(533) Meglos - Episode 4

After being slightly disappointed with the lack of anything exciting happen, I was hoping that this story would end of a more positive note. This is one of the shortest episode of Doctor Who ever and it really shows as yet again the episode starts off with a few minutes of reprise. When the action does eventually get going it seems like there has been quite a development in things because all of a sudden the real Doctor is accepted and people are prepared to have a rational conversation with him.

I still think of Barbara not Lexa when I see Jacqueline Hill. It’s surprising that Lexa is one of the characters that won’t see the end of the episode. She gets killed and is dead without so much of a speech which considering that its Jacqueline Hill isn’t the best way for a character to end. This was the 78^th episode to feature Hill and she leapfrogs William Russell and Katy Manning and now becomes the fourth longest serving companion.

There are some good things in this episode such as the set designs which are very good. I hadn’t noticed that this was an entirely studio based story and whereas the story hasn’t been totally successful, what has been appearing on screen has been quite good. Another thing that works quite well is the CSO shots that are heavily used. There are a few shots that look quite good and that includes two Tom Baker’s appearing on screen at the same time. What’s also good about this scene is that it isn’t just one quite shot but it’s a very good scene which is shot very well by Terence Dudley. Dudley’s name will pop up in credits during the Peter Davison years but his first story is quite well because the whole episode is directed with a good amount of enthusiasm and any problems with the story shouldn’t be laid at his door.

Sadly K9 returns in this episode and I was just surprised that he didn’t need recharging after moving 10 feet. K9’s time in the show is coming to an end soon so I have to just keep that it mind. K9’s involvement is somewhat small and so I wonder what the point was in having him appear in the story. It’s not the only thing that doesn’t quite work in this episode. It’s odd that Meglos waits so long before changing out of looking like the Doctor. Once he had got what he wanted, he stays looking like the Doctor until about a minute before he gets killed. When the change does happen and he changes back to the cactus it doesn’t look as bad as it did in episode one. Another thing that doesn’t quite work is that there doesn’t seem to be anything after being separated from Meglos. Also he has been in this story with the credit of Earthling. I would have named him Mark or Stephen or something like that.

It was a much better episode than the previous one and I am surprised with how much more positively about this story than I did before I started this. It’s not a classic by any means and I think that the Cactus design is still a major problem and I think that casting someone else as Lexa instead of a former companion was a mistake. Those mistakes aside the new era of the show is still going strong and the next several stories are quite important and the lien up of the show is going to change with the first change occurring next with……there is no easy way of saying this……..Adric debuting. Oh dear!

Meglos - Episode 3

I didn’t realise that yesterdays episode was watched by 4.2 million people which is one of the lowest ratings that Doctor Who has had an shows that something needed changing. Half a million more people tuned in for this episode and they didn’t really miss anything and this is another episode where very little happens. I am really struggling to find anything wrong with the episode because there is very little to pick up.

Something I did pick up is how much I liked Tom Baker’s performance as the Meglos Doctor. There were a few moments which saw a certain amount of intensity which does show how much the characters has changed in such a short amount of time. Lalla Ward is stuck with Grugger as Romana has them walking around in circles for most of the episodes. When Romana does manage to make it to where the action is its quite late in the episode and doesn’t really lead to much.

The cliffhanger is much better than the last one with the Doctor about to be crushed by a big slab of stone and this is a much better way to end an episode and with the viewers knowing that he would be leaving the show, it was perfectly possible that he could have left at the end of this episode. Even though he’s the longest serving Doctor ever and this is his 147^th episode, he does show some glimpses of his old self and I think that that his costume has somehow put a different energy into the performance.

This is a very short episode because quite frankly if there is nothing to report then there isn’t much reason for me to write about nothing. I didn’t hate this episode as it wasn’t terrible but I think that this episode is perhaps going to be remembered as bland and inactive episode. Hopefully the final episode will make up for the lack of excitement and the performances may stand out because very little has. Not even Jacqueline Hill could make me interested in the story.

