Serial 123: Arc of Infinity

Doctor: Peter Davison (5th Doctor)
Companions: Nyssa, Tegan Jovanka


Written by: Johnny Byrne
Directed by: Ron Jones

Background & Significance: Peter Davison's second season marked Doctor Who's twentieth anniversary. The season was punctuated by the continuity porn/cluster-frak The Five Doctors. But that's just one thing. This is TWENTY YEARS. The celebration of Doctor Who needed to be a year long and it needed to be epic and noticeable and memorable.

Or, at least, a little bit gimmicky.

The celebration came in the form of returns of old villains as the main foes in each serial. Does this mean Daleks, Cybermen, and The Master? Not.... really? Oh, then you must mean Sontarans and The Monk and stuff, right?

Well... yeah no not at all.

No. Their focus are on what can only be called the important but forgotten villains. Rather seemingly haphazardly selected, "Arc of Infinity" stars the evil villain from the seminal classic story "The Three Doctors". In case you don't remember (or didn't read it or see it, which you should because it was awesome) Omega was a good villain, and one who dated back to the creation of Time Lord society as one of its creators. Crazy memorable, super fun, for many many reasons.

What we end up having is a ridiculous mess of an episode (as we'll soon see) that isn't so much bad as it is textbook "not good". Most of these are story and writing problems, which is none too inspiring for writer Johnny Byrne's other stories: Tom Baker's penultimate "The Keeper of Traken" (starring the return of The Master) and the kick off to Davison's final season "Warriors of the Deep" (featuring the return of the Silurians).

That said? This story is ridiculous fun. So much of it makes absolutely no sense, but they go with it anyways and commit full on, and for that, this serial is amazing. From shooting in Amsterdam (as in the actual place), a trigger-happy Mutant Bird Slave, and some insane Time Lord blood lust, it's a bucket o' fun, and while at the end of it all I'm fully aware that it's not very good, it's still wonderfully awful in the way a lot of old Star Trek is wonderfully awful, and I tend to love these sorts of episodes.

We open after Tegan's departure at the end of the previous season's closer "Time-Flight", and Nyssa of Traken and The Doctor are flying around the universe having a grand old time with Tegan's nowhere to be found.

That's called "Life is good".

Also, because of the disjointed nature of two very different parts of this story, I'm going to split the commentary into "The Omega Storyline" and "The Amsterdam Storyline"

So let's get to it!

Serial 88: The Deadly Assassin

Doctor: Tom Baker (4th Doctor)
Companion: None


Written by: Robert Holmes
Directed by: David Maloney

Background & Significance: The start of Tom Baker's era as The Doctor saw a series of behind-the-scenes shifts that transformed Doctor Who significantly, the most important among these being a new producer in Phillip Hinchcliffe and a new script editor in Robert Holmes.

Together, this... triumvirate, I guess you could call it, was Doctor Who at its most successful. The show became immensely popular. Hinchcliffe and Holmes steered the show into darker territories, focusing more on tonally shifting what had previously been fun wacky science fiction into science fiction with a Gothic horrory bent to it. It was a reflection of the like-minded team of Hinchcliffe and Holmes: their interests were the same, and they worked to tell the stories that they loved to tell. A rare, perfect marriage of producer and script editor. Because of all this, in terms of viewership, in terms of popularity, in terms of sheer quality, Classic Doctor Who peaked here, about halfway through its initial run.

But the awesome only lasted for three seasons.

Each of the the Hinchcliffe/Holmes seasons (12, 13, & 14) got progressively stronger and more fine tuned (re: tonally aligned with the horror etc.) as they developed their show and ideas (Season 14, their final season, being so good that it has been nicknamed "The Gothic Season"), until they were removed from their positions not because they were unsuccessful in terms of ratings or popularity (far from it), but rather because of complaints about adult content. We're talking "scary" and "freak-outty". There's an oft used saying about Doctor Who - quite famous - that says "British children watch Doctor Who from behind the sofa". Yeah.... They'd probably do that for the Hinchcliffe/Holmes.

But enough about Hinchcliffe/Holmes for now (we'll talk about them as we get to more and more of their stories in the future). What about this story in particular?

"The Deadly Assassin" is ridiculously significant. Not only does it come about halfway through Doctor Who's Gothic Season, but it's significant in that it's the only story of the classic series that features absolutely no Companion, and it essentially creates The Time Lords from the ground up.

