Written by Steven Moffat
Directed by Hettie MacDonald
Starring Peter Capaldi, Jenna Coleman, Michelle Gomez, and Julian Bleach
Transmitted BBC One 26th September 2015

Rule One: The Doctor Lies.

Previously on Doctor Who…..

Having met a child Davros on an ancient battlefield, the Doctor is running. His last confession is in the hands of Missy (Not Dead, Big Surprise). His confession may or may not be to do with Davros, he’s not letting on why, but he’s pretty sure he’s going to die. Clara and Missy come looking for him. A Snake Man made of Snakes kidnaps all of them and takes them to see the dying Davros, who wants a word. On Skaro. Cue Dalek Guns and dead friends. Doctor beside himself. Flashback/flashforward, the Doctor aiming a Dalek gun at young Davros. *Cliffhanger Sting*.

Rule Two: Steven Moffat loves a wind-up:

Ok, so there was no way that Clara, Missy, and the TARDIS were really toast, was there? Would have made for a very short series, wouldn’t it? Steven Moffat knows this, and really, so do we. We’ve seen the trailer. He also knows that we know. Thus, The Witch’s Familiar opens with a wry reference to those ‘How we did it’ montage scenes from Sherlock, as Missy offers a cheeky explanation of how they survived via a flashback of the Doctor (one of them, anyway) getting out of the same sort of jam. Consequently, Missy and Clara have escaped and are now outside the Dalek City, in Clara’s case - tied up and upside down while Missy contemplates lunch.

Meanwhile, the Doctor is still in the Dalek City, unwillingly continuing his fireside chat with Davros. This is broken up by a brief escape where the absolutely livid Twelfth Doctor manages what none of his predecessors did. He not only gets Davros out of his chair, but he does a bit of cosplay, and takes the Mark 1 Travel Machine for a spin. It’s a fun moment, but doesn’t last. The Daleks mobilise, in a cool moment they pass through their arches en masse like it’s 1966 - and the Special Weapons Dalek TALKS. 

This diversion over, interrupted by Colony Sarff, he’s soon back with Davros (in the only other chair on Skaro), and Davros resumes his spiel. Their conversations in The Magician’s Apprentice were highly reminiscent of their first meeting in Genesis of the Daleks. That story is echoed even more here, Moffat paraphrases Terry Nation, and cleverly turns famous lines on their head, as the Doctor, shamed by his role in the making of his arch-enemy, is on the back foot for a change. Davros plays the Doctor like a stradivarius here, the wily old goat. Yes, he is dying. We learn that his biological link to the Daleks is the reason he can’t die. He lays it on thick, and the Doctor obliges him. 

Capaldi continues to be a revelation. He rages and swaggers, yet shows sympathy for his ailing foe, trying to help him in his dying hours, even as confusion and disbelief loop around those eyebrows. Julian Bleach almost has us feeling sorry for Davros, turning Season Eight’s “Am I a good man?” question around on him. We even see his eyes, which we always assumed he didn’t have. They share a laugh together. But, even in an episode of Doctor Who that dares to show us Davros’s eyes, that reinvents the Daleks biology, that casually throws in a reference to a relative we never dreamed of - Moffat doesn’t go that far. Davros is still thoroughly rotten to the core and has been playing him. It’s a trap, Davros never intended to die, and the Doctor ends up giving away regeneration energy to him and his creations.

Rule Three: Missy is a compulsive liar.

Meanwhile, outside the walls, the two-hander going on between Clara and Missy is just as central as the one between the Doctor and Davros. The odd couple make their way to the Dalek City through the sewers, where we learn the icky truth of Dalek drainage, which will eventually prove the undoing of the Daleks on the surface. Their exchanges are electric, Clara is smart, but ever so straight-laced, while Missy is freewheeling and more dangerous than ever, as Michelle Gomez, preamble over, really gets going. She can’t be trusted in any way, shape, or form. One of the traits that Moffat has introduced is a tendency, like Heath Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight to casually reel off multiple explanations passed off as truth. She tries to kill Clara more than once, then, in an echo of Oswin’s fate in Asylum of the Daleks, locks her inside the casing of one. Here we learn more about what it’s like to be inside one, and this is no Ian Chesterton-hiding-inside-a casing deal. Missy puts her through her paces in the same way Davros puts his prototype through the motions in Genesis. The language of a Dalek is different to ours, it doesn’t translate, certain words will only come out as Exterminate. When Dalek-Clara finally comes face to eye-stalk with the Doctor, she can only, desperately try to say her name - which comes out as “I am a Dalek”. Missy tries to persuade the Doctor to kill her, in-between attempts at cosying up to the Daleks (“The bitch is back”). It’s only Clara’s desperate cry of “Mercy”, that alerts the Doctor to who’s under the hood, and that the word Mercy is even in the Dalek dictionary. And then the Doctor runs again, as Missy smiles sweetly at the Daleks and says that she’s got an idea.

