offers the Rani's deal to the Doctor, which he accepts.
Mel arrives with the Tetrap and the exchange is made but Mel then disappears and the Doctor learns he has been tricked by a hologram. He decides to reinfiltrate the Rani's lab. Iknoa again distracts the guards but additional guards show up and the Doctor is captured. Mel is released from the prison and ordered to assist Beyus with the computers while the Doctor is brought in and installed in the cabinet earmarked for him.
Once installed, the Rani activates the machine and the various minds are directed into a giant brain in a sealed chamber. She is transferring their minds to it to aid her in developing a means to detonate a passing asteroid made of a material called "strange matter", which normally can only be detonated by interacting with itself. The resulting explosion would create a supernova and interact with the Lakertyan atmosphere, creating time particles. Lakertya would then be transformed into a giant time engine, allowing the Rani to manipulate large swaths of time for her own purposes.
The Rani dispatches the Tetraps who enter the Lakertyan city and fit all the Lakertyans with ankle bands that will kill them if they are removed or if a master switch is activated. As the Tetraps leave the Rani's lab, Ikona sneaks into the lab.
The Rani, observing the brain, begins to notice that the Doctor is beginning to infuse the brain with his own discordant personality. Angered that he might override the calculations, she pulls him out of his cabinet but before she can attack him, she is grabbed from behind by Ikona and shoved into the cabinet herself and locked in. The Doctor studies the brain, deducing it's function and figuring a way to stop it.
The Rani threatens Beyus as he passes by and he releases her, fearing for his people's safety. The Rani confronts the Doctor and admits that her plan will destroy all life on Lakertya, a fact that is overheard by the lead Tetrap. The Doctor and Mel get past the Rani while she is distracted by the brain completing it's calculations and informing her of what material she must fill the nose of the missile with.
The Doctor, Mel and Ikona return to the Lakertyan city to raise the people to fight the Rani. The Doctor manages to free them from their detonation bracelets and collects them in his umbrella. He and Mel then race back to the Rani's lab.
While they are away, the Rani finishes loading the missile and prepares to leave for her TARDIS. The chief Tetrap, aware of the consequences, offers to go with her in the TARDIS but she orders him to stay and contain the Lakertyans. He then follows her at a distance as she leaves, leaving the lab abandoned.
The Doctor and Mel return and use the bracelets to surround the brain and create a field, delaying the countdown. Beyus offers to stay and activate the bracelets. The Doctor and Mel run out and confront the Rani as Beyus activates the devices, halting the countdown at four seconds. The Rani angrily overrides the system, blowing up the brain and Beyus but launching the missile. She then leaves in her TARDIS.
The missile launch destroys the Rani's lab and the Doctor reassures the Lakertyans as the delay in launch threw the missile off it's trajectory and it misses the asteroid. He and Mel then depart in his TARDIS, while in the Rani's TARDIS, the Tetraps have taken over and captured her, preparing to take her back to their home planet where he mind will be used to help their people.
Analysis
After watching the first episode, I saw two possibilities for this story. Either it was going to turn in to The Twin Dilemma where it plummeted into badness around Episodes Three or Four, or this story was not going to be as bad as I expected. In the end, I have to say that I don't think this one is that bad. It's not particularly good, but I don't see why it typically finishes so low in various polls.
The Seventh Doctor's regeneration crisis seems to be quirkiness. Early in the story, there is heavy dose of physical comedy that thankfully starts to go away and is banished when we get to Paradise Towers. Throughout the story he has a constant quirk of misstating common sayings, which could have gotten old, but I'm actually a little sorry didn't stick around as a gimmick of his. Once or twice in a story would have been sufficient. But other than those, the Seventh Doctor emerges mostly as himself, just a touch more manic than he will become and I can't fault that. Had the physical comedy continued, it would have grated, but I see no problem with the Seventh Doctor in this story.
Mel is not great but she's not overly annoying either. He worst trait is that she does a lot of screaming in this story and most of it unnecessarily. I understand a scream when first confronted by a Tetrap as it does a little jump scare and most people find bats somewhat repulsive. I can also justify screaming her head off when in the bubble trap, given it's design to kill you. But after that, he screaming should have been curtailed. There is no reason for Mel to scream her head off every time she sees a Tetrap, even if they are grabbing her. I would have liked to have seen a bit more backbone and fortitude from her.
That being said, Mel did not fall into a whimpering mess the way Peri usually did. When not screaming, Mel was offering comfort and planning to the Lakertyans. She was always trying to help them or get back to the Doctor so she did show some fire and independence. I would have liked for her to be given a chance at some subterfuge or sabotage when she was forced to work with Beyus on the computers and that might have developed if there had been time for a rewrite or two. Still, on the whole, Mel is passible in this one and doesn't go poorly as she does in later stories.
The Rani continues to be enjoyable in this story. If the whole story had been like Episode One and part of Episode Two where the Doctor and the Rani work together (even under deception), this would be a far more enjoyable story just because I don't think anyone can get tired of the Rani's constant frustration and asides with the Doctor. It's not quite as self aware as in The Mark of the Rani but she also doesn't have the Master to play off. Still, it is enjoyable, especially as she has to keep herself from throttling the Doctor.
Unfortunately, once the posing as Mel phase is over, the Rani becomes much more of a generic villain. Her witticisms dry up and it becomes all about ordering the henchmen about to ensure the success of the plan. Her performance is still decent, but it loses the thing that really makes her stand out. Plus I kept getting distracted by a spot on side of her nose that I never really noticed in prior Episodes.
Another reason I thought at first that maybe this story was derided so much was because of the performance of the Lakertyans but that is not the case. Beyus and Faroon are well acted and carry the gravitas of a cowed people trying to preserve themselves. Ikona started a little shaky but as the action continued, his performance improved greatly. Sarn wasn't very good but she dies halfway through Episode One so it is only a small blemish and they other Lakertyans don't get enough screen time or dialogue to make any kind of impact. I had no qualms about them and didn't see any particular problems with their makeup either.
There were some production shortfalls, but nothing that ruined the story for me. The Tetraps weren't great but as long as they stayed in shadow, they worked reasonably well. I think if the outdoor scenes had been filmed later, it would have helped make them work a bit better. Likewise a later time might have helped diminish the need for tinting the sky as much. It wasn't as jarring as in Mindwarp, but it was still a pretty obvious computer effect that stood out whenever seen.
But I can imagine that the point where most people throw up their hands is the giant brain. It makes no sense. Where did it come from or how it was made is completely ignored. Nor is why a brain is used rather than just a large computer. It's something thrown in to be weird and I think just a touch horrifying for young kids but ends up coming across as just dumb. It doesn't help that the brain looks very much like the fabric prop that it actually was. Dimming the lights in the room helped but it still doesn't look particularly good and the story starts to go off the rails.
In my own mind, I can imagine that Pip and Jane Baker probably had an outline of a story they were working on to submit later and had probably gone over a few scenes before they got the desperation call from JNT. This is how I imagine that Episodes One and Two have a bit more depth and are more memorable. Episodes Three and Four have a much more slapdash feel and I think this is the point where what is on screen was a first draft effort rather than having been massaged a bit like the earlier script. Still, for me, this isn't so bad that it ruins the whole experience. It is still fairly well acted and the worst parts don't go on for so long that it becomes a slog.
Probably more bothersome to me than the brain was the lazy plot device of the bracelet bombs. The Rani was already controlling the population with the threat of deadly insects so why the bracelets except as something for the Doctor to use? Again, in a second or third draft, the insects would have been excised and only the bracelets would have been used as a means of controlling the population. The Doctor freeing them would have had the liberating effect of prompting them to action and it would have given Beyus the freedom to rise up as the Rani now could not commit instant genocide against his people. The Tetraps could have easily fled the lab and invaded her TARDIS after overhearing the Rani as her betrayal of them was easily understood at that point.
I don't think story ever had the potential of being great, but it had the potential of being better than it is. But I also think that in that lost potential, it is not as bad as it is made out to be. It moves quickly and the characters are all pretty much enjoyable. The plot is not overly complex, even if the Rani's plan is. It hums along well enough and any failures in production value were going to be there anyway because of budget and just the fact that it was the 1980's. Is it good? No. Is it terrible and something I would never watch again? Also no. I would call it slightly below average in my book, which rates it above at least two other Seventh Doctor stories. Would I watch it again? Probably, although I think I would get bored with it a second time around, especially in the later episodes. So for me, Dragonfire stands easily as the worst of the Seventh Doctor stories rather than this one.
Overall personal score: 2 out of 5
Time and the Rani might be considered the worst Doctor Who story ever. To be fair to it though, it was slapped together extremely quickly with no time for script editing nor any budget. They also did not get Colin Baker back to do a regeneration scene, not surprising given how insultingly he was dismissed. Still, it does exist as it's own thing and must stand on it's own merit.
Plot Summary
The TARDIS is pursued by the Rani and forced to crash on the planet Lakertya. An explosion on the TARDIS causes him to regenerate as the Rani forces her way in and takes him prisoner, leaving Mel behind. The Doctor wakes later in the Rani's lab and tries to fight his way out but he is knocked out by her Tetrap servant. She then injects him with a chemical to inflict short term amnesia.
One of the locals, Ikona, captures Mel believing her to be allied with the Rani. He intends a hostage swap with the Rani for the Lakertyan leader Beyus, who is being forced to assist her. One of the other Lakertyans attempt to escape the Rani but is killed in a bubble trap. Mel prevents Ikona from falling into a similar trap and he realizes that she is telling the truth about not being allied with the Rani. The two of them make their way into a disused pipe to hide from the Rani's guards.
The Rani disguises herself as Mel and as the Doctor comes to, she convinces him that he was working on a machine in the lab and injured in the explosion which caused him to regenerate. Confused by the memory loss, he assumes it's part of the regeneration crisis and begins to work on the machine. But he is easily distracted and eventually realizes he is lacking the proper equipment. The Rani, losing patience with the Doctor's antics, suggests they head back to the TARDIS to gather the equipment.
As they walk back, the Doctor begins to regain his memory and is also becoming more suspicious of "Mel". Entering the TARDIS, he picks a new outfit and then begins to hunt for the needed equipment. On the monitor, they spy the real Mel trying to get back to the TARDIS, although the Rani tries to convince the Doctor that she is the Rani. As Mel approaches, she stumbles and is caught in a bubble trap. She floats away and lands on the edge of a lake, the bubble being slightly trapped so that it doesn't roll on the detonator. Ikona follows Mel and frees her from the trap.
The Doctor and the Rani return to the lab where the Doctor discovers a flaw in the machine. The Rani leaves to get a replacement part while he continues to work. Mel and Ikona run into Faroon, Beyus' wife. They tell her what happened to her and Beyus' daughter and Faroon is determined to tell Beyus in person. She walks into the Rani's fortress. Mel is determined to follow and Ikona creates a distraction for the Tetrap guard, allowing her to get in.
