Some people embrace Conventional Fan Wisdom wholesale, and others are fanatically opposed to it. Whichever camp you belong to, there’s always one story that you genuinely and without bias feel is misrepresented, either in a positive or negative way. There are always a couple you secretly like (The Dominators, anyone?) but I’m talking about real fiery vehemence here. My story of this kind is Remembrance Of The Daleks, a dreadful, crudely made noise-fest that stands as Doctor Who’s most overrated story. I’ve been looking forward to reviewing it, as this is my chance to set my opinions out properly.

The odd thing about it though is that it doesn’t begin that badly; in fact it begins with the best pre-titles sequence of them all (and The Unquiet Dead’s was pretty good). It then leads into some reasonable location work that is often praised for its gritty realism – but so what? Doctor Who has always looked great on location. The only example of bad location shooting I can think of off the top of my head is…this story, in fact, when amazingly anachronistic buildings can be seen in some of the shots.

The scenes set in Coal Hill School are an indulgence; it’s not the best example, but continuity is a big problem in this episode, which comes at a time when the programme was improving in that department. Here we have several old locations visited and many old stories referenced, and in many cases these are used to ground plot points like the fact that the Doctor knows his way round the Totter’s Lane junkyard. This is exactly the kind of thing that Attack Of The Cybermen gets criticised for (in terms of tone and production it is Remembrance Of The Daleks’s closest relative), and yet this one gets off scot-free. Ben Aaronovitch takes certain liberties with established rules, a big one being that ghetto blasters playing Guns ‘n’ Roses in 1963 are a Bad Idea. Why would the Doctor even let Ace remove it from the TARDIS in the first place? It performs no plot function; it is merely a bland and watery attempt to sketch in Ace’s characterisation as a ‘rebel girl’.

On the subject of Ace, Sophie Aldred is very poor in her second story. Her performance is wooden and bland (at least she had some energy in Dragonfire), and she and McCoy have no rapport whatsoever (fortunately this would improve over time). In fact, the majority of the actors in this story are poor: McCoy seems uncertain about how to deliver many of his lines, and the guests are almost uniformly dreadful. Simon Williams and Dursley McLinden are two planks in a pod as Gilmore and Mike respectively, Terry Molloy hams it up like a mental patient, and then of course there is Jasmine Breaks. I know she was only a child, but she drags down even further every scene she’s in. Mike’s conversation with Harry the cafй owner is painful in its tweeness, and when Harry says “I had enough of that during the war” - as if he still relates every event of his ongoing life to it twenty years on – you can almost hear the ‘Crowbar In Period Detail’ box being ticked. The one exception to this is Pamela Salem, who nevertheless has to struggle against some poor lines.

The scene in the playground is nicely atmospheric, but is let down by the interminable Breaks. At this stage though the story is not terrible, merely bland, and if it carried on like this it might just scrape and average. After this we get to Totter’s Yard, for an annoying and destructive piece of continuity. Why should the Dalek be snooping around there? When was the Doctor there? Yes, I know, but I’m talking about the dwindling audience here. It does begin dramatically though, with the unseen enemy (if only it stayed like that) trapped and the soldiers keeping their distance. It is here that the characters start to become annoying: the Doctor’s line of “what a predictable response” is so one-dimensional that I’m in serious danger of a paper-cut from it. All the characters may as well have signs – I’m the anarchist, I’m the pacifist, I’m that rationalist, and so forth – such is the rudimentary nature of their roles. Karen Gledhill as Alison is certainly eye candy but she’s a bit of a waste of space really; she performs the same role as Rachel, as if Salem’s character had just reproduced by splitting down the middle. Really she is just making up the Totty Tally; this story tries and fails to be a blockbuster, which is a bit of a rubbish genre anyway.

The Dalek fires, and completely manages to miss Mike. Get used to this, because there is going to be a lot of it. However, this being a Ben Aaronovitch episode, it does explode some barrels rather impressively; the pyrotechnics are the best thing about this episode. The actual introduction of the Dalek is well directed by Andrew Morgan, but the Dalek itself is dreadful. It looks like it’s made of moulded plastic, it’s head and eye hardly moves, and watching it wobble about on even a flat surface trashes their credibility completely, it having been carefully restored in their previous story. Also of note is the Dalek’s complete inability to hit even stationary targets; this will be taken to truly ridiculous extremes throughout the story. It is a mark of a bad writer that Aaronovitch backs himself into a corner where he has to repeatedly contrive a reason why the Dalek can’t kill anyone.

The potted history of the Daleks in the van is also unnecessary, and McCoy and Aldred have all the charisma of a bowl of semolina. And not even warm semolina, either. When they reach the school though it is good to see a cameo from the ever-popular Michael Sheard. However, the Doctor going on about “great evils” to total strangers is clumsy and irritating.