This takes us back to that cliffhanger, where the Doctor returns to that battlefield encounter with the child Davros, tooled up. Needless to say, it’s the hand-mines that get it, and he leads the child that will one day grow up as his arch-enemy (don’t tell Missy, she’ll scratch his eye out) by the hand away from his doom, and the word Mercy finds its place in Dalek lore. 

Obviously Davros is still going to grow up to be that man. Something awful will happen to him, but something else, and another day. There are still questions to be answered that will probably be answered in about ten weeks time, and Missy will undoubtedly be back at some point, having not been ‘killed off’ for once. Speaking of which.....the Doctor seems pointedly more worried about Clara possibly dying than ever before. Is this the hidden arc of the series? Who knows. Surprises to come no doubt. In the meantime, let’s savour this, the best two part story Doctor Who’s had in years, riffs, silver Daleks, sewers, ray bans and all.

Written by Steven Moffat
Directed by Hettie MacDonald
Starring Peter Capaldi, Jenna Coleman, Michelle Gomez, Julian Bleach, Jemma Redgrave, Clare Higgins
Transmitted BBC One 19th September 2015

We leave on a cliffhanger where the Doctor's left trapped, alone, and defenseless, his friends apparently exterminated, and at the end of his rope. He reappears, somehow, on that ancient battlefield - apparently so desperate that he's training a Dalek gun at the child Davros. And with that, Doctor Who brings back two more old friends - the killer cliffhanger, accompanied by the return of the 'sting', leaving you with your heart in your mouth until next week.

Hard to imagine now of course, but us midling-youngsters of the early eighties were well and truly Pertwee-starved, relying on dim and distant memories of the elegant Third Doctor, and of course the ever-increasing chronicles recorded by Target. Then JNT became a hero by bringing three full adventures to our screens! After the previous Five Faces outings for The Three Doctors and Carnival of Monsters, over the summer of 1982 we were then treated to a monster cornucopia in the form of The Curse of Peladon.

In the Black Scrolls of Fandom this story is categorised as "an Ice Warrior story", which - though of course being true - does do an injustice to the other memorable alien races we meet on Peladon. We have the Peladonians themselves with their distinctive hair styles (maybe the Golgafrinchans stopped off here at some point!), the big shaggy beastie Aggedor, the shrill-voiced, green-skinned, semi-phallic hermaphrodite hexapod delegate from Alpha Centauri, and the downright disturbing delegate from Arcturus. Having no memory of the story on original broadcast I had only my battered Target version of events to go by, and whilst Aggedor was perhaps a little more cuddly than intended (he worked well in the shadows), and Centauri overly 'feminine', Arcturus was just as creepy as his literary counterpart - the production team had a field day on that creation! Perhaps the only let-down was his laser weapon, which suffered from its seventies effects legacy (oh no, the red blob of doom again!).

It was my first remembered experience with the Martians, too, and they perhaps didn't come across as huge and looming as I had been led to believe. Having seen The Ice Warriors and The Seeds of Death now I can fully appreciate this image of them, but unfortunately the rather taller cast here kind of dilluted their presence a bit. Plus of course there's the twist in which they turn out to be goodies rather than baddies this time around, though the Doctor was still able to instill a sense of threat about them when relating his previous experiences, and Izlyr or Ssorg can still be intimidating in spite of their relative heights!

(An an aside - these days we have the likes of Dan Starkey and Neve McIntosh creating a consistent look to a race, but back in the classic series this seldom happened - we're introduced to Sontarans being a clone race, but with the Martians we're actually treated to creatures that seem to fit the bill more admirably, thanks to the Alan Bennion cornering the market in Ice Lords.)