Mel meets the Doctor but he initially believes her to be the Rani while she is confused about his new appearance. They check each other's pulses to see if they are telling the truth and realize the deception. They meet with Beyus and Faroon, discovering that the Rani has captured some of Earth's greatest scientific minds and is holding them in suspended animation. She has also reserved a space for the Doctor.
Outside, the distracted Tetrap guard captures the Rani, believing her to be Mel. He frees her upon realizing his mistake and escorts her to her TARDIS where she retrieves the needed materials. She heads back and Mel and Faroon hide. The Doctor pretends as though he still thinks she's Mel, but the Rani quickly guesses that he has discerned the truth.
The Doctor flees and tries to hide in the Tetrap lair where he is quickly surrounded by the creatures. But Beyus activates the feeding system and releases the Doctor. He sends the Doctor out but also tells him to go to the leisure center of his people to understand why he obeys the Rani. He tries to stop the Doctor when the Doctor takes a piece of equipment from the Rani's machine but the Doctor knocks him down and escapes. He meets Ikona outside who saves him from an attacking Tetrap and takes him to the Lakertyan city.
Outside, Faroon returns to the city and Mel tries to get back to the TARDIS but is captured by the Tetraps. She is brought back to the Rani and held as a hostage until the Doctor returns the stolen piece of equipment.
Inside the leisure center, which Ikona is disdainful of, the Doctor discovers a sphere installed by the Rani. The Rani, learning of the Doctor's arrival and warning against helping him, opens a panel in the sphere releasing several deadly insects. They sting and kill two Lakertyans while the rest flee. Outside, a Tetrap offers the Rani's deal to the Doctor, which he accepts.
Mel arrives with the Tetrap and the exchange is made but Mel then disappears and the Doctor learns he has been tricked by a hologram. He decides to reinfiltrate the Rani's lab. Iknoa again distracts the guards but additional guards show up and the Doctor is captured. Mel is released from the prison and ordered to assist Beyus with the computers while the Doctor is brought in and installed in the cabinet earmarked for him.
Once installed, the Rani activates the machine and the various minds are directed into a giant brain in a sealed chamber. She is transferring their minds to it to aid her in developing a means to detonate a passing asteroid made of a material called "strange matter", which normally can only be detonated by interacting with itself. The resulting explosion would create a supernova and interact with the Lakertyan atmosphere, creating time particles. Lakertya would then be transformed into a giant time engine, allowing the Rani to manipulate large swaths of time for her own purposes.
The Rani dispatches the Tetraps who enter the Lakertyan city and fit all the Lakertyans with ankle bands that will kill them if they are removed or if a master switch is activated. As the Tetraps leave the Rani's lab, Ikona sneaks into the lab.
The Rani, observing the brain, begins to notice that the Doctor is beginning to infuse the brain with his own discordant personality. Angered that he might override the calculations, she pulls him out of his cabinet but before she can attack him, she is grabbed from behind by Ikona and shoved into the cabinet herself and locked in. The Doctor studies the brain, deducing it's function and figuring a way to stop it.
The Rani threatens Beyus as he passes by and he releases her, fearing for his people's safety. The Rani confronts the Doctor and admits that her plan will destroy all life on Lakertya, a fact that is overheard by the lead Tetrap. The Doctor and Mel get past the Rani while she is distracted by the brain completing it's calculations and informing her of what material she must fill the nose of the missile with.
The Doctor, Mel and Ikona return to the Lakertyan city to raise the people to fight the Rani. The Doctor manages to free them from their detonation bracelets and collects them in his umbrella. He and Mel then race back to the Rani's lab.
While they are away, the Rani finishes loading the missile and prepares to leave for her TARDIS. The chief Tetrap, aware of the consequences, offers to go with her in the TARDIS but she orders him to stay and contain the Lakertyans. He then follows her at a distance as she leaves, leaving the lab abandoned.
The Doctor and Mel return and use the bracelets to surround the brain and create a field, delaying the countdown. Beyus offers to stay and activate the bracelets. The Doctor and Mel run out and confront the Rani as Beyus activates the devices, halting the countdown at four seconds. The Rani angrily overrides the system, blowing up the brain and Beyus but launching the missile. She then leaves in her TARDIS.
The missile launch destroys the Rani's lab and the Doctor reassures the Lakertyans as the delay in launch threw the missile off it's trajectory and it misses the asteroid. He and Mel then depart in his TARDIS, while in the Rani's TARDIS, the Tetraps have taken over and captured her, preparing to take her back to their home planet where he mind will be used to help their people.
Analysis
After watching the first episode, I saw two possibilities for this story. Either it was going to turn in to The Twin Dilemma where it plummeted into badness around Episodes Three or Four, or this story was not going to be as bad as I expected. In the end, I have to say that I don't think this one is that bad. It's not particularly good, but I don't see why it typically finishes so low in various polls.
The Seventh Doctor's regeneration crisis seems to be quirkiness. Early in the story, there is heavy dose of physical comedy that thankfully starts to go away and is banished when we get to Paradise Towers. Throughout the story he has a constant quirk of misstating common sayings, which could have gotten old, but I'm actually a little sorry didn't stick around as a gimmick of his. Once or twice in a story would have been sufficient. But other than those, the Seventh Doctor emerges mostly as himself, just a touch more manic than he will become and I can't fault that. Had the physical comedy continued, it would have grated, but I see no problem with the Seventh Doctor in this story.
Mel is not great but she's not overly annoying either. He worst trait is that she does a lot of screaming in this story and most of it unnecessarily. I understand a scream when first confronted by a Tetrap as it does a little jump scare and most people find bats somewhat repulsive. I can also justify screaming her head off when in the bubble trap, given it's design to kill you. But after that, he screaming should have been curtailed. There is no reason for Mel to scream her head off every time she sees a Tetrap, even if they are grabbing her. I would have liked to have seen a bit more backbone and fortitude from her.
That being said, Mel did not fall into a whimpering mess the way Peri usually did. When not screaming, Mel was offering comfort and planning to the Lakertyans. She was always trying to help them or get back to the Doctor so she did show some fire and independence. I would have liked for her to be given a chance at some subterfuge or sabotage when she was forced to work with Beyus on the computers and that might have developed if there had been time for a rewrite or two. Still, on the whole, Mel is passible in this one and doesn't go poorly as she does in later stories.
The Rani continues to be enjoyable in this story. If the whole story had been like Episode One and part of Episode Two where the Doctor and the Rani work together (even under deception), this would be a far more enjoyable story just because I don't think anyone can get tired of the Rani's constant frustration and asides with the Doctor. It's not quite as self aware as in The Mark of the Rani but she also doesn't have the Master to play off. Still, it is enjoyable, especially as she has to keep herself from throttling the Doctor.
Unfortunately, once the posing as Mel phase is over, the Rani becomes much more of a generic villain. Her witticisms dry up and it becomes all about ordering the henchmen about to ensure the success of the plan. Her performance is still decent, but it loses the thing that really makes her stand out. Plus I kept getting distracted by a spot on side of her nose that I never really noticed in prior Episodes.
Another reason I thought at first that maybe this story was derided so much was because of the performance of the Lakertyans but that is not the case. Beyus and Faroon are well acted and carry the gravitas of a cowed people trying to preserve themselves. Ikona started a little shaky but as the action continued, his performance improved greatly. Sarn wasn't very good but she dies halfway through Episode One so it is only a small blemish and they other Lakertyans don't get enough screen time or dialogue to make any kind of impact. I had no qualms about them and didn't see any particular problems with their makeup either.
There were some production shortfalls, but nothing that ruined the story for me. The Tetraps weren't great but as long as they stayed in shadow, they worked reasonably well. I think if the outdoor scenes had been filmed later, it would have helped make them work a bit better. Likewise a later time might have helped diminish the need for tinting the sky as much. It wasn't as jarring as in Mindwarp, but it was still a pretty obvious computer effect that stood out whenever seen.
But I can imagine that the point where most people throw up their hands is the giant brain. It makes no sense. Where did it come from or how it was made is completely ignored. Nor is why a brain is used rather than just a large computer. It's something thrown in to be weird and I think just a touch horrifying for young kids but ends up coming across as just dumb. It doesn't help that the brain looks very much like the fabric prop that it actually was. Dimming the lights in the room helped but it still doesn't look particularly good and the story starts to go off the rails.
In my own mind, I can imagine that Pip and Jane Baker probably had an outline of a story they were working on to submit later and had probably gone over a few scenes before they got the desperation call from JNT. This is how I imagine that Episodes One and Two have a bit more depth and are more memorable. Episodes Three and Four have a much more slapdash feel and I think this is the point where what is on screen was a first draft effort rather than having been massaged a bit like the earlier script. Still, for me, this isn't so bad that it ruins the whole experience. It is still fairly well acted and the worst parts don't go on for so long that it becomes a slog.
Probably more bothersome to me than the brain was the lazy plot device of the bracelet bombs. The Rani was already controlling the population with the threat of deadly insects so why the bracelets except as something for the Doctor to use? Again, in a second or third draft, the insects would have been excised and only the bracelets would have been used as a means of controlling the population. The Doctor freeing them would have had the liberating effect of prompting them to action and it would have given Beyus the freedom to rise up as the Rani now could not commit instant genocide against his people. The Tetraps could have easily fled the lab and invaded her TARDIS after overhearing the Rani as her betrayal of them was easily understood at that point.
I don't think story ever had the potential of being great, but it had the potential of being better than it is. But I also think that in that lost potential, it is not as bad as it is made out to be. It moves quickly and the characters are all pretty much enjoyable. The plot is not overly complex, even if the Rani's plan is. It hums along well enough and any failures in production value were going to be there anyway because of budget and just the fact that it was the 1980's. Is it good? No. Is it terrible and something I would never watch again? Also no. I would call it slightly below average in my book, which rates it above at least two other Seventh Doctor stories. Would I watch it again? Probably, although I think I would get bored with it a second time around, especially in the later episodes. So for me, Dragonfire stands easily as the worst of the Seventh Doctor stories rather than this one.
Overall personal score: 2 out of 5
Thursday, January 5, 2017
The Power of the Daleks (Animated)
I reviewed this story last year but that was for the recon. With the release of the first fully animated story (given that there are no existing episodes) I thought I would revisit this one.
As I covered the plot back then, I won't focus on that or any major aspects of the story unless they have bearing on how things are presented with the new animation. At the very least, the animation does give a better focus on what is going on. In the recon, like most recons, you would get a jump cut between freeze frames to signify who was speaking and you would just have to remember. In the animation, you can actually see three or four different characters standing around and they can all just talk and you still get an easy bead on who is talking. That is a major plus, especially since you can also get extra direction, such as when the Doctor is talking with the governor but staring at Bragen.
