The Pirate Planet

Love him or hate him, there’s no denying that Douglas Adams just isn’t like other writers. A manic energy mixes with a dazzling imagination that skirts the edge of believability, carried by its natural verve; you might disagree with that, of course. As his first story, this has more claim to be television history than the average episode, and most of Adams’s later trademarks appear here in embryonic form. Watching The Pirate Planet for the first time is like being kicked in the balls by an insanely beautiful woman; it makes your eyes water at the time, but wait until your friends hear about it!

The opening scene takes no prisoners. Right from the start the viewer is hit with one of the strangest characters ever presented, a half-cybernetic (proto-Cyberman, really) space pirate yelling about devilstorms and sky-demons at the top of his voice, while the fawning Mr Fibuli lopes around like Igor. Can you imagine if Russell T. Davies had written this? I’d rather not. But it somehow works, because Adams’s writing style just floors the accelerator and sticks a massive two fingers up at detractors, and what happens next is up to you: either hold on, or get left behind. I love it, but I can appreciate the opposite view.

Opening TARDIS scenes are rarely very good, as without a plot to be talking about yet dialogue often falls flat. Tom Baker tries his best, but he’s fighting a losing battle with Mary Tamm on screen with him; she’s like a lightning rod that sucks all quality from the scene away and into the ground. However, the Doctor’s brilliant line of “I’m perfectly capable of admitting when I’m wrong, it’s just that this time I’m not” makes it worth watching.

We’re back on the bridge before too long though, and once you get over the shock of the Captain and start to think about him properly he becomes quite spooky; one of the strongest features of this story is the contrast between humour and serious moments that make the jokes funnier and the serious stuff darker. Just one thing though: the Captain is blatantly far more intelligent than Fibuli, so why does he need him at all?

Initially the Mentiads come across as quite atmospheric and distract from the fact the main city of Zanak seems to consist of about twelve people. However, their whole expressive dance routine becomes even sillier when presented alongside David Sibley’s pathetic acting; the guest cast is what really lets this story down, as only David Warwick as Kemas and Bruce Purchase as the Captain really put up a fight. It is a shame though that the characterisation of Kemas treads some very familiar ground as the iconoclast who breaks free of the social order and leads his people to freedom.

“This planet wasn’t here when I tried to land…” Now we’re getting somewhere. One of my favourite aspects of the original series is that the length and slow pace of the stories allows them to build up a sense of mystery, and this makes a good start with a planet not where it is supposed to be, with various precious stones just scattered about. This could be presented better though, as they are strewn rather strategically where the Doctor should have spotted them earlier. The scene where the Doctor is ignored by the locals is fun, but slightly odd when next time they all seem to be utterly terrified of him: the people of Zanak have this strange habit of changing their customs depending on the narrative requirement, although I could watch the scene of the citizen taking four jelly babies again and again.

The film-recorded shots of the Mentiads walking over the hills look great, which is handy since this is about all they do apart from that massive exposition scene in part three. It’s nice to see Baker so energetic too, as he uses the other wooden actors as a springboard to rescue scenes in danger of going under, such as the tedious soap-opera exchanges between Mula and Balaton. 

That Polyphase Avatron, although appropriate to the Captain in tone, is really pushing it but the special effects in the story are actually quite good and the idea of a robotic parrot is handled well, all things considered. The air car also looks quite good, although I do wish Mary Tamm would shut her mouth for once and the cars need a bit more effort to make them look like speedboats with some bits stuck on.

We’re almost halfway through the story now, and there’s been very little narrative progression since the initial mystery of the disappearance of Calufrax. This is what stops the story from being a classic: the plot is poorly paced and is released in short bursts after long gaps, which allows the tension and interest created by each little bit of exposition to dissipate. However, the Doctor’s line of “I save planets mostly, but this time I think I’ve arrived far, far too late” is brilliant.

The realisation that the Captain is the complete bitch of his pretty little nurse is a good moment of characterisation, and the Doctor’s message of advanced technology being vulnerable to a primitive attack makes a straightforward open-the-door problem an interesting scene. Kemas running on the spot looks stupid, although I do like the idea of an inertia-dampening tunnel and the special effect is very good.

That scar on the Doctor’s lip does look much more prominent on film, and the hasty piece of writing to excuse this that he bashes his face on the console doesn’t quite wash – especially since his injury is also clearly visible in the previous story The Ribos Operation. However, the engine room scene is fantastic as it really sets the story down a new path – we realise that the Captain’s blustering and the Doctor’s humour are all acts as the two men circle each other trying to outwit each other; this allows for the sillier moments to be forgiven. There is also a little bit more of plot that comes trickling through, but again the interest is lost since it is followed by a badly-handled generic shoot-out featuring guards that can’t shoot straight; the story’s fairly gentle mortality rate of 33.3% is confined pretty much entirely to the villains.

Once they hit the mines though, the revelation of the true nature of Zanak is outstanding; The Pirate Planet has probably the best core idea of any story that just about compensates for the disappointing way it is handled. The concept of entire worlds being wrecked to feed another planet is breathtaking, although Kemas’s routine of “verily, thou shalt be avenged” adds some unnecessary cheese.

I never really got the weirdness of K9 referring to the Doctor as “the Master” before. Did you?

The Captain’s cry of “with the Mentiaaaads!” puts me in mind of the guy in The Simpsons who screams “yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeessss!” all the time. On this note though the story slows right down for a massive info dump partially designed to refresh viewers’ memories of the previous episode; it probably would have worked better if I watched this story on a week-by-week basis. Baker makes it interesting, but Tamm sounds like a patronising Blue Peter presenter.

The thought of Earth being in danger seems a bit tokenistic since by part three the audience already cares as much as it’s going to and in any case Earth doesn’t really sit well with this episode. It is followed by another exposition scene where the Captain explains what happens to Zanak’s prey – it is saved by a brilliant idea and also the performances of the two actors; the Captain’s line of “I come in here to dream of freedom” adds some good characterisation to boot.

K9 really gets to show off now, and if you don’t like that character (I don’t) then it’s not necessarily a good thing. Adams gets away with a lot, but a robot dog with a laser in its nose is a bad idea at the start and to pit it against a robot parrot with a laser in its, er, tail feathers sees him overdo it. That said, I can’t really fault the effects. Another great plot revelation follows that of Xanxia; since she’s supposed to be in stasis, the scene would work better if she kept still though. The cliffhanger is appalling largely through a lapse in Baker’s acting, although none of the cliffhangers of this story are particularly good.

The plot has really taken a while to come along, but it’s going strong in the final episode when the nurse’s true identity is revealed. The big sabotage scene amounts to little though apart from plugging stuff into other stuff and blowing it up, and there’s little I can think of to say about it apart from that whacking a console with a spanner is a bit simplistic for this story.

The death of Fibuli is poignant due to Purchase’s acting. However, the big technobabble resolution spoils things a bit since Adams really pushes his luck, and his writing does come across at times as rather smug. He does have the consideration to treat us to a good bit of pyrotechnics at the end though.

Really this is an average story, but the strength of its core idea warrants it being bumped up a grade making it the best of the Key to Time season. The Pirate Planet is a very strong story, but it speaks volumes that the best story of the season doesn’t get a maximum rating from me.