(564) Kinda - Part 3

The third episode of this story is one that is a bit difficult to really but not because its boring or uninteresting but just because I found a lot of it on a level that I don’t understand. The episode starts off with us finding out the contents of what was in the box and some might be disappointed with it just being a puppet but I thought that in the context of the episoe that it was quite a fun resolvement. The thing about this episode is that it features very little of Tegan. In fact apart from a couple of quick shots of her on the floor asleep, she plays no involvement in the development of the plot which I thought was a rather bizarre thing to do for a character that has been so integral to the plot.

Adric spends his time trying to get out of playing games with Sanders and Hindle. Speaking of Hindle, he continues to be fantastic in this episode and what makes his performance so strong is that he gets to act against Todd who is just as barmy and I just think that this is the sort of double act that Big Finish could make a series out of these two. Adric is great in this episode and I thought that despite not actually doing anything he somehow manages to keep himself busy. The Doctor spends his time with Todd and they seem to steer the narrative of the episode and by the end they find themselves in sort of weird psycadelic world where they are watching over events. It’s another barmy moment but visually its an impressive sight and there isn’t a moment which I found myself bored with what was going on.

A big improvement came in the form of Aris who in the previous episode wasn’t convincing as the Mara but in this episode I thought that he was much better in this episode and was believeable as a baddie. This episode saw the introduction of the Trickster who I (and maybe you) have seen as the Landlord in the BBC sitcom ‘Bottom’ and as a teacher in ‘Grange Hill’ from 1990 to 2002. The Trickster is a character that fits in very well with this story.

I really liked the episode and though that it was building up to a thrilling conclusion. The performances were strong and the whole thing was directed very well and the thing about this story is that despite it being filmed entirely in a studio and there being things talked about that I either don’t understand or don’t care about, I still think that this is one of the strongest stories of the season so far after the wobble that was ‘Four to Doomsday’ its clear that the new series is going to survive not just a new Doctor but a new style in transmitting.

(563) Kinda - Part 2

The thing about this story is that whilst I may not understand all the bits and pieces about whats going on I can still say that I am enjoying it. This second episode is still just as bonkers as the first. The episode introduces two new characters who are quite integral to the story (well one of them anyway). The first is Panna who according to the information text on my DVD, appeared in the original version of ‘The Prisoner’. Anyway as Panna, she gives a rather dignified yet mesmorising performance and I liked her as a character. She was with Karuna who is a young girl and is basically Panna’s eyes. They are only really in the episode in order to give Sanders a box. The effect used when he looks inside the box is very good although I thought that Sanders’ contribution was a bit flat.

There are two performances which really stand out but before I mention them I have to talk about Nyssa because due to what is going on from start to finish, I didn’t think about Nyssa until I was writing this review. It shows just how unnecessary having three companions is. The two performances were Janet Fielding and Simon Rouse. Both give fantastic performances for different reasons. Fielding’s performance is great because it starts off as a rather scared Tegan where she is talking to herself (quite literally) and then by the end she has become the human form of the Mara. When she wakes up back on Deva Loka, she gives one of her best performances ever and she seems to be having the time of her life. The performance that Rouse gives is arguably one of the greatest in Doctor Who. His madness is unlike anything that has really been seen in Doctor Who before or since.

If I had to make one critiscm of the episode it would be that I didn’t find Aris convincing when he had the Mara on him. Considering he spent the previous episode and most of this episode as a mute then it would have been best to keep him that way because he just doesn’t really work as anything else. That is really as bad as it got because the cliffhanger wasn’t bad. The fact that Todd ended the episode screaming might be a bit bad but I thought that considering she hasn’t done it up until this point means that whatever is in the box really is terrifying (obviously I know different). But it works as a cliffhanger and ends the episode in a good manner and complimented the episode.

So two episodes in and my opinion of the story is that its working well and all the characters have something to contribute and others really stand out amongst a good group of performances.

(562) Kinda - Part 1

Ok so After not being bowled over with ‘Four to Doomsday’, it was time to get ready for this story which is one of those that I really disliked when I first watched when I bought it on VHS many years ago but in recent years I have started to appreciate the story. I have to say that on the basis of this episode I am going to like the story more than ever. This is a story that is Nyssa-lite and that’s because the problem with having a crowded TARDIS is evident and after a brief scene, she is hurried into the TARDIS and that is it until episode four. This story is a Tegan story because she features in it so much.

Tegan’s story is one that is very interesting because its all in the mind. She first comes across Anatta and Annica (Anatta played by Eastenders star Anna Wing). They are playing chequers which is mirroring what Nyssa and Adric were doing at the beginning of the episode and I think that was really clever and a nice thing by writer Christopher Bailey. The next interesting figure she encounters is Dukkha (played by Jeff Stewart). The three characters that Tegan meets are very striking and its hard to find something terrifying in their performances and how they look.

It’s not just Tegan that’s getting some good stuff to do in this story as Adric and the Doctor encounter the colonists. They are all brilliant with Simon Rouse being the best of the trio as Hindle. He starts off the episode as a bit of a whinger but by the end of the episode he is going to kill the Doctor and so has clearly gone barking mad. The next character that is fun to watch is Richard Todd who plays Sanders. He might as well be called Colonel Sanders because his views do seem somewhat outdated and really all that you can do is just laugh at his backward thinking.  Nerys Hughes plays Todd and is the only one out of the three that has any sense to her character. She is the one that actually treats the Doctor properly so is the one that will the fans will be liking.

The episode is a great opening one that tells two sides of the story well and sets things up nicely. I will be honest and say that I haven’t missed Nyssa despite being a big Nyssa fan but I think that just shows how well Christopher Bailey has written the story and how well Peter Grimwade has directed a story that moves along well and at no point was I bored during the course of this episode which wasn’t the case at all during the previous four episodes.

(561) Four to Doomsday - Part 4

So there is a small possibility that there would be something in this episode that elevated it above the previous three and then I remembered that there is one moment that is usually used when talking about Peter Davison’s time on the show and that is the moment when he plays cricket outside of the ship. I forgot to write in the previous review and say that it got 6.88 which is the first time that an episode got under the sevens since part three of ‘The Horns of Nimon’. One reason why I was worried that this episode would get another under seven score when the dancing returns because as I may have mentioned before, I don’t really like the dancing because it doesn’t really add anything to the story.

I did notice in the early stages that the tempo was very low and there didn’t feel like an urgency which was odd considering that this was the final episode. Tegan also spends most of the episode in the TARDIS so it seemed like this was her episode to do very little. The episode seems to be building up to the great moment where the Doctor is trying to get to the TARDIS and is cast adrift and uses a cricket ball to give him momentum to get to the TARDIS. Now obviously, scientifically speaking this nonsense but as a piece of entertainment its great because it just looks awesome. On an effects level it was very good because it still looks good compared to todays standards.

The final few minutes of the episode are quite good and I like how the Doctor shows a more aggressive side when he throws the virus at Monarch which leads him to shrink and thus ends his plans. It does happen literally without about a minute left to go and then they board the TARDIS. It’s a shame that this happened towards the end of the final episode instead of the first episode. If this had been the case then I would have been a bit more positive towards the story and also Terence Dudley. As it stands I think that this story has been utterly disappointing and I would be surprised if this story isn’t the weakest story of the season. Another plus point (lets end on a positive note), is that the cliffhanger with Nyssa fainting for no reason. Kinda is up next and that will be an interesting experience.

(560) Four to Doomsday - Part 3

So this story is one that is never going to rank highly in my Doctor Who ratings but at least this story is consistent, consistently bad but at least it was consistent. The problems with this episode continue from the previous episodes and that there is a lot of talking and stuff happening but I would be at a loss to explain what I thought happened. What I would say about this episode is that there was one thing that I did actually like. You might want to have a sit down for a moment but there was something more substantial that the cliffhanger to write about.

