"Crisis" - Season 2, Episode 45

Written by Louis Marks | Directed by Douglass Camfield | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 11/14/64

When this episode was originally taped, it was a four-parter. However, due to pacing issues, the third and fourth episodes were combined and much was cut to make this serial a three-parter. This does make this episode a bit snappier, but at the expense of coherent storytelling, since crucial plot-related scenes were cut, what we're left with is a bit of a mess.

I mean, the serial ultimately works, but right around the middle of the episode, there's an obvious cut scene. Barbara had just passed out from the effects of the poison as the rest of the TARDIS crew realize what's happened to her. The Doctor says they have to get Barbara back to the ship, that making Barbara the correct size will make her body's natural defense mechanisms work on the poison. But after the cut, Barbara seems to have refused to go back to the ship, seemingly to prevent Forester (not that any of them know his name) from mass producing the pesticide, risking her own life. The Doctor agrees with her - which is quite different from his tone of urgency in getting her back to the ship literally seconds ago. It's a jarring scene - the first time I watched this serial, I had to rewind to make sure I didn't miss anything. I've not gone and watched the bonus feature on the DVD to see the recreation of the third and fourth episodes - some of the material cut was necessary, like the scene where the four walk around a notepad and piece together the chemical formula on it. And besides, this is what was broadcast - whatever they cut has been lost, deleted with the rest of the episodes by the BBC in the 70s (what we have is piecemeal from the odd episode in the BBC archives, but most of pre-1980s Doctor Who was found at various locations around the globe as a result of the BBC selling these episodes to other territories, and the TV stations in those territories not following BBC orders to destroy the tapes after a certain amount of time).

Still, though this is the weakest of the three episodes, it's still very watchable, and the serial overall is quite good. We get the first indication that the Doctor is a bit of a pyromaniac here - he has a few lines like "nothing like a good fire!" and such, and he giggles with joy once Ian and Susan light the match and light the gas aflame with it. We'll see this again when he watches Rome burn in a few serials, along with a new companion, Vicki, who laughs delightedly along with him (not to get ahead of myself, but I love Vicki).

Kudos to Jacqueline Hill again, though, who plays Barbara wonderfully as her stress levels reach a peak just before she passes out. She does a great job selling how taxed Barbara is from the poison and the exertion of this adventure. It's not just a layer of sweat and a slumped posture - she moves slowly and the look on her face throughout shows the strain on her body. She really is a wonderful actress - probably the best actor on the show to date.

I always laugh at the police officer who is unable to put his hat on correctly, giving up in the middle of the scene and walking out of shot with the chinstrap in his mouth. Oh, Doctor Who actors, never change.

While this episode may seem small scale, it comes highly recommended from me. Only Doctor Who could take an idea like "ever-lasting pesticide" in a time travel show, shrink the four main characters down to an inch tall, and never have them interact with the guest cast and make it work. An excellent start to the second season.

"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "World's End"

"Dangerous Journey" - Season 2, Episode 44

Written by Louis Marks | Directed by Mervyn Pinfield | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 11/07/64

The Doctor suggests they not look into the cats eyes, and it won't bother them. I... don't think that's how it works, Doctor. Luckily for them, the cat wanders off, sparing them from a terrifying death (though that cat would have had a ton of fun with them, I'm sure).

As before, the sets and props are gorgeous. The briefcase Ian and Barbara hide in a few times this episode looks great, and the sink, drain pipe, and sink plug all look amazing as well, considering the budget they were working with.

I quite like the regular-sized characters in this serial, by the way. Forester is very menacing, just dripping with evil with everything he says and does (but not over the top - the actor underplays it just enough so it's believable). Smithers, introduced in this episode, is interesting because of how driven he is to to complete DN6, enough to become an accessory to murder with Forester. That he knows this - and upbraids Forester for it - makes him three-dimensional in a way Doctor Who excels at for it's secondary characters. Sure, he's a cliche - egotist scientist with a lack of morals - but shows to this day don't often give this much characterization to a guest star.

Jacqueline Hill does very well in this episode - she's given some weird stuff to do, namely act Barbara as frightened that she touched the poisoned seeds, but for whatever reason not tell Ian about it. Meanwhile, Ian is thick as hell throughout - he gives Barbara a handkerchief right after turning his back on her while she looks at the seeds and says they're all sticky, and doesn't realize she's touched them even as he says they'd likely kill her.

It's weird, seeing the Doctor so exhausted after climbing the drain pipe, considering how active he becomes starting with his second incarnation and on. Though, thinking about it, the Eleventh Doctor at the end of his life is frail and old, so maybe the First Doctor here has lived for a long time, hard to say (and who knows if the Doctor has ever told the truth about his age at any point in his life, so you can't go with what he says).

Things get weird in the next episode. There's some continuity errors, which I'll cover tomorrow, but suffice it to say, I really enjoy Planet of Giants. I think it's very overlooked and is one of the better produced and written stories in the Hartnell era, and I highly recommend it for someone who hasn't seen a First Doctor serial and would like a taste.

"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Crisis"

"Planet of Giants" - Season 2, Episode 43

Written by Louis Marks | Directed by Mervyn Pinfield | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 10/31/64


I have great affection for Planet of Giants - there are some problems with it, particularly episode 3, but overall, I really enjoy the concept. The scene at the beginning is really well done, as well - the TARDIS not working properly has been done before, but here it's a lot less nonsensical than in Edge of Destruction (as much as I love that two-parter). The Doctor is brilliant in it - once things have calmed down, he gives Barbara a heartfelt apology for his tetchiness, saying that he forgets the niceties when he's on edge (Ian may as well have gotten a poke in the eye from him, which is funny).


I'm sure if they were in color they'd look a lot worse, but the props and set designers have to be given credit here. The giant dead insects look great, the model TARDIS being used to pull back on the sidewalk to show how small it has gotten is gorgeous. While the prop team doesn't get 100% of everything right in this serial, most of it is well beyond what you'd expect for this show. There's some interesting editing going on, too - when the TARDIS crew splits into two groups, they simultaneously figure out what is going on, and rather than have each party explain what's going on separately (thus giving us a scene repeated in full), the camera cuts back and forth between the two groups, suggesting to the audience that they all come to the same realization as to what environment they're in. It's a deft move not often seen in 1960s Doctor Who.


The insecticide is well-seeded throughout the serial as well. The dead bugs the crew sees throughout this episode are explicitly mentioned as things that shouldn't be killed as they're not pests, so we know DN6 is bad - and the greedy businessman murders the scientist who arrived at the conclusion that DN6 should not be produced and sold. I admire how well-written this all is, even if the third and fourth episodes had to be mixed together due to some scenes being incredibly boring.


Still, this first episode is excellent. I love the premise, and the whole crew is on their game this week. Let us not forget the cliffhanger with the cat looming over the TARDIS crew! Taking something every day like a cat and making it terrifying is always effective in this show, and this serial is the first time it's done. Moffat's main shtick originated here.


And so begins my favorite Hartnell season. I've been looking forward to writing about it - the first season is uneven, and the third season is, sadly, mostly missing. Most of this season is good, though.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Dangerous Journey"

"Prisoners of Conciergerie" - Season 1, Episode 42

Written by Dennis Spooner | Directed by Henric Hirsch | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 09/12/64


What was all that about?


The Reign of Terror might actually be the nadir of the first season. I know I did not enjoy Marco Polo very much, but at least it had a coherent plot. I'm usually sympathetic to a sort of romp through a historical period, watching the TARDIS crew interact with various historical characters and events, but this was a bit ridiculous. It's too on the periphery to be interesting - Napoleon may show up in this episode, but it's basically a cameo, and he never interacts with the TARDIS crew. His entire appearance is to hint that he eventually becomes ruler of France, which... duh? There's a way to write a serial where Napoleon interacts with the TARDIS crew - say, he was on his way to Paris, or ran into them on the road or something. But having him for one scene when he would be the most interesting guest character on the show is an odd choice. Lemaitre's revelation that he's James Stirling is nonsensical as well - surely he'd have seen Webster in the prison he was overseeing at some point? For two men who were apparently friends, it's remarkable that Lemaitre/Stirling never interacted with him. Bah, the plot of this one is just dumb.


