Rise of the Cybermen / The Age of Steel

ThereВ’s no question that David TennantВ’s portrayal of Dr. Who is remarkable and enjoyable, hopefully harkening back to the days of Tom Baker by the time Series Two comes to an end. Emotionally moving stories like В“The Girl in the Fireplace,В” В“School ReunionВ” and well-written stories such as В“Tooth and ClawВ” have firmly established TennantВ’s reign, further enhanced by the production quality and overall look and feel of the show. Unfortunately, В“Rise of the CybermenВ” and В“The Age of SteelВ” are embarrassing blemishes on a pristine second season.

Problematic and clumsy, both episodes are predictable and plodding, with the lead characters enticing about as much viewer emotion as the Cybermen display. The clichéd beginning of the first half of this two-parter—the unimaginative “It’s alive!” and death of John Lumic’s assistant Dr. Kendrick after his objections—“I’ll shall have to tell them”—asks the obvious question: why didn’t the assistant state his objections earlier on, before things got out of hand? Why didn’t the earpiece controllers affect the assistant? Lumic’s Almighty Creator reference to the (seemingly) first Cyberman “[you are] my child… we are blessed” is so unconvincing and predictable it’s almost embarrassing to watch. Old school viewers of the show probably have more empathy for Davros in “Genesis of the Daleks”. No doubt Davros’ return in the last episode of this season will be far-more exciting.

With the new series of Dr. Who weВ’ve come to expect quality writing and production, both of which are elusive in these stories. The intimidating and eerie voices of the original Cybermen are long gone, replaced with a diminutive, softly-spoken ring-modulated whimper. A massive В“machineВ” deserves an equally impressive voice, not something regurgitated from a Korg Triton. The producers and visual designers also missed their mark in a rather major way, relying on plastic costumes for the Cybermen, rather than allowing a great opportunity for The Mill to show off their stuff. Imagine how much scarier, robotic, and quick CGI Cybermen would have been! LetВ’s face it, most viewers have a hard time accepting CGI when it does not look good; in both these episodes, CGI would have been far better than the fake looking costumes. No doubt the production team was kicking itself after the episodes completion for not utilizing their creative resources. Simply put, the Cybermen costumes are ineffectual, and pale in comparison to other modern CGI villains, such as the robots in В“I, RobotВ” or the dated В“T2В”.

In order to appease continuity and perhaps out of respect for the original series, both these stories take place on an Parallel Earth, another premise that further distances the viewer. VerisimilitudeВ—a suspension of disbeliefВ—often used to describe film, is all but В“deletedВ” in these stories. LetВ’s face it, itВ’s tough to feel sorry for Earth when it is constantly being invaded, and even tougher to be concerned when itВ’s really just an В“alternateВ” Earth. Having characters meeting themselves (Mickey runs into his more Masculine self В‘RickyВ’) or meeting their alternative family membersВ—and IВ’m not talking about queer brothers and sisters, simply does not evoke any viewer sentiment or connection. For example, RoseВ’s alternative mum is a dog-coddling socialite who takes dismisses Rose after she attempts to resolve a failing marriage. ItВ’s hard to imagine, and even harder to convince viewers, that Rose would be so worried about her parents who really were not here parents, just good Xerox copies or Dolly-the-Sheep-type clones.

And so the first part of this story marches on like the incessant metal march of the Cybermen, taking us from their creation to crashing of a security-less dinner party. The episode trails out with the Cybermen surrounding the Doctor and company, with the menacing and impotent line В“Maximum deletion! Delete! Delete!В”. ThatВ’s what the script editor shouldВ’ve told writer Tom MacRae. Older viewers may have heard a similar phrase back when the Apple II computer with Sam Say It came out.

The second half of this two-parter, В“The Age of SteelВ” never passes enough time to even come close to being an В“ageВ”. It barely passes a day, yet alone credibility. The title sounds nice, though. The plastic Cybermen begin the conversion process of the humans on В‘parallelВ’ Earth, while the Doctor struggles to find screen time in the background, sometimes walking around as though planning a grocery list in his head. One of the stories better moments, or at least scary moments, occurs when the Doctor passes through the underground cooling tunnels and past hundreds of dormant Cybermen. It is interesting to note that the scariest moment of screen time from the Cybermen occurs when they are static.

The Doctor saves the day along with help from Mickey and the Cybermen are eventually В“deletedВ” by means of deactivating their emotion-supression c