I am grateful that this wasn’t a four part adventure because
I don’t think I could stand another episode of the antics at the Shangri-La. I
am getting slightly bored of pointing out the same problems that have appeared
in each of the three episodes.
Billy had been taking something to turn him into a Chimeron.
He ends the episode by going away with Delta and the kid who looks about 13 or
14 and just goes off with them. Kohll could easily have dropped Billy from the
story and it wouldn’t have made much difference. What made it even worse is
that Ray is left pretty much heartbroken. This is not perhaps the best ending
to an episode there has ever been.
Gavrok doesn’t get to be very good in this episode because
he spends the entire episode looking rather foolish. First of all he is
defeated by stumbling into the force field that he created that comes after he
and his guards are attacked by bees and honey. I think that Don Henderson
deserved a better ending because he has worked very well during the three
episodes.
The incidental music is normally something that works quite
well in these stories but on this occasion it just doesn’t work. It’s possibly
the first time that Keff McCulloch has put a foot wrong. When I remember how he
saved the day with the in the previous story but that means that this story
suffers.
There is a bit in the episode where there is about 10 of
them working together. So much for the Doctor looking like the one that saved
the day in Paradise Towers yet somehow falls short during these three episodes.
I think I remember watching a documentary on Paradise Towers and McCulloch said
that he was told to put this story to one side and that shows.
Delta and the Bannermen is only the second story of the 1980’s
to be rated in the 6’s. At the moment it was ninth from bottom. The other 1980’s
story was The Horns of Nimon so its in pretty good company. This story has been
a bit of a disaster. Very little worked in this serial and I think that some of
that should be placed at the feet of the writer because he hasn’t got a grip of
what a Doctor Who story should be. Yes they deserve some credit for trying to
do something different but they just messed up with this. Thankfully
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