Barbara and the Doctor reference the Aztecs again. That serial has already, by the end of the first season, taken a very important place in the show's mythos, hasn't it? The writers at the time - I suspect David Whitaker, primarily - really wanted to set it in stone that history cannot be rewritten.


I do like the scene where Ian tells Jules to remember the name Napoleon Bonaparte, when Jules idly asks who will rule France. Jules' reply - "a Corsican, ruling France?!" is adorable. Ian likes spoiling people, it appears! I wonder if River Song ever met him.


The coda to end the episode is interesting:


Doctor: "Our lives are important, at least to us. But as we see, we learn."
Ian: "And what are we going to see and learn next, Doctor?"
Doctor: "Well, unlike the old adage, my boy, our destiny is in the stars. Let's go and search for it."


Thus ends the first season of Doctor Who. It's interesting - it reminded me of the coda from Survival, the final episode of the classic series:


Seventh Doctor: "There are worlds out there where the sky's burning, and the sea's asleep, and the river's dream. People made of smoke and cities made of song. Somewhere there's danger, somewhere there's injustice, and somewhere else the tea's getting cold. Come on, Ace, we've got work to do!"


They are similar, though I vastly prefer the Seventh Doctor's more evocative version. It is kind of amazing how much the ethos of this show survives over the years - the delivery would have been different, but I could see William Hartnell giving the same speech. I could see any Doctor giving either speech, come to think of it.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Planet of Giants"

"A Bargain of Necessity" - Season 1, Episode 41

Written by Dennis Spooner | Directed by Henric Hirsch | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 09/05/64


The most important scene of the episode, to my mind, is when Barbara and Ian reunite at Jules' house. After their initial excitement of being reunited, Barbara wonders where Leon is. Ian seems to have picked up on Barbara's attraction to the man - he tries to dodge the question of where he'd been, hoping he wouldn't have to tell Barbara that Leon had been killed, and was also the traitor. I think it's sweet that he cares about her feelings in this way - it says to me that he cares about Barbara more than he lets on, too. When she rebukes him, Ian, in what I think is a bit of ugly jealousy, says "he got what he deserved," pissing Barbara off. They make up, later, and even Ian apologizes, but it's some deft characterization (assuming, as I do, that Ian and Barbara are or have already fallen in love).


The Doctor does his best at being clever back at the prison. He tricks the jailer into doing exactly what he wants him to, and this is how Barbara escapes (the jailer really is an idiot). Though why the Doctor says he can't be skulking after people in the clothes he's wearing when the jailer asks him why he didn't go after Barbara, then immediately suggests he follow Susan after they let her escape is beyond me.


And anyway, I'm sick of the characters being arrested and escaping again and again. Yes, characters in Doctor Who are arrested all the time - but when it's done well, each one is it's own interesting problem for them to solve. Here, it's involving the same villains in the same place, and the plot doesn't move forward until it decides to (here, at the end of the episode/beginning of the next episode). The Reign of Terror could have been much better than this, being set during the French Revolution and all, but it's really rather dull (and in some spots, downright stupid).


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Prisoners of Conciergerie"

"The Tyrant of France" - Season 1, Episode 40

Written by Dennis Spooner | Directed by Henric Hirsch | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 08/29/64


One of the three formats one can watch classic Doctor Who in is in it's animated form, our first example of which occurs here. The animation quality varies throughout the run; sometimes, it's excellent, like in the two missing episodes of Patrick Troughton's "The Invasion." Other times, it's abysmal, like in... well, Patrick Troughton's "Power of the Daleks" (which is sad, for such a great story). However, it's likely the bad ones are due to the restoration/animation team not being given much of a budget - or enough time - to do the missing episodes justice. It's a tall task, too, considering the static nature of 1960s Doctor Who - there's not a ton of camera movement or, for that matter, dynamic shots. The animators do their best to liven the episodes up, a bit, with shots that you'd never see in existing episodes of 1960s Who - quick close ups of people's mouths or eyes as they deliver their lines, or extremely quick cuts between characters as they hold a conversation, sometimes at different angles. These types of things do help, honestly, but the Reign of Terror, for example, suffers from a crucial flaw - almost the entirety of every episode is close-quarters indoor shots of people talking to each other. The animators aren't given much room to make the episodes more interesting visually. The other problem is, given the constraints on the animators I mentioned before, people don't look very good unless completely still (which is a bit of a problem, really, in animation). Inanimate objects look quite good, but considering how much of this show (and this episode in particular) consists of two characters jawing at each other, it really hampers the enjoyment of the animation. Again, the characters are very recognizable while still, but they don't animate very well, and most lines are delivered by just moving the mouth, with just a little head movement (usually in close up, to try to hide the awkwardness of just how little these animated characters move).


Still - this is more watchable than recons, it must be said. I'll talk more about Power of the Daleks when we get there, but I was excited for it, even though I knew the animation was going to be sub-par. As much whinging as I did above regarding the quality of the animation, I still wish they'd animate the rest of missing Doctor Who (well, we could do without Celestial Toymaker. Best to leave that one missing as much as possible). And as far as animation goes, the two missing Reign of Terror episodes largely land in the "good" pile.


This is a bit of a strange episode. The Doctor is prevented from seeing any of his friends until the very end (in a scene I'd love to see Hartnell and Hill play, as their joy in seeing each other again seems largely visual, though the Doctor does sound extremely happy to see "his dear Barbara" again). Before that, though, he very confidently speaks with Robespierre - he seems to have no fear that he'll be found out as a fraud. And when he stays the night at the jail, he tries to escape in the early morning, but is caught by Lemaitre, who asks him if he slept well. The Doctor, clearly angry at being caught before his escape, bellows back "I did not! The bed was hard, and the draught blew through the room like the north wind!" which is just as petty as the Doctor gets, and as usual, Hartnell delivers it wonderfully (again, I'd love to see the utter indignation on Hartnell's actual face rather than the tame animation). Oh, and it turns out the only significance of the ring from the last episode's cliffhanger is that the clothier used it as evidence that he thought the Doctor was suspicious for trading it for the sash of a representative (part of me was hoping he hypnotized his dog or something with it, like the Doctor will do to Dodo in season three).


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "A Bargain of Necessity"

"A Change of Identity" - Season 1, Episode 39

Written by Dennis Spooner | Directed by John Gorrie | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 08/22/64


Susan hits her absolute nadir as a character in this episode. It's been much remarked upon, but it cannot go without saying that she refuses to try to escape the guillotine because she has a headache. Is it just bad writing on Spooner's part, or does he really think the character is this stupid? Like I said yesterday - I think it's the latter. All she does the rest of the episode, after escaping with Barbara (who decides to stay with Susan rather than try to escape the guillotine, too, which makes me think Spooner probably hates her, too) with the aid of a lucky rescue by men with guns, is read a map, eat a meal, and go to bed because she's sick. I feel bad for Carole Ann Ford, having to suffer through this garbage.


I do rather enjoy Ian's escape from the jail, though. I mean, the jailer is an idiot, just leaving the keys in the lock like that, but it's a pretty good play on Ian's part. Not immediately escaping is wise - doing so may put him at risk of being caught by some visitor to the prison. Escaping at night would do him better.