The most important thing to note about the animation is that if you go in expecting the animation seen in Episode Four of The Tenth Planet or Episodes One and Three of The Moonbase, you will be disappointed. Those episodes used a very realistic animation style much more akin to anime. But those stories were only animating one or two episodes where this one is doing all six. They also had real video to watch and study movement and facial expressions. Power of the Daleks has none of those and I think that lack of reference is why the animation is more simple and a bit timid.
The animation is not South Park simple but it is not particularly fluid either. The movement of the individuals is akin to the paper puppets you can get with a brad at each joint to give it rotational movement. There is also some facial expression but most of it is focused on the eyes with their movement and dilation being the primary means of expression. That works very well with a character like Lesterson who did demonstrate a lot of emotion with his eyes, even visible in the telesnaps. It works a bit less with the Doctor who would be much more subtle with his whole face giving clues rather than just his eyes.
It still works but it takes a little getting used to. It doesn't help that Episode One has to resolve so much from the regeneration that you don't get settled into the story until you are in to Episode Two. At that point, the story begins to kick in and you start to loose yourself. This is where the animation works over a telesnap in that it draws you in easier. I watched this on BBC America which builds in commercials and I could tell I was really getting into the story because I was so irritated when it would suddenly break for ads. It was like losing the moment and then trying to find it again.
The sound of the story was a bit hit or miss. The large scale scenes involving multiple actors had inconsistent sound as you would expect from a stage. The animation doesn't quite do the depth of the stage justice as it allows the picture to focus tightly on a character which can be jarring if you hear them in a distant, echo-y manner. But the small scenes with one or more characters does fairly well and the tight animation works well, allowing you to focus on the emotion of the scene. I had also forgotten just how good the background noise/music is for providing atmosphere. The use of a musical saw to provide dark atmosphere when the Daleks are plotting and moving in the shadows works so well and when you don't have to focus on deciphering the pictures to get the mood of the scene, it makes the story flow so much better.
One additional experience that I had that enhanced the story for me was that this was the first time I watched a Doctor Who story with someone. My seven-year old son watched this with me and he seemed to really enjoy it. He's been tentative about watching Doctor Who with me because I make no bones about how many of the monsters are designed to be scary. I particularly enjoyed freaking both him and his ten-year old sister out a bit last year when I told them about the Vashta Nerada. That was fun in a twisted way but it also has made them significantly less interested in watching the show with me, despite their enjoyment of other science fiction. But my son did decide to watch this with me, especially when I told him it was animated, making in more like Batman (the excellent early 90's version). It also added a level of unreality for him that made it more manageable, despite the genuine fear that could come about from the Daleks.
The biggest improvement for me was that it much better defined the nature of the battle in Episode Six. The recon that was available to me when I watched it before did a very poor job of conveying the battle, who and how many people were being gunned down by the Daleks. It also gave a better definition of how the Doctor tricked the Daleks into effectively destroying themselves by getting them to destroy the electrical controls and surging power through their whole system. Episode Six alone was worth the animation.
In the end, the animation provided clarity and helped express the story easier for the uninitiated so it was definitely worth it for those aspects alone. However, the animation wasn't so fluid as to make you forget that this is a live action show. The animation is a marginal improvement on recons but not up to being a true substitute for the real episodes. As much as I enjoyed it, I would still keep my original score and I think only the discovery of the whole thing could bump it up to full marks.
Overall personal score (animated): 4.5 out of 5
As I covered the plot back then, I won't focus on that or any major aspects of the story unless they have bearing on how things are presented with the new animation. At the very least, the animation does give a better focus on what is going on. In the recon, like most recons, you would get a jump cut between freeze frames to signify who was speaking and you would just have to remember. In the animation, you can actually see three or four different characters standing around and they can all just talk and you still get an easy bead on who is talking. That is a major plus, especially since you can also get extra direction, such as when the Doctor is talking with the governor but staring at Bragen.
The most important thing to note about the animation is that if you go in expecting the animation seen in Episode Four of The Tenth Planet or Episodes One and Three of The Moonbase, you will be disappointed. Those episodes used a very realistic animation style much more akin to anime. But those stories were only animating one or two episodes where this one is doing all six. They also had real video to watch and study movement and facial expressions. Power of the Daleks has none of those and I think that lack of reference is why the animation is more simple and a bit timid.
The animation is not South Park simple but it is not particularly fluid either. The movement of the individuals is akin to the paper puppets you can get with a brad at each joint to give it rotational movement. There is also some facial expression but most of it is focused on the eyes with their movement and dilation being the primary means of expression. That works very well with a character like Lesterson who did demonstrate a lot of emotion with his eyes, even visible in the telesnaps. It works a bit less with the Doctor who would be much more subtle with his whole face giving clues rather than just his eyes.
It still works but it takes a little getting used to. It doesn't help that Episode One has to resolve so much from the regeneration that you don't get settled into the story until you are in to Episode Two. At that point, the story begins to kick in and you start to loose yourself. This is where the animation works over a telesnap in that it draws you in easier. I watched this on BBC America which builds in commercials and I could tell I was really getting into the story because I was so irritated when it would suddenly break for ads. It was like losing the moment and then trying to find it again.
The sound of the story was a bit hit or miss. The large scale scenes involving multiple actors had inconsistent sound as you would expect from a stage. The animation doesn't quite do the depth of the stage justice as it allows the picture to focus tightly on a character which can be jarring if you hear them in a distant, echo-y manner. But the small scenes with one or more characters does fairly well and the tight animation works well, allowing you to focus on the emotion of the scene. I had also forgotten just how good the background noise/music is for providing atmosphere. The use of a musical saw to provide dark atmosphere when the Daleks are plotting and moving in the shadows works so well and when you don't have to focus on deciphering the pictures to get the mood of the scene, it makes the story flow so much better.
One additional experience that I had that enhanced the story for me was that this was the first time I watched a Doctor Who story with someone. My seven-year old son watched this with me and he seemed to really enjoy it. He's been tentative about watching Doctor Who with me because I make no bones about how many of the monsters are designed to be scary. I particularly enjoyed freaking both him and his ten-year old sister out a bit last year when I told them about the Vashta Nerada. That was fun in a twisted way but it also has made them significantly less interested in watching the show with me, despite their enjoyment of other science fiction. But my son did decide to watch this with me, especially when I told him it was animated, making in more like Batman (the excellent early 90's version). It also added a level of unreality for him that made it more manageable, despite the genuine fear that could come about from the Daleks.
The biggest improvement for me was that it much better defined the nature of the battle in Episode Six. The recon that was available to me when I watched it before did a very poor job of conveying the battle, who and how many people were being gunned down by the Daleks. It also gave a better definition of how the Doctor tricked the Daleks into effectively destroying themselves by getting them to destroy the electrical controls and surging power through their whole system. Episode Six alone was worth the animation.
In the end, the animation provided clarity and helped express the story easier for the uninitiated so it was definitely worth it for those aspects alone. However, the animation wasn't so fluid as to make you forget that this is a live action show. The animation is a marginal improvement on recons but not up to being a true substitute for the real episodes. As much as I enjoyed it, I would still keep my original score and I think only the discovery of the whole thing could bump it up to full marks.
Overall personal score (animated): 4.5 out of 5
Dinosaurs on a Spaceship
Guys, comedy gold. Where's a Silurian audience when you need one?
Plot Summary
After helping Queen Nefertiti of Egypt the Doctor receives a signal from 24th century Earth. A space ship has been detected heading towards Earth and they can't signal it. He volunteers to investigate it and change it's course. The head of the space agency tells him that if he does not, they will be forced to destroy it.
The Doctor gathers a team to go along with Queen Nefertiti. He collects a big game hunter named John Riddell as well as Rory and Amy. However, when materializing around Rory and Amy, he scoops up Rory's dad Brian as well. Together they materialize on the ship where two ankylosaurs run down a hall. Fascinated, the Doctor finds a control panel and when investigating, accidentally transports himself, Brian and Rory to the engine room, which utilizes tidal power. They are chased off the beach of the engine room by a flock of pterodactyls and take refuge in a nearby passageway.
Following the Doctor's disappearance, Amy, Nefertiti and Riddell walk through the ship until they find a control panel in a small arboretum. Accessing a database, Amy discovers that the ship is an ark launched by the Silurians when they believed the moon would impact Earth rather than be captured by it. She also discovers that while the dinosaur population has been maintained, the Silurians are all gone.
The Doctor, Rory and Brian are collected by two robots who take them down to a docking bay. On their way to the docking bay, the trio runs into a Triceratops who takes a liking to Brian and the golf balls he has stored in his pockets. They continue on and the Doctor is taken to see Solomon, a trader and pirate who boarded and killed the Silurian crew when they refused to sell some of their dinosaurs to him. Solomon threatens the life of Rory and Brian if he doesn't repair his artificial legs which were created by his robots after he was attacked by a group of raptors. The Doctor does repair the damage, but also learns that Solomon can't steer the ship and it's guidance system implemented a return to Earth program following the attempts to override the controls.
After finishing with Solomon, the Doctor, Rory and Brian flee while Solomon sends his robots after them. They climb aboard the triceratops they met earlier and escape the robots. Reaching another control panel, the Doctor discovers that Earth is launching the missiles to destroy the ship and they will impact in about fifteen minutes.
Solomon and the robots teleport near the Doctor, telling him that since missiles are approaching, he is leaving without the dinosaurs. But he also mentions that in his scans, he detected Queen Nefertiti and demands her. He kills the triceratops to demonstrate his seriousness and prepares to kill the others. Nefertiti, Amy and Riddell teleport to the Doctor's location and Nefertiti gives herself up to Solomon who then teleports with her back to his ship.
A warning signal pops up on screen of the missiles locking on and the Doctor gets an idea. He and the rest teleport to the control room and the Doctor activates a magnetic lock, preventing Solomon's ship from escaping. He also notices that the controls of the ship are tied to run with two people of the same genepool. He has Brian and Rory take the controls while Amy and Riddell keep watch and hold off a group of juvenile T-Rexes that are trying to enter with stun guns.
With the ship moving away from Earth, the Doctor dislodges the signal transponder that the missiles have locked on to. He then teleports to Solomon's ship and disables his robots. Nefertiti breaks loose, knocking down Solomon in the process, and she and the Doctor leave Solomon's ship with the Doctor leaving the transponder behind. He then demagnetizes the ship and Solomon's ship shoots away from the Silurian transport and into space. The missiles follow Solomon's ship and destroy it.
The Doctor returns Rory and Amy home and Nefertiti opts to stay with Riddell on his big game hunt. Brian however, travels with the Doctor to see the dinosaurs established on a new planet they christen Siluria.
Analysis
A lot of folks dismiss Dinosaurs on a Spaceship as overly silly but I disagree. I think it's a lot of fun and a lot darker than people give it credit for. In fact, it is one of the only instances we get of the dark and angry Eleventh Doctor.