The thing that was a positive for this episode was the development of Adric. He does seem to be back to the Adric that we saw in ‘State of Decay’ because he’s quite conniving and not a team player. I thought that this was something that worked well in the favour of adding some conflict between the four regulars. Unfortunately, Nyssa is the one that’s given the short straw in this serial and suffers the fate of being put under. She only becomes useful towards the end asking the Doctor for his sonic screwdriver and a pencil.

The purpose of what Monarch was doing is explained but to be honest I was so distracted from the story that I neither understand nor care really about what was going on. The thing about Monarch is that he likes to act like the big man but the moment that he is questioned by Enlightenment and Persuasion then he throws a bit of a hissy fit. That’s slightly frustrating although I would say that the visual of the three of them in the chamber is quite good and that’s the only reason for having those scenes in it.

It’s another poor episode and the sooner that I finish watching the next episode the better so I can get on with some better stories. The commentaries of the Peter Davison DVD’s are fantastic if you get the chance to listen to them because they rip these stories to shred (some warrant it more than others) and I was so bored with this story that I was tempted for a while to actually listen to that instead.

(559) Four to Doomsday - Part 2

So its clear that this story isn’t going to improve in my opinion and the problems with this story are even more evident in this episode. I think that Terence Dudley has not really grasped what makes a Doctor Who story because he has written a story that manages to fill the entire running time and yet only have one 10 second moment which has something interesting in it. The problem would normally be that the writer doesn’t know what the new Doctor is going to be like but on this occasion Terrence Dudley has totally missed the mark.

First thing that comes to mind about just how wrong he got it came with the dances. Now its not just one brief moment of dancing but there are several minutes of this and the Doctor and Adric are watching them. It’s nice to know that there isn’t any great rush to sort things out. The other problem is that in between these pointless but visually nice moments, there is a mystery about the ship that isn’t given nearly enough screen time.

The mystery about what the title actually means is something that doesn’t really get resolved. It was mentioned in the reprise that they are four days left before they get to earth. No real detail is given as to what will happen when they get to earth but the word doomsday in the title could have done with a bit of explanation instead of one of the dances.

The only time there is anything interesting is when Bigon reveals that he is infact an android but sadly this comes so late in the episode that I had lost any real excitement about it but I will say that this was a much better cliffhanger than the first one. This is one of those short reviews because so little happened that I just cant be bothered to write anything else so that’s that for today.

 

(558) Four to Doomsday - Part 1

Four To Doomsday was actually the first story that Peter Davison recorded as the Doctor and it was written by Terence Dudley who becomes the 50^th credited writer of Doctor Who and becomes the first person to be credited as a writer and a director. On this occasion I have to say that this story has never been one of my favourites and I am afraid that on the basis I can’t say that the opinion is going to change. I don’t think the reason is because it was Peter Davison’s first story but because the story isn’t very interesting.

The problem ultimately with the episode is that very little happens. The Doctor, Nyssa, Tegan & Adric arrive and spend a while having a look around before coming across the Monarch and his associates who call themselves Enlightenment and Persuasion. They looked quite good as a creation and I thought that Stratford John is a good piece of casting. Sadly they don’t look the same for long as after a drawing from Tegan Enlightenment and Persuasion become a bloke and a woman. This revelation comes forms a cliffhanger. I can’t say that this was a particularly good cliffhanger because if I were watching in 1982 then I wouldn’t say that there would be much of an incentive to watch the next episode.

Whilst I cant say anything positive about the story I can at least say something good about the TARDIS crew. They seem rather friendly with each other considering that in later stories they don’t seem quite the cohesive unit in future stories. This episode starts the season running gag about Tegan trying to get back to Heathrow in 1981 begins here. Considering that she outlasts both Adric and Nyssa, its weird to see her fretting about getting back. Even though she’s told repeatedly that she could get back just moments after leaving in Logopolis, she still keeps banging on about wanting to get back. I get the feeling that this is going to be a problem during the course of this season. As for Adric and Nyssa, they don’t have much to do in this episode. Peter Davison seems to be having fun in this episode and its perhaps no surprise considering this was really his first episode as the Doctor.

As I mentioned this was a bit of a disappointing episode and the next three episodes are going to be a bit of a tough watch. Maybe there is something that is going to pop out and show me I am wrong. I meant Burt Kwouk is in this story so that must mean something.

 

(557) Castrovalva - Part 4

Before I start with todays episode, it doesnt really need pointing out that today is Doctor Who's 51st anniversary and weird to think that this time last year I was at the cinema watching 'Day of the Doctor' and enjoying it. This time last year in my marathon I was watching Episode 1 of 'The Web of Fear'. Today I have been watching the two Dalek movies so I decided to end today with the final episode of Castrovalva.

The final part of Peter Davison’s opening story is an odd one. I mean odd in a good way because I liked it but not in the way that I would have expected. The episode started off with the reprise of the broken glass CSO effect but then the episode seemed to slow down in terms of pace which is a brave thing to do in a final part. This is an important episode because it is where the Doctor is suppose to put the turbulent period of his post-regeneration to an end. For the last couple of weeks I have been actually making notes as opposed to just writing the review whilst I was watching the episode. This is the first episode where I have found myself actually watching the episode instead for most of the episode.

The moment where the Portreeve is revealed to be the Master is perhaps the most understatement of the series. I wrote that I knew that it was the Master and so for me this wasn’t the big moment in the episode that it should have been. On a more positive note, the effect of revelation is good. From the moment the revelation happens, the mood of the episode changes because the Master becomes obsessed with seeing the Doctor before he dies. The Master now has a reputation for coming up with convoluted plans and then realising the error at the very last minute. In this instance he has a convoluted plan but at least he doesn’t chicken out and the plan falls apart because the Doctor is able to work things out.

Adric doesn’t appear until the latter stages of the episodes is interesting because as much as I have liked Adric since he joined the show, I can’t say that I have missed him in this episode and I think that the overcrowded TARDIS problem is starting to show. Ok in previous years the show has had a trio of companions but in this instance, it just doesn’t work and on this occasion it is Adric that has suffered. Adric’s involvement in the episode might be limited but its fun because when they are heading back to the TARDIS its clear that Matthew Waterhouse is a little worse for wear.

I haven’t really commented on the direction. Fiona Cumming is only the third woman to direct a Doctor Who and at the moment the issue of women writers and directors in Doctor Who and at the moment there have been 46 directors in Doctor Who so only 7% are women and yet the figure for women writers is 0%. Fiona has done a good job during the four episodes and has directed it very well. I thought that all the special effects worked really well and I know that she returns for future stories and that’s a good thing because she’s a really good director.

The episode worked well and managed to finish Peter Davison’s opening story with a surprisingly good feeling as I approach the rest of his stories. This wasn’t the first story that Peter Davison recorded as the Doctor and this was a good idea because this is the one that people would have judged him and that meant that he could use the other stories to get to grips with the character but the downside to that is that stories some of the stories aren’t going to be as good as this one. I thought that Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton have done really well over the course of the four episodes and even Matthew Waterhouse had a good story in the early episodes. One thing is for certain, the show is going to survive without Tom Baker and whilst the TARDIS line up is a little crowded, the stories are going to ensure that this season is one of experimentation and its going to be fun.

(556) Castrovalva - Part 3

The third episode is where the story really gets going. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that the first two episodes weren’t any good but they were more about the Doctor’s instability and running around the TARDIS whereas todays episode is more about the place of Castrovalva itself. The episode starts of with the Doctor not being in the place where Tegan and Nyssa left him. The tension as to just where he is doesn’t last a great amount of time but I suppose that it’s a bit silly to put him in too much danger at this early stage of his run. Anyway whilst I still liked the forest location that was shot, I still have reservations about the model shot that is used. Thankfully the quality improves once we get inside Castrovalva and I like the set which has multiple levels and seems quite large compared to usual sets which seem quite closed in .