The Doctor has finally reached Paris, and needs to get new clothes to pose as a French official. He doesn't have any money, so he trades his outfit to the clothier in exchange for a uniform. He trades his ring, in, too - which gives us our cliffhanger later, when it's turned in by the clothier to point out the Doctor is a fraud (we're not shown why this might be the case in this episode). The ring is interesting - he uses it in The War Machines to hypnotize Dodo, and it hasn't really been remarked upon thus far in the show, so whatever its significance is will be a revelation. The only other scene I remember the ring being in is when it falls off the finger of the Second Doctor, no longer fitting his hand.


The Doctor huffing and whinging his way into the prison as the official is wonderful, though. He is mocking everyone he comes across and is enjoying himself in doing so. He treats the jailer as the moron he is, barely giving him a half second to look at his "credentials" before going on about the lack of escort for his arrival in Paris. Hartnell, like all the Doctors to date, is absolutely amazing when he's dressing down everyone around him.


Susan really makes this episode awful to sit through, though, especially with the reading I have where Spooner just has utter contempt for her as a character. Tomorrow is the first of two missing episodes remaining for this season - unlike Marco Polo, though, they've been animated. The poll I did on Twitter a few weeks back said I should watch the animated versions of stories where they exist rather than the recons, so that is what I'll be doing.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "The Tyrant of France"

"Guests of Madame Guillotine" - Season 1, Episode 38

Written by Dennis Spooner | Directed by Henric Hirsch | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 08/15/64


Dennis Spooner must have a very low opinion of Susan (hopefully just of the character, not the actress, as Carole Ann Ford seems a lovely sort). I think a comparison to the other young character in this episode is apt - Jean-Pierre, a kid who looks quite a bit younger than Susan, saves the Doctor's life from a burning building, apparently dragging his unconscious body out from a locked upstairs room to safety. Meanwhile, Susan hurts herself in about three seconds of digging in her prison cell, then later refuses to work on escaping because of rats. It seems she's determined to give up (and we haven't reached the most pathetic moment of this serial yet - that comes tomorrow). I'm not sure why she's written this way - certainly there are other distractions and ways to prevent the women from escaping than that, which is why I think it's deliberate on Spooner's part. I'm not a huge fan of the character, either, but write her better, not even worse than we've seen her before.


Also of note is the Doctor calling the greedy road boss a "common fellow" as an epithet. What an arse (yes, the guy is a moron, but certainly you could come up with a better insult than one based on class, Doctor?). This whole scene is pointless - it's going for comedy but it doesn't really work (it probably could work with some better dialogue). It's a time waster, something to delay the Doctor getting to the plot in Paris.


A decent job is done of keeping Ian away from the regulars so William Russell can go on vacation by doing some filmed inserts. The only jarring one is near the beginning, when we cut to the jailer closing a cell door and telling someone inside - unseen by the audience - to stay against the wall. The only reason we know Ian is in there is because Susan shouts his name into the cell (Ian doesn't respond). Otherwise the only plot point of note in this episode is Ian learning he needs to pass a message to an Englishman from his dying cell cohabitant. The French want to know what was said to Ian, as well, so Ian is removed from the guillotine list.


Susan and Barbara aren't so lucky, and are led away to the guillotine to end the episode as Ian looks on. Other than the aforementioned "comedy" scene with the Doctor, we get some location filming of a Hartnell look-alike walking towards Paris. If it weren't for Ian learning about James Stirling (the Englishman he has to find), this would be a completely throwaway episode, one not worth watching even just for the enjoyment of watching the series regulars. Poor writing damns the whole thing.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "A Change of Identity"

"A Land of Fear" - Season 1, Episode 37

Written by Dennis Spooner | Directed by Henric Hirsch | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 08/08/64


Dennis Spooner is a writer that I largely like. He will write some good episodes for the Hartnell era (and will co-write one of the best scripts of all time in the Troughton era) and oversees a pretty good stretch of the show as script editor. "The Reign of Terror," however, is not his best work. He has to write Ian out for two episodes, which is a bit of a problem since the show, to this point, is very much centered around Ian (though it's quickly moving to the Doctor - we're just a few serials away from that finally being the case, in fact). Worse still, Susan is a shambles in this serial, which is a bit of a letdown considering how watchable she was in The Sensorites (she's not so bad in this first episode, but tomorrow... hoo boy).


The Doctor is becoming the character we know so well, though. "I have the universe to explore," he tells Ian, while trying to shoo him off his ship. Susan isn't happy to see Ian and Barbara go, but relents and leaves while the Doctor goes about his business. Ian is able to convince him to come scout around with them, though, since they're not entirely sure where they are (and why the Doctor is playing as though he has gotten them back to 1960s London, considering he hasn't been able to get his bearings since the show started, I have no idea). This scene is admittedly pretty cute - Ian convinces the Doctor that since he's a very busy man, he may not have time to nip back and visit himself or Barbara, so they should part over a nice drink. The Doctor agrees and they leave.


They discover they're just outside Paris from a young boy. The Doctor is proud of himself for only being 100 kilometers off. When Ian discovers papers signed by the real Robespierre, though, they realize they're off by a couple of hundred years, as well. According to Susan, the French Revolution is one of the Doctor's favorite time periods in Earth history - I wonder if he's been here before? To be fair to Spooner, this is a great period to put the Doctor in - it just doesn't come off very well in this serial (especially over the next few episodes - this one is alright).


I like the scene where the two Frenchmen are overtaken by the soldiers outside. Rouvray is almost able to take control of the situation, but after calling all the soldiers "peasants underneath," one of them shoots him dead. The soldiers take pleasure in killing the other guy, too, offscreen (perhaps they heard him pronounce it "gill-o-tine." What a crap Frenchman). These are dangerous men!


The Doctor being trapped in the house on fire is a good cliffhanger. Hartnell plays it pretty well - he's not usually good at physical acting, but his slamming on the door, begging to be let out, works for me. The smoke billowing into the room is a nice touch, too - you'd have thought the production team would have just opted for the model shot of the house on fire while Hartnell just acts as though it is with no on-screen visual indication it's burning, but they actually spend the money to have smoke filter in.


Rewatching this, though, it has to be said that this serial starts off alright - this episode sets up the premise and doesn't have any insane plot logic (which isn't the case later on in this serial). I'd be excited for the next episode if I didn't know what was coming...


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Guests of Madame Guillotine"

"A Desperate Venture" - Season 1, Episode 36

Written by Peter R. Newman | Directed by Frank Cox | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 08/01/64


I do not understand why the City Administrator, posed as the Second Elder, kidnaps Carol and makes her write that letter to Susan. What is his end goal? Did he really think the TARDIS crew would believe this? Also, how do Barbara and Susan recognize Carol's handwriting (Barbara hasn't even been around since the third episode, she barely even knows Carol)? It's all used as a pretense to get Susan to guide Barbara through the aqueducts, anyway, which gives us more of an opportunity to see her psychic powers at work. Ultimately, I'm not sure why it's needed - why didn't Barbara just take the map with her, rather than leave Susan alone? Are torches not available?


The Doctor's suspicions are confirmed when he and Ian run into humans in the aqueducts, proving they were poisoning the Sense-sphere's water. I wish this was telegraphed throughout the episodes a little better - though it makes sense that the humans from the old ship that have been referenced a few times in the story are the culprits, it seems a bit arbitrary at this point. The episode also never explains the strange roaring sound the Doctor heard when he was under attack - presumably it's the humans being loud to scare what they thought were the Sensorites away? But then why was the back of the Doctor's jacket in tatters the last time he was in the aqueducts? It's strange that the humans would go out of their way to rip up his jacket and then leave him there...


The good lighting I praised in the last episode is gone from this one. Where the aqueducts were a dark space that the Doctor need a torch to see in before, here their lit up quite nicely for our regulars. The director is the same between these episodes, so I'm not sure why this was done (I suppose because the way they were lighting it before was a giant pain, and considering Hartnell is already struggling to get his lines right, asking him to say them while also holding a torch exactly right is probably too great an ask).


