Day 61: The Web Planet - Crater of Needles

It’s incredible to think that this episode got the second highest rating during this story of 13 million. 13 million! It’s mind bogging but this episode finally moves to the crater of needles which has been mentioned several times. After the almost stationery feel of the story it seems that this episode is where things start to pick up. There is a good moment when Barbara is told about the prison and there is a sense of the battle between the Zarbi and the Menoptra. After the Zarbi and the Menoptra being separated it was nice to see them interact and also another thing about the Zarbi was that we get to see them with a weapon. Quite how we were suppose to find them menacing when they just made a noise at people yet didn’t seem to have any way of stunning or killing people was one of many flaws with the creatures. There are a new set of creatures that are introduced to this episode and the are apparently simpler than either the Zarbi or the Menoptra. Frankly they look like a bit of a late addition and also look rather stupid.

The performances from the regulars is better and its nice that Jacqueline Hill made a return. I thought that William Hartnell had a good episode and he and Maureen O’Brien managed to appear to do quite a lot without really doing very much. Hartnell tinkers around with the map thing, talks to O’Brien and then goes for the hairdryer treatment. William Russell and Jacqueline Hill are on good form and do slightly more in this episode than Hartnell or O’Brien.

There are some good shots that have been achieved by Richard Martin. There are some more shots of the Menoptra flying around and its rather well done. The thing about the effect done to the screen was good in episode one but has started to get annoying because it seems to be getting out of hand. Instead of a light smudge in the first episode we get pretty much a full screen of smudge. It’s a better episode than the previous one but that’s not really saying much. So far the story is exactly as I remember this and I don’t think anything will ever change. If this had been a four part story then maybe this might have been a better story but at six it’s a big stretch.