Invasion of the Dinosaurs - Episode 6

Day 365 sees the final episode of this story that isn’t as clear cut as many people would suggest in terms of quality. Yes the episode doesn’t start off in the best way due to the fact that there is the darn T-Rex. The Doctor is doing his best to look scared against something that would win 2^nd prize at a kids making competition. It’s made worse by the fight between the T-Rex and whatever it was fighting. The fight was very poor and had no entertaining value to it whatsoever. Whereas we didn’t get very much dinosaur action in the previous episode, we got more than our fair share here.

I like how the Brigadier comes in to save the Doctor just as General Finch is about to collar him. The Brigadier really does show his loyalty to the Doctor in this story and also Benton does as towards the end of the episode, he gets to have a scrap with General Finch and I love how he apologises to Finch, totally Benton. Yates pulling a gun on the Doctor, Benton and the Brigadier is one of the most unexpected turns in the show. Even when he’s telling them on the plan he has a look of someone who believes he’s doing the right thing.

Normally I wouldn’t talk too much about actors that are recurring but not what I would class as supporting actors. Bryson is a character that has a great look on his face when asked to make a cup of tea. His usefulness is made even greater when he distracts Yates. I think it’s a shame that Yates gets sidelined again after this moment. When the episode ends there is a brief mention about what is going to happen to him but that’s it.

The only aspect of this episode that is somewhat frustrating is the bit with Sarah Jane trying to convince Adam and the others. If Sarah Jane could escape without causing harm to the others why wouldn’t they let her do what she did in the previous episode? Thankfully Adam is the one that sees sense and leads the revolt against Grover. When they do realise it does lead to a good final scene with Whittaker and Grover. Grover goes to a lot of trouble to convince the Adam and Ruth that all is well but it does seem like a last ditch attempt and its doesn’t feel like it has much heart in its execution which is why it doesn’t last long. The effect where the Doctor is trying to reverse the time effects is done rather well and it is one of the better effects that are used in this story.

It’s good that Grover and Whittaker end up sending themselves back to where the dinosaurs were coming from (with a little help from the Doctor). It’s good that the Doctor didn’t have a direct involvement in this but Grover and Whitaker were hoisted by their own petard.

I think that whilst this story has a fantastic premise but it totally let down by the models. There are many ways that they could have got around the dodgy dinosaurs so this story is known as the one with the dodgy dinosaurs but if you put that to one side then what we have is a great story that has some very impressive performances especially from Richard Franklin and Malcolm Hulke and Paddy Russell deserve credit for coming up with this story and making it work as well as it did on screen.