We get our first description of what we'll later find out to be Gallifrey in this episode. More importantly for the era we're in, though, we learn the Doctor and Susan don't come from Earth! Susan, speaking to the First Elder, after dropping that tidbit, describes her home planet, which has burnt orange skies at night and bright silver leaves on trees. Almost fifty years later, in Gridlock, the Tenth Doctor describes his planet in a similar way, and I remember loving this scene the first time I saw it (I watched the new series before going back and watching the classic episodes). It makes me happy that Russell T. Davies called back to the Sensorites in many ways - apparently the Ood-sphere is near the Sense-sphere, and they are both races who look ugly but end up being largely good in the end. The Ood are used for the same purpose as the Sensorites, to show that judging a person on their looks is unwise. I'm impressed with Davies' kisses to the past - they're remarkably subtle, but very clever (that same episode has the Macra in it, a monster we haven't encountered yet, but they're also brilliantly written in). I can only imagine being a classic Who fan and hearing the Doctor describe his planet when that episode first aired.


But back in 1964 - what a shock it must have been to find out the Doctor is not from Earth! It's true he hasn't been confirmed as a different species, yet - he won't be for a long time. But right here, near the end of the first season, Doctor Who is sewing seeds that will allow it to continue forever. The First Elder says to Susan, "Part of you calls for adventure. A wanderlust!" It must be a small part, though, because Susan says she wants to "belong somewhere" at the end of the episode (I wonder if Carole Ann Ford had decided by this point that she was going to leave soon?). Anyway, the City Administrator is banished to the wastes when it's discovered he altered the map and weapons given to the Doctor, once they return with the humans in the aqueduct. I wish we could have seen the City Administrator receive his sentence, but we don't. I rather liked the actor playing him, it would have been nice to see him react to being caught out. The episode ends with the Doctor flipping out when Ian casually jokes that the Doctor doesn't know what he's doing. He says he'll throw him and Barbara off the ship at their next stop (what did she do to deserve that punishment?!).


Reflecting on this serial now that I've finished it, I am still fond of it. It has dull points - this story will be done better and faster later on, so it's a bit of a slog now. But like I said before, I'd have liked to see Peter R. Newman back, particularly to write a nice four-parter, where he can pack all his good ideas in and cut the bad. The Sensorites looms over Doctor Who in many ways, which is odd to say about such an unassuming little adventure, but a lot of little things happen. We see our first "monsters" that turn out to be good. The Doctor seems to want to help just to help, rather than help entirely to save himself and run off at the earliest possible convenience. We get our first description of Gallifrey, and we find out Susan and the Doctor aren't from Earth. So many tiny bits of the show's DNA first surface here, and I find it charming, for all its faults.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "A Land of Fear"

"Kidnap" - Season 1, Episode 35

Written by Peter R. Newman | Directed by Frank Cox | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 07/25/64


Black and white television has always looked good in the gloom. The dark aqueduct scene that opens the episode is darkly lit, giving the scene a much-needed feeling of oppression that otherwise would be completely absent, since we don't see anything of what attacks the Doctor at all. After Ian and Susan get him out of there, the Doctor realizes that one of the Sensorites must be their enemy - it's a bit of a leap in logic, but it makes a sort of sense. Anyway, the Doctor's jacket is ripped up, and he gets a rather fetching cloak (he comments "Beau Brummell always said I looked better in a cloak," yet again referencing an off-screen adventure).


Apparently, according to one of the scientists, Sensorite society is perfect, and all are contented. This is a strange belief to hold, considering how xenophobic and vindictive the City Administrator is (as is his buddy, who I'm going to call Some Guy, even though I think he's referred to in the credits as Fourth). Carol explains what purpose eyelids are for (why, I don't know), and the scientist Sensorite replies, "To see all the time is not a good thing." I can't fathom why a Sensorite would say that, since they're unable to see in the dark and very frightened when that happens.


The City Administrator helpfully reiterates the plot to us, as he explains to the Second Elder shortly before his death at the City Administrator's hands what he's going to do - that he's going to use the sash he has, the Second Elder's sash, to impersonate him. We already knew this - and yes, I grant that this is restating a major plot point from the last episode that viewers may have forgotten, but it could have been written better.


Since the Doctor's coat got ruined, when the Sensorite trying to help the City Administrator blames the Second Elder's death on the Doctor but describes him as wearing his coat when he does it, the City Administrator's plan is foiled. He gets a promotion at the Doctor and Ian's urging, though, as they haven't caught on yet that he's the enemy. Meanwhile, the First Elder handwrings a little about the death of his advisor, but doesn't look into it too closely before promoting the City Administrator and moving on as if nothing had really happened. No one - the Doctor or the First Elder or anyone else - seems very alarmed at the death of the Second Elder. They mostly go about their business and I can't imagine why one or more of them don't want to have some sort of immediate inquiry into what happened with the death.


Carol is grabbed by a Sensorite while the Doctor and Ian head to the aqueduct without telling Susan, and the episode ends. I'm not sure if it's the writing, the directing, or both, but I enjoyed this episode more than the past few, despite its deficiencies. The plot is coming together, now, and tomorrow's episode introduces the final bit of the puzzle we don't have yet.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "A Desperate Venture"

"A Race Against Death" - Season 1, Episode 34

Written by Peter R. Newman | Directed by Mervyn Pinfield | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 07/18/64


Watching the entirety of Doctor Who again, this time in order, is an interesting experience in many ways. I'm re-evaluating stories I've only seen once, and this serial is the second in a row where I've largely changed my mind about it. I didn't rate the last serial, The Aztecs, very highly before - but on a rewatch, I noticed things it did very well and it's quality compared to what surrounds it is impressive. The Sensorites, sadly, is going in the other direction - here we have a fairly dull episode where every plot beat is telegraphed well in advance and are very obvious.


Take Carol speaking to the City Administrator, for example - she mentions how she'd be unable to tell any of the Sensorites apart if they didn't have distinctive clothing. The City Administrator, in response, says "I never thought of that," in a super obvious way. Gee, I wonder what's coming next? Will the City Administrator pose as someone else to further his own ends? Sure enough, he captures the Second Elder and takes his sash. Voila! He's now the Second Elder (it's odd that even the Sensorites can't tell each other apart very well).


Otherwise, this episode is just moving pieces into place for the next one. The Doctor goes to explore the aqueduct and Ian and Susan follow him. It hasn't played the card where we find out how the water has been poisoned, yet, though there have been a few clues throughout the past couple episodes, but not many enough to have a satisfying payoff.


One production thing I want to mention - moving a giant spotlight around to correspond to the Doctor's flashlight has to be a giant pain - shoutout to the guy who had that job.


But yes, otherwise, there's just not much going on here. I'm not sure why I liked the serial the first time through - perhaps it's the Sensorite mask design? I love how each one is visually distinct. Usually alien creatures on Doctor Who are identical - I didn't think we'd buck the trend so early on, here.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Kidnap"

"Hidden Danger" - Season 1, Episode 33

Written by Peter R. Newman | Directed by Mervyn Pinfield | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 07/11/64


The Sensorites are ineffective warriors. One says, within earshot of Ian, that he's afraid of them, even though they are unarmed. Maybe keep that to yourself, Sensorite, you'll be in a better bargaining position. The Doctor is very angry in the first half of this episode - always on the verge of shouting down someone who crosses him. He storms out of one scene, ranting, "Dictated to by petty thieves and my own grandchild!" He's so angry, he doesn't make any sense, saying, "In all the years my granddaughter and I have been traveling, we have never had an argument - and now you have caused one!" which is nonsense - we've seen him argue with Susan several times.