I always like the Tenth Doctor when he would give up on negotiation and mercy and just extract vengeance and it was rare to see that in the Eleventh Doctor because he was so much of a negotiator. Here, he is finally confronted with a situation that is non-negotiable and he gives in to those dark tendencies that the Eleventh Doctor kept so well hidden, though even here he hides them behind a mask of cheerfulness. But when he turns as Solomon begs for mercy, he pointedly asks if the Silurians begged for mercy and then walks out. He doesn't show the anger or even much of the cold fury that the Tenth Doctor did, but there is a coldness in his voice, given an unsettling edge by his cheery demeanor in how he delivers the death sentence. It is quite enjoyable.
The gang is interesting although a bit underused as you might expect in a 45-minute story. Brian is obviously brought along for the plot device of being able to steer the ship but he at least is used well for comic relief and to get a touch of depth in with Rory. Rory also does well in bonding with his dad and the two of them function as the true companions in this story.
The other three are highly underused except for some light comic relief and the plot device of giving Solomon something to take and be rescued at the end in the form of Nefertiti. Riddell does even less as his only scene where he does something of value is to hold off some dinosaurs and even then he is with Amy. Amy at least gets some crack lines and functions as a mini-Doctor with two inexperienced companions. I suspect that Chris Chibnall had some extra ideas for Nefertiti and Riddell but was forced to cut them for time.
What I wish could have been cut instead were the two robots. Solomon is an excellent villain: cold, shrewd and merciless. He is a good foe and it is also quite satisfying when he dies. His robots though are just terrible. They were voiced by a comedy duo but their jokes were lame at best and their delivery was pretty poor as well. It needed to be much sharper as a harsher sarcasm would have improved things a bit. It also was a bit lame that when the Doctor, Rory and Brian are escaping on the triceratops, the robots develop stormtrooper aim and couldn't hit such a large and relatively slow moving target. So in either case of how the robots were to be portrayed (henchmen or comic relief), they didn't deliver and pulled down a pretty good villain.
One of the complaints I've heard regarding this story is that the plot is too simple but I didn't see anything wrong with that. There was problem that manifested itself, the Doctor worked at it, thwarted the villain and saved the ship. Contrast to other stories, I don't recall too many instances where I felt the story was padding itself. I think the biggest one was the stuff with the triceratops and that was a by-product of desperately wanting the visual of the Doctor riding a triceratops. It could have been cut but some dinosaurs other than the initial viewing and the juvenile T-Rexes needed to be in to help justify the title.
Regarding the dinosaurs, I thought they did a pretty good job as far as the CGI goes. There were one or two moments where it looked a little bit janky, but for the most part, I thought the integration went well. It helped that the ship was kept dark and that smoothed over what could have been some rough spots where they could fudge in the darkness. But overall, I thought it a pretty good effort and can't recall any significant instance where I was pulled out of the story due to the visual effects.
Overall, I think this is a far better story than it is generally given credit for. Remove the robots (or upgrade their personalities) and give the other companions a little more to do and I think this would be a grand adventure story with a dark twist. It's about as dark as you'll see the Eleventh Doctor get which is a rare sight indeed. At the very least, it is a fun adventure with a good amount of comedy to lighten the mood but not so much as to ruin the darker tone. I'd happily pop this one in at any time for a fun romp.
Overall personal score: 4.5 out of 5
Plot Summary
After helping Queen Nefertiti of Egypt the Doctor receives a signal from 24th century Earth. A space ship has been detected heading towards Earth and they can't signal it. He volunteers to investigate it and change it's course. The head of the space agency tells him that if he does not, they will be forced to destroy it.
The Doctor gathers a team to go along with Queen Nefertiti. He collects a big game hunter named John Riddell as well as Rory and Amy. However, when materializing around Rory and Amy, he scoops up Rory's dad Brian as well. Together they materialize on the ship where two ankylosaurs run down a hall. Fascinated, the Doctor finds a control panel and when investigating, accidentally transports himself, Brian and Rory to the engine room, which utilizes tidal power. They are chased off the beach of the engine room by a flock of pterodactyls and take refuge in a nearby passageway.
Following the Doctor's disappearance, Amy, Nefertiti and Riddell walk through the ship until they find a control panel in a small arboretum. Accessing a database, Amy discovers that the ship is an ark launched by the Silurians when they believed the moon would impact Earth rather than be captured by it. She also discovers that while the dinosaur population has been maintained, the Silurians are all gone.
The Doctor, Rory and Brian are collected by two robots who take them down to a docking bay. On their way to the docking bay, the trio runs into a Triceratops who takes a liking to Brian and the golf balls he has stored in his pockets. They continue on and the Doctor is taken to see Solomon, a trader and pirate who boarded and killed the Silurian crew when they refused to sell some of their dinosaurs to him. Solomon threatens the life of Rory and Brian if he doesn't repair his artificial legs which were created by his robots after he was attacked by a group of raptors. The Doctor does repair the damage, but also learns that Solomon can't steer the ship and it's guidance system implemented a return to Earth program following the attempts to override the controls.
After finishing with Solomon, the Doctor, Rory and Brian flee while Solomon sends his robots after them. They climb aboard the triceratops they met earlier and escape the robots. Reaching another control panel, the Doctor discovers that Earth is launching the missiles to destroy the ship and they will impact in about fifteen minutes.
Solomon and the robots teleport near the Doctor, telling him that since missiles are approaching, he is leaving without the dinosaurs. But he also mentions that in his scans, he detected Queen Nefertiti and demands her. He kills the triceratops to demonstrate his seriousness and prepares to kill the others. Nefertiti, Amy and Riddell teleport to the Doctor's location and Nefertiti gives herself up to Solomon who then teleports with her back to his ship.
A warning signal pops up on screen of the missiles locking on and the Doctor gets an idea. He and the rest teleport to the control room and the Doctor activates a magnetic lock, preventing Solomon's ship from escaping. He also notices that the controls of the ship are tied to run with two people of the same genepool. He has Brian and Rory take the controls while Amy and Riddell keep watch and hold off a group of juvenile T-Rexes that are trying to enter with stun guns.
With the ship moving away from Earth, the Doctor dislodges the signal transponder that the missiles have locked on to. He then teleports to Solomon's ship and disables his robots. Nefertiti breaks loose, knocking down Solomon in the process, and she and the Doctor leave Solomon's ship with the Doctor leaving the transponder behind. He then demagnetizes the ship and Solomon's ship shoots away from the Silurian transport and into space. The missiles follow Solomon's ship and destroy it.
The Doctor returns Rory and Amy home and Nefertiti opts to stay with Riddell on his big game hunt. Brian however, travels with the Doctor to see the dinosaurs established on a new planet they christen Siluria.
Analysis
A lot of folks dismiss Dinosaurs on a Spaceship as overly silly but I disagree. I think it's a lot of fun and a lot darker than people give it credit for. In fact, it is one of the only instances we get of the dark and angry Eleventh Doctor.
I always like the Tenth Doctor when he would give up on negotiation and mercy and just extract vengeance and it was rare to see that in the Eleventh Doctor because he was so much of a negotiator. Here, he is finally confronted with a situation that is non-negotiable and he gives in to those dark tendencies that the Eleventh Doctor kept so well hidden, though even here he hides them behind a mask of cheerfulness. But when he turns as Solomon begs for mercy, he pointedly asks if the Silurians begged for mercy and then walks out. He doesn't show the anger or even much of the cold fury that the Tenth Doctor did, but there is a coldness in his voice, given an unsettling edge by his cheery demeanor in how he delivers the death sentence. It is quite enjoyable.
The gang is interesting although a bit underused as you might expect in a 45-minute story. Brian is obviously brought along for the plot device of being able to steer the ship but he at least is used well for comic relief and to get a touch of depth in with Rory. Rory also does well in bonding with his dad and the two of them function as the true companions in this story.
The other three are highly underused except for some light comic relief and the plot device of giving Solomon something to take and be rescued at the end in the form of Nefertiti. Riddell does even less as his only scene where he does something of value is to hold off some dinosaurs and even then he is with Amy. Amy at least gets some crack lines and functions as a mini-Doctor with two inexperienced companions. I suspect that Chris Chibnall had some extra ideas for Nefertiti and Riddell but was forced to cut them for time.
What I wish could have been cut instead were the two robots. Solomon is an excellent villain: cold, shrewd and merciless. He is a good foe and it is also quite satisfying when he dies. His robots though are just terrible. They were voiced by a comedy duo but their jokes were lame at best and their delivery was pretty poor as well. It needed to be much sharper as a harsher sarcasm would have improved things a bit. It also was a bit lame that when the Doctor, Rory and Brian are escaping on the triceratops, the robots develop stormtrooper aim and couldn't hit such a large and relatively slow moving target. So in either case of how the robots were to be portrayed (henchmen or comic relief), they didn't deliver and pulled down a pretty good villain.
One of the complaints I've heard regarding this story is that the plot is too simple but I didn't see anything wrong with that. There was problem that manifested itself, the Doctor worked at it, thwarted the villain and saved the ship. Contrast to other stories, I don't recall too many instances where I felt the story was padding itself. I think the biggest one was the stuff with the triceratops and that was a by-product of desperately wanting the visual of the Doctor riding a triceratops. It could have been cut but some dinosaurs other than the initial viewing and the juvenile T-Rexes needed to be in to help justify the title.
Regarding the dinosaurs, I thought they did a pretty good job as far as the CGI goes. There were one or two moments where it looked a little bit janky, but for the most part, I thought the integration went well. It helped that the ship was kept dark and that smoothed over what could have been some rough spots where they could fudge in the darkness. But overall, I thought it a pretty good effort and can't recall any significant instance where I was pulled out of the story due to the visual effects.
Overall, I think this is a far better story than it is generally given credit for. Remove the robots (or upgrade their personalities) and give the other companions a little more to do and I think this would be a grand adventure story with a dark twist. It's about as dark as you'll see the Eleventh Doctor get which is a rare sight indeed. At the very least, it is a fun adventure with a good amount of comedy to lighten the mood but not so much as to ruin the darker tone. I'd happily pop this one in at any time for a fun romp.
Overall personal score: 4.5 out of 5
Wednesday, January 4, 2017
Sixth Doctor Summary
Unsurprisingly, the Sixth Doctor is the first classic Doctor I finish and I can't say that I'm sad to see the back of him. I've nothing against Colin Baker and in fairness, I actually kind of liked his brusque, arrogant style of Doctor. But his era had some real stinkers and I'm not sure I ever got on with Peri. Mel was better in the Sixth Doctor era, but with only six episodes to evaluate, I could say the same about Tom Baker's cabbage companion.
Unfortunately, there were no stories of the Sixth Doctor era that really stood out as great. I ended up with three stories that managed a 4 for me but even in those, I may have been generous. Of those three, I think The Mysterious Planet was probably the best just because the shift from arguing to teasing helped Peri's acting and you had Dibber and Glitz as a fun comedy bit. But the other stories either flailed around at the middling level or tanked and tanked hard. When you have three of eleven stories pulling a 1 or lower, that doesn't say much for the overall quality of the era.
