I didn’t realise this until just now but this was the last
story this season to be filmed and so that means that technically this was the
final episode that Colin Baker recorded as the Doctor. I have commented on how
well Colin Baker and Bonnie Langford seemed to be getting on and now it’s easy
to see why. It will be interesting to see how their relationship comes across
in the final two episodes of this season.
The Mogarians don’t really seem to have had much purpose in
this story except for this episode where they enter the main control room and
save the day. Saving the day is probably a stretch because it turns out that
Rudge is also not quite as he seems as he turns on the Commodore and stages a
hijacking. The Vervoids are much more effective as a villain as everyone else
becomes a bit less effective and they have this wonderful habit of just popping
out of every vent whenever people are walking past. They are killing people at
quite a rate and it almost seems like Pip and Jane Baker are trying to make up
for a lack of deaths in a story.
Doland is the one that committed the murders which is
something that most people might have seen coming but I honestly didn’t and
still don’t remember that it’s Doland. Malcolm Tierney has been very good in
this serial and I have always been fan since appearing in House of Cards which
was obviously filmed long after this serial but Tierney is a very good actor
and managed to blend into the background which led to the good reveal.
The courtroom scenes don’t seem to impact that much into the
episode as in previous episodes. A good scene comes when the Doctor acknowledges
before the court that he was asked for help and the Valeyard reluctantly agrees
with this. After all the good work that the Doctor does in showing us he’s a
good person. It is perhaps unfortunate that this is the story where he
basically commits genocide by wiping out the Vervoids. I think that this was an
unfortunate but narratively necessary way to end the story. It leads to the
Valeyard to wanting the Doctor charged with genocide. This leads to another
close up in the cliffhanger. This is now the 10th episode out of
twelve which ends with the Doctor being the last thing we see in the episode.
It’s starting to come across as a bit unoriginal and repetitive.
I haven’t commented on how good a job Chris Clough did on
directing this story which I will try and correct now. He has done a good job
in taking my mind off the fact that there isn’t any location filming. The
lighting and sets have all worked very well and apart from a few CGI effects
which don’t work quite so well the effect used to show the decaying leaves is
another impressive moment that occurs in this season. The death of the Vervoids
looks good and the effect of a leaf in the Doctor’s hand also look good even by
today’s standards. Before I did this marathon, I wouldn’t have rated Pip and
Jane Baker as particularly good writers but after being impressed with the Mark
of the Rani and being impressed with this story, its time to re-evaluate them
as writers.
I have really changed my opinion of Mel. Ok so the screaming
is annoying and I don’t think that will change but as a companion I think that
Bonnie Langford deserves more credit than she has been given in the past. I
think that the character is a breath of fresh air from what he have seen in the
companion role because she doesn’t try and annoy the Doctor or try and kill him
but decides to be very active from the beginning so because of this and other
things that have happened I am really looking forward to the final story.
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