The Master doesn’t really feature in this episode until quite close to the end but that doesn’t mean that Anthony Ainley was left doing a crossword or watching cricket but he was doning and white beard and wig to play Portreeve who is the elderly leader of this group and this is where I have to pick up on the weaknesses of the story because I can tell that its clearly Ainley. I don’t know whether it wasn’t so obvious in 1982 but I cant imagine that they were fooled for long. Anyway I like the characters that we meet in Castrovalva. I wasn’t wild about the masks that they were wearing at the beginning of the episode but the buckets that some of them seem to be wearing in later scenes are even worse. I work in a stationary shop and the buckets could easily be sold as bins.

I am surprised at how long Adric and the Master are kept out of this story. It was good in the previous episode because it gave Nyssa and Tegan some screen time because they were newer characters whereas Adric had been in the story for about 12-15 episodes before ‘The Keeper of Traken’. When Adric does make an appearance he does so in what was quite an atmosphericly shot moment because Adric appears in darkness and a solitary light shows his outline. Another shot is when he appears to Nyssa in a mirror which is clearly a CSO shot but I thought it was well done.

This was a more lesuirly paced episode than the previous two, although there is a fair amount of running around in the final few minutes. The cliffhanger is another CSO effect which has a sort of shattered glass effect of different aspects of Castrovalva and shows that its not quite the place that they thought it was. There are a few moments which highlight this and it was clever of Fiona Cumming to do this quite subtltly. Some might say this was an error on her part but it could easily be passed off as a good piece of directing. With one more episode left of Davison’s opening story and I have to say that I am enjoying Castrovalva more than I thought I would.

(555) Castrovalva - Part 2

So this episode doesn’t air a week after the previous episode but the very next day. I suppose in this day and age where series are aired daily (mainly on channels like CBS Drama) so I suppose watching in 1982 was a weird kind of feeling. Anyway back to the story and after not being sure of how I was suppose to be feeling, it seems like the story was back on familiar grounds in today episode. The episode starts off with the TARDIS about to reach event one but the way that the Doctor and the others stop this from happening is quite a simple way that isn’t done in a straight forward way and I like that. The Doctor who ends up in a wheelchair manages to stay himself long enough to tell Tegan how to jettison 25% of the TARDIS.

The build up to the moment where the jettison happens is quite good and the idea that this scene doesn’t actually involve the Doctor is something that would have seemed totally out of place in previous regeneration opening stories but somehow this new style allows this to work. The Doctor doesn’t really have much of an impact in this episode really because he’s either rolling around in his wheelchair or holed up in his Zero Cabinet. It seems quite odd that they went to the decision to keep the Doctor so much out of the action. The upside to this is that it means that Nyssa and Tegan get a fair amount of the action which I like.

The location footage looks rather good and reminds me of the filming for ‘The Android Invasion” where the weather looked marvellous and the location itself was lovely to watch and where they filmed todays location is equally good. The only problem with this portion of the episode is the model shot of Castrovalva looks rather poor. That said that is the only thing that I didn’t like in the episode.

The episode ends with the Zero Cabinet being empty after Nyssa and Tegan found some blood which is an ok way to end an episode but I think that the cliffhanger didn’t really work as well as the rest of the episode which I thought was very good from start to finish. The episode never seemed to be slowing down or waiting for something to happen. As soon as it changed direction it did and did it in a seamless way. Two episodes in and the story is working well and I think that things are starting to settle down and the show is managing to survive without Tom Baker.

(554) Castrovalva - Part 1

This is quite an important episode of Doctor Who which might sound like a stupid statement but bare with me on this because there are multiple reasons for this. Firstly there is the matter of a new Doctor in the form of Peter Davison. Another is that it’s the first time in the shows history that its not airing on a Saturday. Instead Doctor Who is airing on a Monday and Wednesday. This might seem like a sign that the BBC were showing a lack of faith in the show and that might be true but the most alarming fact is that whereas Season 18 would take about seven months to run through, Season 19 would be on screen for just three months. The gap between the final part of ‘Logopolis’ and the first episode of this was 289 days which is a record and beat the previous season’s record of 231 Days.

The episode starts with a pre-title scene which is basically the reprise from the previous and the thing that is different is that the music is more upbeat which I like cause its basically saying that there is a no sheriff in town. The episode was never going to have Davison’s Doctor running around as he would normally do but instead he’s a bit all over place and doing a bit of running. I think that Davison’s Doctor is underrated and this episode shows this because he does a great deal whilst appearing to not be his self. There are little nods to previous Doctors and I like the impressions but I don’t know what to make about his untangling the Doctor’s scarf. I don’t think they should have done that.

With this being the final story in the Master trilogy this means that it will involve a rather convoluted plan. At the moment it doesn’t look like this is going to be the case. The Master is using Adric to plunge the TARDIS into ‘Event One’ also known as the Big Bang. I like how Adric is being used because its an interesting way of using a character. The Adric that’s on board the TARDIS isn’t the real Adric and it gives Matthew Waterhouse the opportunity of playing two different aspects of the same character.

Apart from a few minutes at the beginning set on Earth, the vast majority of the episode takes place inside the TARDIS and I love the idea that this happens. With a lot of things up in the air there is a sense of not being as they were and after seven years worth of episodes with the same Doctor it’s a weird feeling with the scenes in the TARDIS of a familiar setting but with unfamiliar people. The Zero Room only appears in this story but its such a good idea I wish they had kept it and used it in future stories.

The cliffhanger is a good one and it’s the ending that the episode should be. As an episode I thought that it was a good if slight understated episode. It’s hard to judge how Peter Davison’s era is going to be after one episode but I think the signs are promising. It’s not going to be as good as the Tom Baker era or even Jon Pertwee’s but I think that there will be things in future stories that I will like and then there are smiling Silurians and the Murka. For now I am just enjoying this opening story of the Davison era and liking it.

(553) Logopolis - Part 4

Today is the 172^nd and last episode to feature Tom Baker as the Doctor. It’s hard to believe that tomorrow will see a new Doctor. It’s something that I have been building up to for the last couple of weeks but here we are and the end has been prepared for. I was really wondering what I was going to feel as I started to watch this episode and it didn’t take long for me to feel a huge sense of sadness. It’s hard to believe that it’s been five and a half months and it seems like only five minutes since I started watching Robot. It does feel odd that Tom Baker’s seven and a half years comes down to this 25 minute episode and no episode in Doctor Who has had such importance placed on it. The episode starts off with the Doctor’s handshake with the Master and the look on his face which is one of disgust.

The Monitor doesn’t last very long in this episode but his death wouldn’t be a cop-out because visually it was very good and it was the start of things to come. The problems with the Master continue to show up when just after the Monitor was wiped away, the Master decides to just get up and leave which seems like the Master as a character has taken a step backwards.

The stuff where Tom Baker is running around when the story moves to Earth is perhaps the most action packed that his Doctor had been perhaps ever. I thought that the stuff on earth was better than the stuff on Logopolis. The build up to the big scene was quite good and the fact that it was on location was a nice addition because it felt like it was injecting some energy which it was needed.

The performances were good but in particular there were two that stood out. The first was Tom Baker’s obviously. There were times were he clearly knew the end was coming and whilst he didn’t have the energy that he would have had during the early days of the show but there was still some of the original Doctor in that performance. The second was Anthony Ainley who seemed to be up to speed with the character and I liked the combination of Tom Baker and Anthony Ainley and it’s a shame that they didn’t have more stories together because I think they could have had some good stories together.

The regeneration scene was really good and was perhaps more emotional than when Jon Pertwee turned into Tom Baker. The music used was really downbeat (which would change in the next story) and the watcher walking towards the Doctor and the two merging was a really good effect and the transformation was also rather good but I think that if it were done today then it would be more gradual whereas in this regeneration its still done well but does look a bit slow compared by todays standard. The sight of Peter Davison is a definitive sign that the Tom Baker era was well and truly over.