"The ancient Curse of Peladon will be fulfilled"

The story itself could almost be a Shakespearian play in its opening moment, with the array of characters paraded in front of us and their roles ascertained, through it soon settles down into the more traditional sci-fi trappings of a Doctor Who story. Torbis and Hepesh sound it off in front of their young King, and then the former apparently falls foul of the "curse" as a sign of displeasure of the mythical beast of Peladon over the decision to join the Federation. Here the "mistaken identity" strategy is used to introduce the Doctor and Jo to events, and it doesn't take long to see how the pretty Earth 'princess' has caught the eye of the King (who seems to quickly forget that she was meant to be on a date with Mike Yates - as Katy says on the commentary, "there's something about a prince that is irresistable!"). Then the Martian delegates turn and up the next couple of episodes are spent trying to convince us (and the Doctor) that they are the good guys, only to turn out that they actually are, hoorah! The real villains turn out to be Arcturus in league with Hepesh, and the ensuing revolution looks set to be victorious until the Doctor turns up proving the mythical Aggedor beasts are real, and its representative in the Citadel promptly shows its displeasure on its 'master' Hepesh. Hmm, actually it could have been written by Shakespeare after all!

"Holy flaming cow!"

Lennie Mayne's directorial debut for the series provides us with a competent traversal through the script, ably maintaining the journey through the layers of intrigue and no dud casting to be seen (or under costume!). David Troughton handles his first leading role well, and Gordon Stothard continues to excel in his non-speaking roles, this time visible on-screen as the mute champion Grun (strangely with a name-change as if the actor didn't want people to realise it was him!); plus with barely a minute on-screen Wendy Danvers makes her formidable presence known as the real Earth delegate Amazonia, who had she arrived when she was supposed to might well have been able to take on Izlyr, Hepesh and Aggedor on her own with the fierceness on display!

The sets are well-designed, too, with the mountainous slopes of Peladon superbly realised at Ealing, seamlessly integrating with the excellent modelwork as the TARDIS seemingly plummets to its destruction early on. Stunt-work is also excellent, but you can still play the "see Terry Walsh as the Doctor" drinking game and have a good chance to get sloshed [and of course the Uncle Terry commentary drinking rules might well send you into a stupor at around 22:55 into episode one :)].

The story has some notable firsts and lasts: it's the first time we're told the TARDIS is indestructible (though that had been suggested in stories like The Chase - but then why would we need the HADS in The Krotons?); it's the first story to be shown out of production order, having swapped with The Sea Devils to make the season flow better (though I've always felt that The Claws of Axos/Colony in Space make better continuity when reversed); it's the first story since The Space Pirates to have no location filming (indeed it and Monster are the only Pertwee stories like that) - Barry Letts said on the commentary that this helped finanically with the location-heavier stories in the season; and it's the last time the TARDIS console room appears in this configuration (perhaps the drop down the mountain did more damage than initially thought!).

Probably the best 'fluff' to watch out for is Pertwee muffling his lines under the TARDIS console as a picture of a naked lady comes into his eyeline (*not* Katy Manning!).

In conclusion, a fun story with lots of intrigue, good acting and great sets, plenty of monsters (the biggest gathering of races since The Daleks' Master Plan!); being a four-parter, there's also little of the sluggishness that can occur in the longer stories of this era).

I'll leave you with this thought: how must poor Peladon have felt, having lost both of his father-figures in the space of a couple of days - one initiated by the other and both by his mythical Royal beast - and then having a beautiful woman first turn down his marriage proposal and then turn out to be an imposter!

Doctor Who: Season 9 - Day of the Daleks
Written by Louis Marks
Directed by Paul Bernard
Broadcast on BBC1 - 1st - 22nd January 1972
DVD release - 12 September 2011

This review is based on the UK Region 2 DVD release.

This DVD release is timely, given the direction that the show has taken of late. Back in 1972 it possibly seemed daring for a TV series about time travel to broadcast a story focused on, well, time travel, but these days temporal paradoxes are ten-a-penny in Doctor Who. Day of the Daleks did it with seventies' panache, though, and its episode four exposition – as the Doctor realises what's happened, or will happen – still packs a decent punch. But Day's appearance on DVD is timely for a number of other reasons too. It's difficult to hear Jo Grant talking about “September the 13th” – a key date in the story – without hearing strange echoes of our own “September 11th” and its recent anniversary. At the same time, the story's release was surely deliberately scheduled for September 12th in the UK, allowing those who pre-ordered or snapped up a copy quickly to watch Day of the Daleks again on the most appropriate of days. Whether it's historical contingency changing the associations viewers now bring to a Jon Pertwee story, or playful use of 2Entertain's schedule, this release is all about time. It includes a useful “Now and Then” feature (particularly pertinent since new footage for the Special Edition involved returning to Dropmore Park), as well as Part Two of “The UNIT Family”. And the reworked Day of the Daleks gets its own separate making-of on Disc Two. The commentary track includes Terrance Dicks and Barry Letts, with contributions from actors Jimmy Winston and Anna Barry as well as vision mixer Mike Catherwood, who also participates in “A View from the Gallery”. All of this provides a good mix of front-of-camera and behind-the-scenes anecdotes, with features from Blue Peterand Nationwide further contributing to the package, though neither seems to represent the Daleks especially well.