Prior to this, Time Lord mythology was largely undefined and undeveloped. They had first appeared in Patrick Troughton's final serial "The War Games" and then again in Jon Pertwee's "The Three Doctors", but even then they were only loosely defined and never specifically mythologized.

Here, in "The Deadly Assassin", script editor Robert Holmes (who is the most prolific, popular, and awesome of the writers of the classic series) takes the opportunity to completely re-define the mythology behind Gallifrey and the Time Lords. It's here that we first learn of Rassilon, the workings of Time Lord society (including their garish and ridiculous (but so so awesome) outfits), and the concept of limited regenerations.

And he does all that in four episodes.

So let's get to it!

Doctor Who: The Movie (1996)

Doctor: Paul McGann (8th Doctor)
Companion: Dr. Grace Holloway


Written by: Matthew Jacobs
Directed by: Gregory Sax

Background & Significance: By 1990, Doctor Who was no more. McCoy's tenure ended and the BBC canceled the show. The fanbase, like Trekkies and Browncoats, turned inward to fill the void left by their favorite show. Zines, fanfiction, fan communities, conventions, radio plays... all of "the usual" cropped up to keep the show alive.

Needless to say, after its cancellation, Doctor Who proved itself a viable property, one with amazing staying power. It had all the cultural impact of Star Trek, and if Kirk and Spock et. al. managed to create a giant franchise empire, Doctor Who certainly could as well.

So in the mid '90's, they tried to revive it.

The BBC joined with American studios (attempting to bring in a U.S. viewership) to fund a single, made-for-TV movie with an American broadcaster that would function as a backdoor pilot to an ongoing series. It would be done on the relative cheap and filmed in Vancouver, and if the movie did well enough they would move it to series with this movie serving as the show's first episode.

They also decided that the movie would continue The Doctor's story where it had [essentially] left off in 1989. Certain changes would be enacted as it had to be new-viewer friendly. Other than that, it was essentially the same thing. The movie would introduce key elements. The Time Lords, The Master, Daleks, The TARDIS, and almost all of the original mythology would stay in place. The Doctor would regenerate, making a new incarnation in Paul McGann, giving a new generation a new Doctor to grow to love.

All that? Ridiculously logical. That all makes sense (for the most part). So what could go wrong?

Ohhhhhhhhh so much. As is probably clear, the movie failed to spark any backing or interest in continuing further, specifically from broadcast network Fox. The BBC couldn't move forward without an American network, despite the fact that the movie aired to eight million in Britain (about as large as Doctor Who was back at the end of its run... Which, considering that the show had been off the air for seven years at that point, isn't that bad).

And really, all of the problems everyone has comes from odd choices and lack of good, thrilling story that's--I hate to say worthy, but--worthy of the greatness of Doctor Who.

Personally? I came to this with much excitement. I had been looking forward to Paul McGann since I had first heard about him. And the movie itself didn't sound so awful (some of the complaints from the fanbase are things I was expecting and could just write off or around).

We can discuss all of its failings as we go through it, but just to be clear at the outset: I was excited for Paul McGann going into this, and he did not disappoint. More than anything, he really does a great Doctor. All the problems fall on the story and the writing and the direction and some really strange choices. So let's keep that in mind and separate the movie from The Doctor himself.

So let's get to it!

Serial 156: Ghost Light

Doctor: Sylvester McCoy (7th Doctor)
Companions: Ace


Written by: Marc Platt
Directed by: Alan Wareing

Background & Significance: After the "disaster" that was Colin Baker, Doctor Who underwent more shifts and changes. Colin Baker was fired by the BBC, the show moved from a prime time weeknight time slot back to Saturday nights, episode lengths went from forty five minutes to twenty five minutes, the budget was slashed again, the BBC still had their sights on killing the show, and a well-known comedian at the time, a fellow named Sylvester McCoy, became the Seventh incarnation of The Doctor.

Known for his comedy, Sylvester McCoy's Doctor was, in fact, funny. But he was also dark and manipulative, growing more and more into this Chess Master as his run progressed. He is (aside from David Tennant in 2006) the ONLY Doctor to ever be selected over Tom Baker's 4th Doctor as the "fan-favorite" in Doctor Who magazine's annual "Who is your favorite Doctor" poll.

That said, he is, perhaps, one of the "forgotten" Doctors. He wasn't as fan-favorite as Tom Baker or Peter Davison (or even Patrick Troughton), nor was he infamously reviled (a la Colin Baker). He's a Doctor like Jon Pertwee or Paul McGann who just sorta... fades into the background among the more openly popular Doctors.