No matter how many times I have watched this story I always wish that the Doctor hadn’t tried to pull that cable off the gantry. I wish that something would happen which meant everything was alright but sadly it doesn’t happen and the final few minutes are truly sad and I haven’t felt like this since the goodbye scene between the second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe. This episode may not have had much in terms of dealing with the main issue in it but to be honest that could have been dealt with in the first couple of minutes and it wouldn’t have made any difference to the story. I cant really decide whether the episode was what it needed to be. As a four part adventure it did what it needed to be and we said goodbye to the longest serving Doctor in the style that it needed to. Whereas ‘Planet of the Spiders’ did seem to have thing that were put in to indulge Jon Pertwee, here there wasn’t anything like that.

Well that’s the biggest part of the journey over with. Tom Baker has been a mesmerising Doctor and he is going to be a difficult act to follow. Already I worry that things aren’t going to be quite as good but maybe time will tell but one thing is for sure, the show isn’t going to be the same again.

(552) Logopolis - Part 3

The penultimate episode is perhaps the one where there is the most advancement happens in terms of plot. It where all the various elements from the past couple of episodes finally meet up. Firstly there is the companion line up having a decent amount of time together and I quite like it. I like how they all have different things that they bring and something I hadn’t clued on before reading the information text that they actually all have something in common and that is they have all suffered a loss before joining the Doctor. The episode restarts with the shrunken TARDIS and it reminded of the recent story ‘Flatline’ where the TARDIS is the same size. Due to the TARDIS being smaller that it meant the Doctor was out of action for a while and when he does get back to normal size he is rushing around like a mad man (in a blue box).

There might be a new Master but the problems with the Master are still the same. He doesn’t think things through until its too late. This is the first time that we get to see the Anthony Ainley version of the Master. I think that it’s a solid performance but its hard to judge really at the moment. I think that the problem with Ainley’s Master is that he is always going to be judged against Roger Delgado so I am going to try and be fair and judge Ainley’s Master against what I see.

As far as the narrative is concerned it feels like its trying to do two things at once. Its trying to tell a story right here and now but its also getting the groundwork done for Peter Davison’s arrival. The appearances of the Watcher felt like they were more significant in this episode than in previous ones and as the ending draws closer it feels like there is no real way for the Doctor to get out of things. There is a line that the Doctor gives where he says “I’m going to stop him if it’s the last thing that I do”. There is a sadness behind this that I cant figure out whether its acting or Tom Baker being real.

As far as the cliffhanger goes its another good one because it sees the Doctor and Master form an alliance and more importantly shake hands. It’s a handshake that’s going to be bad for the Doctor but I like that its not necessarily dramatic but its more what it signifies and I think that this is why the cliffhanger is so good. As an episode I really enjoyed it and for a while I almost forgot that the next episode would be the final episode for Tom Baker.

(551) Logopolis - Part 2

The first thing after the titles are finished that appears on screen is the sight of the Watcher. The first couple of minutes are back on the lay by where the Doctor is about to be taken to the police station and gets Adric to create a diversion to give the Doctor the opportunity to escape and to be honest he doesn’t have to try very hard because all he does is pretend he’s fallen off a bike and that’s all that is needed. Once the story leaves the lay-by that is when it starts to go up a gear.

Tegan appears to have found her voice in this episode and despite spending most of her time running around in the TARDIS, when she does eventually meet the Doctor and Adric, the noise levels go up and the number of TARDIS crew is going up to pre-1970 levels. Nyssa doesn’t appear until the final couple of minutes which is a bit of a surprise. What is also a bit of a surprise is that at the half way point of the story that the Master still hasn’t appeared. There are a couple of chuckles but that’s about it.

The story moves to Logopolis and the first thing that we see is a model set which isn’t the greatest if I am being honest because for me the scale of things in the shot don’t quite add up to me. I know that I maybe (and probably am) wrong but it just doesn’t work for me. When we get down onto the planet then a number of things strike me. The first is that the person playing the monitor looks a lot like Noel Edmonds and I cant get rid of that thought at tall. The idea that the Logopolitans mainly use their heads to come up with mathematical sums instead of using computers even though they do have a giant satellite.

The cliffhanger is rather good because of the fact that the Doctor is about to be shrunk to a rather small size. At the half way stage the story is starting to take shape and things are working out well. This episode might have a certain amount of glumness about it but compared to the previous episode it does seem that the narrative moves along at such a speed that there isn’t the time to worry about it. Two episodes left and there is a part of me that wishes the story would end differently but sadly that’s not going to happen but at least the moment has been prepared for.

(550) Logopolis - Part 1

Logopolis is the 41^st and final story to feature Tom Baker as the Doctor. It feels a bit of a shame that Tom Baker chose now to leave the show as I think that with the renewed freshness that the show has had since John Nathan Turner became Producer, he could have done another season but I suppose I might be in the minority there but this is the middle story in the trilogy of adventures featuring the Master although really if I am going to be pedantic (and I can cause this is my review), then out of five episodes he has only really appeared once. Anyway the thing about this episode is how glum everything is. It’s not just the fact that 95% of the action takes place in a lay-by but the fact that everyone’s performance lacks an excitement. Most notable is that of Tom Baker who looks very different from the previous episode.

I think that the relationship between the Doctor and Adric has been quite good and they spend most of the episode together. They seem to have the most interesting time in the story. This is a story which has a lot of real science in it then what we have are few moments which are a bit difficult for me to understand. The sight of the TARDIS prop inside the console room is one that is so good I wonder why it wasn’t used before. The idea of them walking into a new console room everytime they walk into the TARDIS prop is something that looks good but if the science was explained then I might lose track.

This serial introduces Janet Fielding into the show as Australian air hostess Tegan. It’s a bit generous to call her an air hostess because she has never actually done it as a job and infact is about to start when this episode begins but that aside, Janet Fielding has a rather understated debut. Knowing what she will become in future episodes, its fair to say that she starts off quite perky and jolly. She spends her time in the show with her Aunt Vanessa. Spending a moment to talk about Aunt Vanessa, if she were in todays Who then she wouldn’t have been killed off so quickly and she would have become a regular visitor to the show. She was by far the happiest person in the episode.

A strange white figure appears in the middle of the episode which as the story progresses is announced as ‘The Watcher’ but at this point he is just a strange figure but when the Doctor spots him the look is one where its clear he knows what is coming and its not good. The only aspect of the episode which I didn’t think worked was the final few minutes which led to the cliffhanger. The involvement of the DI is something that seems to offer very little and the shot of the policeman seen at the beginning of the episode and Aunt Vanessa who are action man figures dressed in the clothes of the policeman and Aunt Vanessa. I would have expected something with a bit more action.

As an opening episode which needs to be as epic as the man about to leave the show it was a good one because it set the tone right and did a good job of introducing the new companion. I watch these future episodes knowing that the Davison era isn’t too far away and whilst I am looking forward to the arrival of Peter Davison, I know that the Tom Baker era is coming to an end and after four an a half months, I am trying to get use to the idea that the show will have changed and I don’t know at the moment whether its for the better.

(549) The Keeper of Traken - Episode 4

The final episode is another episode of two halves but they aren’t that different to each other. The first half is the aftermath of the Melkur becoming the Keeper. It’s safe to say that it was never going to be the most popular appointment in history. Knowing what happens in this episode, I just want it to happen and I surprised to find out that the big scene between the Doctor and the Master doesn’t happen until seven minutes before the end. That’s pretty much what this whole episode and story have been about to be honest but before I finish this entry, I will talk about other aspects of the episode like I normally would.