Among all these extras, Disc One's “Blasting the Past” includes some interesting observations from the likes of Terrance Dicks – unimpressed by the Doctor casually shooting an Ogron – and assorted commentators bemoaning the 'three Dalek problem' of the story, with director Paul Bernard coming in for a fair amount of criticism. This lack of Daleks becomes one of the key narratives told about Day, production and fan lore which positions the story as weak in credibility. However, viewed after the events of 2005's Dalek (seemingly referred to by Anna Barry in the commentary) is this really such an issue? Why shouldn't the Daleks send a taskforce of three to sort out the Earth's timeline? It could be argued that rather than making their military mission look under-powered, this reinforces the Daleks' potency. But fandom's favoured interpretation – three Daleks bad – finds itself given succour by this DVD. It's unsurprising, really, because fan interpretations essentially inform all the changes made in Disc Two's main event: the reshaped Special Edition.

Fandom seems agreed on the 'fact' that Day's Dalek voices are a bit rubbish. Early on, they're slow and ve-ry, ve-ry ob-vi-ous-ly syllabic, but that reinforces the Daleks' alien nature. Hearing the original voices again, they don't sound quite as shockingly dreadful to my ears as the DVD Extras and Making-ofs want to assure me is the case. Although Nick Briggs' new vocal performance is as polished and Dalek-y as you could ever wish it to be, I'm still not wholly convinced by the desire to iron out Doctor Who's rough edges or story-by-story inconsistencies. As “Blasting the Past” points out, sometimes you just can't make everything fit together. (And additional Disc Two extra, “The UNIT Dating Conundrum”, makes much the same point). Ben Aaronovitch's sage words on the subject of overall continuity run as follows:

Call this the Aaronovitch Limitation Effect, if you like: it basically says that we should just learn to live with Doctor Who's inconsistencies of detail rather than trying to make everything meet up in perfect continuity. But if we can't ever consistently track the Doctor's attitude to drinking, or UNIT dating, then why aim for consistency in Dalek voices so that they 'fit' with other portrayals? Equally, why worry about whether there are three Daleks if it can be argued that just one is enough to cause a right old ruckus? (Sadly Rob Shearman isn't called upon as a talking head in this instance, so I had to imagine my own extra-special edition where he contests the view that three Daleks can't make a convincing attack force).

One Special Edition change directly corrects what members of the production team have bemoaned as a “mistake”. So the gun-toting, Ogron-blasting Doctor criticised by Terrance Dicks and Barry Letts is deftly revised. Now we see the offending Ogron shoot first, with the Doctor acting in self defence. By contrast, other tweaks strike me as more questionable, or as matters of fan taste: why alter the images of past Doctors which in the original are accompanied by elements of the Doctor Who closing title sequence, so that now the new images have a more generic visual backdrop? The title sequence appearing in-story is an interesting detail: seeing visuals which usually frame Doctor Who bleeding into the narrative folds the show strikingly in on itself. Altering this bizarre moment seems tantamount to trying to smooth out and unfold the text; a bit of a shame when the original has a notable, quirky charm.

More understandably, other changes are aimed at beefing up the SF and action-adventure credentials of the story, so that now we see characters disintegrate rather than simply disappear; the Doctor's trike exploits have been visually souped up and the Controller's death sequence is rendered even more dramatic, as are various battle sequences. These additions generally work well, unlike the newly designed 22nd century panorama which looks too much like dropped-in CGI for my tastes, and is markedly out of keeping with the production values and visuals surrounding it.

One of Disc Two's extras “The Cheating Memory” is a discussion of how memory works, but it also amounts to a statement about the story's reconstruction by producer Steve Broster, since it contrasts footage from the two versions of Day of the Daleks, one dubbed 'Memory' and the other 'Reality'. The 'Memory' version is actually the Special Edition: the suggestion is that Broster has finally produced his remembered version of Day – more spectacular than it actually was in 1972. Memory hasn't cheated here, though. Instead, one fan's childhood memories have inspired a re-ordering of reality, i.e. a reworking of the story.

