(675) Silver Nemesis - Part 1

It would seem logical that in the silver anniversary of Doctor Who that the silver monsters would be used at some point. The last time that they made an appearance was back in season twenty-two in what I thought was the best Cyberman story if not one of the best. They made their last appearance nearly 50 episodes ago and boy has the showed changed in that time. There is a new Doctor, a new companion and a new attitude to the show. This episode aired on the 23^rd of November 1988 so it was effectively the anniversary story.

This is another story directed by Chris Clough and I make this his 6^th story out of the last nine stories to appear on TV. Not that it’s a bad thing because he has always directed the stories with a good amount of pace to them.

The story is that people are after the silver nemesis which is going to land (conveniently) on November 23^rd 1988. There are three villains after it, the first we see is De Flores (played by Anton Diffring). He is leader of a bunch of Neo-Nazi nutters. To be blunt, their involvement in the story is the one that I like the least because it do anything to the story. They rely on others doing all the dirty work for them. I like Diffring because he seems like a good actor but apart from that it’s a bit of a duff part of the puzzle.

Lady Peinforte (Fiona Walker) in 1638. She is quite a good villain and she’s good because of the way that she talks and also the way she moves. An odd thing to say I know but movement can lend a lot to a performance. I do find the moment when she and Richard suddenly appear in a tea room in 1988. Richard spends the entire episode afterwards being spooked by what he sees as Peinforte is taking everything in her stride. It’s good to see a female character that is a villain but not relying on men. She is using Richard as someone to act as a slave and it’s a refreshing change.

The Doctor and Ace don’t appear until we are in the fifth minute of the episode. There is a nice bit of build up so that when they appear. They do an awful lot of travelling in this episode. I think that they do more travelling in this episode than in the last season and a half.

Courtney Pine is the big name in the episode but to be honest I have never heard of him so if it is another piece of stunt casting then it doesn’t bother me. It was a nice little scene and its nice to have this sort of music in a 1980’s Doctor Who. It’s a refreshing change from the techno stuff that has been rife in the show.

The whole bit about filming at Windsor Castle does seem to be a little bit of an unnecessary narrative. Somebody is pretending to be the Queen for reasons that I don’t understand (apart from the fact that it’s one of her homes) but I just think that it’s silly. Apart from that there wasn’t very much in the episode that didn’t work. I like the nod to the very beginning of the show with the casting of Leslie French as the Mathematician who is killed early on. He turned down the role of the Doctor in 1963. I don’t know whether he regretted this.

The different villains isn’t a problem which is something that interests me because in a normal adventure this would be a problem. I don’t think that its due to this being the anniversary story but Kevin Clarke has done a good job of keeping the whole thing going along. The cliffhanger is nice because the very last shot is of a Cyberman standing in the middle of the screen. It’s a shame that they don’t appear until the end of the episode but its hard to argue that their return wasn’t dramatic.

(674) The Happiness Patrol - Part 3

The Happiness Patrol is a story is best described as average. It has some quite interesting political messages in these three episodes it is always forgotten because of the Kandy Man. It’s annoying that after all the good work done in Remembrance of the Daleks, that its that stupid Kandy Man creature that undermines it. This wouldn’t be so bad but it’s a monster that is put out of action by lemonade and a hot poker. No one takes it seriously and as a result I don’t take it seriously. The main threat from these three episode has always been Helen A and that is where the story is rescued.

The Fifi puppet looks quite good in this episode. It’s mobility is impressive given that it appears very little money was spent elsewhere. I know I was a bit critical in previous episodes but it suddenly made sense in this episode. It’s death was something that was going to have more of an effect on Helen A than on the viewer.

Helen A tries to leave in the shuttle but Gilbert M has beaten her to it. She doesn’t do much in the first half of the episode but Sheila Hancock shows us why she’s a great actress in the latter half of the episode. Helen A’s attempt to justify what she had done to the Doctor was a nice scene but it came way too late in the episode. It’s hard to not find something nice in Helen A’s desire to find somewhere that is happy all the time. Her sadness at the death of Fifi’s perhaps the nice way to end her time in the episode and it is perhaps the most that she deserves after what she has been doing.

The Doctor singing is something rather amusing. This is something that works well in this episode but I think that had this happened in the twenty-fourth season then I would be saying that it just adds to the problem but the idea that singing and music is helping in the uprising. Not one bullet was fired but the Doctor was still able to make change happen.