I think that the sight of Melkur in the Keeper’s chair is still impressive and I also like the idea that he can pop up pretty much anywhere which perhaps isn’t quite a big thing considering the original keeper popped up in the TARDIS in episode one. The Melkur not having the power for a while does seem like a narrative stalling method which does work. The lead up to the eventual confrontation between the Doctor and the Master is quite good but I was just wishing that it would happen. The scene where the Doctor finds himself inside the Master’s TARDIS is a great little scene and it’s the first time since ‘The Deadly Assassin’ that the Master has appeared in Doctor Who and I think that Geoffrey Beevers is a superb piece of casting not just because Beevers doesn’t wear that odd mask and costume that Peter Pratt wore but instead we get to see Beevers use his whole body to show us why even when he is playing the role for Big Finish he is so damn good at it. On a side note, go to the Big Finish website and purchase from the Main Range page the story ‘Master’ which is one of the finest stories ever made. Anyway back to the story and I just wish that the scene with the Doctor and the Master was longer but that’s my personal opinion.

The final scene is great because it ends with the Master seemingly defeated and that appears to be the end of it. The Doctor and Adric are on board the TARDIS but one of the things I like about this story is that its not the end because we have the ‘regeneration’ moment with the Master taking over Tremas’ body which is a mixed moment because whilst visually it’s a great thing to see, I liked Tremas so much over the course of the four episodes that it’s a shame that he paid the price for just being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The last shot is of Nyssa walking into an empty room and that is a proper cliffhanger for a final episode.

It was a great ending to a great story and my appreciation for this story has gone up even more and I think that Tom Baker’s penultimate story shows just how good Tom Baker has been recently and also how much JNT and Christopher H Bidmead have improved the show in such a short amount of time. However as much as I have enjoyed this story I do feel a bit down because I know what comes next. The moment has been prepared for and things are about to get loud.

(548) The Keeper of Traken - Episode 3

This episode is an episode of two halves because the first half is pretty much like Traken itself. It’s very peaceful and very tranquil with nothing that would shake the skin off a custard. The first noticeable thing that appears at the beginning of this episode is that Melkur is after the power that the Keeper possesses. I don’t know if it was just because I wasn’t paying attention in the previous episodes but this is the first time that I have actually heard the purpose of Melkur in the story. The thing about Traken which is quite baffling is the speed at which things happen there. Kassia has gone from being a new bride to the new Keeper in an extraordinarily quick amount of time. I also cant believe that no one has noticed the change in character that Kassia has undergone in the same short amount of time. I guess that when things are as laid back as they seem on Traken that such changes in personality aren’t taken too seriously.

The second half of the episode is where the action really shows whats good about the story because this is where we learn a bit more about Melkur. It was great how there were more and more shots what the master Melkur sees. It’s not until the very end that the figure turns around and even though he’s not named as the Master in the credit there cant be many people who watched this in 1981 that this was the master. It’s quite fun that just under a week since the Master changed gender that we are getting a new Master in this story. The Melkur design has been on of the highlights of this serial and it gets better in at the end of this episode where it becomes the Keeper after consuming Kassia and the sight of the Melkur sitting in the Keeper’s chair is a great one and it makes for a great cliffhanger. The cliffhangers have been the main weakness of this story and its good that they have managed to rectify the situation a bit here.

The performances have all been quite good with Nyssa being one of the strongest ones. She has been a bit in the background so far so it was good how she seemed to develop quite a lot here. I think that with a bit more work she will show everyone why I think that she’s one of the best companions in Doctor Who. Tom Baker’s performance has been good but I think that it’s a bit tame compared to how it’s been in other stories in the season. The fact that the Doctor and Tremas are friends is still something that tickles me and I like how despite being a little bit of a spare part in the episode, Adric continues to impress me.  

This sets up the final episode brilliantly and I think that this story is even better than I have previously thought of. It’s weird to think that this time next week I will be in the Davison era and a tiny bit of sadness is starting to creep into my enjoyment. If only the show had been like this in the previous season then I could see myself saying that I wish Tom Baker had gone on for a bit longer but I think that he is getting the set of stories that he deserves.

(547) The Keeper of Traken - Episode 2

So the penultimate story of the Tom Baker era is off to a good start due which is perhaps down to nostalgia and I have to try and take that out of my watching and review this story like I would with any other story. I still think that its strange that the Doctor and Tremas are working together and are the best of friends throughout this story. Anthony Ainley is very good as Tremas and I still believe him as a good person even though a few episodes later he will be the exact opposite. Tom Baker and Anthony Ainley work well together and they are not the only good double act that appear on screen in todays episode. I think that Adric and Nyssa are a good fit together and its probably due to the fact that they appear to be the same age so the two sides of the story work quite well.

The Melkur is still a visually impressive villain and its good that we at least get to see it move in this episode instead of just moving its head. What I like is how we get to see that there is more to Melkur than just a statue walking around. There is someone inside and if you think about it then you would realise that it has to be bigger on the inside than on the outside…..wait a minute!!! The most we see from whoever (wink wink) is inside the Melkur is a hand. Kassia was pretty much singled out as one to watch when we learnt that she tended to Melkur in the gardens and in this episode things got slightly stranger as he gave her a neck thing which means that he can control her and does quite soon after putting it on. There are a few moments when her ‘eyes’ go red and it’s a similar effect to the one used in ‘Planet of Evil’. Somehow despite that story being about six years ago, the effect in this episode seems worse than before.

The problem of today’s cliffhanger is the same as yesterdays. I think that todays is slightly better but it seems that all the efforts have gone into making the rest of the episode work and didn’t have any time in working on a satisfying cliffhanger. It that’s the worst thing that I can say about the episode and story then it’s a pretty good episode and it is just as much fun as I have thought in the past. All the performances are really solid and due to my new appreciation of Adric and there being no K9 it means that there isn’t anything to get me annoyed and that’s a good feeling to have.

 

(546) The Keeper of Traken - Episode 1

Before I start this entry, I am going to start by telling a little story. Many years ago when places like HMV still sold VHS’s, I went into that store and discovered in the clearance section a copy of this story for the bargain price of £6.49 and so took it home and I can remember how much I loved this story immediately after watching it. There aren’t many that have made me feel like this and so ‘The Keeper of Traken’ has always held a special place in my heart. Today is the start of another trilogy of stories however unlike the E-Space trilogy, this isn’t an official trilogy but I think that this is a more important trilogy because of what happens during the course of the next twelve episodes. This is also the first episode to feature Anthony Ainley who will be playing the Master at the end of this story and it also sees the first appearance of Sarah Sutton who plays Nyssa. Nyssa is for me one of the best companions in Doctor Who. Everytime there is a Nyssa story from Big Finish, I look forward to theses stories even more.

The relationship between the Doctor and Adric seems to be a lot better than it was when Romana was around. I think I quite like this combination and had Tom Baker stayed in longer or Adric had come in early and Romana left early then we would have had some good stories with this combination. However as it is we just get an episode where they spend it together and most of it is in the TARDIS. The Keeper pops up during these TARDIS scenes and despite watching this story several times over the years, I didn’t realise that the Keeper was played by Denis Carey who most people now would have seen as Professor Chronotis in ‘Shada’. The purpose of the episode is explained by the Keeper in just one scene and we learn how Traken is a nice place and I just think that this is obviously not going to last once the Doctor and Adric arrive.

The story that the Keeper tells is about the Melkur. I really like the design of Melkur as even if you don’t know the big revelation that’s coming about the Melkur, its hard not be impressed with it and it doesn’t really do a lot but what it does do is very creepy and in particular how it just pops up in the crack of the two doors in the chamber. The Melkur will become even more relevant to the story in future episodes but just based on what has been shown in todays episode there is still plenty to like about what is effectively a statue.

On Traken, it’s a studio bound set yet at no point during the course of the four episode did I find myself being bored with the action and I didn’t really miss the outside filming.  The sets do look rather splendid and I think that a lot of time and energy was put into making what appears on screen looks great. John Black’s first foray into Doctor Who is at the moment a success.