The interior sets are good, and in fact better than the location scenes, which is extremely unusual. The French Revolution reference back to the opening episode is quite sickeningly smarmy; on it’s own it gets by, but given that another two stories are referenced in that same scene its smugness becomes oppressive. I’m only one episode in and I’m sick of it.

The transmat in the cellar is a great piece of special effects but is misconceived from the start: its only purpose is to set up the Daleks climbing stairs. This is often called a defining moment for the show, but really it’s one of the stories lowest points: for a start it’s a massive in-joke and nothing more, and it would have been better to just leave it at the Dalek climbing stairs later as it chases Ace. Secondly it is so badly written that it epitomises what is wrong with this story. The Dalek chases the Doctor up the stairs, chanting “exterminate” over and over and over again. Outside, Ace has a fight with the headmaster and overpowers him, before opening the door. The Dalek is still just sitting there repeating its catchphrase; it’s only once the Doctor and Ace are long gone that it actually gets round to firing (what was it doing?). It is possibly one of the worst executed scenes ever, and turns the Daleks into total jokes. They are appallingly written, with their dialogue limited to just the basic catchphrases. They say “exterminate” (or a variation) a truly staggering 27 times in this story, more than in the black and white years at all if I’m not mistaken. Seven people in total are actually exterminated; I feel that the instances of the word should tally with the number of exterminations, or else it becomes boring rhetoric from a writer with no better ideas. Here the Daleks have a Rhetoric Rate (if you will) of 74.1% (a percentage derived from comparing the number of times the word is said to the number of exterminations). Going on the strength of the only onscreen extermination, this rises to an unbelievable 98.3%. It is quite ridiculous. I like their new modulated voices, but there is no consistency to them. 

The much-praised cafй scene is just a jarring attempt to make the Doctor seem mysterious, but it’s so shallow that it just makes the Doctor look very pretentious. It’s as if this script is held together with PVA glue.

The Hand of Omega is another poor effort, retro-active continuity used to justify a badly-defined sci-fi gizmo. The floating casket is superb though, with even an effort made to create a shadow for it (something that lets down almost every other attempt at CSO the show ever did), although it consequently does require a blind vicar. That baseball bat, however, is just lame.

The rebel controller is initially good, but when it is revealed to be the girl it falls to pieces, just like any other scene where Breaks is present. Ratcliffe’s Nazism is more puddle-deep characterisation, a token attempt to provide the character with motivation (hint: just stick with lust for power. Never fails).

Ace finds the “no coloureds” sign – oh wait, the Daleks are racists too! The subtext! The subtlety! The underlying issues are like insect stings in this episode, they’re that annoying. The scene with the television is one of Doctor Who’s worst ever moments, not because it can’t be reconciled with anything else the series ever did, not because it demolishes the fourth wall with a giant metafictional wrecking ball, but because it’s probably the most sickening, smug and thoroughly irritating in-joke the programme ever did – and it had some clangers in its time.

The Dalek chases Ace through the school, of course waiting before she has gone before it actually fires at anything. Its aim is so bad that it looks like it’s just aiming at random objects. The bat attack made me cringe, and the Dalek’s aim is no worse without its eye. The cliffhanger to the second episode builds on the previous episode’s weaknesses: Daleks cluster round Ace and chant “exterminate” all the live-long day. Daleks so predictable and childish generate no tension as it’s blatantly obvious that they are just going to sit there chanting away to themselves until someone comes to the rescue. And lo, this is exactly what happens: the Doctor turns up with a dish with some flashing lights on it (“I rigged up something like it on Spiridon”: another example of a previous episode being used to avoid coming up with new ideas) and knackers the Daleks. It’s just terrible, and what annoys me is that people criticise poor old Destiny Of The Daleks for this kind of thing, even though this is a far worse offender. The claw that throttles the Doctor worked in Paradise Towers (although there’s less gurning here), but that story had a sense of humour. Maybe if this one wasn’t so preoccupied with being gritty it might be able to laugh off its naffness.

The Dalek mothership has a great set for the bridge, but Terry Molloy is absolutely dreadful as Davros / the Emperor, screaming his lines as if his mouth is full (“weport!”).

The Quatermass reference is the second-most smug in-joke of the programme, although the Doctor’s discussion of Gilmore’s nickname is actually a good, genuinely human moment that comes as a relief. The exposition scene here has more join-the-dots characterisation, with the Doctor stopping just short of turning to camera and saying “I’m mysterious, you know”.

