The End of Time

So, this is it. After three and a bit seasons and five Christmas specials, David Tennant’s turn as the tenth Time Lord reaches its dramatic conclusion. It’s Russell T Davies’ second chance to write the ultimate conclusion to end all conclusions, to wrap up the most popular incarnation of the character and to end his time on this show, and I’m pleased to say that he does a better job of it than the season 4 finale. Although a chimpanzee with a typewriter would have done a better job of that, so it’s not saying much.

The Ood elder tells the Doctor of his prophecy.

And it’s my second chance to watch this two-and-a-quarter hour double bill, of which I have only the vaguest memories, mostly of the Master dressed like a scruffy hoodie with a glowing transparent skull and Timothy motherflipping Dalton turning up with his posse of Time Lords and spitting a lot. I had somehow erased the memories of the Master turning the entire human race into clones of himself (including a bad lookalike of President Obama) and the whole thing again with the drum rhythm, knocking four times, and the sound of a Time Lord heartbeat (ooh, nice touch, I’d almost think this was planned all along). There is a wonderful moment when, finally, after all the bluffs, the prophecy of the Doctor’s death (he will knock four times) turns out to be Wilf knocking on the glass door of the radiation chamber, asking to be let out, and a calm realisation spreads over the Doctor’s face. If I take away anything good from this episode, it will be that moment. It’s lovely.

Tap-tap-tap-tap, and it all makes sense.

Bernard Cribbins does a fantastic job as Wilfred, even if he does look like he’s on the verge of tears in every scene (or maybe because of that!). Wilf is essential in keeping this story grounded in human drama while insane things are happening around them. His scenes with the Doctor where they do nothing but talk to each other in a café are some of the best. The rest of the story concerns itself with big but flimsy ideas like destiny, prophecies and, yet again, the death of the entire human race and the end of the existence of time as we know it. Because, obviously, you can’t have a finale without something ridiculous happening. I don’t know why Russell T Davies has to write so many stories involving “everybody in the world”, because it immediately loses its believability if you stop to think about it for two seconds. Every single person on the planet turning into a copy of the Master would wreak absolute havoc. Planes would fall out of the sky, cars would crash in the street, people of different sizes, like children, could be crushed to death in seats and harnesses, and what about pregnant women? Are there mini-Masters inside Masters, or did all the foetuses die? I feel like I’ve said this a hundred times now, but you cannot do such big events like this without thinking about the consequences.

“Look, ma, I’m the president!”

Timothy Dalton is fantastic. Having previously appeared in Hot Fuzz, he was obviously deemed a good fit for the role of the villain again. He exudes charisma and presence both as the narrator to the events of part 1 and as the president of the Time Lords. This is the first time we see Gallifrey and the high council since the 1980s and the scale of these scenes is a vast improvement, beautifully captured by the VFX team without appearing overly “greenscreen-y”. The Time Lords have always been corrupt, but the time war has sent them over the edge of evilness. I was surprised to hear the council talking about the Doctor’s search for “the Moment” that will end their existence. I hadn’t realised the events of ‘The Day of the Doctor’ had been so explicitly foreshadowed. Side note: The Doctor travels a lot before coming to see the Ood at the start of the episode, during which time he marries Queen Liz!

The Time Lords, and Gallifrey, return. Briefly.

It’s a shame the Master is a little wasted here, turned into a rampaging monster that wants to eat people. This would have been a good opportunity to cast a different actor and do a whole new take on the character, rather than bringing back John Simm. There’s a good chance this will happen in the upcoming series, given his fate at the end. As for the Doctor’s fate, the radiation chamber is as contrived a setup as you can imagine, leading to the most drawn-out death scene ever. There’s literally fifteen minutes of screen time after the accident in which every major character the tenth Doctor has ever met is bid farewell. To say it’s indulgent is putting it mildly. I suppose I can’t really blame Russell T Davies for wanting to add these scenes; this is just as much a finale for him as a writer as it is for the tenth Doctor as a character, but I must say, the way the Doctor clings onto his life is like a petulant child. He’s been through at least nine regenerations by this point, he knows the drill. He should have had more dignified last words than “I don’t want to go.”