Ultimately, I'd say the Sixth Doctor era is the unfortunate by-product of a lot of little failures. John Nathan-Turner was ready to move on but not allowed. He regained some footing when he finally grasped that the BBC intended him to see the show to it's death in the Seventh Doctor era and that liberated the storytelling. Similarly, you had a script editor in Eric Saward who was overworked, stressed and hated the actor playing the Doctor. He and the other writers tried and failed at taking a darker turn while still attempting to be entertaining. It was probably the height of the arrogance of the show where they legitimately thought they could get away with whatever they wanted and the fans would still come. This began to turn with the Trial season, but the damage was done and lesson not fully learned until the Seventh Doctor era.
There are good performances and good stories in the Sixth Doctor era but they are buried in a larger supply of garbage. I am happy that the Sixth Doctor has gotten a redemption in the form of the Big Finish audio dramas and that has helped his overall reputation. But, his era will probably go down as both my least favorite and lowest rated of the classic Doctor eras.
Highest Rated Story: The Trial of a Time Lord: The Mysterious Planet - 4.0
Lowest Rated Story: The Twin Dilemma - 0.5
Average overall rating: 2.75
The Twin Dilemma
Attack of the Cybermen
Vengeance on Varos
The Mark of the Rani
The Two Doctors
Timelash
Revelation of the Daleks
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 1: The Mysterious Planet
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 2: Mindwarp
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 3: Terror of the Vervoids
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 4: The Ultimate Foe
Unfortunately, there were no stories of the Sixth Doctor era that really stood out as great. I ended up with three stories that managed a 4 for me but even in those, I may have been generous. Of those three, I think The Mysterious Planet was probably the best just because the shift from arguing to teasing helped Peri's acting and you had Dibber and Glitz as a fun comedy bit. But the other stories either flailed around at the middling level or tanked and tanked hard. When you have three of eleven stories pulling a 1 or lower, that doesn't say much for the overall quality of the era.
Ultimately, I'd say the Sixth Doctor era is the unfortunate by-product of a lot of little failures. John Nathan-Turner was ready to move on but not allowed. He regained some footing when he finally grasped that the BBC intended him to see the show to it's death in the Seventh Doctor era and that liberated the storytelling. Similarly, you had a script editor in Eric Saward who was overworked, stressed and hated the actor playing the Doctor. He and the other writers tried and failed at taking a darker turn while still attempting to be entertaining. It was probably the height of the arrogance of the show where they legitimately thought they could get away with whatever they wanted and the fans would still come. This began to turn with the Trial season, but the damage was done and lesson not fully learned until the Seventh Doctor era.
There are good performances and good stories in the Sixth Doctor era but they are buried in a larger supply of garbage. I am happy that the Sixth Doctor has gotten a redemption in the form of the Big Finish audio dramas and that has helped his overall reputation. But, his era will probably go down as both my least favorite and lowest rated of the classic Doctor eras.
Highest Rated Story: The Trial of a Time Lord: The Mysterious Planet - 4.0
Lowest Rated Story: The Twin Dilemma - 0.5
Average overall rating: 2.75
The Twin Dilemma
Attack of the Cybermen
Vengeance on Varos
The Mark of the Rani
The Two Doctors
Timelash
Revelation of the Daleks
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 1: The Mysterious Planet
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 2: Mindwarp
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 3: Terror of the Vervoids
Trial of a Time Lord Pt. 4: The Ultimate Foe
Saturday, December 31, 2016
Revelation of the Daleks
How inconvenient. Do you know how difficult it is to find good secretaries?
I've noticed that Eric Saward has a somewhat negative reputation as a writer among Doctor Who fans as he writes stories that are exceptionally violent and have very high body counts. One could also argue that he doesn't do the relationship between the Doctor and the companion particularly well either. However, Earthshock is highly regarded among the fans as is Resurrection of the Daleks, so perhaps it is only when he sticks his oar into other's work that he garners a bad reputation. I don't hear much about Revelation of the Daleks except about the cutoff joke at the end where the Doctor is going to say "Blackpool" so I went in to this story somewhat blindly.
Plot Summary
The Doctor and Peri land on the planet Necros, where the Doctor has learned that an old friend of his, Arthur Stengos, has been interred in the suspended animation facility of Tranquil Repose. As this is unlike the personality of his friend, the Doctor is suspicious. He lands the TARDIS well away from the facility and he and Peri walk through the snow towards the facility. Along the way they are attacked by a man who has been mutated. He goes for the Doctor and Peri is able to knock him out with a blow to the head with a tree branch. The blow clears his mind and he dies telling them that his condition was brought about by one known as "The Great Healer."
In the facility, the chief embalmer, Mr. Jobel, is finishing the preparations on the President's wife who has just died and is expected shortly. As he dismisses his staff to prepare, two body snatchers, Natasha and Grigory, slip past. Natasha is the daughter of Arthur Stengos and is just as suspicious of his internment in the facility as the Doctor is. The two manage to make it to Arthur's registry but they find his cryogenics chamber empty. They are discovered by guards and they make their way to another chamber where they find brains held in jars. They also find Arthur, suspended in a clear Dalek casing, his head mutating into a Dalek. He appeals to his daughter as the Dalek thought processes begin to take over and she blows him and the casing up.
Monitoring events from a secret chamber is Davros as a head suspended in a jar, attached to a machine. He orders Daleks on patrol. He also orders the snatchers caught as well as one of the junior embalmers, Tasambeker, brought to him. Davros also contacts Kara, the owner of a protein processing factory that has been working with Davros. He supplies her with raw protein material and she in turn funnels money back to him for his research. He requests additional funds and she agrees. However, she is determined to be rid of Davros and shortly after finishing the call with Davros welcomes Orcini, a disgraced knight and highly skilled assassin, and his squire Bostock and hires them to kill Davros. Orcini readily accepts, forgoing payment as he sees killing Davros as a badge of honor.
Natasha and Grigory are apprehended by two workers, Takis and Lilt. They are locked into a dungeon and Lilt tortures Grigory, attempting to get the truth of who sent them and what their mission is out of him. Meanwhile, Tasambeker is brought to Davros where he has her observe Jobel, with whom she loves, though he despises her. Davros has notices a strong streak of anger in her and hopes to turn her love into a vein of hate and make her into a Dalek.
The Doctor and Peri arrive at the facility, having been forced to climb a wall to get in. The Doctor is unnerved when he observes a monument garden with his picture on it as he believes that it means that he will die there. The monument of him suddenly falls on him and he appears to be crushed. Peri rushes over but she is stopped by Jobel, who observed the event and has developed a lust for Peri. But the Doctor emerges, the monument not being made of stone after all. They dismiss Jobel and enter the facility.
Inside, the Doctor and Peri are greeted by Tasambeker and the Doctor inquires her about their facilities. Unable to get the full answers from her, he asks to see the Great Healer. He dissuades Peri from going with him and she instead goes to see the DJ who plays music and observes the facility. The DJ is flattered by Peri's appreciation of his aping 20th century Earth DJs and shows her around his studio. The Doctor meanwhile is captured by two Daleks and taken to the same dungeon as Natasha and Grigory. Davros, pleased with the Doctor's capture, dispatches a group of Daleks to the protein plant to arrest Kara. They also kill her secretary and accomplice, Vogel.
While the Daleks are gone, Orcini and Bostock sneak further into the facility. They release the three prisoners to create a diversion while the two of them enter Davros' lab. The Doctor radios Peri and orders her to get back to the TARDIS and radio the President's ship to leave off as the facility is under control of the Daleks. Davros is alerted to this and sends more Daleks to stop her. Unable to get out, Peri uses the DJ's radio to signal the ship. The President's ship breaks off it's approach and they also observe another ship heading towards Necros.
Tasameker, ordered by Davros to kill Jobel, instead tries to warn him of Davros' plan. He mocks her and laughs her off. Enraged at his condescension, she stabs him with a syringe of embalming fluid, killing him. She runs off and runs into the Daleks heading toward the DJ studio and they kill her.
The Doctor sends Natasha and Grigory to destroy the lab they found earlier while he tries to get to Davros. Natasha and Grigory succeed in getting to the lab but find their weapons depleted. They set the controls to overload but before they can get out, a new Dalek teleports in and kills them. It is destroyed with the lab when the controls explode.
Orcini and Bostock reach Davros' lab and succeed in destroying Davros' head at the control panel. However, this was just a mock up and the real Davros, in his chair, emerges. Both Orcini and Bostock are wounded by Dalek guards, though Bostock appears dead. Orcini is propped in a chair and Kara is brought in, confronted with her failed plan. She is forced to admit that she also supplied Orcini with a hidden bomb, intending for all parties to be destroyed by it. Orcini stabs her with his hidden knife for her treachery, killing her.
Peri and the DJ manage to hold off and destroy several Daleks before they break through and the DJ is killed. Peri is brought to Davros' lab where she is reunited with the Doctor, who was also captured by several patrolling Daleks. Davros expounds on his new facilities to create Daleks, even going so far to tell him about how unused parts are turned into raw protein which are then shipped throughout the galaxy as a food source. Davros prepares to activate his other facilities, replacing the one that was destroyed when Bostock rises and shoots off Davros' hand. He is then gunned down by a Dalek.
While distracted, the unidentified freighter lands, revealing a faction of Imperial Daleks, invited by Takis and Lilt. They take them through the corridors where they destroy the Daleks loyal to Davros. They enter the lab and arrest Davros and escort him out, preparing to take him to Skaro for trial. The Doctor, Takis and Lilt create a distraction and Orcini destroys the Dalek guard. Orcini, wounded, is unable to go with them and volunteers to stay behind and detonate the bomb given him by Kara, which will destroy all of Davros' facilities. The group runs out and reaches the ground level as Orcini detonates the bomb. This destroys the facilities but the Imperial Daleks and Davros lift off in their ship.
With the facility destroyed the Doctor offers to show them how they can process the native weed flower plant, which is similar to the soybean on Earth, to continue to meet their protein deliveries. He then promises to take Peri to a fun location, though the scene ends before he can reveal where.
Analysis
On one hand, I can understand why this story is looked down on and why Eric Saward is not highly regarded as a writer. But on the other hand, I can't help but admit that I really enjoyed this one. Looking at it squarely, I believe that this might actually be the Sixth Doctor story I enjoyed the most. The fact that it goes for several long stretches in Episode One without the Doctor might say something about my overall attitude towards the Sixth Doctor.