Wow – some people actually get exterminated in this episode, which came as a surprise, although of course we don’t get to see it. The Supreme Dalek uses an old casing (I think) and looks good, but the time controller is naff. I’m prepared to forgive this one though as it was state-of-the-art at the time, even if it does show a lack of foresight.

In between Attack Of The Cybermen-style references to past Dalek stories Keff McKulloch cracks out his drum machine; I’d hoped to avoid mentioning him because he actually started off okay in this episode, but when the action scenes step in he degenerates into someone mucking about with a keyboard. His tinny percussions completely undermine the early 1960s period detail.

Mike gives himself away in a lumbering, contrived scene; outside, Daleks fire at soldiers over a dozen times and only hit anywhere near them twice. The shuttle landing, however, is magnificent (even though wires are visible); if only that much attention was paid to the script.

The confrontation between Mike and Ace is abominable as neither of them can act, and the dialogue (“you scumbag! I trusted you!”) is straight out of EastEnders. It is followed by an equally bad confrontation between Renegade and Imperial Daleks, in which neither side can hit large, static targets. It’s so poorly done that I genuinely cannot understand this episode’s popularity – although I like the Special Weapons Dalek. The Doctor states that “the Daleks are such boring conversationalists”; given Aaronovitch’s script that just sounds ironic.

It was pointed out to me once that Ratcliffe’s and Mike’s deaths are inappropriate; they set up a possible racist undertone, but just got zapped without this being developed or resolved in any way, which is absolutely true now that I think about it but since this lurching attempt at a subtext drops dead on the starting line anyway it hardly matters. I have no idea who pointed that out to me, but thank you! In fact, there are so many examples of this sort of thing that I’m getting sick of listing them – but the “blobs” speech sounds like a GCSE student wrote it.

We don’t need Davros, and we certainly don’t need Molloy. At least when he’s unmasked his speech impediment goes, but he really is a prime cut of ham here. In fact he’s beaten only by McCoy, who’s “infinite rice pudding” speech is just about the only part of this story that gets criticised as much as it deserves to be. He namechecks The Power Of The Daleks, and his “have pity” plea is a direct reference to Genesis Of The Daleks.

The Cartmel Masterplan is used as another tool to allow the writer to make up any super weapon he likes and have it do anything he likes without having to explain it, although it is unusual and good to see some 16mm film recording for the model shots. All that’s left now is the Supreme Dalek whirling round and round as it self destructs. Really I’d rather not talk about it.

This episode’s popularity truly staggers me. The Discontinuity Guide says it has “mystery and magic into the series with much intelligence and revisionist continuity”, which it quite simply doesn’t, and The Television Companion quotes one reviewer as saying “they [the Daleks] were evil, cunning, vicious, all by themselves (or so it seemed). Dignity was finally restored.” Was he even watching the same episode? The Daleks just wobble about chanting meaningless catchphrases and missing with their weapons; they’ve never been so pathetic. Even Andrew Cartmel lists this story as his favourite – it must just be me. Despite its pretensions, Remembrance Of The Daleks is a silly kids’ show with nothing to recommend it.

Never have so many people worked so hard to create so little as they have in Terminus. This story from the 20th season is certainly on of the most uneven stories of the Peter Davison era which excels on some points and dies badly on others.

I've gotten used to the occasional padding to fill the story and sometimes have enjoyed it. Smarter authors will fill the padding with bits of back story or character scenes but Steve Gallagher fails to come up with anything interesting or original to keep the story moving. In a story that has a full TARDIS crew, the Doctor, Nyssa, Tegan and Turlough, plus two pirates, Kari and Olvir, and various guards, prisoners and the Black Guardian it should be a whirl wind adventure but it completely falls flat after the first ten minutes of the first episode. The Black Guardian has forced Turlough to damage the TARDIS and it crash lands on a ship just as it is being hit by raiders. The TARDIS crew is separated and have face various dangers. This is a real explosive start but then absolutely nothing happens until the third episode. It's just a bunch of one dimensional characters going through a predictable routine that doesn't add much to the story.

The raiding party is dressed with comical helmets, capes, and skin tight jump suits that make them look more like they are from a futuristic telling of "Babes In Toyland" and fails to give them any credibility. Olvir, who claims to have combat training, panics and hides in a corner after their first violent encounter. Later he barely manages to handle a worn and battered Valgard and still completely misses the Garn taking off with Nyssa just a few feet behind him. The character is so badly written I couldn't help but wonder if it was originally supposed to be Adric in the story but hastily rewritten and readjusted to fit a different character.

As a stark contrast from the look of the raiding party the Vanir, guards on Terminus, are amazingly catching in their styles. The skeletal like armour makes and odd clicking sound as they move and their masks give them a powerful presence when they enter the scenes.