Meglos - Episode 2

This episode starts off with a very long reprise, it lasts close to two minutes but once that is over with the action starts to get going it kind of stutters throughout. The Cactus Doctor gets to Tigellan first and has to take an oath of allegiance at the insistence of Lexa which is fun to watch everyone around her go mad at her for this. I still have a slight problem with thinking of Jacqueline Hill as Lexa and not Barbara. Sometimes I still think that Ian or Susan would pop up and tell her that she cant change history or something like that. Ok so I am going to try and stop using the term Cactus Doctor and refer to the creature as Meglos. Meglos’ plan is to go to Tigellan and take the Dodecahedron which would explain why he goes to the trouble of looking like the Doctor. I like that the Doctor has been to Tigellan before and judging by some of the lines that are said that he has been during the Doctor’s current incarnation.

I think that the Doctor with cactus spikes on his face and hands is an interesting look and one that looks far better than the other guy I saw in the previous episode. The idea of their being two Doctor roaming around the same place at the same time is something has been done in Doctor Who before but here it seems to be more fun but there seems to be something odd about Tom Baker. I know that he wasn’t very well during this season but there seems something specific that is altering his performance. He does seem like a shell of his former self and almost makes me miss the days when he was very silly. It may be deliberate that his performance is subdued compared to previous stories but its definelty noticeable. The highlight for Meglos comes when he arrives and after going through the niceties (or not), he manages to be alone with the Dodecahedron and somehow take it which is suppose to be vast and probably unmoveable and I like how much worry this causes.

After spending the previous episode doing very little, its surprising (or not really) that K9 doesn’t go very far before his batteries run low and he requires recharging. The thing that comes to mind is knowing that he is due to leave quite soon so there aren’t many more episodes for K9 to take up air time.

The cliffhanger is rather disappointing and this sums up my feelings towards this episode. This is an episode where not a lot seems to happen and compared to the previous episode it seems to have lost a spring in its step and when it did get into life it was quite late in the episode and had to stop at the wrong moment. The cliffhanger used featured Romana whereas I would have finished with the Doctor or Meglos but that’s just me. At the half way point, I am still more positive about it than I was two episodes ago.

Meglos - Episode 1

Meglos is interesting for a few reasons. Firstly it’s one of the shortest titles for a Doctor Who story (Robot being the shortest), secondly its infamous for the villain being a cactus and third and perhaps most importantly, it sees the return of Jacqueline Hill who was last seen 453 episodes ago but in a different role than she is in today. I don’t quite know whether it was a good idea to bring Hill back but as someone else because whenever I see her I just think that its Barbara talking and not Lexa. That’s not to say that she doesn’t give a great performance because she does and manages to at least seem different to Barbara but its not hard to imagine Barbara saying the things that Lexa says.

As I mentioned this story is infamous for being the one with the cactus in it and sadly that is the one thing that lets this story down because from the moment that it appears on screen I find myself losing a little bit of interest. It could only happen in Doctor Who where someone thought “I know what Doctor Who hasn’t had before….a talking cactus!”. Quite why JNT let this through the production meeting baffles me. Actually forget that never mind JNT, what about Barry Letts? There is something that doesn’t quite make sense and it is to do with the cactus because it required a booth to transfer to the weird looking human but doesn’t quite such a thing when changing to look like the Doctor.

The CSO that appears in this episode is quite impressive and apart from some fraying around the edges of people’s hats the effects worked very well and its been a while since the effects have looked quite so good. In fact the production values for the episode looked quite good and its easy to see that this story was required relatively early in the season run.

It’s strange (in a good way) that the Doctor and Romana spend the entire episode in the TARDIS trying to fix K9. Now firstly I want to know why they would bother considering that he is of little value to the story but secondly its fun that they manage to find something to do while not actually achieving anything. Their episode only really starts once they start to go over the same events over and over again.

The cliffhanger is quite good because the Doctor appears saying that they mustn’t upset the tigellans and considering that it comes out of nowhere and I think that anything has to be better than a cactus or a human with cactus spikes all over his face and hands (cant quite understand why they don’t go through his clothes) and the next episode should be good. I think that I feel a lot more warmly about this episode than I did 24 hours ago. I don’t think that it will ever be a classic but I think that there is going to be something good that comes out of the story come the final episode.