But I don't think memory is the crucial term in all of this. After all, this Special Edition isn't really about one fan's memory – it's a team effort drawing on the skills, the craft, and the artistry of people such as Mark Ayres, Nick Briggs, Toby Chamberlain, John Kelly and others. As such, the two Dalek Days shouldn't be captioned 'Memory' and 'Reality'; they should be thought of as 'Community' versus 'Reality', because it's the fan community and its priorities that are testified to here rather than Broster's own personal recollections. It's effectively the fan community – or at least one generation of fans – which has determined how Day should be fixed and enhanced. It's fandom that's driven this agenda, working against the Aaronovitch Limitation Effect to make Dalek extermination effects more like they 'should be', along with voices, and visions of the 22nd century.

Day of the Daleks: Special Edition is thus almost a sort of anti-Star Wars release. Where that franchise has a creator and rights-owner who keeps on 'fixing' (that is, messing with) details that its fan community feels are sacred, in Doctor Who's case it's the fan community that's able to fix details it has identified, over the years, as being problematic. The Day of the Daleks: Special Edition is quite clearly a labour of fan love, and deserves to be appreciated in that spirit. But I think it should also be remembered that fan communities have a habit of revising their collective views over time: what seem like 'facts' about Day's failings may well be revised again in the future. Rather than simply capturing a childhood memory, then, or representing an objective take on Day, the Special Edition showcases fandom's creativity and professionalism whilst offering a snapshot of communal, generational interpretations of the original story. While there may be no perfect Day to be had, both versions on this DVD are vibrant reminders of how iconic Doctor Who can be of its time: then, and now.

In my mind, I can sum up the third Doctor era by saying that the only real classics are in season seven (Pertwee’s first). I knew that The Sea Devils was pretty good though, and so when I came to rewatch it for this review I was hoping I could give out a five-star rating. Unfortunately, while it remains a strong story and one of the era’s best, it never quite achieves its lofty ambitions.

Partly, its good-but-not-a-classic status is down to the most basic methods used to get it onto screen. The opening scene, for example, uses all the obvious methods to get a reaction from the audience, such as coming from the monster’s point of view to prevent the viewer from seeing what they look like. I’m not going to be precious and criticise something like this – and it isn’t bad in any case – but it does set the tone for something that isn’t going to break new ground.

Here’s the thing though: how well is this story made? The cast are largely top-notch, the script is tight and more or less bereft of silly lines and the set design is sumptuous, with even locations that are onscreen for a few seconds given dozens of tiny details. With this and The Curse Of Peladon it’s easy to see what drained the money from The Mutants.

Clive Morton’s charming portrayal of Trenchard is one of the story’s highlights as comes across as a man genuinely convinced that what he’s doing is the right thing and as a consequence prepared to commit some rather dodgy acts. This is crucial for the character, as it offsets the more-or-less motiveless Master (Roger Delgado was a fantastic actor but the character only had credibility in The Deadly Assassin). However, there is some crude plotting evident as Trenchard drops the expo-bomb early on by crowbarring in a reference in about sinking ships. This might slip by unnoticed apart from the fact that Trenchard is – so he believes – in on an extra-legal spy mission with regards to that. There’s more nice characterisation to make up for it with the Doctor and Jo being cautiously civil to the Master (the Doctor refusing to shake his hand is a great moment), and it must be said that while he isn’t really given a reason to be evil apart from simply being the baddie, Delgado is as good here as he ever was and he does at least make the character interesting. This is seen later as well, in the wonderful scene where he watches an episode of The Clangers and seems to be genuinely charmed by it.

Malcolm Clarke’s score is an acquired taste, but his use of early synthesisers creates a score that totally fits with the atmosphere of the story, even if it’s not something I’d want to actually listen to itself. Thinking of this and his dramatic, chilling score to Earthshock it’s hard to credit him with Attack Of The Cybermen, where he sounds like he’s playing a broken harpsichord with his elbows. 

Edwin Richfield puts in a good performance as the stern but sympathetic Captain Hart (it’s difficult to believe he went on to play Mestor, the king of the giant slugs, in The Twin Dilemma). It’s a bit strange though as to why he’d leave some valuable forensic evidence just lying around on the shingle.

The scenes set on the sea fort are wonderfully done, with some interesting camera angles, dark lighting and echoing sound effects all coming together to create a real feeling of unease and claustrophobia. The two crewmen are well played (you’ve got to love Declan Mulholland) but their characterisation as superstitious sea-dogs is a bit corny. This also marks the point where the Sea Devils are seen clearly for the first time, and while they’re reasonably effective – better than the Silurians, to which it’s natural to compare them, and above average by Barry Letts’s standards – but their immobile, rubbery heads could do with being kept in the shadows a bit more. The flash from their guns is a great special effect and it’s hard to credit how much more effective the complete package as a whole is here than in the sequel Warriors Of The Deep a whole twelve years later.