I don’t understand why Martha and Mickey are suddenly married. Wasn’t she already engaged to somebody else?

While I enjoyed parts of this finale and felt it was quite cleverly wrapped up, there’s a lot that doesn’t work so well or doesn’t make sense if you think about it too much. The high stakes are implausible – why would a device capable of transforming the population of an entire planet (it’s basically a weapon of mass destruction) be so casually discarded, with only a pair of bumbling alien scientists to come and salvage it? The Doctor falling from their ship and crashing through a glass ceiling, and surviving with just a few scratches, is possibly the most ridiculous thing he’s ever done. He’s not superman!

The Doctor’s explosive regeneration wrecks the Tardis.

As this is the end of the tenth Doctor’s run, I will briefly comment on the character and David Tennant’s portrayal. I think David Tennant defined the character almost as much as Tom Baker did. Not just because he was really popular and stayed on for so long; he’s a fantastic actor, whether he’s doing his comedy thing, his angry shouty thing or his quiet solemn thing. You only have to watch episodes like The Family of Blood to see the sort of range he’s capable of. His style and characteristics became synonymous with Doctor Who. He’s a tough act to follow.

The tenth Doctor is more human-like than many of the others, excepting Paul McGann as the eighth. Like him, he’s got a romantic side but actually (more or less) falls in love, which is a first. It’s not a trait I particularly care for as I feel the Doctor should be more alien and weird (something Matt Smith nails). The Doctor has always been a caring character (that’s basically what he does) but, with Ten, this empathy is more explicit, leading to more instances of him being visibly rattled, distraught or affected by events. Like Nine, his cheerful comedy routine is just to cover up his true feelings.

Any version of the Doctor (yes, even Tom Baker) wears thin over time. As I was rewatching his first season, I found him extremely likeable, but as time goes on, the character picks up annoying little habits (“weeeelllll…”), catchphrases (“allons-y!”) or traits that begin to grate (“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”). A lot of this is down to the writing, of course. I would have liked to see more of the tenth Doctor under the new writing team (when he reappears in the 50th anniversary special, he’s actually excellent). The Tenth Doctor is merciful, even to his greatest enemies, always looking for a solution other than killing, and he is fascinated by human culture to the point of coming across like an excitable space tourist.

Anyway, I’m not going to put David Tennant in ranking order with all the others, because I haven’t bothered doing those for the new series – the style of the programme is too different to compare them fairly with the old serials – but I will say that I like him more than I liked Christopher Eccleston.

Here’s my pick of favourite episodes from the past three seasons. Thanks for reading, and here’s to the next Doctor!

The Girl in the Fireplace.
A scary, sweet and clever adventure that crosses time and space.

The Impossible Planet / The Satan Pit
Excellent visual design and another scary story in an impossible situation.

Human Nature / The Family of Blood
A tragic love story and David Tennant’s best performance.

Blink
The best Doctor Who episode doesn’t star the Doctor. Ingenious and frightening.

Silence in the Library / Forest of the Dead
Moffat crams more out-of-this-world ideas and scares into this two-parter.

Turn Left
A wonderful “what-if” tale where the Doctor never saved the world.

Gridlock

With all of time and space at his fingertips, why does the Doctor keep coming back to the same places? Particularly when he’s taking his new companion on a trip to same planet and era he took Rose – that’s just going to stir up some uncomfortable memories, surely. It’s New Earth, again. It’s New New York, again. But the city is not thriving anymore and strange things are happening in the slums and beneath the hovercar motorways.

Oh, look, it’s the Macra! You might remember these from The Macra Terror, but you probably won’t.

Gridlock is all about traffic jams, and if you’ve ever spent a significant amount of time stuck in a traffic jam, you’ll certainly find a lot here to relate to. It wears it influences on its sleeve – you only have to glance at this dystopian scene to see hints of Blade Runner, The Fifth Element, Star Wars, Judge Dredd, and any sort of sci-fi with oppressed underdwellings and glistening cityscapes towering above. Gridlock is broadly satirical – the idea that you could be stuck in traffic for so long that you could live there is just ridiculous enough to make you think. It’s amusing, and it’s the sort of thing I find appealing in science-fiction, but as soon as you start to analyse it, it stops making much sense.