In his limited capacity, I did enjoy the Sixth Doctor. He was a bit less pompous in this story than in other stories and I thought there was a more introspective air about him. He also was a lot less condescending towards Peri in this story. There were still moments where he was rude and negative towards her, but there were also moments of compassion. He actually comforted her in a limited way after the mutant died that she did it in self defense. He also went so far as to show trust and care for her welfare in suggesting she go visit the DJ and then signalling to her to return to the TARDIS to radio the President's ship. That is a lot more confidence than he has ever shown her before and he did it without any form of backhanded insults.
Peri herself also wasn't too bad. She didn't have the wibbly whimper that she often has, even if she did spend a lot of time suggesting they run back to the TARDIS. But she did show herself useful in a couple of instances and there were even some moments where she showed compassion for the Doctor, even if she then spent just as much time whining about how she would be left on Necros.
The real assets of this story though were the secondary characters. Davros was entertaining in his megalomaniacal way and although you can miss the quieter and more cunning Davros, he still got the drop on just about everyone. Indeed, his only real flaw in this story is that he went James Bond villain and had to explain his plans to the Doctor, giving Bostock more time to recover and the Imperial Daleks time to arrive. I did enjoy the couple second fake out where you actually think Davros has been killed by Orcini. Of course, having seen later episodes, I knew that Davros would survive but I was at a moment of genuine curiosity when I saw the control panel blow up and Davros' head cave in as to how they would bring him back.
Unquestionably, the character I enjoyed the most was Orcini. There was a quiet confidence in both the character and in the actor portraying him. He had an excellent rapport with Bostock and a genuine quiet menace about him. There was no bluster or talk. He was deadly and you could feel that deadliness as he walked around. It was also nice to see the two of them actually take out Daleks and not just be overwhelmed and pray for a Deus Ex Machina at the end. They went in and they meant to see the job done and I appreciated that.
For the most part, I liked Kara as well. She was better in Episode One where she was more subtle in her motivations. You could tell that she was conspiring against Davros and she was a bit oily with Orcini and the transponder/bomb, but there was room in her interpretation that she wasn't as conniving as you might expect. However, she gave way to tropes in Episode Two, especially with the standard villain exposition of the plan to the henchman for the audience benefit. I actually liked the fact that Orcini straight up murders her for her betrayal of him and that Davros is completely unphased by his having a hidden dagger. She is a minor villain but done fairly well and dispatched readily when her part is over.
I thought the sets and camera work was pretty good for the 1980's. It is just an unfortunate by-product of the 80's that the sets generally look worse than the ones in the 70's, but I thought these were fairly well done. I did like the outdoor filmed scenes quite a bit, especially with the snow on the ground. It gave a harsher look to the environment and helped set the mood properly. Of course, most things look better on film so that's always an improvement.
There were a few things I didn't care for. Some of the secondary acting wasn't great. Tasambeker stood out for me particularly. She wasn't bad when doing the demur mouse, but her appeals to Jobel weren't done well and her jilted lover bit where she stabs Jobel was particularly poorly done. Jobel himself was also not the best. He was alright when doing the overbearing administrator or the plotter, but his attempts to be creepy infatuated were overdone and a bit too rape-y for my taste.
I also thought the DJ was way over the top and didn't really understand his commentary of things through the story. He didn't make much sense to have in the story to begin with other than as a place to keep Peri until the last bit. His fight was decent but his death was somewhat dumb as he just stood up to be shot rather than staying hunkered down. It was odd and felt rather pointless in a fairly dense story.
The Daleks were fairly well done but there were small problem with them as well. I liked that they were somewhat vulnerable to the weapons but in doing so, the models were revealed to be a bit cheap. When the Doctor shoots off the eyestalk of the guard Dalek near the end, you can see the top wobble as it spins. It's also a bit disappointing that the Imperial Daleks provide a Dalek Ex Machina ending rather than the Doctor figuring a way out of the dilemma.
This story is definitely not for everyone given that it is uber-violent and delves in some pretty dark humor for a family show. It also has some odd cutaways that border on silly at times. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the story and would probably pick it over nearly every other Sixth Doctor story to watch. I think only Vengeance on Varos or Mysterious Planet would compete with it. So for me, this is quite a good one.
Overall personal score: 4 out of 5
I've noticed that Eric Saward has a somewhat negative reputation as a writer among Doctor Who fans as he writes stories that are exceptionally violent and have very high body counts. One could also argue that he doesn't do the relationship between the Doctor and the companion particularly well either. However, Earthshock is highly regarded among the fans as is Resurrection of the Daleks, so perhaps it is only when he sticks his oar into other's work that he garners a bad reputation. I don't hear much about Revelation of the Daleks except about the cutoff joke at the end where the Doctor is going to say "Blackpool" so I went in to this story somewhat blindly.
Plot Summary
The Doctor and Peri land on the planet Necros, where the Doctor has learned that an old friend of his, Arthur Stengos, has been interred in the suspended animation facility of Tranquil Repose. As this is unlike the personality of his friend, the Doctor is suspicious. He lands the TARDIS well away from the facility and he and Peri walk through the snow towards the facility. Along the way they are attacked by a man who has been mutated. He goes for the Doctor and Peri is able to knock him out with a blow to the head with a tree branch. The blow clears his mind and he dies telling them that his condition was brought about by one known as "The Great Healer."
In the facility, the chief embalmer, Mr. Jobel, is finishing the preparations on the President's wife who has just died and is expected shortly. As he dismisses his staff to prepare, two body snatchers, Natasha and Grigory, slip past. Natasha is the daughter of Arthur Stengos and is just as suspicious of his internment in the facility as the Doctor is. The two manage to make it to Arthur's registry but they find his cryogenics chamber empty. They are discovered by guards and they make their way to another chamber where they find brains held in jars. They also find Arthur, suspended in a clear Dalek casing, his head mutating into a Dalek. He appeals to his daughter as the Dalek thought processes begin to take over and she blows him and the casing up.
Monitoring events from a secret chamber is Davros as a head suspended in a jar, attached to a machine. He orders Daleks on patrol. He also orders the snatchers caught as well as one of the junior embalmers, Tasambeker, brought to him. Davros also contacts Kara, the owner of a protein processing factory that has been working with Davros. He supplies her with raw protein material and she in turn funnels money back to him for his research. He requests additional funds and she agrees. However, she is determined to be rid of Davros and shortly after finishing the call with Davros welcomes Orcini, a disgraced knight and highly skilled assassin, and his squire Bostock and hires them to kill Davros. Orcini readily accepts, forgoing payment as he sees killing Davros as a badge of honor.
Natasha and Grigory are apprehended by two workers, Takis and Lilt. They are locked into a dungeon and Lilt tortures Grigory, attempting to get the truth of who sent them and what their mission is out of him. Meanwhile, Tasambeker is brought to Davros where he has her observe Jobel, with whom she loves, though he despises her. Davros has notices a strong streak of anger in her and hopes to turn her love into a vein of hate and make her into a Dalek.
The Doctor and Peri arrive at the facility, having been forced to climb a wall to get in. The Doctor is unnerved when he observes a monument garden with his picture on it as he believes that it means that he will die there. The monument of him suddenly falls on him and he appears to be crushed. Peri rushes over but she is stopped by Jobel, who observed the event and has developed a lust for Peri. But the Doctor emerges, the monument not being made of stone after all. They dismiss Jobel and enter the facility.
Inside, the Doctor and Peri are greeted by Tasambeker and the Doctor inquires her about their facilities. Unable to get the full answers from her, he asks to see the Great Healer. He dissuades Peri from going with him and she instead goes to see the DJ who plays music and observes the facility. The DJ is flattered by Peri's appreciation of his aping 20th century Earth DJs and shows her around his studio. The Doctor meanwhile is captured by two Daleks and taken to the same dungeon as Natasha and Grigory. Davros, pleased with the Doctor's capture, dispatches a group of Daleks to the protein plant to arrest Kara. They also kill her secretary and accomplice, Vogel.
While the Daleks are gone, Orcini and Bostock sneak further into the facility. They release the three prisoners to create a diversion while the two of them enter Davros' lab. The Doctor radios Peri and orders her to get back to the TARDIS and radio the President's ship to leave off as the facility is under control of the Daleks. Davros is alerted to this and sends more Daleks to stop her. Unable to get out, Peri uses the DJ's radio to signal the ship. The President's ship breaks off it's approach and they also observe another ship heading towards Necros.
Tasameker, ordered by Davros to kill Jobel, instead tries to warn him of Davros' plan. He mocks her and laughs her off. Enraged at his condescension, she stabs him with a syringe of embalming fluid, killing him. She runs off and runs into the Daleks heading toward the DJ studio and they kill her.
The Doctor sends Natasha and Grigory to destroy the lab they found earlier while he tries to get to Davros. Natasha and Grigory succeed in getting to the lab but find their weapons depleted. They set the controls to overload but before they can get out, a new Dalek teleports in and kills them. It is destroyed with the lab when the controls explode.
Orcini and Bostock reach Davros' lab and succeed in destroying Davros' head at the control panel. However, this was just a mock up and the real Davros, in his chair, emerges. Both Orcini and Bostock are wounded by Dalek guards, though Bostock appears dead. Orcini is propped in a chair and Kara is brought in, confronted with her failed plan. She is forced to admit that she also supplied Orcini with a hidden bomb, intending for all parties to be destroyed by it. Orcini stabs her with his hidden knife for her treachery, killing her.
Peri and the DJ manage to hold off and destroy several Daleks before they break through and the DJ is killed. Peri is brought to Davros' lab where she is reunited with the Doctor, who was also captured by several patrolling Daleks. Davros expounds on his new facilities to create Daleks, even going so far to tell him about how unused parts are turned into raw protein which are then shipped throughout the galaxy as a food source. Davros prepares to activate his other facilities, replacing the one that was destroyed when Bostock rises and shoots off Davros' hand. He is then gunned down by a Dalek.
While distracted, the unidentified freighter lands, revealing a faction of Imperial Daleks, invited by Takis and Lilt. They take them through the corridors where they destroy the Daleks loyal to Davros. They enter the lab and arrest Davros and escort him out, preparing to take him to Skaro for trial. The Doctor, Takis and Lilt create a distraction and Orcini destroys the Dalek guard. Orcini, wounded, is unable to go with them and volunteers to stay behind and detonate the bomb given him by Kara, which will destroy all of Davros' facilities. The group runs out and reaches the ground level as Orcini detonates the bomb. This destroys the facilities but the Imperial Daleks and Davros lift off in their ship.
With the facility destroyed the Doctor offers to show them how they can process the native weed flower plant, which is similar to the soybean on Earth, to continue to meet their protein deliveries. He then promises to take Peri to a fun location, though the scene ends before he can reveal where.
Analysis
On one hand, I can understand why this story is looked down on and why Eric Saward is not highly regarded as a writer. But on the other hand, I can't help but admit that I really enjoyed this one. Looking at it squarely, I believe that this might actually be the Sixth Doctor story I enjoyed the most. The fact that it goes for several long stretches in Episode One without the Doctor might say something about my overall attitude towards the Sixth Doctor.