As an aside - and I grant you, I shouldn't these lines too seriously, as they already contain a blatant lie - but he implies he's been traveling with Susan for years, but she's apparently sixteen. If that's the case, that means the Doctor was traveling around with a very young girl for a while, a situation I can't see a pre-An Unearthly Child Doctor handling very well (hopefully the Henry VIII trip was sometime recent, and he didn't put her in danger when she was twelve or something!). It also makes for a continuity clash when we see something like Clara talking to the Doctor and Susan in Name of the Doctor, when Susan is clearly the same age as she is now. I digress, though - just an interesting thought, not something I'm upset or worried about.


Sadly for us, it's Jacqueline Hill's turn for a vacation, so she stays on the ship for a few episodes while everyone else goes down to the Sense-sphere. The First Elder, before the TARDIS crew arrives, gives us our serial thesis statement: "It is a failure of all beings that they judge through their own eyes," which, sadly, is still very relevant these days. Speaking of relevance to today, the City Administrator is extremely xenophobic on sight of the TARDIS crew and friends. He tries to have them killed without authority from his superiors, thinking them just being on the planet is a danger to their species. Luckily, he's stopped for now, but will probably keep trying to kill our heroes until this serial is over (hint: he will).


I originally thought it was kind of dumb that Peter R. Newman makes it so obvious that the water is what made Ian sick, that he should have made it a little less obvious. He's not trying to trick the audience with it, though - the scene is written in such a way to just provide a nice cliffhanger for us, not to try to make us figure out what happened. The problem is in the next episode, where our heroes take a little too long to figure out what happened, but that at least makes a little sense, because they don't dwell on the fact that Ian alone drank different water.


It's interesting to note the Sense-sphere has several different castes, which is interesting (and little remarked upon in the rest of the serial). Apparently there is the leader caste, warrior caste, and the Sensorites. The Sensorites, apparently, are the worker class - they "work and play," we're told, while the leaders think and lead and the warriors fight. We're never shown a clear distinction between these levels of society - unless the Sensorites still on the spaceship are warriors, and our heroes are sitting with "leaders?" The script never makes it clear, and it's strange for it. I'm not sure what Peter R. Newman was going for with it - some sort of comment on Communism, considering the time in which this was made? If so, he doesn't take a hard stance on it, and his opinion on the Sensorite's caste system is ambiguous.


"Doctor Who" puns: 2 | Tomorrow: "A Race Against Death"

"The Unwilling Warriors" - Season 1, Episode 32

Written by Peter R. Newman | Directed by Mervyn Pinfield | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 06/27/64


It's interesting seeing how adventures feel when watching them in order. Though I've seen all of Doctor Who before this blog started over the years, I remember enjoying The Sensorites quite a bit, before. It's not godawful or anything, but this episode is a bit dull. Perhaps this is the episode that's padded the most to make sure the serial lasts six episodes long? It might be - there's a sequence over two minutes long where Ian and Barbara walk slowly through the spaceship looking for Sensorites. It's supposed to be tense - and it may have been in 1964, but this scene doesn't age well. Once they find the Sensorites, at least as they back away for another minute and a half, we get a few lines of dialogue and can get a good look at the things. It's still pretty dull, though.


We get another reference to a past adventure the Doctor and Susan had - they were on the planet Esto, which had plants that could communicate via thought transference, and Susan uses that example to explain to Barbara why she wants to have them both think - and only think-  "we defy you." The force of the thought knocks the Sensorites to the ground, and lets the Sensorites know that Susan is telepathic later on. It's interesting, though - two episodes in a row, now, we've heard of adventures the Doctor has had that we haven't seen. It seems Newman likes to use the time before An Unearthly Child for plot expediency - explain what he wants Susan to do by saying she's encountered a similar situation before, one that we never have to actually show. However, all these years and episodes later, the references to the past stand out to me - the Doctor didn't seem like much of a traveler in An Unearthly Child, at least not one who enjoyed adventuring, yet. Perhaps Esto was a super boring trip, one in which the only interesting thing that happened was psychic plants. Susan, weirdly, seems to have an affinity for plants - she's obsessed with the flower in the petrified jungle back in The Daleks, is terrified of the screaming jungle in The Keys of Marinus, and had the run in with the psychic plants on Esto. I'm not sure what to make of it - surely it's unintentional on behalf of the production team, of course - but it's an odd coincidence.


Presumably, the Sensorite on the outside of the ship that acted as the cliffhanger for yesterday's episode is one of the ones that enters the ship here. It's never really explained, and everyone on the ship seems remarkably unconcerned with it, at least until it's among them. Why they didn't try to track it or shake it off is beyond me.


Molybdenum, a real mineral, is the reason the Sensorites won't allow the TARDIS crew or spaceship to leave. The Sense-sphere is loaded with it. Apparently humans had arrived on the Sense-sphere before and caused great harm to the Sensorites, somehow. They mention a sickness in this episode, but it's largely unexplained for now. It's apparently easy to harm the Sensorites, though - they're terrified of the dark because they can't see at all in it (they're eyes are the exact opposite of a cat, the Doctor notices), and loud sounds appear to irritate them (why the high-pitched screeching they emit doesn't bother them, I don't know - perhaps they can't detect it).


The episode ends with Susan having a conversation with the Sensorites telepathically, where we can only hear what she has to say. She tells everyone to stay where they are, and that she's going with the Sensorites to their planet so everyone doesn't get killed, and the episode ends.


It makes me sad that I'm not loving this serial as much as I did the first time I watched it. Perhaps it gets better, but the reputation it has may be appropriate, for once - it's fairly overlooked in fandom. It has some good ideas, but they might be spread a bit too thin over the six episodes. Poor Peter R. Newman - the bonus features on the DVD explain how he died tragically young, and we don't know a whole lot about him. Toby Hadoke goes and interviews some of his family, and it borders on slightly creepy, but doesn't cross the line due to the respect Toby gives the family and that they pay to their relative. I would have liked to see what else Newman would have written for Doctor Who - I think he's largely pretty good, and most writers improved the more they wrote for the show (Terry Nation aside. Sorry, dude, your work is a rollercoaster of quality). And while I'm not sure if it was Newman or script editor David Whitaker who put in lines like "it all started as a mild curiosity in the junkyard," it's a good line, and it's a shame we just have the one serial from the guy.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Hidden Danger"

"Strangers in Space" - Season 1, Episode 31

Written by Peter R. Newman | Directed by Mervyn Pinfield | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 06/20/64


Despite the last episode seemingly leading immediately into this one, Barbara says she's "over" the Aztecs already. How?! She was broken up about it just a few minutes ago. I suppose some time could have passed between the two episodes - when the Doctor starts flying the ship when they leave Mexico, he's alone, and there's a fade to black. Perhaps a few hours or days pass... Still, though, this is indicative of a problem Doctor Who faces throughout its entire classic run. Once a serial is over, the characters move on, barely remarking - if they remark at all - on what just happened. The worst example of this is Time-Flight in the early 80s, but that's a long ways away. For now, Barbara has moved on, and the Doctor's brief dalliance with Cameca is never mentioned again.


At least everyone is enjoying themselves, now! "Yes, it all started out as a mild curiosity in a junkyard, and now it's turned out to be quite a, quite a great spirit of adventure, don't you think?" the Doctor asks. They then recite, briefly, what they've been through (some of which become fandoms name for the mentioned stories, such as "The Daleks" or "Marco Polo"). The Doctor also mentions meeting Henry VIII - and making him angry enough to send them to the Tower of London, where the TARDIS was. Susan confirms this, so it seems like the Doctor isn't lying about it... I wonder if Big Finish has done an audio about this, because if so, I haven't heard it (I know the Sixth Doctor met him at one point, but I don't remember the First Doctor doing so). Anyway, it's another rare mention of stuff the Doctor got up to before An Unearthly Child - something we won't hear much more about in the actual show itself, since Susan is going to be leaving in a few serials. The series quickly looks to its future and doesn't fill much in about its past, which is ultimately a good thing, really.