Must be a Friday night. Traffic’s a nightmare!

For instance, the chain of events that led to this situation would have to be incredibly specific. The entire planet was overcome by a dangerous drug/virus simultaneously, at which point every single hovercar was trapped under the city. Entropy would demand chaos from order, but the gridlock itself is incredibly orderly and everyone seems to accept what’s happening, despite no contact with the upper levels. Why does nobody make a break for it? There’s plenty of room between the cars. Why not fly up a bit higher when the Macra are snapping away at you? These could just be VFX goofs, I suppose. Who plugged the Face of Boe into the system? And was it really only the Doctor who could fix it to get the roof open again? How, biologically-speaking, do an alien cat man and a human woman have kitten children? Why is everybody in New New York British except for the news reporter woman? Who is she anyway?! And so on, and so forth.

Bah, who cares? KITTENS!!!

But I don’t really want to pick too much, because you start to lose the interesting aspects of this story. It doesn’t really matter that it’s not believable, it’s just fun to see characters in this bizarre situation and how they react to it. It’s interesting that there’s no villain or malevolent foe in this story, simply a system that has failed. The Macra, previously seen in The Macra Terror, are not responsible for any of this, as far as I can tell, they’re just down in those depths for some reason.

The Face of Boe reaches the end of his long life.

But the most interesting thing about this story is nothing to do with the gridlock itself, but the Face of Boe, who returns for his third and final appearance to finally give the Doctor his dying message… “You. Are. Not. Alone.” Martha demands answers and the Doctor has to go through his “I’m the last of my people” routine again, only this time with some lovely descriptive imagery of Gallifrey. I sense a trust developing between the Doctor and Martha, which is probably why he hasn’t taken her back home yet. There’s a lot more to see and do before things start to get… interesting.

The Trial of a Time Lord (The Mysterious Planet)

Sometimes you need to take a break to recharge your creative batteries. After more than twenty years on the air, Doctor Who takes its first “hiatus”, coming back fresh after an eighteen month gap. Colin Baker returns, along with his scary smiling face in the title sequence, but the music has been changed to a more subdued and bassy version of the theme. Season 23 has one further change: the entire season is one story arc, encompassing multiple stories that tie into a narrative framing device, namely a courtroom trial. The Doctor is facing charges from his own people, for meddling in the affairs of others. Past attempts to bring together multiple writers’ stories into an arc have not been successful, so I remain sceptical for now.

The Time Lord courtroom. Surely putting the screen BEHIND everyone is just going to cause neck aches, no?

Things certainly get off to a good start, as the story opens with the single most ambitious visual effect the show has ever attempted so far. A fantastically complex motion-controlled sequence sees a Time Lord space vessel pull the Doctor’s Tardis into its glowing tractor beam hatch, the camera swerving and swooping around to cinematically capture the event. It’s seriously impressive. Sadly, that’s where most of the budget went, as the rest of the story is set within the usual low-budget BBC sets or out in a forest, and film has been swapped for cheaper outdoor video again. Oh well!

The incredible opening sequence is not just technically accomplished, it’s superbly composed too.

The courtroom side of the story has the Doctor face off against his prosecutor, the Valeyard. As you would expect, he doesn’t take the situation seriously, and gets increasingly irrate. This is actually quite a suitable situation for this version of the Doctor and provides some comedic moments (“I object!” “What now?” “Yes, now!”) and some epic rants. All the while, the court is watching one of the Doctor’s adventures on the screen, set on a mysterious planet that closely resembles Earth…

Seeing the remains of Marble Arch underground station, Peri is understandably upset at seeing what Earth will eventually become. The Doctor merely sees it as a statistic. All worlds come to an end eventually.

Well, it’s two billion years in the future and Earth isn’t where it’s supposed to be; in fact, the Doctor confuses it for planet Ravolox. Something is going on here but it’s a mystery for another time. The story features a fairly typical social dichotomy setup, with a primitive tribe above ground and the technologically advanced society sealed below. In a classic role reversal, the poor humans down there are slaves to their robot “god” and the Doctor has to lecture it about the value of life, which it obviously fails to grasp.

The Doctor confronts the robot, Drathro.