But he is rather deftly incredible (especially, as we shall see, next week...) and a remarkably captivating Doctor, charismatic and incredibly specific. Far, for me, from forgettable.

Today's serial, "Ghost Light", comes from Sylvester McCoy's final season, when The Doctor has become the skilled tactician and chess master. It is also notable in that it was the final serial ever filmed in the classic Doctor Who era (although it was not, in fact, the last broadcast). Other than that, nothing special about it. No Daleks, Master, Cybermen, etc. Just a Doctor Who story.

As it was the last, and the budget had been progressively slashed more and more as time had gone on, the serial is told in three parts, even though it was written to be four (because the final budget only allowed them to do three). What you're left with, then, is a disjointed work that feels like it's missing entire sections or scenes, so I'll explain it as best I can, but if it feels disjointed, and you're left going "Huh?" that's why.

Also, apologies for the screencaps. The way they shot this was really, really dark (which goes with the whole Light thing that comes into play later) so it makes the screencaps look muddy. I did my best, but... yeah... At some point I just can't do no more. So keep that in mind and bear with me in places, cuz it might get a little bit rough.

So let's get to it!

Serial 138: Vengeance on Varos

Doctor: Colin Baker (6th Doctor)
Companions: Peri Brown

Written by: Philip Martin
Directed by: Ron Jones

Background & Significance: Peter Davison, fearing typecasting, left Doctor Who after three well-regarded seasons. Realizing his popularity, and knowing that they, again, would have to do something a bit different, Jonathan Nathan-Turner (the producer from Tom Baker's last season through the show's ultimate cancellation in 1989) decided to cast then-well-known television actor Colin Baker.

Colin Baker's era was particularly infamous. Perhaps most well-known for its darker stories and Colin Baker's completely outlandish costume (more on that a bit later), the series, at this point, had begun to show the signs of both age and disregard.

And I find that rather sad.

In a lot of ways, this is completely grounded and understandable. Doctor Who was entering its 22nd season, and those in charge of the BBC etc. found it outdated and were looking for something new. Not only that, but Colin Baker was a radical take on The Doctor (more on this later), one who was not nearly so likable as his predecessors. The audience got alienated. This wasn't the same guy who had been around for the past twenty years... Which is ironic, because The Sixth Doctor was the same guy, just different.

And perhaps that's a bit unfair, but it's also quite true. Not every incarnation is going to work for everyone. The truth is (as we shall see), The Sixth Doctor was a DIFFICULT Doctor to like. He wasn't as immediately likable as ANY of the other Doctors. But his portrayal isn't about likability. It's about "who is this guy?"

Unfortunately, the writers didn't really have any idea how to write for him. They just saw cold nihilist, so the stories became exceptionally bleak and dark. "Vengeance on Varos" is a story specifically cited for its extremely violent and dark content, and that's completely undeniable (as we soon shall see).

Also interesting to note: this serial (like "The Visitation") is not "remarkable" in any specific way. No Daleks, no Cybermen, no Master, no multiple Doctors, no Gallifreyans. Just a Doctor and Companion get in over their heads and have to deal.

Let's get to it!

Serial 129: The Five Doctors

Doctors: Richard Hurndall (1st Doctor), Patrick Troughton (2nd Doctor), Jon Pertwee (3rd Doctor), Tom Baker (4th Doctor), Peter Davison (5th Doctor)
Companions: Tegan Jovanka, Vislor Turlough, Sarah Jane Smith, Susan Foreman, The Brigadier, Romana


Written by: Terrance Dicks
Directed by: Peter Moffatt

Background & Significance: In 1983, Doctor Who turned twenty. You know what that means. Something big. Something epic. Something legendary.

Ten year's previous, they did "The Three Doctors," a multi-Doctor crossover that didn't suck and was kinda awesome (despite the lack of Hartnell, but even then, he had one of the standout lines) and succeeded. In 1983, they decided to re-capture the magic with "The Five Doctors." They gave the script to popular and incredibly prolific Who writer Terrance Dicks. He was given the following rule: to feature The Doctor in his five incarnations and "as many monsters and companions as you could cram in there." The intentions noble, stages was set for the anniversary special to be a celebration of the show's long and varied two decade history.

Spoiler alert: And it fails. Hard.