Another odd pair of characters added after a few episodes are the Garm and Bor. The Garm is a huge creature with a dog like head and glowing eyes that has been forced to serve the Vanir. Unfortunately it only looks good but when it talks you can sadly see the thin veil meant to cover it's mouth and the face of the operator inside. Less would have been more with this character. On the other hand Bor is more of the average guy type character who just wants to stay loyal to his job and has paid for it with pain and suffering from radiation sickness. He's the most interesting character brought in during the story and gets all the best lines. "Am I dead?" he asks. "No? Well, good, cause I was hoping for something better on the other side."

Nyssa gets the worst writing of all the companions in this story. She's gone from an experienced space traveller with a high IQ to someone who, when hearing footsteps approach, cowers into a little ball and hopes for the best. Then she spends two episode screaming in fear and getting stripped down to her undies but manages to come back in the final episode as a genius scientist who is willing to brave out the rest of Terminus and stop the plague.

Tegan and Turlough go no where in this story. All they have to do is spend time together and scowl at each other to get them to do anything. There is so much that could have been done with the Black Guardian haunting Turlough in this story it's sad they way both of them are turned to one dimensional roles.

One of the strengths of this story, and there are very few of them, is the design of the ships and Terminus. That skull symbols on the doors are very powerful and give an uncomfortable feeling to the location. There is also enough dressing and changes in set dressing that you never get the "we've been down this corridor before" feeling.

So why was this story done? Apparently the idea had been rejected two years earlier but accepted for the anniversary season. As part two of the second Black Guardian trilogy the story fails to advance the Black Guardian plot in any way. The structure of a trilogy leads to the second act being a big cliffhanger but there is no advancement to the umbrella story here. The best bet is to just skip the story between the classic Mawdryn Undead and the creative Enlightenment and just make it Black Guardian two parter.

'Warriors of the Deep' is one of Peter Davison's more maligned Doctor Who stories. The opener for his final season featured the return of two related sets of 1970s Pertwee villains - the erroneously named Silurians, and the so-called Sea Devils. This was probably something of a counterpoint to fan criticism of Season 20, which had a rather low monster count.

Like several stories of this era, there are a few problems with 'Warriors' from a continuity point of view, and like those others, it's surprising that the production team seem so vested in continuity, but so prone to errors. These would be a little more permissible if adhering to previous stories was detrimental to the script... However, in this case the Silurians know themselves by this incorrect name [they would seem to date from the Eocene era] and the Sea Devils call themselves by the nickname given to them by a mad sailor in their eponymous debut serial. This is rather irritating, and could probably have been written around - perhaps an explanation along the lines of both names being inaccurate, but commonly used due to declassified UNIT documents or something? Whether you buy that or not, the creatures certainly shouldn't refer to themselves by these names.

One continuity problem I don't particularly see is the assumption that Icthar is the scientist from Season 7's 'The Silurians'. As if the fact he sounds and looks totally different isn't enough, there's nothing explicit to say he is. There's nothing to say the third or fourth Doctors hadn't had an encounter with the 'Silurians' off-screen, and met Icthar then. Right from the start, Doctor Who features references to adventures not seen in the show - 'The Invasion', 'The Face of Evil', 'Timelash' and 'Battlefield' feature explicit use of adventures not seen on screen. So really I see no problem with the idea of a "Missing Adventure" featuring, a 'Silurian' triad containing Icthar and the third or fourth Doctors. Aside from these minor aberrations, which are really more a concern for fans watching as a part of a larger continuity, there's only one other problem with Johnny Byrne's script. It really was a little optimistic to imagine the realisation of the Myrka coming off, but more of that in a bit. Aside from this, the script is wonderful. The Seabase crew are all nicely defined characters, Icthar is both sympathetic and hard-headed at the same time, and the Doctor is frankly superb. The plot's nicely done, and though the Hexachromite gas is something of a plot device, it's nicely used - it's not as simple as just using this weapon, there are lots of moral issues involved.

The cast are splendid. Davison's performance through Season 21 was superb - it wasn't really bad for his first two series, but he finds an extra gear for his swansong year. He's on top form out of the box here, desperately trying to mediate between the 'Silurians' and the humans until the very last minute, really transmitting the emotion and urgency of the script, and I don't think there's been a more fitting final scene to a story than the Doctor, looking at all the dead bodies on the Seabase bridge. "There should have been another way." And Davison nails it perfectly. For the other regulars, well, Tegan and Turlough don't get the best of the script. Turlough for one is effectively another member of the Seabase crew, though Strickson's still hugely watchable. Tegan more sort of gets in the way, though Janet Fielding makes the best of a bad deal - something both characters had to be content with too often. The guest cast are generally terrific, with Tom Adams excelling as Vorshak and Ian McCulloch compelling as Nilson, while Norman Comer gets a respectable amount of nuances though the 'Silurian' costume. Only Ingrid Pitt, predictably wooden as Dr. Solow, and Nitza Saul as Karina really let it down.