There are certain similarities with Robert Holmes’ first Doctor Who script, The Krotons, which is fitting as this was his last one before he sadly died the following year. He has undoubtedly made some of the best contributions to this show over the years, and this remains evident even in his final story. Take the two mercenaries, Glitz and Dibber. Another writer might have ignored any characterisation of two fairly inconsequential characters, but Holmes fleshes out his villains with quirks, gives them humour and personality that breathes such fun into their scenes that I was actually glad that they got away at the end.

Glitz and Dibber plan to breach the control room.

Where the writing kind of fails is where it uses wishy washy space terms without much thought. Glitz and Dibber are from “the constellation of Andromeda”, apparently. Now, let’s ignore for a moment the fact that you can’t strictly be “from” a constellation, since it’s merely a representation of many stellar bodies as seen from Earth; one such body would be the Andromeda galaxy, which is such an astronomical distance from our own that it renders any interest in Earth trivial. These two characters noticing that Earth is a couple of lightyears off of its position is, to put this into perspective, like somebody in Australia noticing that a grain of sand on Brighton beach has moved a couple of millimetres to the left. A couple of lightyears isn’t even as far as Earth’s nearest star, Promixa Centauri! Where is this mysterious planet getting its sunlight from?!

Anyway, niggles aside, I thought the Mysterious Planet was rather good. I’m certainly intrigued by the courtroom side of things, but I found the actual story presented to be strong in its own right. We’re off to a good start, let’s hope it continues.

The Five Doctors

Following on from the 20th season is this remarkable anniversary special, originally broadcast to celebrate the show’s 20th year on the air. To replicate the original experience, I would have preferred to have seen the originally broadcast version, but circumstances led me unwittingly to the special edition released much later, with some of the visual and audio effects updated, so I can only comment on this version.

The Doctors meet!

Much like The Three Doctors, the story is little more than an excuse to get the previous incarnations of the Doctor together, plucked out of time and placed inside an elaborate ancient war game. It’s a shame that Tom Baker decided to opt out and that William Hartnell was no longer alive, as this special really ought to be called “The three and a Half Doctors (plus friends)”, but that’s not as catchy. Nevertheless, it’s a delight to see Patrick Troughton (does that man not age?!), and Jon Pertwee back again, while Richard Hurndall takes over as the first Doctor, and some previously unseen footage from Shada is used to explain the fourth Doctor’s absence. Clever!

Trapped within a maze of mirrors, the first Doctor and his granddaughter Susan are reunited. How’s that non-existent pocket of 22nd century post Dalek-invaded Earth been keeping you, Sue?

Despite the absentees, The Five Doctors is a glorious celebration of the show’s history, using every available cast member, reference and villain it can reasonably squeeze into its 100 minute runtime. I genuinely had no idea that a 20-year older Carole Ann Ford would return to play Susan, nor the cameos by Jamie, Zoe, Liz and Yates. And that’s on top of a bright yellow Bessie, Lethbridge-Stewart, The Master, Yetis, Cybermen and a Dalek all running around the battlefield (there’s even time to reverse the polarity of the neutron flow!). It’s a smorgasbord of nostalgia, a who’s who of Who, and it’s quite amazing that it all works so well.

Turlough doesn’t have much to do in this story, but Tegan accompanies the first Doctor into the tower, while Susan remains in the Tardis.

Essentially, the story splits and jumps back and forth to follow each Doctor and a companion as they each take a different route up to the tower of Rassilon. This allows them some breathing space (as well as time to reminisce with old friends), but it does make the story a little scattershot, never settling in one place for very long, until a satisfying culmination towards the end. The lack of arbitrarily dramatic cliffhangers is a blessing; this is just one epic feature without cuts.

Sarah Jane is still Sarah Jane, panicked and often hyperventilating. The third Doctor is still the third Doctor, determined and confident. I swear he cops a feel of her boob at one point.