The drama of the Doctor radioing for help is undermined somewhat because the rescue helicopter is already on its way, but really it’s done for comedic purposes and as such works in a generally intelligent and unobtrusive way. It’s here that we really get to notice just how slow-paced the story is, with a huge amount of emphasis placed on what are in real terms minor plot points: namely the Master’s theft from the naval base and Trenchard’s distraction. There’s a well-choreographed fight sequence at the end of the episode that’s fun to watch, as although Pertwee’s by no means my favourite Doctor it’s always nice to see him swash his buckle (or is that the other way round?); when all’s said and done though there isn’t much in this episode to develop what we’ve learned from part one.

Part three has a huge reprise that does get a bit tedious (although I acknowledge that the story wasn’t originally intended to be seen all in one go) and makes it difficult to ignore the amount of padding that’s creeping in at this stage. This is what prevents The Sea Devils from being as great as it nearly is: it’s well written, acted and produced but it takes a long time to do very little. We’re almost halfway through the story by this stage of the proceedings by we’re still hearing about the same sinking ships as we were in part one. Meanwhile poor old Till is still raving about Sea Devils. After an hour, I would have expected a story to have progressed a bit further than this.

There is some very good modelwork to be seen with the submarine, and there are some atmospheric scenes as the Sea Devils infiltrate it. Donald Sumpter’s performance as Commander Ridgeway (wasn’t he in The Queen’s Nose?) is amusingly earnest, with his facial twitch making him seem vaguely Ahab-like in a rather establishment way. The cliffhanger to the third episode is deservedly iconic and back in 1972 my Mum had nightmares over it while ill with German Measles…

Trenchard’s shock at seeing the Sea Devils is nice – he’s the most interesting character in the story, a fundamentally good man whose desire to protect his country is perverted by the master. However, the scene going into the minefield is the beginning of the sonic screwdriver becoming an all-purpose magic wand. “This makes a rather good mine detector…” says the Doctor. I bet it does. There are more atmospheric scenes on the submarine, but the big exposition scene yet again sticks to what we already know. The storming of the castle, by contrast is very well done, exciting without trying to be too flashy which gives it a low-key dynamism. Something swiftly comes along to undermine this though, with the rather old-fashioned feel of the Pertwee era comes to the fore with Blythe – apparently 3rd officer – reduced to the girl who fetches the sandwiches. The cliffhanger to part four is very clever, as we don’t even get to see what Jo finds so shocking.

The civil servant Walker is a great character but doesn’t really have credibility; he’s very much a character of tedious red tape. He’s still fun to watch though, although suddenly Blythe is an officer again and annoyed about being asked to fetch food.

The Sea Devil voices are good, but the negotiation scene brings on the usual Greenpeace line from Malcolm Hulke that pretty much retreads Doctor Who And The Silurians. Surprise surprise, some stock footage later and all is undone. The comedy scene on the submarine is fun if a bit out of place; it does inject a bit of life into what is, while still enjoyable, going on too long.

We go into the climax with the Doctor using the overfamiliar motif of buying time by pretending to help the villain. Oh look, he’s double-crossed him. I don’t want to sound churlish though as episode six is characterised by some great action scenes that remind me a lot of The Invasion (one of my favourite stories), even replicating the somersault-off-the-roof stunt. I don’t really have anything to say about the climax since it’s so obvious there’s no real way of getting an angle on it, but the final twist is almost comforting, as it sees a return to the Doctor vs Master set up of the previous season. Thankfully it wouldn’t be overused like it was then: in fact Delgado only made two more appearances in the show after this before his premature death.

I don’t want to come across as sounding like I don’t like this story: The Sea Devils is well made and very entertaining, but basically it brings nothing new to the table. Put in context of the Pertwee years then it acquits itself well, but on its own terms then despite its general high quality it feels like a wasted opportunity

In a ninth season proliferated by such memorable monstrous creations as the Daleks (‘Day of the Daleks’), Ice Warriors (‘Curse of Peladon’ which also added with lesser threatening impact Aggedor and Alpha Centauri to the list), Sea Devils (‘The Sea Devils’) and Mutts (‘The Mutants’) one could be forgiven for denigrating the closing story entitled ‘The Time Monster’ for arguably not offering up another memorable alien foe to live on in the viewing public’s collective memories. I personally would like to offer up my support of this particular story which despite running to almost two and half hours always manages to enchant and delight me whenever I return to watch it making it an entirely pleasant complete viewing experience where its six episodes pass by relatively quickly.