If I had to pick some faults with this episode then there are two and just two. The first is the slightly frustrating matter of the Doctor and Adric trying to convince people that they are there for good reasons. The icing on the cake comes when the Keeper says “Evil” and naturally everyone thinks that he is referring to the Doctor and Adric. The second fault is that the cliffhanger is rather disappointing because it doesn’t really have any drama or tension to it. The point of a cliffhanger is to give the viewer a reason to tune in for the next instalment but on this occasion there isn’t really a reason. The only reason that there would be to tune in it to see what is going on elsewhere in the story.

As an episode it’s a good start to the story and things are set up for the rest of the serial. After being slightly disappointed with the previous story, it was nice to get back to being enthusiastic about what I see on screen. As part of the Master/New Beginnings trilogy it’s a promising start and the countdown to the Davison era really starts now.

(545) Warriors Gate - Episode 4

Today is an episode of mixed emotions because on the one hand Lalla Ward is leaving the show after 46 episodes although technically the character of Romana has been in the show for 66 episodes which would work out as the fifth longest serving companion on the show. It’s crazy to think that this is Tom Baker’s 164^th episode and there are just eight episodes left. Anyway back to today’s episode and I was kind of hoping that something would jump out at me but I have to say that this is the case. The first several minutes of the episode are taken up with a lot of talking and a lot of technical scientific terms which quite frankly I didn’t understand. This confusion does carry on for most of the episode and then with about six or seven minutes left of the episode the whole thing bursts into life and there is suddenly a lot of panic and action.

The only thing that made any sense was that Biroc says that they are basically to blame for being in the situation. Apart from that there is very little in the way of a story from this side of the episode and this episode will be remembered for Romana’s departure. Sadly Romana’s exit is a bit rushed but I liked the Doctor’s line about her being “the noblest Romana of them all”. Part of me wishes that the Doctor would have tried a bit harder in persuading Romana to stay. Lalla Ward wasn’t exactly happy with her exit One advantage of Romana departing is that Adric moves up the rankings because he was treated rather badly in this episode. It was 17 minutes before he first appeared and once he, the Doctor and Romana were in the TARDIS he was ordered to stay by Romana. At the end of the episode where its just the Doctor and Adric in the TARDIS, I think that it’s a weird combination.

As a companion, Romana has been really strong in both incarnations. I think that Lalla Ward is slightly better than Mary Tamm but I think had Tamm been in the show for slightly longer then my decision might be different. Ward gave Romana a slightly more fun sense of arrogance compared to Tamm. As an episode this story is no worse or better than the previous three but as a story I don’t think that it will be one of the classics. The next story is the penultimate one for Tom Baker and the next step in the regeneration of the show is about to take place. Sadly the final part of the E-Space trilogy isn’t quite the story that it needed to be and its perhaps the most disappointing story of the season so far.

(544) Warriors Gate - Episode 3

After wondering what was going to happen to Romana at the end of the previous episode, it must have been somewhat disappointing to see the hand wander down to the cuffs to release Romana. Or at least attempt to release her because the thing that is revealed about the Tharils in this episode is that they aren’t quite as good as we have been led to believe. This comes after Boric leads the Doctor through some sort of Alice in Wonderland setting and comes across the same banquet hall as before but this time its alive with the sound of people and music. Here humans are the slaves and the Tharils are the rulers and don’t treat the humans with a great deal of respect.

I have to say that I don’t think that this story gets the credit that it deserves in terms of special effects. People are so quick to mock the show because of ‘crappy special effects’ and other stuff but when you look at this episode and in particular the CSO used with the Doctor and Biroc in the Alice in Wonderland setting, it shows how much the show pushed the boundaries of what was possibly. Even by 2014 standards, its hard not to be impressed with what I have seen on screen. There is very little in this story that doesn’t rely on special effects of some kind and its this stuff that I find most interesting. The problem with the story is still that it’s a triumph of style over substance because narratively the story is lacking anything and I feel like Paul Joyce is doing all the work really. Ultimately when Biroc starts talking about time winds then I start to lose interest because it feels like the real science is starting to get into the story and if I want real science then I’ll watch something on BBC 4.

Adric has a slightly more productive episode than the previous one and he feels slightly more part of the team. That said I think that this is largely Romana’s episode because she seems to be everywhere and that’s not a critiscm but just an observation. It’s good to see Tom Baker being more productive than he was in the previous episode. To be honest he’s just more mobile rather than actually progressive in narrative terms.

The episode only really gets going in the final few minutes when the truth of the Tharils is revealed and I think that this is an interesting development. Frustratingly though this happens too late and the episode ends with a visually impressive cliffhanger. I say visually impressive because the shot goes from nice banquet hall to cobweb banquet hall and yet it flows really well. The episode is another one where there are good things to enjoy about this story but its still not working on me and its definelty the weakest story of the season.

(543) Warriors Gate - Episode 2

I am going to get this out of the way from the very beginning and say that I don’t think I will like this story by the end of episode four. I base this on the fact that even after all the stuff that happened in this episode I still cant find anything to be wowed by. It’s definelty a stronger episode that yesterdays but I cant say that much has really improved overall after two episodes. This really is a story of two halves because the first half is with the Doctor and he spends most of his time in the banquet hall which whilst a very nice looking set does mean that the Doctor is restricted in what he does and spends most of it interacting with the robot guards and whilst he does well it does seem like a bit of a waste of his talents. There were glimpses of the old comedic aspect of the Doctor which I know I haven’t been a huge fan of in the past but in small doses, its very much enjoyed on my part.

Romana drives the narrative in this episode in my opinion because she is very much the leader between herself and Adric in the early stages of the episode and once she leaves the TARDIS, she becomes even more involved in the episode and she does become part of the cliffhanger because it ends with a close up of her face screaming in terror at a Tharil about to lay its hand on her face. Romana doesn’t scream very much in this show (in either incarnation) and so she must feel some danger to scream. Adric still feels like the spare part of the team and that’s a shame considering how well he was used in the previous story. He does get one great moment in the episode when he tells K9 that he is more useless than usual. Considering that Adric hasn’t had as much interaction with K9 as we have, its good that he has come to this conclusion so quickly.

There is a slight problem with the character of Rorvik because I can see that they are trying to make a sinister villain out of him but when you consider the villains that there has been in just this season alone then Rorvik doesn’t quite work and I just think that its someone trying to be more of a menace than he actually is and that is part of the problem because if you don’t believe in the threat in the story then there is no desire to be bothered about the Doctor coming in and saving the day. This was another episode which had some good moments but as I mentioned earlier, I still have bought what Stephen Gallagher is trying to sell and I don’t think that its terrible compared to stories like ‘Meglos’ and ‘The Horns of Nimon’ but out of the three stories that form this trilogy, this is definelty the weakest of the three. Note I say weakest and not worst because there is too much going on in this story and still to happen for me to consider this adventure as a rubbish contribution.

(542) Warriors Gate - Episode 1

I’ve never been a fan of this story and out of the three stories of the trilogy, I felt that this was the one that let the side down and on the evidence of the first episode there isn’t anything that would make me change my mind. This is the final story to feature Romana and K9 and whilst I am disappointed about the former, the latter is good news. To be fair to the story, the opening shot is quite good because it’s atmospheric and looks really fab. This is the second time in this season that the episode starts off with a long (ish) panning shot, the first being ‘The Leisure Hive’ but unlike that panning shot, this one isn’t as long and visually is better.

I think that one of the things that works in this stories favour is the special effects because there are many throughout the four episodes and there are a few that take place in this episode. One in particular is when Biroc is running and there is a ghost trail behind him. It might be the sort of thing that would feature in a 1980’s music video. Credit should go to Paul Joyce for doing a job and pushing the boundaries of what should be possible for 1980’s TV. Apparently his directing methods caused some problem but they don’t show on TV. It’s fair to say that this story isn’t like anything that the show has seen before.