First off, that's my own opinion, and maybe I'm a victim of my own anticipointments, but I don't think so. And for the sake of some background, here's why...

1) Tom Baker passed on it because it was "too soon". So they used archive footage from an incomplete story that was never aired, meaning he doesn't even really appear in this serial.

2) Hartnell's dead, so they decided to bring in Richard Hurndall, who kinda looks like him, and expected him to pull off Hartnell... But we'll talk more on him a bit later.

3) If you count The Master and not The Fourth Doctor, there are TEN main characters in this ninety minute story. Such character work takes a remarkably skilled writer, and, while Terrance Dicks is good, he's not that good.

4) There was a HUGE mess of scheduling conflicts going on all through this. They couldn't accomadate Frazern Hines (Jamie) to be Troughton's Companion, so everyone got kinda bumped and dumped around leading to some awkward things that don't necessarily make so much sense.

So just know all that as we delve into this. I really wanted to like this, but it ended up being overly ambitious and it ended up failing if you ask me.

One more thing before I start. This story is remarkably bouncy, with each Doctor kinda getting his own storyline, so I'm going to bounce around and just focus (for the most part) on one Doctor at a time.

Or at least, that's the plan, anyways.

But enough blather! Let's get to it!

Serial 119: The Visitation

Doctor: Peter Davison (5th Doctor)
Companions: Adric, Nyssa, Tegan Jovanka


Written by: Eric Saward
Directed by: Peter Moffatt

Background & Significance: Tom Baker's reign (previously described as legendary) ended after seven years. It was legendary, epic, and gave the world easily the most popular and well-known Doctor from the classic series. When he left, the producers were left with a crisis:

How could they possibly follow up one of the greatest Doctors to date?

The answer, interestingly enough, came from casting something that was completely different from the previous four Doctors, who were all fine gentlemen, but the youngest at the time of casting was Tom Baker, and he was 40 when he got the job. So they tried something completely different: They cast 29 year old Peter Davison.

A radical departure from all of the previous Doctors, Davison was notably younger than all the actors had been when they took over (note that he was over a decade younger than Tom Baker when Tom Baker got the role) and casting him (and I believe he was quite the popular actor at the time) was a huge gamble. It was also an attempt to bring in a younger crowd, especially in the wake of Star Wars coming in and becoming a massive influence on all of sci-fi forever. The show went back to basics, focusing on classic stories, science fiction (as opposed to the goofy humour of Baker's era), and the return of old villains.

So part of the question is... did it work? Did the ridiculously young Doctor work?

The Visitation takes place halfway through Davison's first season, with Tom Baker's final companions (Tegan, Nyssa, and Adric) still hanging around, and for the first time on this blog, there is nothing special about it. No Daleks. No Cybermen. No Master. No multiple Doctors. No nothing. Just a classic Doctor Who story.

So let's get to it.

Serial 78: Genesis of the Daleks

Doctor: Tom Baker (4th Doctor)
Companions: Sarah Jane Smith and Harry Sullivan


Written by: Terry Nation
Directed by: David Maloney

Background and Significance: When Jon Pertwee abdicated his role as The Doctor after five seasons, he did it having the longest run as the character by at least two years. (Honestly, I find it incredibly cool that he was on the show for about the average length of a fairly successful TV show.) He left the show as a serviceable Doctor, his era coming with some new innovations (color, more action, more and cooler special effects) and a long, healthy run some very good Doctor Who stories and some new innovations (not the least of which was the introduction of The Master).

And then he got replaced.

Not only that, but the run of his replacement, Tom Baker, would be nothing short of positively legendary. Playing The Doctor for seven years (two years longer than Pertwee, and more than Hartnell and Troughton combined), he is an incredibly iconic Doctor, from costume to mannerisms, and the show was never more popular in its original run. Tom Baker's Doctor is widely considered to be the best and most widely known (although David Tennant fans might disagree) of all time, and with seven years under his belt, it's very easy to see why.

With the Fourth Doctor, the show became nothing short of a phenomenon and incredibly exciting as this goofy looking chap with a giant scarf and a silly mish-mash of clothes took center stage and showed the world what Doctor Who was really capable of.

But enough of that, what about this episode?

This episode, "The Genesis of the Daleks," is one of only two times The Fourth Doctor went up against his greatest foe. Shocking as that might sound, especially given the rampant popularity of The Doctor before and since, it's a mark of Baker's era that he wasn't *crutched* by Daleks and they weren't a foe for The Doctor to fall back on.