Right from the opening scenes with the Doctor waking up from a nightmare vision of the Master succeeding in some diabolical scheme involving a trident shaped crystal you are immediately aware that our hero’s arch enemy will be the main protagonist of this particular story. Whilst Jo (wearing another groovy seventies outfit (grey short skirted dress and knee length high heeled bright yellow boots)) mentions about recent volcanic action on the island of Thera I take a moment to glance around the light airy lab surroundings and ponder if it might be in a similar waterfront building to that which was used during ‘Terror of the Autons’. Returning to Jo’s volcano newspaper article and the Doctor’s subsequent supposition that it might be linked to some scheme involving both the Master and Atlantis this is indeed prophetic reasoning despite the inconclusive verbal input from both Captain Yates and the Brigadier.

Nestling in the English countryside we find in the grand period setting of the Newton Institute the instantly recognisable features of the soberly dressed Master involved in highly scientific and undoubtedly costly research. So as to avoid detection whist at the Institute he goes by the Latin Professor nodeplume of Thascales, which to anyone with a classical education would have realised translates to Master. With the intention of making him the intellectual superior most viewers don’t gain a favourable opinion of his two assistants however when you have scientists of the calibre of both the Master and the Doctor you really don’t want humans to either equal or even outshine them thereby upsetting the balance between reality and fantasy. Having said that I personally feel that although undoubtedly ‘out of her depth’ regarding the Professor’s experiments Wanda Moore’s seemingly resolute and determined character of Doctor Ruth Ingram acquitted herself commendably, if not entirely memorably during her scenes in the Institute lab. The same really can’t be said regarding her colleague Stuart Hyde (played by Ian Collier) whom, with possibly the worst line of the story (‘May God bless the good ship women’s lib and all who sail in her’) is really, for the most part only on hand to offer comic relief to this story. The main scientific aspect of the story has the amusing acronym of TOM-TIT but it’s actual meaning, that of Transmission of Matter Through Interstitial Time is a fascinating concept rendered believable through clever camera trickery and convincing performances by the Master and his colleagues whilst manipulating their experimental equipment. Of all people it is Sergeant Benton whom grasps the concept of TOM-TIT and through a child like amusing but essentially accurate way infers that with the equipment the Professor and his team have found a way to move an object ‘through the gap between now and now’. Unfortunately there are advanced and reduced time side effects to the procedure as both Stuart (whom ages to a wrinkled old man) and Sergeant Benton (reverts to a naked baby leading to the humorous ‘reverting to normal size and age’ sequence at the stories conclusion) discover. Using the equipment also apparently causes time dilation in the immediate vicinity of the Institute building as experienced by a window cleaner, the Brigadier and a platoon of UNIT troops to name a few whom are frozen in time as a result. Time is very much on the Doctor’s mind and, in keeping with this third incarnation’s predilection for speed his modifications to his yellow roadster, charmingly called ‘Bessie’ now feature a ‘super drive’ device, pulling said lever dramatically (and it has to be said, rather comically) increases this vintage motorcar to unbelievable speeds particularly when journeying towards the Newton Institute. Having established through his time sensor device that the Institute is the origin of the disturbances in the time field the Doctor is anxious to put an end as soon as possible to any further effects generated from the scientific activities occurring at the rural research facility.

With the use of the TIM-TIT equipment, the Master acquires the powerful multifaceted trident crystal from the fabled city of Atlantis. Through this haloed jewel he gains control of the feared time eating creature Kronos whom appears in the Institute lab as a brilliant white-attired humanoid figured entity with a vast feathered wingspan. In my opinion, with sparing use here and there towards the end of Atlantis itself this alien life form is effective albeit in a rather blurred brief fashion. As we have seen so many times before Roger Delgado’s Master seeks out those weak willed individuals whom hold a position of authority and in ‘The Time Monster’ actor John Wyse renders a timid easily led character in Newton Institute director, Doctor Charles Percival whom is a rather short lived cast member ultimately devoured by the initially uncontrollable Kronos. Now not only does the TOM-TIT apparatus transport the entire crystal structure from Atlantis to the Institute but surprisingly the Master also gains a new weak willed servant in the form of the wide eyed High Priest Krasis (Donald Eccles). Now presumably by drawing power from the crystal the Master is able to draw other people and objects from the past to combat the advancing UNIT forces. On the one hand you have the Master clearly enjoying showing off to his new and rather backward lackey and on the other you gotta feel sorry for poor old Captain Yates out there in the rural countryside where he and his armed forces are faced with a myriad of increasingly dangerous obstructions to their route. First up he faces a knight in full armour, whom on horseback raises his lance and charges towards them forcing the convoy off the road to let the medieval figure pass. Personally I found this highly amusing as indeed were the detachment of Roundhead soldiers whose armoury and experience were clearly no match for the modern armed forces of UNIT. Far more serious however is the Master bringing forth a World War II flying bomb which indeed made for a very tense and exciting episode cliffhanger ending.