The fifth Doctor is the anchoring point, but he spends much of the story on Gallifrey, outside of the Death Zone, where he uncovers the President’s secret plans for immortality. Yes, sadly, there is corruption on Gallifrey yet again. This is becoming an embarrassing cliché and I can’t blame the Doctor for not wanting to stick around as President. He does get a brief moment to meet his past selves, which is nicely done. You can get a good sense of how the different versions of the Doctor vary. Davison is definitely the least eccentric of the bunch, a normal and level-headed type by comparison. Pertwee and Troughton play their roles much as they ever did, despite the years in between, and Richard Hurndall does a reasonable job of approximating some of Hartnell’s performance, although it would have been more authentic if he’d fluffed his lines a few times and ended all his sentences with “hmm?”.

Lord President Borusa gets more than he bargained for when Rassilon grants him immortality.

The Five Doctors is hardly a masterpiece of imagination, then, but it’s nevertheless well made and a lovely tribute to the history of the show. The sort of silly-but-fun “why the hell not” exercise I can easily get behind. As it’s a one-off special, the budget would appear to have allowed for better production and visuals. One scene in particular is genuinely great, as a robot ninja busts up a legion of cybermen, teleporting around and lobbing arrows at them, causing them to explode and fall to pieces, arms and heads everywhere. Earlier, a rogue Dalek shoots itself in a hall of mirrors and within its exploded remains is its rarely-sighted grotesque embryo. Marvelous!

Total carnage. I bet Hideo Kojima was a fan.

Sometimes logic has to fly out of the window, though. For instance, the second Doctor tricks the illusion of Jamie and Zoe by recalling that they shouldn’t know who he is, since their memories were wiped when they were returned to their time zones. But by the same reasoning, how would the Doctor have remembered that, as it happened almost immediately prior to his regeneration and exile on Earth. He would have had to have been pulled from the past moments before this, but there’s no indication this is the case when he turns up to visit the Brigadier. Similarly, why exactly is K-9 with Sarah Jane? Mk.I was left on Gallifrey with Leela and Mk.II was left with Romana (in a black-and-white photograph). I suppose it doesn’t matter, really; some questions are best left unanswered for the sake of a bit of fun, and this was a lot of fun. Job done.

Mawdryn Undead

I’ll be honest: after part 1, I had decided this story was going to be rubbish. The annoying schoolkids stealing a car, the cheesy villain and awful-looking video effects, Lethbridge-Stewart working at a school for some reason..? What’s going on?! Thankfully, the story does develop and it turns out to be one of the most interesting I’ve seen so far.

Dance, boy. Dance!

Certainly, Doctor Who doesn’t deal with local time phenomena very often, and the revelation that Nyssa and Tegan are six years back in the past is a good one. Of course, the Brigadier is always great to have on screen, and two of them is twice as nice. His memory loss seemed like a lazy conceit at first, but it makes sense in the end and the story comes together well. He’s a terrific character to have alongside the Doctor, and it almost made me nostalgic for the Pertwee years again (heaven forbid!).

The timeframes aren’t quite right, but that’s mostly because the 1970s pretended to be the 1980s. Now that is really is the 1980s, the Brigadier retired in the 1970s. Perhaps they should have set the present day bits in the future to avoid this whole mess!

It’s the nastiness and horror that is most surprising, though. Mawdryn and his brothers in exile, doomed to torturous immortality, is a tragic tale in itself, but the make-up designs are something else. Heads split open, pulsating brains poking out, not to mention the horribly burned skin earlier on – it’s all rather grotesque. Excellently grotesque! I liked how he pretended to be a regenerated Doctor as well. This one really surprised me, I had no idea what to expect, and that’s a good thing.

Mawdryn, posing as the regenerated Doctor, is treated with suspicion.

I suppose the weak link is really the Black Guardian. He’s played like a pantomime villain stuck in a pop video, and even after it’s all finished, I don’t entirely know what he was after, whether he just wanted the Doctor dead or if he was in on Mawdryn’s plan to drain his regenerations first. Turlough is even more confusing, with seemingly none of the crew bothering to question what an alien is doing posing as a schoolboy on Earth. Since he’s sticking around on the Tardis for a while, I suspect we’ll learn a lot more about his plan in the next story. It makes a change to have a secondary character with an ulterior motive, at least.

The Brigadier nearly runs into his other self, an act that would turn out to be not as catastrophic as first feared.

This was surprisingly good, then. One of the most memorable, unusual and intriguing stories so far; well paced, horrific and humoured in equal doses, and complemented by a distinctive synthy soundtrack. And from the looks of things, it’s far from over.