The design on the spaceship is gorgeous, it has to be said. I love retro futurism. Unfortunately, the set is lit far too brightly, so the feeling of dread they were probably going for as the TARDIS crew examines what they think are corpses is nonexistent. It's too bad, too, because having no explanation for several minutes and a darkened set would have gone a long way to making things creepier.

Maitland, the captain of the ship, doesn't seem too fazed to learn that the travelers come from the 20th century - perhaps time travel is possible in their time? I don't know why Peter R. Newman included the bits about when they're all from, it's just awkward and the ship crew not being bothered that people from 800 years ago are interacting with them never feels right. Newman does get some cute dialogue in, though - the Doctor insists "there's not an ounce of curiosity" in him and then immediately asks more questions about what happened on the ship, and Ian and Barbara laugh.

The Sensorites are able to do what the Voord couldn't, and remove the lock from the TARDIS. This, apparently, means the TARDIS crew cannot get in. Breaking down the door would disrupt the inner dimensions of the TARDIS, so they need to get the lock back, somehow. So far, the TARDIS hasn't been flyable because the Doctor removed a fluid link, a switch got stuck, all the systems just completely shut down, a force field was put around it, the ship gets trapped in a tomb out of their reach, and now the lock is removed. Barbara wonders why they ever leave the ship, and it's a great question. Well, in universe, it is, anyway - clearly they leave the ship because there wouldn't be a television show otherwise. Anyway, I look forward to the writers realizing they don't have to break the ship or make it inaccessible for the crew to have adventures - it's straining credulity at this point.

The back half of this episode has some mildly interesting scenes, but there's not much to say about them, I don't think. The Doctor flying the ship out of colliding with the Sense-sphere would be entertaining if it weren't so static - he just says what he's doing and moves his hands a little. Still, I like that the Doctor is a skilled pilot, apparently, even if he can't quite figure out the TARDIS, yet. The women are forced to cook for the men, and Ian bugs them about when it'll be done, even. Shut up, Ian, cook it yourself (he's not a total jerk about it, but the scene grates nonetheless). John, the other crew member, seems possessed at first, then cries a lot. A Sensorite appears on the outside of the ship to close the episode - he looks like a stereotypical Area 51 alien with a scraggy beard.

I like this serial a lot - but mostly when it's on the Sense-sphere. The spaceship episodes aren't bad by any means, but they're a little dull. This is one of those episodes that I'm glad isn't missing - it would be awful to get through without the images.

"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "The Unwilling Warriors"

"The Day of Darkness" - Season 1, Episode 30

Written by John Lucarotti | Directed by John Crockett | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 06/13/64


Even though Ixta is convinced the tunnel filling with water will kill Ian, the production never shows us this directly - we only see a small trickle of water flowing next to Ian's feet. He's able to climb up into the room where the TARDIS is in the tomb in an oddly dreamlike sequence (there's nothing to it - he's just climbing, he's not hallucinating or anything. It's just edited strangely, and honestly I don't know what they're going for).


The Doctor is about to deliver the bad news to Barbara that Ian didn't make it when he pops up, and the Doctor is clearly overjoyed. He definitely enjoys the company of his reluctant passenger, and you can tell he feels responsible for his safety as well (recall the Doctor's mood in The Keys of Marinus when he thought he'd failed and gotten Ian sentenced to death - absolute numbness and disbelief. This is not the same man that we saw in An Unearthly Child). We also get a similar scene with someone who hates Ian - Ian again pops up out of nowhere to take Susan with him, as Ixta taunts her that he's dead.


The Doctor and Cameca scenes in this episode are somewhat depressing. Cameca has caught on that she won't be marrying the Doctor - why the Doctor's whittled wheel tells her this, I have no idea. Perhaps she intuits it, I don't know.


Autloc, who appears to have known Cameca for a long time, is disillusioned after being attacked early in this episode. He doesn't know if it was by Ian or someone else, and Barbara says it couldn't have been Ian, because why would she order the attack of the one man who trusts her? His faith in her gone, he decides to forsake his position and belongings and go to the wilderness to live (whether this is simply exile or suicide, I don't know. I don't know which would be worse for the poor guy, to be honest). Barbara realizes she's ruined this man's life by trying to change history and failing.


The scene where Cameca brings Ian and Susan to the throne room after springing them from capture is just cold on the Doctor's part. She saves his friend's lives, but he refuses to let her go with him. He doesn't explain or lie or anything. He turns his back to her and she just leaves. The Doctor's feelings for Cameca are ambigious, too - he goes to leave the coin she gave him in the last episode in the tomb before the TARDIS departs, but changes his mind and takes it with him. Maybe he did feel something for Cameca... but why leave her on such bad terms? Is it some patronizing attitude on his part that it'd "be good for her?" For a man who tends to call people not as technologically advanced as him "savages," I'm not sure he had much in the way of feeling for her beyond just a general attraction. That he led her on knowing this makes it all the more cruel.


Tlotoxl's plan is to kill Barbara in front of the whole city at the sacrifice during the solar eclipse (the eponymous day of darkness). His timing is strange - he attacks Barbara before any sacrifice is made (Ian stops him in time), but what if he had gotten her? He just claims that she's a false goddess. Though I suppose he'd have proven she wasn't a real goddess when she dies and is proven mortal. The TARDIS crew are able to get in the tomb to the TARDIS and make their escape, after Ian fights Ixta, during which he kicks him off the pyramid, ostensibly killing him. We get no dialogue about this - whether Ian is just happy Ixta is dead, whether he's upset, feels guilty, nothing, not in this episode or any other. Now, Ian is old enough, maybe, to remember World War II, so maybe he's able to handle better death better than me. Or he's not given a scene to grieve because of the serial nature of the show. Probably both.


We get a little epilogue where the Doctor and Barbara discuss recent events. Barbara is upset that she hurt Autloc, but the Doctor assures her that though he's lost his faith, he's better off, which is patronizing as hell (and probably wrong, as I'm sure Autloc's mental state is not in a good place - like I alluded to above, it's possible he killed himself as a result of all this).


This is the best full serial so far. It has problems - Barbara's idea that the only thing that prevented the Aztec society from surviving beyond Cortes was human sacrifice is ridiculous and, well, racist. There's no way Cortes and the other conquistadors weren't going to swoop in and kill everybody they found so they could pillage all their wealth. That was going to happen, human sacrifice or not. If Barbara really wanted to save them... well, I don't know how it'd be done, but preparing the Aztecs for Cortez, somehow, might have been nice. Don't ask me, though, ask Barbara - she's the supposed Aztec expert.


But, as I said, it's a well constructed four-parter. The pacing, for once, isn't glacial, and the characters are interesting and play off each other in surprising ways. All the little plot threads intertwine and affect the others throughout, which is not as common in this show as I'd like it to be. Susan's plotline was pretty bland, but it was Carole Ann Ford's turn for a vacation for most of this serial, so I suppose that's why. She does get a pretty big role for parts of the next serial, too (and is actually fairly good in it, for the most part). If I were to recommend a single serial from what I've seen so far, it'd be The Aztec, as it's the best serial of the first season (the next two serials aren't bad - I quite like The Sensorites - but they don't reach the heights of this one).


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "Strangers in Space"

"The Bride of Sacrifice" - Season 1, Episode 29

Written by John Lucarotti | Directed by John Crockett | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 06//06/64


There is a strong case to be made that this is the best episode so far this season, with only the very first, An Unearthly Child, to give it a run for it's money.