I remember a few years ago this story being part of a news feature on Newsnight about this story and its political satire. Watching this story hasn’t been a happy experience but it wasn’t as bad as I have thought of it in the past. I am not sorry that this story is over but I think that I have been harsher on this than I should have been. Still not convinced on the Kandy Man design though.

 

(673) The Happiness Patrol - Part 2

This is Sylvester McCoy’s 20^th episode as Doctor. The last three weeks have gone fairly quickly and there isn’t much time left in the McCoy era. This story continues its political stance and I think that its up to the viewer to decide how subtle it actually it. I hadn’t twigged this until watching this episode but the patrol the second group in the past two seasons of the show that have featured all women in a group.

The Kandy Man is temporarily stopped by the Kandy Man walking into some spilt lemonade. This is quite a creative way of escaping. Even though it’s a clever way of escaping it does show how rubbish the Kandy Man is and how he can’t really be seen as a visible threat.

The pipe people are introduced into this episode and as a design they look quite good. They are all played by kids and they fall over a couple of times which shows that is something that is rather unfortunate but the low lighting does mean that the

Fifi is an interesting creation but doesn’t really belong in the rest of the story yet its allowed to take some screen time in one of the endless pipe scenes. It’s good when Helen A is treating it like most people would treat a family pet but outside of Helen A scenes its just rather irrelevant.

The best scene comes quite late in the episode where the Doctor is talking to two people are basically snipers and he tries to goad one of them into killing him and yet the person with the gun cant go through with it. So the one without the gun is the one with the power and the gun is meaningless. Any doubts that people may have still had (even after Remembrance of the Daleks) should well and truly have disappeared after this scene. I always knew that this was the case but this scene is a great example of this.

John Norrington is the supporting star of the episode as he manages to deliver a superb performance with a character that is a stickler for bureaucracy. When I see him, I still think of his performance in The Caves of Androzani and even though this is a totally different character, its another example of how good an actor he is.

The episode ends with the Doctor looking at a poster of Ace who is about to enter a show. Next to that poster is another one with the letters RIP written on it (in pink paint obviously). It isn’t the greatest cliffhanger but I think that it’s been a disappointing episode really. Despite their being some sparks in this episode, it is a rather forgettable one with performances that are left to wander around with no real sense of urgency. Considering that there are only three episodes in this story I would have thought there would have been a greater sense of urgency.

(672) The Happiness Patrol - Part 1

The second story of the silver anniversary series continues with The Happiness Patrol which has to have the most ironic title in Doctor Who history. I think that this story is the first proper story that deals with a darker tone. Sadly this is one of those stories that is purely studio bound. I think that we were somewhat spoilt in the previous story. Terror Alpha is a place where being unhappy is a crime. Anyone who is unhappy is referred to as a Killjoy. At the very beginning of the episode someone is rumbled as a killjoy. I liked this opening as it pretty much told you everything that you needed to know about the current setting for this story.

The TARDIS gets painted pink for some reason. Pink is a colour scheme in this serial as everything from sets to costumes has something pink about them. The titular Happiness Patrol are basically the police force used to enforce happiness but I don’t think that they look right because their design is very 1980’s. Included in the patrol is Lesley Dunlop who can currently be seen in Emmerdale.

I like how there is a purpose for why the Doctor and Ace have arrived on Terror Alpha. Sometimes it’s good that the Doctor has planned something from the very beginning instead of stumbling across it. I would have liked to know how long in the past that the Doctor heard something about this planet. The Doctor and Ace spend several minutes trying to get arrested which is quite funny because in any other story this wouldn’t be a problem. The subtle humour that takes place in this episode is quite good and something that is written in well by Graeme Curry.

Sheila Hancock plays Helen A who is clearly as play on Margaret Thatcher who was nearing her time in office. There is an unnerving vibe from her performance and it’s one of the main things that I am liking about this story. It’s easy to see the parallels between Helen A and Margaret T. She doesn’t raise her voice but reigns with terror with the words that she uses.

Despite being rather impressed with several parts of this episode there is an elephant in the room. The big issue is with the serial is that of the Kandy man which looks a lot like Bertie Bassett. I seriously don’t believe that no one clocked onto the similarity. But the problems aren’t just with the look of the Kandy Man but also the voice. I don’t quite know what would have worked to make this monster work but the voice used just confounds the problem. The cliffhanger is slightly disappointing but does end with the Doctor trying to smile (in terror) but failing. That is more of the subtle/black comedy breaking through.