It seems like Romana’s exit has been prepared for because there is a little scene where Romana talks about her and the Doctor going their separate ways. It wasn’t with the Doctor but it seems like they are actually taking the time to prepare for a companions exit which they haven’t done for quite sometime. It feels odd that this is the ninth episode for Adric and it’s the first time that he has a scene as a companion and gets a proper TARDIS scene with the Doctor and Romana. That said he does seem to be a bit of an outsider because the Doctor and Romana are talking to each other and Adric is standing to one side like a spare part.

The cliffhanger is quite a good one because it looks like the Doctor is about to get his head knocked off. I had trouble trying to get interested in this story. It’s wasn’t terrible by any means but I think that it’s a bit dry and I worry that the next three episodes is going to be a triumph of style over substance. Only time will tell I suppose but the omens aren’t good.

(541) State of Decay - Episode 4

This episode is the final episode to be transmitted in 1980. It starts with the reprise which still looks weird when Romana is backing away from Adric as he is about to be bitten. It must be said that there is a bit of Karma at play because later on Adric is prepared to sacrifice Romana to the Three Who Rule. I quite like Adric in this episode because he clearly trying to look out for his own interests but later on he tries to pretend that he was looking out for Romana. What makes this quite fun is the look on Romana’s face which clearly shows that she doesn’t believe him. Considering that this is the first time that all three regulars have appeared in the same scene.

The whole episode is building up towards the sacrifice and normally this would be either rushed or not really looked at but it takes up a nice amount of the episode and its dealt with in a good manner. I liked how the Doctor dealt with the situation and used the scout ship/tower as a weapon and used what energy it had left in shooting it up into the air and back down again. Tom Baker was on good form because he gives a good Henry IV speech and there were some classic fourth Doctor moments.

We finally get to see the great one twice. The first is a model mixed in with scanner graphic which works but had it been the model of the great one as it is then it wouldn’t have worked quite so well. The second is when its hand comes out of the ground. Visually it’s a strong image and one of the best shots in the entire serial. I think that overall this episode is the strongest in terms of directing out of the four. Peter Moffatt has done a great job in keeping the pace up and there are some great shots that he manages to achieve. Terrance Dicks has worked his magic again and has saved the best until last and tied things up nicely.

As the middle story it does a good job of being the middle story of being a trilogy it does what it needs to do but as a story in its own right its also very good. I think that its another good story in the JNT era and the next story is the final one for K9 and more importantly for Romana. The changing of the companion line up starts in the next story so there is still plenty to look forward to in this season.

(540) State of Decay - Episode 3

I watch these episodes at the moment on my Xbox and usually when I finish an episode I stop it straight away and come the next episode and it was whilst watching the closing credits Barry Letts’ name pops up and I forgot that during this time on the show we have the partnership of Barry Letts and Terrance Dicks in Doctor Who. Sadly this isn’t 1970 anymore and the heyday of Tom Baker’s tenure has gone so whilst it’s good to have a Doctor Who story with Barry Letts and Terrance Dicks credited it’s sad to think in a way that this isn’t their show anymore. The episode was watched by 4.4 million viewers which bearing in mind that just a year before episode three of ‘Nightmare of Eden’ which aired on December 8 got 9.6 million viewers it must have looked like they needed to hit the panic button but I can’t think why this episode got such low viewing figures. If I didn’t know I would have thought that the nightmare episode would have got 4.4 million viewers and this episode got 9.6 million.

The opening scene seems quite a long one compared to usual episodes and that’s not a critiscm because it’s a really well performed one with all the important characters (except Adric). Aukon is by far the best performer in the scene and the Doctor is a close second. It’s during this scene that the Doctor and Romana first hear Adric’s name. I still think that its impressive that Adric has been side-lined for so long. Really the Doctor and Romana should have seen this coming considering in a normal story with the pair they would have been separated at the earliest moment yet in episode three they have hardly been apart. Matthew Waterhouse has a pretty easy time of it in this episode as he doesn’t appear until the final few minutes of the episode. When he does appear his costume has improved dramatically and its just a shame that he doesn’t wear it past this story.

The episode features a scene where the Doctor is locked in a cell with his companion and he talks about a hermit on Gallifrey. This is very much a Terrance Dicks trait because it appeared in two Jon Pertwee stories (where he was script editor). I thought that it was a nice bit of continuity in a time when the show was looking towards the future its nice that they did this nostalgic moment.

This episode was one of those that was a collection of moments and that is why this episode is quite good because those moments are so good and another of those good moments include any scene with Zargo and Camilla because it has a Macbeth feel to it which when done right (as in this case) is a strong image to have on screen. The death of Tarak is very grim by Doctor Who standards and not because its gory or particularly violent (even though it is), its because its quite prolonged. Instead of a quick death which is over in a second or two, Tarak’s death takes considerably longer.

The last minute sees Camilla about to attack Adric and Romana leaving him to his fate which I thought was very strange and not really in the spirit of the show but then she got her comeuppance of sorts when she is facing Zargo and this is the cliffhanger which normally would make me groan with disappointment because people would know that she is going to appear in future stories but in the case of this particular cliffhanger it works well and I am looking forward to the final episode. At the moment this is falling just short of ‘Full Circle’ in terms of ratings but I wouldn’t be surprised if the final episode goes just ahead.

(538) State of Decay - Episode 2

The second episode of this story still sees Adric separated from the Doctor and Romana. I don’t know if this is deliberate but the unexpected bonus because it is making Adric a stronger companion. The episode starts off with something rather strange, the Doctor has blue blood. Now the last time that the Doctor bled was in ‘The Deadly Assassin’ his blood was red and this is apparently a Tom Baker idea which is silly really but something else which was quite strange was the fact that Aukon was entering a room and it was clearly daylight outside which does slightly confuse the whole vampire thing.

The Doctor and Romana spend the vast majority of the episode exploring the tower which has a control room which will become relevant in future episodes but I liked the interaction between the two which considering how much tension there was apparently during recording is a surprising fact. The reaction that the Doctor gives when he comes across a barrel with blood in it is the sort of reaction he would have given during the early days of his tenure.

As this is a Terrance Dicks, it is perhaps not surprising that the story has worked as well as it has. The characters are all well rounded and at no point have I found myself bored with the story and it shows that Terrance Dicks hasn’t lost any of his magic that he has shown in the past. Peter Moffatt has directed this story rather well but due to the fact that the story is written so well and the performances are so good, the directing doesn’t really stand out which is a shame really but my abiding memory of this story so far isn’t the directing.

The revelation that Aukon, Zargo & Camilla’s names are similar to names that the Doctor and Romana read in the previous episode along with the control room development is perhaps the big thing of this episode. I really like the bit at the end where we see the model shot in the Resting place where the floor is moving up and down like a massive heartbeat. The last shot is of a close up of Aukon’s eyes which is good cliffhanger but for perhaps different reasons to normal. On one hand it was perhaps drama light but bearing in mind what had just shown up on screen it was the right ending to the episode and apart from a few individual errors, this was another solid episode with some solid performances.

(538) State of Decay - Episode 1

The middle story of the trilogy on the face of it should be the strongest one because it was written by Terrance Dicks but after enjoying the previous story I have to admit that I am questioning whether this is still the case. It’s always nice when a familiar name returns to the show because its been a while since Terrance Dicks was involved in Doctor Who. His last offering ‘Horror of Fang Rock’ was a really solid story and that was about three years ago and the show has changed so the sort of story that Dicks wrote may not work in this new era. The signs are good pretty much from the beginning because there is the model shot of the tower which looks impressive and that is followed by the appearance of Zargo, Camilla and Aukon who are the three who rule and if you didn’t know what was coming then you could easily tell that something isn’t quite right about them.

It’s quite a while before Adric makes an appearance and he spends the entire episode pretty much on his own and only interacts with K9 and manages to outsmart him (which isn’t too difficult) but its quite good that he gets to investigate on his own and not be introduced to the Doctor and Romana show. His scene where he tries to steal some bread and ends up with some food and a coat that is by far better than what he usually wears. Whilst I am starting to change my opinion of Adric, the one thing that will never change is my opinion of his costume which does look like pyjamas.