Jacqueline Hill as Barbara is the main reason for this. She is amazing throughout. She's a total badass! The episode opens with her rising to Tlotoxl's challenge to prevent Ian's death by grabbing a knife and holding it to Tlotoxl's throat! He relents, and when asked later why she didn't intervene supernaturally, she replies, "Why should I use divine powers when human abilities will suffice?" which is both a smart response and a good line on Lucarotti's part.


Lucarotti is forgiven for the slow, plodding Marco Polo for this serial, by far the better of his two season one scripts. He writes the Doctor as someone who barely bothers to keep up the façade as a servant of Yetaxa - when Tlotoxl wants to talk to him in the garden, he initially dismisses him with a curt "Oh, go away, Latoxl," pronouncing his name incorrectly like he does with Ian when he's annoyed with him, which I think is deliberate on Hartnell's part (though a few other actors screw up Tlotoxl's name in this episode, at least Hartnell has a reason to do so).


Barbara is amazing again in the scene where Tlotoxl and Tonila (another priest) attempt to poison her. She says both sides must show trust in each other, and bids Tlotoxl to drink the cup he proffered her. When he doesn't, Barbara loses it. She throws the cup to the ground and it shatters, and roars at Tlotoxl and Tonila to be gone. Tonila runs off, but Barbara grabs Tlotoxl and tells him she's a false goddess. She basically taunts him to prove it! Hill is magnificent in this scene. She is furious and scares Tlotoxl badly enough to have him cower over the sacrifice stone in fear as though she were to kill him herself.


Yesterday, I wondered if Tlotoxl actually believed any of the Aztec religion, or if he was just an evil, bloodthirsty bastard. The scene following the one above gives me pause, because John Ringham, the actor playing Tlotoxl, stands in the foreground of the scene while Autloc and Tonila discuss Yetaxa in the background. He looks disturbed and very, very angry, and I have to give him credit for absolutely selling how much he hates being manipulated by a woman he hasn't proven to be a fake yet. He acknowledges Barbara/Yetaxa as a worthy opponent - he claims "Yetaxa's weakness lies not in herself, but in her servants," reasoning that he can't beat Yetaxa by herself, which is a pretty good reading of the situation. His plan involves getting Susan in trouble by trying to force an arranged marriage on her which he knows she'll rebel against, which is against Aztec law. He's got the measure of Susan, because he's right, she throws a fit, even throwing in a bonus for Tlotoxl by saying to Autloc that he's a monster like all the rest of the Aztecs, even though he just said he'd do everything in his power to protect her. Susan isn't the brightest bulb in the box...


Hartnell gets some fantastic scenes in this episode, too. One thing I'd like to wonder about, though, is that Cameca says she was given a coin by Ixta's dad in the same garden they're standing in, but he disappeared and was never seen again that night. Where did he go? Did they ever find his body or anything? He apparently went up the tunnel to the tomb, but why did he go up there, and not ever seemingly come out? Did he have a TARDIS stashed away in there like the Doctor does now, and fly off after fathering Ixta? Is the Doctor Ixta's dad?! ...No, all of that is dumb, but I do wonder what happened to the guy, as it's never explained. All the Doctor cares about is the tunnel, not what happened to it's designer.


Anyway, the Doctor and Cameca share a cup of cocoa at the Doctor's urging, which means he mistakenly has proposed marriage to Cameca. He's alarmed when she spells it out to him, and, knowing that he will eventually leave before marrying her is a little heartbreaking. Autloc and Cameca end up in a bad place at the end of this story because of the TARDIS crew's actions, and I pity them both.


We later get a line that shines from Hartnell, so much so that it feels like something from Russell T Davies' or Steven Moffat's tenure on Who. When telling Ian about his discovery of the tunnel, the Doctor lets slip that he learned about its existence from his "fiancée." Ian, incredulous, asks him how he got a fiancée and the Doctor replies, as Hartnell looks into camera with a twinkle, "Yes, I made some cocoa and got engaged," which Ian laughs at and the Doctor waves him away. Hartnell doesn't get many lines like that, but he plays them well when he does. That type of line proves that the show that is airing now in 2017 is the same exact show that was being made in 1964, involving the same character. William Hartnell is the Doctor, and he's wonderful.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "The Day of Darkness"

"The Warriors of Death" - Season 1, Episode 28

Written by John Lucarotti | Directed by John Crockett | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 05/30/64


*A quick note on the format of this blog. Past entries have been too summary-heavy, which has already proven tedious to write (particularly the note taking phase). Since episode summaries abound online, I'm going to try to limit posts to my own thoughts, starting with this post. As a result, post lengths may vary wildly, especially as I get used to the new format. I think it will prove more interesting as a result, though, hopefully! Thanks for reading!*


I love the opening scene of the episode, with the Doctor absolutely furious with Barbara for attempting to stop the human sacrifice from last episode. William Hartnell can play righteous fury with the best of them, and since Barbara is the best actor of all his companions, their scenes together always work so well. Barbara is on the defensive, here, which is unusual, since she's often the one furious with the Doctor in similar scenes. Jacqueline Hill is a good enough actress to play it both ways, though, and Hartnell matches her.


Tlotoxl is an interesting character. He is a master manipulator - he plays everyone off each other very well, be they the TARDIS crew or his fellow Aztecs. I'm largely unfamiliar with Aztec culture besides the broad strokes, but it seems odd to me that he's allowed to publicly declare Yetaxa to be a false goddess and not face any consequence. Lucarotti sets this up by making it appear to be a debate between Tlotoxl and Autloc - though Autloc is the senior priest, he doesn't seem to have absolute authority to completely shut Tlotoxl down. Which is probably a good thing, as it provides tension that lasts throughout the serial - and unlike his past effort, Lucarotti is able to keep things interesting throughout.


I can't blame the fight scenes on Lucarotti, though, of course. The first one in this episode seems to be a hug battle between Ian and Ixta. I'd imagine it's a directing problem - Waris Hussein was able to get a good fight scene out of cavemen in "The Firemaker," but Crockett seems satisfied with a fight between two men who appear to never have fought before (which is understandable on Ian's part as he's a schoolteacher, but Ixta is supposed to be a decorated warrior by this point in his life). Ian's Vulcan neck pinch is weird - it's something that would be painful, but shouldn't knock anybody out, much less an Aztec warrior.


I can't believe I'm saying it, but the First Doctor flirting with Cameca actually works. He seems genuinely affectionate with her, and while her actress's performance falls a little flat for me, Hartnell is able to carry the scene.


It occurred to me while watching this episode that it's possible Tlotoxl doesn't believe in any of the gods at all, and just enjoys being a bloodthirsty manipulative bastard. I don't remember how the last episode of this serial actually ends, but at the end of the last episode, Tlotoxl is obsessed with proving Barbara to be a false goddess. He's convinced she's fake as soon as she suggests the sacrifices should stop - and is never once afraid of being punished in case he's wrong (he says he is, but he's so confident he's right, he could easily be lying). When he tells Ixta to kill Ian despite Autloc's wishes, he's clearly so happy with the idea that he probably just wants to see people die. Perhaps this is a comment on human sacrifice on Lucarotti's part - that only someone as evil and bloodthirsty as Tlotoxl could perform the task. The Doctor, though, has more ambiguous feelings on it - he's mad at Barbara at the beginning of the episode not only because he thinks her attempt to stop human sacrifice will fail, but also because he feels like it's disrespecting Aztec religion and culture.


Susan's subplot is uninteresting. She's being taught how to be a proper, demure Aztec woman, and she protests that she'll pick her husband, not be assigned one, which is nice enough and agreeable to me, but playing it as a definite backwards cultural artifact doesn't work, considering there are cultures today that still do arranged marriages and I happen to know a couple who are very happy together in that situation (a Muslim friend of mine's parents were arranged, and they're a great couple).