In his limited capacity, I did enjoy the Sixth Doctor. He was a bit less pompous in this story than in other stories and I thought there was a more introspective air about him. He also was a lot less condescending towards Peri in this story. There were still moments where he was rude and negative towards her, but there were also moments of compassion. He actually comforted her in a limited way after the mutant died that she did it in self defense. He also went so far as to show trust and care for her welfare in suggesting she go visit the DJ and then signalling to her to return to the TARDIS to radio the President's ship. That is a lot more confidence than he has ever shown her before and he did it without any form of backhanded insults.
Peri herself also wasn't too bad. She didn't have the wibbly whimper that she often has, even if she did spend a lot of time suggesting they run back to the TARDIS. But she did show herself useful in a couple of instances and there were even some moments where she showed compassion for the Doctor, even if she then spent just as much time whining about how she would be left on Necros.
The real assets of this story though were the secondary characters. Davros was entertaining in his megalomaniacal way and although you can miss the quieter and more cunning Davros, he still got the drop on just about everyone. Indeed, his only real flaw in this story is that he went James Bond villain and had to explain his plans to the Doctor, giving Bostock more time to recover and the Imperial Daleks time to arrive. I did enjoy the couple second fake out where you actually think Davros has been killed by Orcini. Of course, having seen later episodes, I knew that Davros would survive but I was at a moment of genuine curiosity when I saw the control panel blow up and Davros' head cave in as to how they would bring him back.
Unquestionably, the character I enjoyed the most was Orcini. There was a quiet confidence in both the character and in the actor portraying him. He had an excellent rapport with Bostock and a genuine quiet menace about him. There was no bluster or talk. He was deadly and you could feel that deadliness as he walked around. It was also nice to see the two of them actually take out Daleks and not just be overwhelmed and pray for a Deus Ex Machina at the end. They went in and they meant to see the job done and I appreciated that.
For the most part, I liked Kara as well. She was better in Episode One where she was more subtle in her motivations. You could tell that she was conspiring against Davros and she was a bit oily with Orcini and the transponder/bomb, but there was room in her interpretation that she wasn't as conniving as you might expect. However, she gave way to tropes in Episode Two, especially with the standard villain exposition of the plan to the henchman for the audience benefit. I actually liked the fact that Orcini straight up murders her for her betrayal of him and that Davros is completely unphased by his having a hidden dagger. She is a minor villain but done fairly well and dispatched readily when her part is over.
I thought the sets and camera work was pretty good for the 1980's. It is just an unfortunate by-product of the 80's that the sets generally look worse than the ones in the 70's, but I thought these were fairly well done. I did like the outdoor filmed scenes quite a bit, especially with the snow on the ground. It gave a harsher look to the environment and helped set the mood properly. Of course, most things look better on film so that's always an improvement.
There were a few things I didn't care for. Some of the secondary acting wasn't great. Tasambeker stood out for me particularly. She wasn't bad when doing the demur mouse, but her appeals to Jobel weren't done well and her jilted lover bit where she stabs Jobel was particularly poorly done. Jobel himself was also not the best. He was alright when doing the overbearing administrator or the plotter, but his attempts to be creepy infatuated were overdone and a bit too rape-y for my taste.
I also thought the DJ was way over the top and didn't really understand his commentary of things through the story. He didn't make much sense to have in the story to begin with other than as a place to keep Peri until the last bit. His fight was decent but his death was somewhat dumb as he just stood up to be shot rather than staying hunkered down. It was odd and felt rather pointless in a fairly dense story.
The Daleks were fairly well done but there were small problem with them as well. I liked that they were somewhat vulnerable to the weapons but in doing so, the models were revealed to be a bit cheap. When the Doctor shoots off the eyestalk of the guard Dalek near the end, you can see the top wobble as it spins. It's also a bit disappointing that the Imperial Daleks provide a Dalek Ex Machina ending rather than the Doctor figuring a way out of the dilemma.
This story is definitely not for everyone given that it is uber-violent and delves in some pretty dark humor for a family show. It also has some odd cutaways that border on silly at times. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the story and would probably pick it over nearly every other Sixth Doctor story to watch. I think only Vengeance on Varos or Mysterious Planet would compete with it. So for me, this is quite a good one.
Overall personal score: 4 out of 5
Wednesday, December 28, 2016
The Return of Doctor Mysterio
Things end and it's sad. But things begin again and that's happy
Ok, first things first. New Doctor Who for the first time in a year: YAAAAAYYYYY!!!
It was fairly well broadcast that this story was going to be Doctor Who's take on comic book movies. What's more, even from the preview, there was a strong inkling towards the Richard Donner original Superman movie. It would be an interesting take to see how well they could integrate such a fantastical element into a show that relied on pseudo-science.
Plot Summary A young boy named Grant wakes up to find the Doctor hanging outside his window, having accidentally snagged himself in his own trap. Grant lets him in, initially mistaking him for Santa. The Doctor rewards him by taking him up to the roof and showing him the machine he was building to try and clear the time disturbances around New York. He hands Grant a power gem, which Grant mistakes for medicine for his cough after the Doctor mentioned he is called the Doctor. Ingesting the gem causes Grant's desire to become a superhero to become a reality and he develops the powers of Superman.
Twenty-four years later, shortly after the night of the Singing Towers of Darillium has ended, the Doctor returns to investigate an alien infestation in the guise of the Harmony Shoal corporation. He returns with Nardole, whom he has reassembled to his original body. Breaking in, he discovers an investigative reporter, Lucy Fletcher, also snooping around. They observe the PR director, Mr. Brock's, body being taken over by alien brains, who cut his head open and insert themselves in. The two flee but are discovered by Dr. Sim who prepares to kill them. They are rescued by a superhero called The Ghost, who knocks out Sim and flies Lucy back to her apartment.
The Doctor recognizes Grant and he and Nardole head over to the apartment where Grant works as a nanny. He works for Lucy and she comes up to find the Doctor. Grant ducks back with the Doctor promising to keep his secret for the moment. Lucy interrogates the Doctor and he admits that the brains are an alien invasion that he is investigating. Grant meanwhile flies out for more superhero deeds. Lucy observes these on the television and convinces the Doctor to set up a meeting with the Ghost. The Doctor informs Grant of this and he calls Lucy to set up a meeting with her the next day on the roof. Grant attempts to play it off with Lucy that he has a date, which arouses latent jealousy in her.
The Doctor meanwhile slips out and he and Nardole head back to the Harmony Shoal corporation. Brock and Sim are planning to capture Grant to take over his body when the Doctor shows up. He gives them a chance to depart but they refuse and he vows to stop them. Nardole picks him up in the TARDIS and they head over to the Tokyo office and hack into the main computer, discovering a transmission to a ship in low Earth orbit. The Doctor and Nardole board the nearly abandoned ship where they are trapped on the bridge by a couple of guards.
At the same time, Grant shows up to Lucy's rooftop as the Ghost where they have dinner and an interview. Sensing Lucy's conflicted feelings about the real him, Grant nearly reveals his identity but changes his mind when he worries that it might hurt her. Brock then turns up and threatens to kill Lucy if he doesn't go along with their plan. Grant hesitates but then breaks away and flies off. Brock debates on killing Lucy and keeping her daughter as hostage when Grant shows up in his regular form to put Brock off. Brock holds off killing them while he calls out for the Ghost to come back before he kills one of them.
Dr. Sim signals the ship and from him the Doctor deduces their plan to crash the ship into New York. It will seem as though aliens are attacking, causing the world leaders to come to the Harmony Shoal corporation for protection as the building is designed to withstand the impact blast. From their, they will take over the leader's bodies and prepare for total conquest. Deducing they are not ready yet, the Doctor directs the ship down and prepares to crash it into New York. He also modifies the radio to a signal only Grant can hear and informs him of what is happening.
The Doctor angles the ship at Lucy's building and Grant catches the falling ship, revealing his true identity to Lucy. She kisses him and the two take off where Grant will throw the ship into the sun. The Doctor comes down and disarms Brock. UNIT also arrives and purges Harmony Shoal, although the alien infesting Dr. Sim escapes into one of the soldiers.
The Doctor leaves with Grant promising to retire as he and Lucy settle into a relationship. Nardole tells them of River Song, which the Doctor had been recovering from, and the two take off for further adventures.
Analysis
I've seen mixed reviews of this on-line and I think I fall somewhere in the middle of everything. I generally liked it, but there was a lot that fell short for me and I'd have to call it mostly middling. I can imagine that many reactions will be more extreme as since it has been such a long wait, people are either inclined to love it no matter what because it's been so long, or hate it because they waited for something that didn't do it for them.
Unquestionably, the best thing about it was the Doctor. He was on point and very good. He was funny but also poignant when he needed to be. He had a lot of witty lines and some funny cracks as well. I also enjoyed his bit play both with young Grant and Nardole. Both had a simplicity about them that played off the Doctor's intellectualism and overlooking of the obvious.
I also really enjoyed Nardole. I didn't remember much about him in The Husbands of River Song but he played much as I expected him to. He was actually a bit better than I expected because he would interject with a simple pedantry in a way that reminds me a lot of my seven-year old son. But unlike a character who can give in to know-it-all-ism, Nardole has a simplicity about him that is refreshing and plays well against the deviousness and lying the Doctor often engages in.
As the Doctor and Nardole were my favorite parts of the story, they also represented a significant shortcoming in this story, in their somewhat limited use. It wasn't that I didn't like the characters of Grant and Lucy, but they seemed pale and boring when compared to the Doctor and Nardole and as a result, I got a bit bored when it was just them on screen. Grant and Lucy also suffered a bit by one other comparison and that was to Richard Donner's Superman.
Grant's powers are obviously Superman inspired, although there were a lot of other superhero references throughout. In that vein, many scenes other other tropes were taken from the first Superman movie, the dinner on the rooftop being the most obvious example. Homages are fine, but when they run so close and so long you start to compare them directly to the original and while the actors who played Grant and Lucy were good, they were not Christopher Reeve and Margo Kidder. It was another scene where the show seemed to slow down and I found myself wandering and not caring about these people and wondering what the Doctor was doing.
I must admit that I am also not much of a superhero movie person. I recognized a lot of little nods: Grant modulated his voice like Batman, the steam of the streets like the 1989 Batman or 1990 Dick Tracy movie, the accidental gain of superpowers like Spiderman, the use of several notable Spierman lines and the trials of having superpowers as a teenager as done in Man of Steel. However, I have not seen a superhero movie since Man of Steel and I've never seen any of the Marvel movies. So a tie in to superhero movies doesn't do much for me as I've somewhat checked out of that genre.