Arc of Infinity

Whenever the Doctor returns to Gallifrey, there’s always some sort of political problem going on. For a society that has so much power, you’d think their security would be a lot better. This time, the Doctor is caught up in a conspiracy to free the ancient ex-Time Lord Omega from his antimatter prison. It’s been ten years since Omega last appeared, in the anniversary special The Three Doctors, so it’s an appropriate year to bring him back (from the dead?).

Welcome back to Gallifrey, Doctor. You’re nicked. Sorry.

While the Doctor and Nyssa are gallivanting around Gallifrey, another story runs parallel, following a couple of backpackers in Amsterdam, who we later learn are the cousin and friend of Tegan, who rejoins the adventure by sheer coincidence. Amsterdam just happens to be Omega’s base of operations on Earth, while he communicates with his accomplices on Gallifrey from afar.

Omega has changed his appearance since last time. And built a Tardis. And a chicken?

The backpackers are almost unwatchably awful, but nevertheless, it’s an interesting way to split up the story into two parallel threads that come together near the end. The final chase through the Amsterdam streets is perhaps longer than it needs to be, and I would have liked to see the duplicate Doctor idea expanded upon.

This guy. Why? Just why?

Speaking of duplicate Doctors, this story casts Colin Baker as the security commander Maxil. At the time, this would have been a non-issue, but I found his presence distracting because I know that he will be cast as the next Doctor in a couple of seasons’ time (even having never seen any of Colin Baker’s episodes myself). He plays a ruthless by-the-book hardnose, so it’s difficult to get a feel for how he’ll be later on.

Floating around in the Matrix, Omega lets Tegan tell the Doctor where she can be found. Great plan, Doc!

Arc of Infinity is mixed, then. The Amsterdam half of it is weak, but the mystery stuff with the Time Lords is pretty watchable, even if it doesn’t make much sense, and the plot introduces ideas that it doesn’t develop or conclude very well. One thing I will say, Nyssa was a lot better in this than she has been before, and that’s probably because she had more to do. Keeping the roster of Tardis crew down to a minimum is a good idea. I also liked the execution scene; even though it was obvious that he wouldn’t really die, it was a cool-looking contraption.

Warriors’ Gate

I don’t think I’ve ever been quite so confused watching Doctor Who before. After three parts, I still had no idea what was actually going on. Lion-faced people, a magic mirror, fragments of a castle in a contracting universe, robotic suits of armour, something about “time winds”, a crew of layabouts in a ship made from something that seems like it should be important but on top of everything else the story is throwing at me, just washes over me in a haze of “buh?”

All that remains of the Tharil’s castle, in the void. I guess. To be honest, I have no idea.

It’s only in part four that things start to make sense. The lion-faced people are time-sensitive beings who are abused by traders as slaves to pilot their ships through the time streams. They live in the space between dimensions, a sort of no-man’s land. They were apparently a bit nasty in the past, keeping human slaves themselves. The stuff with the mirror? No idea. The best I can say is that it looked pretty cool. Some of the direction is very nicely staged, particularly the slow tracking shot through the ship at the start (someone was a fan of Alien, I take it?). There’s an otherworldly vibe about the whole thing, eerie sounds, a sense of mystery, and the story at least tries to be a bit cerebral, teasing you with time effects. Unfortunately, I don’t think it makes any sense. What was the bit with the coin toss all about? Something about 50/50 chances? What does it even mean? What? WHAT?!!

It’s the Firefly class ship Serenity… no, wait.

Admittedly, it probably is a story that benefits from repeat viewings, but that is beyond the scope of this project; each episode gets one chance, and with Warriors’ Gate, that chance was spent with me scratching my head and failing to follow what was happening. I can’t even imagine what it must have been like to watch it in four weekly instalments back in 1980. Baffling, I’d guess. For me, it was just boring.

Lane and Royce provide some bumbling humour.

