Nightmare of Eden

When I reviewed 'The Creature From the Pit', I noted that after 'City of Death' the air of general silliness starts to extend beyond the Doctor to other characters. Whilst this was largely successful in that story, by 'Nightmare of Eden' it seriously undermines a potential serious plot that should, Doctor aside, have been played straight. It is doubly unfortunate that having co-scripted some of my least favourite Doctor Who stories of the series entire run, Baker delivers a potentially interesting script that suffers at the hands of the production team, but sadly that is what happens.

Firstly, I'd like to get a discussion of Vraxoin out of the way. Having elected to lecture the audience on the dangers of drugs, Baker faces the constraints of a four-part Doctor Who story, originally broadcast in a Saturday teatime slot. This presents a problem; on the one hand, there isn't really time to create an intelligent discourse on drug abuse, and on the other, there are limits to what could be depicted in a series with an audience containing a large number of children. Consequently, the writers resort to a simple "drugs are bad, m'kay?" message with Vraxoin their fictional stand in for real narcotics. And therein lies the problem. Drugs are fun. Addictive and destructive as they often are, most people who use drugs do not start taking them with the actual intention of committing suicide, they take them for recreational purposes. Vraxoin however, does not seem like fun; after a brief and seemingly pleasant high, it immediately causes such massive withdrawal pains that another dose is immediately required, and this is implied to lead very rapidly to death. As drugs go, it doesn't sound very marketable. Given the restrictions of the series format, I doubt Baker had few other options open to them in getting their message across, but frankly I'd much rather that they had just told another story instead of venturing into the territory of unconvincing bullshit. 

Regardless of this, Baker could potentially have made an interesting exploration of why people turn to drugs and why people like Tryst deal in drugs, especially from the point of view of the twenty-first century, when an increasing number of students are apparently resorting to drug dealing and prostitution to subsidize their income. In all fairness to him, he makes the effort, but Tryst's weak arguments about his need to fund his work and the ability of customers to make their own choices are utterly undermined by Lewis Fiander's ghastly portrayal of the character. Given the role of the story's principle villain and would-be ruthless drug dealer, Fiander elects to portray the character as a shambling buffoon with a ludicrous accent. His rationale for this escapes me and it may just be that he's a really bad actor, but his absurd performance robs the character of any sense of motivation whatsoever, as he descends into clichйd eccentric scientist mode. To add insult to injury, Fiander seems to think his performance is amusing, but it is merely painful. Geoffrey Bateman's performance as Dymond is somewhat better, played deadly straight and full of nervousness and anger, but still fairly unmemorable. 

Inappropriate silliness abounds. After his excellent performance as Jack Tyler in 'Image of the Fendahl', Geoffrey Hinsliff goes and spoils himself as Waterguard Fisk, another terrible performance and another wasted opportunity; as an official representative of a so-called pleasure planet the government of which seems to bandy about the death penalty very easily, Fisk could have been used to make interesting (or at least, vaguely convincing) points about fascism and police corruption. Instead, like Tryst, he's portrayed as a cretin, who utters such cringe worthy lines as "criminals are like that" and struts about in a horribly over-the-top fashion. I would mention Costa, but he's only present to give Fisk someone to spout expository dialogue at and does nothing else of note. 

Annoyingly, despite my reservations about the way the drug plotline is handled, the plot of 'Nightmare of Eden' is reasonably engaging and pretty much watertight, as the Doctor and Romana seek to separate the ships, return the Mandrels to the CET machine, and absolve themselves of blame for drug running. But the entire production is so crass that it becomes disappointingly pedestrian, and for the avid fan in the video and DVD age, the fact that the CET machine is little more than a bargain basement Miniscope robs the story of what might otherwise have been an interesting gimmick. The jungle set of Eden looks very artificial, which after the luscious jungle of 'The Creature From the Pit' is especially obvious, and most of the other sets are just bog-standard corridors. The model work is passable, but forgettable in a season boasting the Jagaroth and Movellan ships, and the costumes of the crewmembers on board the Empress are laughable. The fact that the incidental music made so little impression on me that I can't remember if it was good or not is not a particularly good sign either, although at least it isn't intrusive. The Mandrels are not as bad in my opinion as some fans seem to think, although their overly long arms look woeful. I do however like the fact that their big heads, huge glowing eyes, and strange mouths seem like a laudable attempt to avoid the usual humanoid in a suit look, and it does make them look alien. 

There are however some worthy aspects to 'Nightmare of Eden'; David Daker (previously Irongron in the marvellous 'The Time Warrior') is very good as Captain Rigg and portrays Rigg's drug-addled state later in the story quite well (certainly better than Stephen Jenn does as Secker). Barry Andrews is quite good as Stott, slightly compensating for Fisk and Costa. The direction is competent enough, and I like the fact that it seems to be poking fun at the series' limitations, as Tom Baker chases Barry Andrews through the same set three times in a row in Episode Two. Dymond's space suit, and the fact that he uses a shuttle craft to travel between ships is a nice reminder that the story is set in space, which the cheap cop-out of a transmat would have lacked (I am not, incidentally, suggesting that a transmat is automatically a cop-out, just that I feel it would have been in this instance). 

Finally, there are the regulars. As usual, Tom Baker clowns around as the Doctor, whilst Lalla Ward plays things relatively straight, and K9 makes sounds haughty from the sidelines. Also as usual, this generally works fine, but whilst the Doctor's lines about Galactic Salvage Insurance in Episode One are rather funny, his notorious "Oh, my fingers! My arms! My legs! My everything!" in Episode Four merely emphasizes the fact that the story has descended into farce. This is a shame, since Baker proves adept at conveying the Doctor's contempt for Tryst's activities and his attempts to justify them, as exemplified by his quiet "Go away" as Tryst is arrested at the end. K9 and Romana both get plenty to do too, and it occurred to me whilst watching this story that K9's tendency to soliloquize is a perfect vehicle for plot exposition without it sounding forced. Overall however, 'Nightmare of Eden' is a failure, a potentially decent story let down by lacklustre production, some bad lines, and some inappropriate acting. Which is perhaps ironic, given that the following story combines pantomime slapstick, a silly monster, farcical dialogue and a villain who is perhaps more over the top than any other villain in Doctor Who's entire run, and still manages to be enormously entertaining…