Looking at them objectively, I liked Grant a bit more than Lucy, although she had a better scene with the Doctor. Grant was more affable and did a pretty good job at being both a perfect guy and also the little man you never pay attention to. Lucy was a bit harsher as demanded by the role but suffering from Lois Lane syndrome in not recognizing Grant also made her seem a bit vapid at times. That said, her interrogation of the Doctor was very well done. You know it's a plastic squeeze toy but just her telling you it feels pain and the squeal it makes in addition to her intense stare, you could feel the Doctor's discomfort. She also portrayed an excellent knack for deduction that you could readily believe. It did clash with her non-recognition of Grant, but I still think it added well to her character.
The villains were a bit one-note even if they did have a nice creep factor. My wife, who is not a Doctor Who fan, happened to look up at that time and was unnerved by their appearance. I think I liked them better as the brains though without the apparent tie in to the folks in The Husbands of River Song as they seemed better when they were more original. There was also the small annoyance in that the longer the story went on, the easier I figured it would be for the Doctor to defeat them. They had a nice plan as the Doctor noted, but they were still so easily thwarted that it seemed something of an anti-climax.
There was one thing that stood out for me both in the episode and the trailer for Series Ten and that is a fear that Steven Moffat may run into RTD territory. Russell T. Davis spent some of the last episodes of his tenure indulging in a lot of look back and back slapping. While I appreciate the Doctor's speech about how things change at the end, it seemed a bit of breaking the fourth wall, as though he were trying to assure the watchers that it's okay that he is leaving. It is very similar to the way he had the Eleventh Doctor call Clara at the end of Deep Breath. It was like he didn't trust the audience to accept change unless he gives them permission and I don't care for that.
I'm interested to see what he is planning to do with Bill and how things will go in the tenth series but I got a bit of an Amy vibe and how the American versions were cut with her giving an intro after the cold open. I might have been more sensitive to that due to the flashback I was having regarding the Doctor's speech but it was just another thing that has me on a little bit of an edge regarding the ego of Steven Moffat.
Taken as a whole, it was a fun little romp and people who like superhero movies will probably enjoy this one a lot. I would have liked a lot more Doctor and a meatier villain but you understand that things are going to be a bit fluffier in a Christmas special. I would probably rate it as my least favorite of the Capaldi Christmas specials but still not bad. Middling was my descriptor earlier and I think that's probably the best way to keep it.
Overall personal score: 2.5 out of 5
Ok, first things first. New Doctor Who for the first time in a year: YAAAAAYYYYY!!!
It was fairly well broadcast that this story was going to be Doctor Who's take on comic book movies. What's more, even from the preview, there was a strong inkling towards the Richard Donner original Superman movie. It would be an interesting take to see how well they could integrate such a fantastical element into a show that relied on pseudo-science.
Plot Summary A young boy named Grant wakes up to find the Doctor hanging outside his window, having accidentally snagged himself in his own trap. Grant lets him in, initially mistaking him for Santa. The Doctor rewards him by taking him up to the roof and showing him the machine he was building to try and clear the time disturbances around New York. He hands Grant a power gem, which Grant mistakes for medicine for his cough after the Doctor mentioned he is called the Doctor. Ingesting the gem causes Grant's desire to become a superhero to become a reality and he develops the powers of Superman.
Twenty-four years later, shortly after the night of the Singing Towers of Darillium has ended, the Doctor returns to investigate an alien infestation in the guise of the Harmony Shoal corporation. He returns with Nardole, whom he has reassembled to his original body. Breaking in, he discovers an investigative reporter, Lucy Fletcher, also snooping around. They observe the PR director, Mr. Brock's, body being taken over by alien brains, who cut his head open and insert themselves in. The two flee but are discovered by Dr. Sim who prepares to kill them. They are rescued by a superhero called The Ghost, who knocks out Sim and flies Lucy back to her apartment.
The Doctor recognizes Grant and he and Nardole head over to the apartment where Grant works as a nanny. He works for Lucy and she comes up to find the Doctor. Grant ducks back with the Doctor promising to keep his secret for the moment. Lucy interrogates the Doctor and he admits that the brains are an alien invasion that he is investigating. Grant meanwhile flies out for more superhero deeds. Lucy observes these on the television and convinces the Doctor to set up a meeting with the Ghost. The Doctor informs Grant of this and he calls Lucy to set up a meeting with her the next day on the roof. Grant attempts to play it off with Lucy that he has a date, which arouses latent jealousy in her.
The Doctor meanwhile slips out and he and Nardole head back to the Harmony Shoal corporation. Brock and Sim are planning to capture Grant to take over his body when the Doctor shows up. He gives them a chance to depart but they refuse and he vows to stop them. Nardole picks him up in the TARDIS and they head over to the Tokyo office and hack into the main computer, discovering a transmission to a ship in low Earth orbit. The Doctor and Nardole board the nearly abandoned ship where they are trapped on the bridge by a couple of guards.
At the same time, Grant shows up to Lucy's rooftop as the Ghost where they have dinner and an interview. Sensing Lucy's conflicted feelings about the real him, Grant nearly reveals his identity but changes his mind when he worries that it might hurt her. Brock then turns up and threatens to kill Lucy if he doesn't go along with their plan. Grant hesitates but then breaks away and flies off. Brock debates on killing Lucy and keeping her daughter as hostage when Grant shows up in his regular form to put Brock off. Brock holds off killing them while he calls out for the Ghost to come back before he kills one of them.
Dr. Sim signals the ship and from him the Doctor deduces their plan to crash the ship into New York. It will seem as though aliens are attacking, causing the world leaders to come to the Harmony Shoal corporation for protection as the building is designed to withstand the impact blast. From their, they will take over the leader's bodies and prepare for total conquest. Deducing they are not ready yet, the Doctor directs the ship down and prepares to crash it into New York. He also modifies the radio to a signal only Grant can hear and informs him of what is happening.
The Doctor angles the ship at Lucy's building and Grant catches the falling ship, revealing his true identity to Lucy. She kisses him and the two take off where Grant will throw the ship into the sun. The Doctor comes down and disarms Brock. UNIT also arrives and purges Harmony Shoal, although the alien infesting Dr. Sim escapes into one of the soldiers.
The Doctor leaves with Grant promising to retire as he and Lucy settle into a relationship. Nardole tells them of River Song, which the Doctor had been recovering from, and the two take off for further adventures.
Analysis
I've seen mixed reviews of this on-line and I think I fall somewhere in the middle of everything. I generally liked it, but there was a lot that fell short for me and I'd have to call it mostly middling. I can imagine that many reactions will be more extreme as since it has been such a long wait, people are either inclined to love it no matter what because it's been so long, or hate it because they waited for something that didn't do it for them.
Unquestionably, the best thing about it was the Doctor. He was on point and very good. He was funny but also poignant when he needed to be. He had a lot of witty lines and some funny cracks as well. I also enjoyed his bit play both with young Grant and Nardole. Both had a simplicity about them that played off the Doctor's intellectualism and overlooking of the obvious.
I also really enjoyed Nardole. I didn't remember much about him in The Husbands of River Song but he played much as I expected him to. He was actually a bit better than I expected because he would interject with a simple pedantry in a way that reminds me a lot of my seven-year old son. But unlike a character who can give in to know-it-all-ism, Nardole has a simplicity about him that is refreshing and plays well against the deviousness and lying the Doctor often engages in.
As the Doctor and Nardole were my favorite parts of the story, they also represented a significant shortcoming in this story, in their somewhat limited use. It wasn't that I didn't like the characters of Grant and Lucy, but they seemed pale and boring when compared to the Doctor and Nardole and as a result, I got a bit bored when it was just them on screen. Grant and Lucy also suffered a bit by one other comparison and that was to Richard Donner's Superman.
Grant's powers are obviously Superman inspired, although there were a lot of other superhero references throughout. In that vein, many scenes other other tropes were taken from the first Superman movie, the dinner on the rooftop being the most obvious example. Homages are fine, but when they run so close and so long you start to compare them directly to the original and while the actors who played Grant and Lucy were good, they were not Christopher Reeve and Margo Kidder. It was another scene where the show seemed to slow down and I found myself wandering and not caring about these people and wondering what the Doctor was doing.
I must admit that I am also not much of a superhero movie person. I recognized a lot of little nods: Grant modulated his voice like Batman, the steam of the streets like the 1989 Batman or 1990 Dick Tracy movie, the accidental gain of superpowers like Spiderman, the use of several notable Spierman lines and the trials of having superpowers as a teenager as done in Man of Steel. However, I have not seen a superhero movie since Man of Steel and I've never seen any of the Marvel movies. So a tie in to superhero movies doesn't do much for me as I've somewhat checked out of that genre.
Looking at them objectively, I liked Grant a bit more than Lucy, although she had a better scene with the Doctor. Grant was more affable and did a pretty good job at being both a perfect guy and also the little man you never pay attention to. Lucy was a bit harsher as demanded by the role but suffering from Lois Lane syndrome in not recognizing Grant also made her seem a bit vapid at times. That said, her interrogation of the Doctor was very well done. You know it's a plastic squeeze toy but just her telling you it feels pain and the squeal it makes in addition to her intense stare, you could feel the Doctor's discomfort. She also portrayed an excellent knack for deduction that you could readily believe. It did clash with her non-recognition of Grant, but I still think it added well to her character.
The villains were a bit one-note even if they did have a nice creep factor. My wife, who is not a Doctor Who fan, happened to look up at that time and was unnerved by their appearance. I think I liked them better as the brains though without the apparent tie in to the folks in The Husbands of River Song as they seemed better when they were more original. There was also the small annoyance in that the longer the story went on, the easier I figured it would be for the Doctor to defeat them. They had a nice plan as the Doctor noted, but they were still so easily thwarted that it seemed something of an anti-climax.
There was one thing that stood out for me both in the episode and the trailer for Series Ten and that is a fear that Steven Moffat may run into RTD territory. Russell T. Davis spent some of the last episodes of his tenure indulging in a lot of look back and back slapping. While I appreciate the Doctor's speech about how things change at the end, it seemed a bit of breaking the fourth wall, as though he were trying to assure the watchers that it's okay that he is leaving. It is very similar to the way he had the Eleventh Doctor call Clara at the end of Deep Breath. It was like he didn't trust the audience to accept change unless he gives them permission and I don't care for that.
I'm interested to see what he is planning to do with Bill and how things will go in the tenth series but I got a bit of an Amy vibe and how the American versions were cut with her giving an intro after the cold open. I might have been more sensitive to that due to the flashback I was having regarding the Doctor's speech but it was just another thing that has me on a little bit of an edge regarding the ego of Steven Moffat.
Taken as a whole, it was a fun little romp and people who like superhero movies will probably enjoy this one a lot. I would have liked a lot more Doctor and a meatier villain but you understand that things are going to be a bit fluffier in a Christmas special. I would probably rate it as my least favorite of the Capaldi Christmas specials but still not bad. Middling was my descriptor earlier and I think that's probably the best way to keep it.
Overall personal score: 2.5 out of 5
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