It’s not been a really strong episode but I think that the tone is just right and I don’t think that I am going to dread this serial as much as I thought that I would but compared to the previous story, this does lack some of the drama and more important sunlight.

 

(671) Remembrance of the Daleks - Part 4

The episode really gets going from the very beginning with the Imperial Daleks leaving the shuttlecraft. I won’t go on about the fact that the size doesn’t look big enough to house everything that’s in it. After waiting for what has felt like an eternity we get some Dalek vs Dalek fighting. The first big scene between the two Dalek factions is fantastic and I love everything about it. One of the Imperial Daleks is destroyed in another huge explosion. That was until the Special Weapons Dalek appears and blow a Renegade Dalek up. I love the idea of a Special Weapons Dalek and this that this isn’t something that Terry Nation would have come up with.

There is a huge explosion at the base of the Renegade Daleks which is one of my favourite explosions in Doctor Who. I don’t know if you have a top 5 explosions in Doctor Who list but I sort of do and this one would go in at number one. I have gone on for most of these episodes about the explosions but it really does seem like a lot of effort when into making these explosions as big as possible after two and a half decades of rather limp bangs that its nice to have something to be wowed by.

The death of Ratcliffe does seem a bit of a shame really as he’s struck down by the girl. The death which is slightly more effective is that of Mike’s. His death seemed inevitable from the very beginning but he too is killed by the girl but it’s a far more violent and effective death. The girl is quite good in this episode and manages to rack up quite the body count. It is perhaps the wisest thing that she doesn’t die but stops being under the Dalek’s control.

The Doctor has his big scene with the Emperor/Davros in the basement. It’s quite unusual that the Doctor and Davros wouldn’t be in the same room but its because of Terry Molloy and Sylvester McCoy that this works as well as it does. McCoy shows us again why his Doctor is underrated as a Doctor in my humble opinion. Sophie Aldred really does go through all the emotions in this episode because she starts off quite loved up with Mike and then goes back to her normal self before being quite sad at the end.

Davros makes his return after last appearing in Revelation of the Daleks. In that story he had his hand blown off and so now all that appears is his head. Davros wants the hand of omega to transform Skaro’s sun into a source of power and over power Gallifrey. His appearance doesn’t come until the midway point of the episode. It’s short but sweet, he is tricked into using the hand of omega by the Doctor. Once he realises that the hand of omega is heading back to his ship he manages to live another day. It would be twenty years before Davros would appear in Doctor Who or mid-June in my marathon.

What the Doctor has done is effectively commit genocide and that is something that would have earned a trial two years before. It’s fair to say that this story doesn’t have the happiest of endings as pretty much everyone is dead and the final scene takes place during a funeral. No one can accuse the show at this time of being comedic.  

As a story, this has been rated as the best Dalek story ever and at the moment it’s the third best story ever and only the third story to ever get in the 8’s. Only Inside the Spaceship and The Deadly Assassin have managed this. It has been a wonderful adventure and its remarkable how my faith has been restored in the Seventh Doctor in just four episodes. This is the final appearance of the Daleks in the classic era. They have undeniably been a fantastic aspect of the show and a reason why the show is still going on in 2015. If the show hadn’t come back in 2005 then no monster could have asked for a better story than this one. It is perhaps the last good Dalek story but maybe time will tell.

(670) Remembrance of the Daleks - Part 3

The penultimate episode of this story and this is one of those episode just gets better as the story progresses. The way that Ace was saved was perhaps not the strongest but after the previous episode’s start it was always going to be less dramatic. The effects used in the machine that the Doctor used on the Daleks doesn’t look very good and is the only thing that lets this early scene down. The action starts up quite quickly in this episode when the Doctor being strangled by a claw was a great moment and one that made me jump when I first saw it.

The Daleks conflict is given more credibility I think when we get a little explanation from the Doctor (to Ace) about why the hand of omega is so important. There is a bit of development from the Imperial side when we get to visit the Imperial Dalek’s spaceship we get to see the Emperor Dalek which was first seen in Evil of the Daleks although I use the word seen in its loosest sense. The set doesn’t seem quite big. I don’t know how they move around which is probably why I don’t think we do. I want to the Imperials to win just because of their colour scheme. I know that’s not the best reason but I like it a lot.