The biggest problem, however, is the direction. While the Myrka is a pathetic monster [never moreso than when knocking over a set of obviously foam doors], most of the story's problems come from Pennant Roberts. I remember him doing an interview in Doctor Who Magazine where he blamed everyone under the sun for the serial's shortcomings - perhaps he should have looked a bit closer to home. The set design for the Seabase is more than adequate, insofar as the series' budget could ever hope to capture the look of an expensive military facility, while the redesigned costumes for both sets of monsters are pretty decent - it strikes me as rather hypocritical that some fans can accept Cybermen who don't have balaclavas as being an improvement, and yet giving the 'Silurians'/'Sea Devils' laser-proof armour that prevents the Seabase crew from just gunning them down is terrible. The Seabase crew's costumes are also respectable, though the mass amounts of eyeshade could have been safely omitted. However, Roberts inexplicably decided to shoot everything inside the Seabase in a million-watt light. The Seabase should have been dank and claustrophobic - not necessarily some rundown armpit of the world, but certainly not like something out of a music video. This exacerbates the problems of the Myrka - shot in shadows, it's shortcomings needn't have been half as obvious. Roberts was also responsible for the casting of Pitt [in the original script, the character was male], and really should have realised how utterly ludicrous Solow attempting to drop-kick the Myrka would look. In other places, his direction is simply tepid.

Overall, I do rather like this story. Overambition isn't the worst fault in a script, and a good story can shine through something like the Myrka. Combined with Davison, this ensures the pace keeps up, and 'Warriors of the Deep' certainly can't be described as boring. Despite myriad other failings, Roberts does imbue a decent amount of suspense - some of the missile runs are nail-biting, while the Doctor's stance, not taking the side of the humans, but that of peace, does keep the viewer guessing as to the precise outcome.

Certainly not recommended to fans who don't like Davison, and a little too unintentionally comical to consider showing to non-fan friends, but forewarned of the sheer awfulness of the Myrka, this is basically a rewarding story, with some superb scenes and machinations going on to distract from the shortcomings. Even the brightness of the base doesn't seem as bad once you're immersed in the storyline. "Warriors of the Deep" holds in common with several underrated Who stories, in that a few negative elements have been allowed to mask many good points for far too long.

You can see a clear progression with Eric Saward's Doctor Who work. 'The Visitation' is a nice, textbook straightforward romp. 'Earthshock' is an action movie-type story, with a fairly easy to follow plot for the most part until it all goes a bit mad at the end. 'Resurrection of the Daleks' was a slickly-directed collection of set pieces linked by a somewhat schizophrenic narrative. And 'Attack of the Cybermen' is a mess of indistinct plotlines, continuity references and two-dimensional cyphers. And yes, it is a Saward script. If Paula Moore did have any input, Saward script-edited this one to the extent that it's very much his story.

When dull Hinchcliffe fans bleat on about how dependant the JNT era was on past continuity, they often don't really have much of a case. Generally, the references were harmless. It's fandabbydozy if, say, you can name which stories the clip reel in 'Mawdryn Undead' references, but if it's about all you've seen it doesn't overpower the plot. However, 'Attack of the Cybermen' is something of an exception. To full appreciate what's going on, you could do with knowing that Mondas was destroyed in 'The Tenth Planet', that the Doctor thought the Cybercontroller dead from 'Tomb of the Cybermen', that there are Cybermen in the sewers most likely left over from 'The Invasion', and that Lytton was in 'Resurrection of the Daleks'. And that's not to mention the references like 76 Totter's Lane...

But the biggest problem 'Attack of the Cybermen' has is it's horribly dull. The thing takes until nearly the end of the first episode before it threatens to really get going. Until then, we have to put up with Lytton and his bunch of Sweeney rejects bumbling around, and the Doctor and Peri mucking around looking for a distress signal. The running joke of the 'fixed' chameleon circuit is amusing for about nine seconds of its' first appearance, while the references in the score to Steptoe and Son and Phantom of the Opera are cring-inducing. Colin Baker, having been hammy and fun in 'The Twin Dilemma', is hammy and irritating early on, having to deal with the clunky mood-swings in the script - notable the dreadful "Unstable?!?" moment. He settles down a bit later on, though the script lets him down, notably the overwrought scenes with Vlast and when he orders the shooting of Russell. I always got the impression that the violent overtones of Season 22 were not so much Saward's attempts to subvert the gentle fifth Doctor, but in fact his belief of how the character should be, turning the Doctor into some sort of revenge figure.