So, Romana is staying behind with K-9. Given she didn’t want to return to Gallifrey, that’s understandable, but the nature of her departure is very spur-of-the-moment and strange. No stranger than anything else that happens, mind you. I suppose I grew to like Romana, but I maintain she has been a non-entity, little more than a mirror for the Doctor, or a mentor for K-9, with little character development of her own. She could have been a role model for Adric, but now that’s not going to happen. And K-9? Well, if he doesn’t come back as another incarnation (Mk.3, anyone?) then I will miss that little metal dog. As for E-Space? I’m glad to see the back of it.

Romana and K-9 leave with Biroc to help them free the slaves or something. Also they’re in a black-and-white photo for some reason.

State of Decay

I dislike it when alien cultures are portrayed as Ye Olde Earthe, but in the case of State of Decay, at least there is an attempt to justify it. Having been pulled into e-space thousands of years ago by an ancient giant vampire, three human astronauts have become immortal, lords over a village of peasants, their rocket ship towering above them all. Denying knowledge and science under penalty of death, a small group of rebels learns in secret, and then the Doctor arrives to help things along.

The Earth ship, Hydrax, now a castle, symbol of power… and mighty projectile weapon.

There’s a real danger with doing a horror story like this that it will end up being corny. Unfortunately, I think State of Decay suffers in that respect. The vampire lords look and act in a stereotypical vampire fashion, with pale-faced stares and the power to hypnotise mortals. There’s ritual sacrifice yet again (yawn), the imagery is gothic and clichéd, with rubbish-looking bats swooping about. The subplot with the villagers is pretty boring, and newcomer Adric’s part in the story feels like it was written in as an afterthought (and it probably was). At this point, Adric is basically pointless – an irritating character who does nothing of any use. By contrast, Romana and the Doctor’s scenes play out naturally and they have developed a rapport. It’s a shame Romana is caught and has to play the damsel role at the end, but the story is one big cliché anyway.

“Oooh, ve’re wampires! I vant to suck your blood!”

But the resolution is wonderfully ridiculous, as the Doctor uses the old rocket ship as a gigantic stake through the heart. Some of the imagery is also quite dark, with tubes of blood feeding the vampire, bodies drained of all life, and finally the vampire lords decaying and falling to the floor in a pile of dust. I liked that.

The Great One rises from his slumber. Remarkable timing, I must say.

There’s also an attempt to fit a fantastic legend into the story, of how all vampire tales are based on these creatures, which the Time Lords battled many ages ago, destroying them with mighty “bow ships”, until the last of its kind disappeared, never to be seen again (until now). It’s just a story, admittedly, but it sets off the imagination. It’s probably for the best, then, that we don’t get a good glimpse of the creature itself. Just a (rubbish-looking) image on a scanner screen and then a giant hand rising from the ground.

The rebels use Ceefax to identify the Hydrax crew.

Both this serial and the last have dealt with very similar themes: civilisations that have stagnated or regressed; names that have been changed beyond recognition; or purposes lost to time. Perhaps this is a feature of e-space, but if so, I feel there is more that can be done with it than a vampire story. I’m hoping for something a bit better next. Oh, and drop that kid Adric back home as soon as possible, thanks. Or just leave him anywhere. Or kick him into space. You know, whatever’s quickest.

“Hello, I’m Adric. I’m going to eat your food, complain about things and then fail to rescue to Romana.”

The Armageddon Factor

Perhaps the modern trend of Doctor Who bookending its series with elements of an ongoing story arc can be traced back to The Key to Time. Although episodes in between have only small references to the Doctor’s quest and the Guardians, the first and last serials feature these things prominently, and The Armageddon Factor wraps it up for good. It is not the most thorough of resolutions – I’m still none the wiser as to who the Guardian was or why a Key to Time even existed in the first place – but there are a few good twists and some nice drama to this one in itself.

Princess Astra realises her destiny is to become a piece of transparent plastic. Disappointingly, she does not say “armageddon outta here” at any point.

It’s a very “plotty” serial, for want of better term. A lot happens and everything intertwines. There’s a lot of really good science-fiction concepts too, such as a nuclear war between neighbouring planets, a computer controlling things behind the scenes, mind-control devices, a perpetual time loop and a mysterious figure pulling the strings.

Mentalis, a computer system built to perpetuate a state of war between two worlds. Impervious, invulnerable. Is defeated by ducking.