We then have the brief rather intriguing premise of an interconnection of the Doctor and the Master’s TARDIS the Doctor speaking backwards (which we now know is nothing of the kind!) and Kronos devouring the Doctor. However as this happened in his TARDIS, the Doctor, as a Time Lord existed as an ethereal being, his voice and that of his other thoughts being heard by Jo (and the viewers) before his assistant pulled the ‘fast return’ lever on the console to bring him back.

Although briefly seen whilst the Master is attempting to obtain the crystal it is the last two episodes of ‘The Time Monster’ that are firmly located in the confines of Atlantis. Now even on the meagre budgets available to the production team in 1972 you cannot expect miracles from a studio bound set especially for a story which concludes the five story ninth season of the show. In fact many a fan will I’m sure too easily denigrate the recreation of Atlantis when compared with the perceived reality of the mythical city. Admittedly the starkness and simplicity of the surroundings feel to be in direct contrast to the location and studio work of the ‘present day’ Newton Institute. However for me it is the period specific performances on offer that aid the effective shift in location in this stories closing stages. No more so is this apparent than with Ingrid Pitt’s majestic regal performance as Galleia, Queen of Atlantis. Here we clearly have a ruler steeped in power and influence who does not suffer fools gladly and you almost get the feeling that Roger Delgado has to significantly raise his performance in scenes with Pitt making them feel rather atypical for Doctor Who. George Cormack endearingly portrays the wise white haired elderly King Dalios, a figure whom takes great amusement in rebuffing the Master’s attempts at mind control. In amongst the Master’s plotting in Atlantis we have the inexplicable sequence of the Doctor acting as a ‘Spanish matador’ when faced with the mythical Minotaur beast in passageways under the city. Admittedly it’s difficult to support this clear bit of script padding, no matter how pleasing it may appear. However continuity-wise it links nicely with the Doctor’s ability to subdue Aggedor in the citadel of Peladon with similar skill earlier this season. Again echoing a similar dungeon scene (to be found in Sir Reginald Styles house (‘Day of the Daleks’) we again find the Doctor and Jo imprisoned, this time leading to a rather endearing conversation about how the Doctor learnt the secret of life from a hermit whom lived close to the house where he grew up. Lastly Jo’s trip to Atlantis finds her getting rather pally with Galleia’s handmaiden Lakis (Susan Penhaligon) and acquiring a rather opulent Atlantean gown and ringletted hairstyle leading to the Brigadier’s incredulous comment on seeing her when she returns to the Newton Institute at the end of the story.

Jon Pertwee as the charismatic third incarnation is always a joy to watch however his performance in this story in my opinion seems a tad muted compared with other entries during his tenure as the Doctor. For me his most memorable scene in this story would have to be his constructing a ‘time-flow analogue’ device from a Moroccan burgundy bottle, spoons, forks, corks, key rings, tea leaves and a mug much to the incredulous observations of Stuart, Ruth, Sergeant Benton and Jo. I certainly struggle to recall anything particularly memorable regarding Katy Manning’s scatterbrained but well-meaning character apart from her elaborate Atlantean gown which she gains in the stories latter stages. From the surroundings of the Newton Institute, travelling in his TARDIS through to the time he spends in Atlantis, Roger Delgado renders his usual distinguished scheming portrayal of the Master, each performance cherished all the more due to his untimely death in 1973. Of the remaining cast although the UNIT regulars (the Brigadier, Sergeant Benton, Captain Yates) contribute admirably to the continued ‘family’ feel of the series only the aforementioned Ingrid Pitt and George Cormack are of particular note their characters adding a level of believability and charm to the ruling structure of mythical Atlantis.

In the final analysis I view ‘The Time Monster’ very much an ensemble piece in which each member of the leading cast contributes their own element to the overall feel of an enjoyable, engaging story which although not worthy of classic status is certainly not deserving of its perceived lack lustre reputation. I personally am able to overlook this stories shortcomings (the Master on his knees at the end pleading for his life and some of the truly cringe worthy lines expressed early on between Ruth and Stuart) and just ‘sit back and enjoy the ride’ as the Doctor attempts to foil another devilish and ingenious scheme of the cool, calculating Master.