Still, Colin does well from the script compared to poor Nicola Bryant. While I don't think she's as bad an actress as is sometimes made out, she certainly can't save bad scenes. She also suffered from a part that was heavily underwritten. Here, Peri's largely superfluous, simply nagging and whinging at the Doctor for the most part.

Saward is far more concerned with Lytton. While Maurice Colbourne gives an efficient performance, the character's scripting is odd. We have the Doctor's moral quandry about misjudging Lytton [who he never met in 'Resurrection, but still...], but the character does very little to show he's any different than he was - remember, the Cryons are paying him to help them. Colbourne is never quite able to imbue the character with any more depth than that of a well-spoken heavy.

However, Lytton does better than most of the guest cast. Brian Glover's much-praised performance as Griffiths isn't actually all that much cop, the character being a standard slightly-squeamish henchman. Terry Molloy is similarly bland as Russell. The idea of getting Michael Kilgariff to reprise his role as the Cybercontroller is inexplicably bad seeing as the role basically entails being quite tall, wearing a costume and shouting a bit. That he's fat seventeen years on hardly helps the menace factor. David Banks does fairly well as the overshadowed Cyberleader, but the Cryons are a faceless bunch, not helped by silly costumes and cod-alien dialogue. But by far the worst element are Stratton and Bates.

It doesn't help that they're in the most superfluous of many pointless subplots which Eric seems to have crammed into the story for no readily apparent reason. We're subjected to these two idiots legging it from a work party, indulging in disguise japes, meeting up with Griffiths and Lytton and then being sharply killed off. Of course, the alleged characterisation hardly breathes life into this strand of the story. Stratton is shouty, Bates is a bit wet. Eat your heart out Bob Holmes. What really seals it is that the chap playing Stratton [he doesn't deserve me actually checking to see who played him] gives what's probably the worst performance in the series' history. That's a history that includes turns from Christopher Robbie, Dolores Grey, Leee John, Rick James, andJon Pertwee in the second half of Season 9. The chap seems to have decided to simply shout his lines at poor Batesy at all times in the hope this will work. It doesn't, and the result is excruciating.

By the second episode the plot is ludicrously contrived. We have the Cybermen planning to blow up Earth using a comet to save Mondas, but to help their cunning plan they lock up the Doctor in a room stacked with explosives, not even bothering to remove his sonic lance first. It must be some sort of Cyberarrogance programming, as they don't bother taking Lytton's knife off him later either.

But then this is the worst bunch of Cybermen we've ever had. Worst than the chaps with the balaclavas and silly voices in 'The Tenth Planet', and worst than the Monty Python and the Holy Grail-inspired squad that spend most of 'Silver Nemesis' running away from a bow and arrow. Cybernetic monsters from the future aren't very scary when ninth-rate London hoods and labourers take then out with pistols and spades. I smoke twenty cigarettes a day and eat junkfood constantly, but I'd quite fancy myself in a fight against an 'Attack' Cyberman.

It's all based on coincidences and large lapses of logic. It's stupid and boring. Thankfully, it was to be the rough nadir of the show in the 1980s, and very gradually the show would bounce back. Thank God.

Some dates are indelibly etched on our minds. For me, one such date is 5th January 1985, a time pregnant with possibilities if you were a Doctor Who fan. Me, I was a music fan and I was into girls, That day I hooked up with my new girlfriend, Sarah, hit the town, bought U2's Unforgettable Fire. Oh and I was looking forward to watching Attack of the Cybermen. What a title! I still love it. Cybermen. Attacking. What more could you want? Twin Dilemma was a false start, wasn't it? Colin Baker was great in it, a little theatrical, perhaps but he boded well and made a dramatic contrast to Peter Davison. The story was complete tosh, the production values were poor, the twins were... Best not to dwell on the inadequacies of this tale, everything would be put to right in ATTACK OF THE CYBERMEN! 

Yes, Attack of the Cybermen. This got 9 million viewers, you know. I'm sure Mr and Mrs Joe Shmoe and little Jimmy looked in the paper to see what was on TV and came across Doctor Who and one look at that title and, well, you'd have to check it out, wouldn't you?

