Saturday, 13 July 2013

Day 59: The Web Planet - The Zarbi

The Zarbi is when any goodwill towards this story well and truly goes out of the window. After the idea that the TARDIS has disappeared it turns out in reality that its just being moved by the Zarbi. Vicki does suffer quite a lot in this episode and she seems to have been sidelined for most of the running time. Even Barbara seems to have suffered a bit but not to the extent of Vicki. Barbara is being possessed by giant bumble bees. They look quite good and are named as Menoptras but they seem a bit to weak in my opinion. It’s quite easy to see why and how the Zarbi are the superior creature in this story. The TARDIS has been moved and all Vicki does in the early part of the episode sees her just pretending to sway from side to side.

In terms of trying to explain what was going on in this episode is difficult to do because I just couldn’t follow what was going on and whilst I found the Doctor and Ian’s part in the story to be most interesting but that’s not really saying much because there is so little going on. Also another problem with the episode is that they seem to be using the same set trying to pretend that it’s a different part of the planet but its clearly the same.
The first time that it gets remotely interesting is at the quarter hour mark where Vicki is able to get out of the TARDIS and meets up with the Doctor and Ian. There is a funny moment where the Doctor is trying to communicate with the Zarbi by waving his arms around and pointing at every Zarbi in shot. William Hartnell seems to give the best performance and I like the final shot of the episode where the cylinder hangs over the Doctor’s head and a voice starts talking to him.

The cliffhanger was quite good but by this point I had completely lost track of what was actually going on. There are moments in this story which are quite good but its mixed in with a lot of nonsense which ruins the whole story. There is one thing that can be said in a positive way and that it is a brave thing for the show to do but sadly its not enough to save this story.

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