We also meet an old friend of the Doctor’s, Drax, and suddenly the rather dark tone of the story changes for silly comedy (including a sequence involving a shrink ray). Curiously, Drax calls the Doctor “Theta Sigma” (presumably another nickname?) and suggests that “The Doctor” might just be a title he acquired after earning his doctorate. Although what’s perhaps more curious is that he recognises the Doctor by sight, even though his face has changed!

“Ello, me old chum!”

Drax is quite fun, but his persona is weirdly comedic in a story that is otherwise fairly grim. The Shadow is the main villain of the piece, the servant of the Black Guardian. With his wonky skull mask and sinister voice, I thought he was quite good. I also liked the twist reveal at the end, but it does leave things open for possible future stories. K-9 has a hard time in this one, almost getting melted for scrap and later being brainwashed by the Shadow, but he turns out alright.

The Shadow is on a quest to collect the key fragments too. Like the Doctor’s shadow. Ah, I see what they did there.

In Romana, K-9 and the Doctor, we’ve had a Tardis full of smartypants for this series, but it’s actually worked out quite well. I see the appeal of having a human presence to keep the audience grounded, but this shows that it’s not always necessary, and Romana’s intelligence takes some of the egotistical edge off of the Doctor’s character. It’s a change from the lonely wanderer that the Doctor is in the modern series, as is the presence of old Time Lord friends and entities of power handing out quests for him to do.

K-9 has no trouble getting around in this story since it conveniently takes place on small sets with nice flat floors. Despite the grand scope and all the teleporting around, it does feel claustrophobic at times. Ahh, BBC budgets!

With the navigator circuits randomised so the Guardian cannot follow, the Tardis disappears into new adventures.

The Invasion of Time

The Invasion of Time picks up where The Deadly Assassin left off, with the Doctor exploiting Gallifrey’s ridiculous legal system again, this time to become President of the Time Lords. Why would he want to do that? Well, that’s where the mystery lies.

I’m still not entirely sure what the Doctor’s plan entailed. Keep the invaders out by letting them in?

It’s clear from the start that the Doctor is not behaving his usual self. This is the most crazed, absent-minded and bizarre he has ever been portrayed. Tom Baker’s ability to perform a masterful display of confusion, anger and misdirection is used by the writers here as an important plot point, since he must shield his true intentions from the invading Vardans. He does it brilliantly.

The Doctor offers the Vardans a jellybaby.

Sadly, the Vardans are not well developed villains. Aside from learning they can transmit themselves across energy waves and read minds (while appearing as shimmery tinfoil apparitions), it is later revealed that they are in fact human (what?). Once defeated, it’s as if the story ends and a new one begins, as they were actually being used by the Sontarans. It’s a tacked on ending, culminating in a chase through the corridors of the Tardis, which look like an old school or a warehouse and not in the least bit alien.

Sontarans are all supposed to be identical clones. That doesn’t work out so well.

The writing is witty, with plenty of funny lines from the Doctor and others, but it can be a bit too light-hearted for the situation. While the mystery lasts, the early parts of the story are quite good. I always enjoy some universe-building in sci-fi, and seeing the capital city of the Time Lords is a pleasure. We even see the wastelands arounds the city this time (albeit this is just some plains filmed through a red filter), and meet the Doctor’s old mentor, Borusa. For a season finale, it’s a suitably “big” storyline. What could be bigger than the Time Lords’ own planet threatened? But sadly it’s not very well thought out and doesn’t end well. Stor, the Sontaran captain, threatens to destroy the entire galaxy with a grenade he’s holding. Just think about that for a second: the entire GALAXY? Did someone tell the writer “quick, make up the biggest threat you can think of for the ending, don’t worry if it doesn’t make sense!”.

Completely out of the blue, Leela remains behind with Andred. I will miss her.

Finally, another sad note is the departure of Leela. I actually saw this coming, but I had expected her to remain in the wastelands and help the savages outside. Instead, these are quickly forgotten about and instead she falls in love with Andred the guard and stays behind with him. So stupid, and what a waste of a meaningful exit. She also keeps K-9 with her, which might actually mean something, except the Doctor leaves with a box with the words “K-9 Mk.II” written on it. Oh dear.