Doctor Who - he's back and it's about time. An apposite description for this story, but first lets go back to 1982 and Earthshock. It was a revelation. Episode 1 is still premium Who. Anyone watching it for the first time was genuinely enthralled by the time the closing credits began. The Cybermen were back and we'd had no warning! (If the 2005 series can deliver a similar coup then I'll eat all the celery you can set before me.) Unfortunately the remaining 3 episodes don't really live up to the 1st. The fact that it is virtually plotless doesn't really matter. it's simply a vehicle to reintroduce an old enemy and kill off a hapless companion. The dinosaur twist is neat but there are roughly 60 minutes of meandering narrative and chatty, boastful Cybermen. I reckon the more they talk, the duller and more ridiculous they become. For my money, The Invasion represents the Cybermen at their best, keeping them in the background, tantalisingly. All the talking is done by the Cyber-Planner. The Cybermen look great: sleek, functional and with blank, impassive faces (no 'scary' grimaces here). Revenge of the Cybermen doesn't muck up the design and the 'head-guns' are a GREAT idea, think about it, it makes total sense - it's logical However they have become rather talkative, not Gerry Davis' fault, I feel but it's obvious that Robert Holmes dislikes writing for them. He was the wrong (re)writer for the story because he likes to create CHARACTERS and that's not a trait the Cybermen truthfully have as The Invasion (and Tomb of the Cybermen) nicely demonstrates.

Attack of the Cybermen represents the nadir of a self-destructing series. The seeds were sown with the re-introduction of the Master in Keeper of Traken. A perfectly fine story, as was the atmospheric Logopolis. At a pinch his presence in Castrovalva was acceptable, but Time Flight? The King's Demons? The Five Doctors? Etc, etc... Overkill. This exercise had already been tried from Terror of the Autons onwards and to dubious effect but at least it was novel at first. Season 20 brought back an 'element from the past' for every story and in the process alienated casual viewers and didn't exactly enthrall the fans either. A year later, and we had some reason for optimism:The Awakening, Frontios and, of course, The Caves of Androzani. Otherwise there was a worrying preoccupation with old villains and, increasingly, unwarranted violence. The blood and gore was laid on even thicker in the following season (Lytton's torture, general torturing in Vengeance on Varos, rat-eating and an inappropriate stabbing in The Two Doctors. Revelation of the Daleks at least had the black wit of it's script and the sheer verve of Graeme Harper's direction to carry it along. It's Colin Baker's best story by a country mile.

Michael Grade wasn't the enemy of Doctor Who. The main problem with the latter Davison, early C. Baker stories lay squarely with the production team. There is no unifying vision for the voyages of the Doctor. Whether we like them or not, we can see what Hinchcliffe/Holmes, Letts/Dicks, Williams/Adams, Lloyd/Davis, et al, were trying to achieve. They set an overall tone; they aren't necessarily trying to be original but they ARE trying to tell good Doctor Who stories. John Nathan-Turner presided over some great (or at the very least, interesting) stories: Warriors' Gate, Kinda, Enlightenment, Caves, Revelation, Greatest Show in the Galaxy and most of Sylvester McCoy's last season. But there is no overall tenor to the seasons that contain them, no direction (well, not until Andrew Cartmel came along...). Shock tactics are employed - virtually everyone dies in Resurrection of the Daleks, some horribly. The aim of Eric Saward and Nathan-Turner seems to be to make the series more adult. Inferno showed how this could be done without resorting to needless violence. The Green Death has a great, topical story and some chills but no gratuitous injury or maiming. The Dalek Invasion of Earth is surprisingly grim, even now, but Verity Lambert and co. doesn't smash the viewer in the face with it. Don't get me wrong, I've nothing against violence, per se, in Doctor Who or any other drama but just using it for effect is an empty and somehow degrading gesture. Nathan-Turner didn't seem seem to be interested in scripts, just recurring monsters, guest stars and strait-jacketing, inappropriate costumes (all his Doctors, Tegan, Nyssa, Adric, Turlough, Peri...). His best script editor was Cartmel.. He made the series more cohesive. You can argue the pros and cons of his version of the Doctor but at least he gave it some thought, and with Ace he brought character development into the series. Again, it's arguable whether or not you agreed with the way he did it but he tried and, more or less, succeeded. Saward simply wasn't reined in enough and in any case he shared Nathan_Turner's desire to make the series great by simply apeing the past. It's a shame because he showed a flare for dialogue and witty one-liners ("mouth on legs") and his debut, The Visitation, is a sound, traditional tale. 

Where does all this leave Attack of the Cybermen? It's akin to a dodgy Easter egg: thin, tasteless chocolate - hollow - wrapped in crinkly tin foil and containing sweets that leave a bitter taste in the mouth. Could you sustain yourself on such a diet? Colin Baker couldn't and neither could the viewers. Attack of the Cybermen is no better or worse than most of the stories that surround it and that's not a good thing.

Attack of the Cybermen - such a good title, promising much and delivering nothing. I haven't seen Sarah for years and The Unforgettable Fire saw U2 slide into bombast and self-importance. Ring any bells?

