The Ark in Space - Episode 1

The Ark in Space marks the first story with Philip Hinchcliffe as producer. It also marks the beginning of the gothic era of the show and this particular episode is the first time since ‘Inside the Spaceship’ that only features the regulars. I am watching this with the CGI effects used to replace the somewhat poor model shots.  The CGI effects are impressive and the opening moments of this episode show that this is going to be a different story from ‘Robot’. Due to the fact that there aren’t any other people in this episode, the drama has to come from the problems that the regulars find themselves in. Firstly it’s trying to get the oxygen supply working, then it is trying to get past the automatic guard.

It takes Sarah just over three minutes to get into trouble. Instead of sticking with Harry and the Doctor, she decides to go looking in another room which doesn’t have a great deal of oxygen. Sadly as I mentioned in the previous review, the feminism journalist side of the character has gone and replaced with a normal female companion. Her next unfortunate moment comes when the Doctor and Harry place her on a bed and when she wakes up finds herself being freaked out. There is the line where the Doctor responds to Harry by saying “There are only two of us here and your name is harry”.

It’s very rare that I comment on the sets but it looks very impressive and I like how there is a bit of continuity for a future story. Ok so the entire serial is a studio based one but when the sets look as good as these do then it doesn’t matter. The best set comes with the chambers which are holding all the crew of Nerva.

As there aren’t any other performances to speak of then I will have to talk about the central ones. Tom Baker really has got to grips of this story. He seems so different in this story to the last (probably because several months had passed since this story and ‘Robot’ were recorded). I am not sure whether I like the way that he talks to Harry. It just doesn’t seem very much like the Doctor and even William Hartnell’s Doctor wouldn’t have spoken to Ian, Steven or even Ben in the way that Tom Baker’s Doctor talks to Harry. I like how Harry is taking his first trip into space in his stride. There are moments when the posh twit aspect of the character comes into play and with this story being the way that it is, its needed to have a bit of light entertainment. I think that Ian Marter does his best with what is rather a flimsy role. That doesn’t mean there is something charming about Harry but its clear that his time on the show is going to be a little bit short. Elisabeth Sladen must have been disappointed that her role had been somewhat watered down since she started. In this episode along she’s been put in peril on three occasions. Sadly she suffers in this episode and gets the short straw out of the three regulars.

The cliffhanger is very good and very creepy. The wirrn falling towards the camera (from Harry’s POV) is a great way to end the episode and the episode on the whole has been rather good. I would have liked more from Sarah Jane but that aside I think that the proper start to the Tom Baker era has kicked off in tremendous manner and I am very confident about the future of this season and think that when the supporting characters get introduced to the story then things will start to pick up even more.