The girl from episode one makes another appearance in this episode appearing in the graveyard and again does a lot without doing very much. I am surprised with how effective a little girl can be. I do think that credibility is stretched a bit when it’s revealed that the little girl has been in the battle computer and Ratcliffe hadn’t noticed.  The fight between the two factions hasn’t happened really so far and they have kept out of each other’s way without firing a shot. Quite how this has happened I don’t know but it has. I love how Ratcliffe starts to learn the truth about his actions. He thinks that he is going to be in charge and he is sound bought down to earth with a bump.

The sight of Daleks gliding (or wobbling in some cases) through the streets of London is something that has surprisingly been lacking in previous Dalek stories and so it’s quite an effective sight, but there is one bit where a Dalek is coming to the camera and it looks like the top half is going to come off which is a bit unfortunate.  

Mike’s truth is revealed towards the end of the episode. I think that they had waited until the right moment to use this in the story. Ace’s reaction is what makes this work quite well as she had had a crush on him from the very beginning.

The cliffhanger is another great one with a proper size shuttlecraft landing in the playground. It wasn’t a dodgy CGI effect or model but an actual 100% real prop and that is what makes the arrival so good. The Doctor’s reaction is quite funny and it seems like this episode ended way too quickly. It’s been another superb episode and it is perhaps one of the best Dalek stories for quite sometime. In fact I would so far as to say that it might be the best one since Genesis of the Daleks.

(669) Remembrance of the Daleks - Part 2

I said yesterday that this story has a special place in my heart and todays episode is the one that started it all for me. I have a fuzzy memory of my early years but around the time that this story was on TV I was living in Doncaster and for reasons that I will never know, we ended up watching episode two of Remembrance of the Daleks at school. I loved it and because the school I attended was similar to the one in the story, I immediately went out into the playground and pretended there were Daleks everywhere.

Never in all the time that I have been doing this marathon have I enjoyed watching a cliffhanger replay so much. It still works superbly and how its solved is quite good because Ace recovers enough to attack the head teacher. The subsequent explosion of the basement door is another of the superb explosions.

The scene where the Doctor and Ace destroy the Dalek from the basement is a great scene as its short and intense. We go from a busy scene like that to a lovely quite slow scene with the Doctor and the new person running the café played Joseph Marcell. Marcell would go on to play the butler in the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. The discussion between them takes on a rather racial and philosophical tone which isn’t something that you would expect from Doctor Who.

Gilmore is a very good blueprint of the Brigadier. He’s reluctant to believe the Doctor because he doesn’t understand what’s going on and is willing to let military intelligence to do all the talking. This approach doesn’t come across as annoying because its balanced with Rachel and Alison who are more ready to believe (but just as confused).

The Doctor encounters the Hand of Omega and there is another nice scene where the Doctor goes to the undertaker and he is talking to a guy on the phone (the governor) who talks about the Doctor being “an old guy with white hair” a reference to William Hartnell. The effect of the Hand of Omega moving is very good and does still up a bit.

Michael Sheard is very good in this episode although he meets a rather sad ending when he gets into a scrap with Mike and is seemingly killed by the Daleks and his final resting place is in the cemetery. Peter Halliday is another old face that returns playing a blind vicar. It’s a brief role but one that is quite nice and I am reminded of all the previous appearances that he has made in the show.

There is a great scene where Ace is turning on a TV and whilst waiting for it to warm up. While she’s waiting for it to warm up there is a “No Coloureds” sign in the window which is an extraordinary thing to appear in Doctor Who because race had never really be a subject matter in the show before and this is another sign that the show is trying to come across as current by acknowledging these sort of issues.

There is a little joke when the TV warms up and the TV announcer introduces a new show called “Do” which is supposed to be Doctor Who but obviously doesn’t. I think that this is a joke that the story gets away with because there isn’t time to really think about it because the next scene does a great job in getting my attention.

Ace has decided to go back to the school to pick up her tapedeck (long before Ipods and MP3 players were invented) and this introduces a whole world of trouble for her. There is one shot where a Dalek appears round a corner and appears at the bottom of the stairs. Another great shot is the one where Ace batters a Dalek with a baseball bat. It is followed by her jumping through windows. It’s nice that Ace gets the cliffhanger this time as she is being approached by three Daleks who shout ‘Exterminate’ but don’t do it. It’s been another outstanding episode with some great performances and some wonderful directing. Bring on the next episode.

Before I finish for today, I never mentioned the colour scheme of the Daleks. I love the gold and white scheme and wished that it would be used from now on. Compared to the grey and black of the Dalek we saw in the previous episode, the new livery looks like breath of fresh air.