I don't want to be a McCoy basher... I really want to like his version of Doctor Who, and I do on several levels. Though I do find less to like in his three years on the show, his acting included. 

Back in the late eighties and early nineties when all I had were a few Doctor Whos from the eighties that I had taped off PBS (and I was younger and less critical) it was easy to like Sylvester McCoy. I didn't have much to compare him to apart from some Davison stories and most of Colin Baker's run. Fifteen years on, I have just about every episode and have come to the conclusion that yes, the program lost its way in the last four years or so. It went from a dramatic program to some odd mix of lightness/faux-drama and staginess. It certainly amped up the juvenile antics and silliness. I watched Remembrance of the Daleks the other night, and it merely drove this point home. 

The three Dalek stories of the eighties are a variable lot. Resurrection and Revelation are both almost unrelentingly grim, and consequently difficult for me to enjoy. Revelation is the better of the two plot-wise, but is so depressing to watch that I don't want to watch it again (and find the critical acclaim for it baffling). In contrast to those two stories, Remembrance of the Daleks is much lighter and far more enjoyable, but it comes with the curse of the McCoy years: sloppy or hurried editing, characters who have very artificial dialogue and who do inexplicable things, and lots of self-referential scenes or lines. 

The basic plot is sound enough. The Doctor has left a Gallifreyan stellar manipulator on earth in 1963, which the Daleks want. They pursue him there, and attempt to retrieve it. Things get complicated because two factions of Daleks want the weapon. The Doctor runs around trying to keep the humans from dying so he can spring his trap. Simple, right? 

Except that I can't picture Hartnell's Doctor taking the stellar manipulator with him when he went on the run. It makes his (presumably stealthy) theft of his TARDIS and escape from Gallifrey far more problematic. Furthermore, why remove it from the TARDIS and leave it at an undertaker's where it is surely less secure than it would be inside his ship? Why bury it in the graveyard, mock graveside service and all? And if there was a good reason for removing the Hand of Omega from Gallifrey (which can't have been to trap the Daleks, since he hadn't encountered them yet in his first incarnation), why send it back to Gallifrey at the end of the story? And it's nearly impossible to accept the Doctor destroying Skaro and Skaro's solar system considering the animal life or Thals that might have been living there. Hadn't he just been tried for genocide two seasons earlier? These questions undermine the plot. 

As for the Doctor, Sylvester McCoy simply does not have the gravitas or presence to carry off the part. I felt that way when I first heard that he was replacing Colin Baker. I've grown more accepting of his portrayal of the Doctor, but he just is not believable as someone who can project an air of authority and control a situation. His delivery of many lines is cringe worthy if we're expected to take him seriously, apart from times when he's in a quiet contemplative mood. He's very good in those scenes, of which the cafe discussion with Harry is a good example. Most other lines are just ... stagy, for want of a better term, or exaggerated. Consider "Little green blobs in bonded polycarbide armor" which he spits out horribly, or "That ship has weapons that could crack this planet open like an egg", a supposedly doom-laden pronouncement that fails to impress. Contrast that with Pertwee's "Compared to the forces you people have unleashed, an atomic blast would be like a summer breeze" from Inferno, or Troughton's "It will end the colony's problems because it will end the colony!" from Power of the Daleks. I know whom I'd take seriously. It's hard to accept McCoy as this dark, manipulative figure when you actually watch him perform. 

It's not that I dislike McCoy. He seems like a personable fellow. He's just all wrong for the part, and not an actor with great dramatic range. Neither is Sophie Aldred. Contrast them with the supporting actors who play Rachel, or Gilmore, and it becomes obvious that the two leads are the least convincing actors on the show. That being said, I like them both despite my criticisms and so I can watch Remembrance with the same rose-colored glasses I wear while watching any era of Doctor Who, but I find that I perhaps need thicker lenses. 

The Daleks alternate between impressive and sad. The single Dalek looks great while taking on the military in episode one. The Dalek who chases the Doctor up the stairs without shooting him, and then takes thirty seconds to break through the door to the cellar is just silly, and the Imperial Daleks who keep shooting the wall behind the gray Daleks in part four ought to be able to aim better considering that the two groups are about ten feet apart. On the other hand, the Daleks do benefit from the fact that Davros isn't revealed until the end of part four (though it's too bad he had to be brought back at all). And the voices sound great. 

I want to like this. I'm a Doctor Who fan who doesn't enjoy criticizing the show. I find that I do enjoy Remembrance of the Daleks more than either of its two predecessors, and it's not a bad story in it's own right, it's just flawed in a number of ways. It's enjoyable, but far inferior to the vast majority of stories and acting that preceded it, apart from season 24. Good fun if you don't look at it too closely.