"Genesis of the Daleks," however, is perhaps most notable because it is the introduction of the incredibly iconic creator of The Daleks.

Davros

And really, that's the entire reason I wanted so desperately to see this episode. I loved him in the most recent series when The Tenth Doctor and his multitude of Companions ran up against him in "Stolen Earth/Journey's End," and the appearance of Davros and the backstory that comes with him is the thing that really grabbed me and sucked me into wanting to watch "The Old Stuff", which means it's really his fault that I'm doing this blog in the first place.

So I owe it to the Daleks' creator to talk about his introduction.

Oh. And it's about the creation of the Daleks. Who doesn't love that?

Let's get to it!

Serial 65: The Three Doctors

Doctor: William Hartnell (1st Doctor), Patrick Troughton (2nd Doctor), Jon Pertwee (3rd Doctor)
Companion: Jo Grant


Written by: Bob Baker and Dave Martin
Directed by: Lennie Mayne

Background and Significance: In 1973, Doctor Who turned ten years old. There was probably much rejoicing that this little, low budget, sci-fi TV show had hit ten years (and really, what has hit ten years in this day and age? Not only that, ten years of sci-fi. Stargate is the only think I can think of) and, as such, the producers decided to throw a little Doctor Who party in the season's premiere episode by doing something they had never done before:

A Multiple Doctor Team-up.

And oh how joyously glorious that sounds... and oh how joyously glorious it turned out to be, and let's be real. It could have been terrible. How many times has the word "crossover" been met with insane disappointment? Yeah. Not here.

The idea is to take Jon Pertwee and team him up with Patrick Troughton and William Hartnell and have them have an epic adventure of day-saving that requires all three to work together in order to bring down the forces of evil.

But there was a problem.

Towards the end of his run (which ended seven years previously), William Hartnell had fallen into bad health. While it was [really] always an issue (it was because of his health that the producers needed to bring in Troughton), the seven years away hadn't given Hartnell any improvements on his condition, and he was quite the worse for wear.

Originally, the plan was to have all three Doctors share screen time equally, but when it became apparent that Hartnell would not be able to contribute the time or energy required to give the performance the story had in mind, the producers wrote around him, essentially writing him out of the show.

It would be Hartnell's final acting performance.

The story then fell almost entirely upon Jon Pertwee and the newly-returned Patrick Troughton, who upped his performance and slipped back into the role as fantastically as he ever had, and Jon Pertwee came in with a wonderful performance that matched Troughton's in Pertwee's own style.

The Three Doctors is a legendary four episode fangasm with an awesome story that is big, fun, exciting, and incredibly memorable beyond the the fact that it is a Doctor team up. It is a fantastic Doctor Who story, and if you want to check it out before I review it here, I can't say I'd blame you. You'd be in for quite a treat.

So let's get to it.

Special Edition! Serial 21: The Daleks' Master Plan

Doctor: William Hartnell (1st Doctor)
Companions: Steven Taylor, Katarina, Sara Kingdom

Written by: Terry Nation and Dennis Spooner
Directed By: Douglas Camfield

Background/Significance: The Daleks need to be epic and to be written sparingly. They're like... The Joker (so's The Master, but kind of in a different way and also the same way) and they really lose their power if they appear too much or in a context that isn't... massive and epic. And you can only do massive and epic on occasion, not every week, or that power's lost too. (For more information, go watch the most recent series' "Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks" to see what I mean).

They're great villains and they deserve a great story. Which brings us to this one, "The Daleks' Master Plan." It's twelve episodes long (all but three of the episodes are lost), making it the longest single Doctor Who serial around (the next longest is Patrick Troughton's final serial: The War Games, which is ten episodes).

Fortunately for those who want them, this serial (as all those that are missing) has been released as an audio experience because (for whatever reason) all the audio survives and has been released.

Mavic Chen looks down on audio recordings; Zephon is confused.

The story was in Hartnell's third and "final" season (he did two serials in season four) and it's.... crazy long. I popped it on my iPod and experienced what was basically a five hour Doctor Who story, starring The Daleks as they chase The Doctor and his companions across time and space as they attempt to take over the Galaxy, starting with Earth.

So let's get to it.

(Also, as a note, because it's so long and because I experienced it in only audio, I'm going to try to just blast through it with minimal plot summary (because it's just so incredibly slow... and incredibly lengthy) and there's really only a few things I want to highlight).