As far as the Doctor and Romana are concerned. It takes them an awful long time to get involved in the story. Once they do its when the story gets interesting. I think that Kalmar is an interesting character and despite being the oldest, Arthur Hewlett doesn’t allow that to get in the way of coming across as a believable leader. His group are an odd mix of living primitive surroundings and yet having a BBC computer in the base. I think that in 1980, the use of a BBC computer would have seemed quite a cutting edge piece of kit but sadly it dates the story horribly.

If I had to pick a fault with this episode is that it doesn’t feature as much of Zargo, Camilla and Aukon. What there is of them is good but I think that they are so good (Aukon especially) that I wanted them more involved in the story. I know that this will be the case but I wanted them more in the story now. The cliffhanger is quite creepy and just days after Halloween and that is why it perhaps works better than if I were watching this in mid-March. It’s an interesting opening episode but I cant say that I have been wowed by it. There are elements that I have always liked which are on screen again and with the new appreciation of Adric means that the future episodes will be fun to watch.

(537) Full Circle - Episode 4

The final episode of the first story of the E-Space trilogy starts with the reprise of the Marshmen walking into the Starliner and I think that it’s a fantastic image that is again helped by the music. It’s weird that I always thought that the music of the JNT era was terrible and yet twelve episodes in and I have to say that my opinion has changed. I am sure that at some point the music will not work but at the moment I am impressed with how much I have enjoyed the music and its been used smartly during this story.

I’ve always been a fan of this story and nothing in the past four days has made me change my opinion of Andrew Smith’s writing. The writing has been strong and consistently engaging, its just a shame that Smith never got to write another DW story for the show but he’s written a few cracking stories for Big Finish which I highly recommend (especially The First Sontaran). I never felt like the story was plodding along and even though I haven’t been wild about the Outlers, I cant say that they have been detrimental to the story. I think that its given Adric a reason to exist and ultimately a reason to stowaway on board the TARDIS. The direction has been a revelation and I think watching this story in this manner means that the directing really stands out.

After telling the deciders that the starliner has been ready for centuries it seems that the main aim of this episode is to get them off Alzarius. It was never going to be that simple and during the course of the episode there are a few drops of information where it turns out that the Marshmen are the ancestors of the humans/deciders and I liked this because it bought back what Draith said in the first episode and was a good payoff for explaining the marshmen.

There is a bit where the Doctor is using K9’s head to scare off the marshmen, this is the most useful that K9 has been for quite sometime. The simplistic way that the Doctor tells the deciders how to take off is quite a fun way and I think that it was never going to be a scene that would go on for a while because quite frankly this would have taken too much time and required either another set or a more complex decider chamber. I liked how they went off in the starliner with no problems and thought that the deserved a nice exit.

The final scene with the Doctor and Romana in the TARDIS is quite a sad one and it seems like a surprisingly downbeat tone. They are travelling in E-Space which is still quite funny when its green but I like how they are feeling down about their current situation without realisation that things are about to get worse with Adric on board. I really must stop the hate for Adric.

This was a good final episode to what has been the best story of the season so far. I have rated this story overall at 7.56 with ‘The Leisure Hive’ at 7.51 and ‘Meglos’ at 7.46. In Tom Baker’s stories this is tied in 9^th place with Robot and overall it is the 30^th best story beating such strong stories as ‘City of Death’ (32), ‘The Talons of Weng Chiang’ (45) and ‘The Tomb of the Cybermen’ (65). I would be surprised if this story isn’t one of the highest rated stories of the season. On a slightly downbeat note, two weeks on Wednesday will see the last Tom Baker episode which seems to have come around really quickly. As the moment that has been prepared for gets closer I will be thinking about the state of the show and just what Tom Baker’s legacy will be.

(536) Full Circle - Episode 3

Something struck me as I started to watch this episode and that its weird to see Tom Baker’s face when the theme tune plays. It’s a title sequence that is more associated with Peter Davison and Colin Baker so its still weird even though this is the tenth time that this title sequence has played. Upon watching the reprise, I was hoping to see K9 get his head knocked off but sadly not. What is shown are the spiders which look worse than they did in the previous episode. It’s still a major problem that I have with the story and the only time that they look ok is when the Doctor is looking at one later on in the episode.

I have been thinking about the deciders and come to the conclusion that despite having the War Lord as one of their crew, I actually think that Login is the stronger of the trio. I think of Inspector Wexford rather than Login when I look at George Baker. Login is the nicest of the trio and the one that at least comes across as having any morals.

Tom Baker is perfect in this episode because he does seem to have gotten his mojo back and does both comedy and serious acting. His comedy comes with his reaction when the Outlers are coming out of the TARDIS instead of Romana. His serious side comes when he shows his anger at the deciders and also at Dexeter who shows his mean side when he is about to perform his experiments on the captured Marshman. I hadn’t noticed how good Tony Calvin was because he had really been in the background of all the characters that have been in the story so far. Lalla Ward doesn’t really give a bad performance but unfortunately doesn’t really

The story seems to progress quite quickly in the scene where the Doctor points out that the Starliner has been ready to take off for centuries and that people are replacing perfectly fine parts. This moment is added with the announcement by the deciders that no one knows how to pilot the starliner.

The cliffhanger is another good one and does slightly mirror the first cliffhanger in that it involves several Marshmen and the music adds to it. However this one is slightly better because it sees the Marshmen penetrate the starliner and this sets up the final episode perfectly. This was another solid episode and I think that over the past three episodes this serial has done what Doctor Who should do and that’s tell a fun story with some good characters and the E-Space Trilogy is a nice thing for the season to get involved in and keep peoples attention until the final few stories to see the departure of Tom Baker.

(535) Full Circle - Episode 2

I still like the sight of the marsh creatures coming out of the lake, the directing and the music help make it as effective as it is. The marsh creatures are quite good because not only are they visually impressive but there are little things included that make them seem quite good and most notably is that they can adapt to their surroundings. Such a simple thing can make a lot of difference in a creature that never actually utters a word.

The Doctor is very different in this episode and I mean that in a good way. The Doctor encounters a Marsh child and is surprised when it doesn’t react well to his welcome and he responds by saying something about usually being good with children. Throughout the entire episode Tom Baker doesn’t really take the roll up to 11, he spends most of it at 5 or 6 and he only really gets animated when he encounters the Deciders. The Doctor and Romana don’t meet during the episode and I feel slightly sorry for Romana because she is stuck with Adric and the rest of the Outlers who make Adric take them to the TARDIS. I like the bit where Romana hands the knife back to one of them after having it pointed at her. I have decided that Adric isn’t quite as annoying as I have previously thought (at the moment) but I am not so sure about his friends.

There is one truly fantastic moment and maybe one of the best moments of the entire season and that is when K9 gets beheaded and not in a going to be back to his normal self in the next episode kind of way.

If I had to pick one thing that was wrong in this episode then it would be that the spiders don’t look very scary. It would probably have been best to have them in low light or not much of them seen because they could have worked but in their current state they just look a little bit hokey and I don’t just mean by 2014 standards. Ok there might be another thing but its not necessarily a fault of the story but more of a shift in the rules of the TARDIS. I say rules but its more like guidelines. Despite only being in the TARDIS for mere minutes, he is able to pilot the TARDIS. Ok so he accidentally does this but I think that off all the buttons he presses he somehow manages to press the right one. This is a trend that occurs quite often during the JNT era where any bugger can operate the TARDIS. This in my opinion does weaken the magic of the TARDIS.

The cliffhanger was good but not quite on the same level as the previous episode. Romana being bitten by a spider and there being no sign of help is something that works really well and it’s the perfect way to end this episode. Two episodes in and this story is just as good as I have thought of it in the past. The writing, directing and performances have all been on good form and I cant really see how the next two episodes are going to see a change in this.