The Doctor is arrested when he goes to talk to Barbara near the end of the episode, because her servants aren't supposed to go talk to her, according to Tlotoxl. I bring it up because Hartnell goes nuts in this scene, spitting and complaining about his treatment, and I love it. I always love an indignant Doctor, and Hartnell plays indignant very well.


This is another serial that I wish was in color. The costumes look gorgeous and I bet the sets would look better with some color in them - particularly the scenes at the top of the pyramid (though the painted background might not pop so well). I felt the same way about Marco Polo, so it appears Lucarotti gets lucky with his set designers.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "The Bride of Sacrifice"

"The Temple of Evil" - Season 1, episode 27

Written by John Lucarotti | Directed by John Crockett | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 05/23/64




Barbara and Susan exit the TARDIS by themselves, and Barbara immediately recognizes Aztek iconography on the corpse they come across in the tomb they've landed in. She admires the jewelry and even puts one piece on. Apparently the Aztecs were a specialty of Barbara's, so she knows quite a bit about their culture. Susan, meanwhile, doesn't, or at least isn't that impressed: "Hey, look! Cartoons!" she exclaims, pointing at a wall. Barbara leaves the room in a door on a pivot (this is actually an important fact). Someone dressed in Aztek priest clothing sees her and initially claims that she must be arrested and punished for trespassing at the temple of Yetaxa.


The Doctor and Ian follow Susan out of the TARDIS, who told them she can't find Barbara. The Doctor is not happy she went off on her own. They find the door on a pivot and go out, looking for Barbara. It closes behind them and they realize they've just locked themselves outside the tomb where the TARDIS is. The man who caught Barbara before, Autloc, enters and greets the three of them as servants of Yetaxa. He explains that Barbara was wearing a bracelet that indicates she's the reincarnation of Yetaxa, apparently a wise high priest. They are taken to Barbara, but as they are, Susan is scared of someone as soon as she sees him - a man called Tlotoxl, who is the man who performs the human sacrifices. I realize the scream is functional - make us suspicious of Tlotoxl as soon as we see him - but it strikes me as though Susan, in character at least, is a little racist (she sees an unfriendly brown person and screams, while earlier in the season she decided a tall, blonde haired, blue eyed Thal was "perfect," which is... something). We discover he and Autloc disagree on whether human sacrifices be performed, though Autloc will not prevent the tradition on his own.


The TARDIS group meet up with Barbara, who is in a gorgeous feather getup that makes her look like some sort of god, like the Aztecs think she is. We find out, through Susan, that Yetaxa used to be a man, so why would the Aztecs worship Barbara as the same person? Barbara replies: "The form the spirit takes is unimportant." Who knew Barbara Wright, in the very first season, would make the first argument for a female Doctor?


The Doctor tells her that if the Aztecs realize she is not Yetaxa, they'll kill them all. When Autloc asks if he can let her servants wonder among the people freely, she lets the Doctor and Ian go, while Susan is to remain with her. The Doctor makes a big show of wanting to be the eyes and ears of Yetaxa among the people, so he and Ian can go learn more about the tomb the TARDIS is locked in, so they may be able to find their way back in.


Barbara is to be used to bring forth the rain, and to do so will require a sacrifice be made to Tlaloc, the rain god. Ian, who, at Tlotoxl's urging, will train to lead the army, is supposed to hold the sacrifice down, and he is not looking forward to it.


The Doctor, doing some in-person research, travels to the garden where "retired" Aztecs live. This is remarkable - people at age 52 get to "live free from responsibility and care," a setup I hope I get to see in real life someday (and preferably at that age, too. I can dream, I guess, because it will never happen, at least not in the US). The Doctor immediately takes an interest in a woman named Cameca, who he is clearly attracted to . He sets about flirting with her, likely for pleasure just as much as it is for learning about the temple. Cameca knows the son of the dead man who designed the temple, so she is to arrange a meeting between the Doctor and this unnamed warrior.


The Doctor goes back to speak to "Yetaxa." He warns her that she musn't interfere with the coming sacrifice. Barbara flat out refuses. She claims she'll be able to save Aztek civilization - her reasoning being that if the human sacrifices are done away with, when Cortez arrives, he won't slaughter them all. I, uh... still think he will. Dang, Barbara, I thought you were an expert? The Doctor reacts with that famous line: "But you can't rewrite history! Not one line! What you are trying to do is utterly impossible. I know. Believe me, I know!" It's interesting, because I usually hear only the first two sentences of this - not the bit about the Doctor "knowing" that rewriting history is supposedly impossible. It takes a different meaning with the added context - it implies the Doctor has tried to change history before, but was unable to. I wonder to what he's referring to? It's odd, too, because we've already seen him change history - he arrived and, with Ian's help, taught cavemen how to make fire, and traveled with Marco Polo and, though it's minor, Polo saw him dematerialize. All of that counts as rewriting "one line" of history, no? Anyway, Barbara responds to him with. "Not Barbara. ...Yetaxa," meaning she is about to do what she damn well pleases.


The sacrificial ritual begins. Just before Tlotoxl is about to kill the man, Barbara stops him and proclaims all sacrifices are to stop. The man to be sacrificed accuses her of denying him honor - so Tlotoxl tells him to "honor us with your death," as he runs and jumps off the pyramid, ostensibly kill him. As soon as he does this, it starts raining, and Tlotoxl is convinced this is why. Anyway when the sacrifice still looked like it was going to still happen, Susan screamed, which Tlotoxl asserts is a crime. Barbara decides Susan should learn more about the Azteks so rather than kill her, sends her off to study. Tlotoxl is upset about this, and claims Barbara is a false goddess, and he'll prove it, as the episode cuts to credits.


Lots of great bits in this episode. The famous line "But you can't rewrite history, not one line" happens here, and Barbara is clearly enjoying herself as Yetaxa (it's pretty clear Jacqueline Hill is enjoying herself, too, lending her performance with a gravitas Barbara doesn't usually have. Autloc is kind of not acting very well, but the other guest actors are well done. And this is only a four part serial, so that should mean there's not much padding, right! That's true so far, at least...

"Doctor Who" puns: 2 | Tomorrow: "The Warriors of Death"

"The Keys of Marinus" - Season 1, Episode 26

Written by Terry Nation | Directed by John Gorrie | Produced by Verity Lambert | Original air date 05/16/64


Sabetha wants to tell Tarron, the chief investigator, about Susan, but Barbara is unsure if he's in on the kidnapping, so they resolve not to. She also doesn't want to worry the Doctor, so she leaves him out of it as well, hoping that he can come up with some sort of solution to save Ian. They decide to go talk to Kala, to see if she saw anyone her late husband met with often, in the hopes that she may have some idea who is involved. She starts crying while they're there, and says she misses her husband and is ashamed to have to live with his crime for the rest of her life. She says, "You must have been sick with worry since you spoke to Susan, but I just can't help you, I know nothing," which is odd since no one told her Susan had been kidnapped. No one notices this mistake at first, and they leave. Kala stops crying as soon as the door closes, and she goes to her closet where Susan is tied up to taunt her. In the hallway, Barbara realizes Kala couldn't have known about Susan, and they go back, just as Kala is about to kill Susan on the orders of her co-conspirator.


You'll have to excuse me for reading more into a Terry Nation script than I probably should, but Kala and Aydan fascinate me. They are truly a messed up couple - Aydan slaps Kala for speaking to him in a way he doesn't like, suggesting ongoing spousal abuse. They conspire with the prosecutor to steal the micro-key, apparently to sell it, meaning they're unhappy with their current financial situation - perhaps they blame that for the problems they clearly have with their marriage? When Aydan is about to confess in the courtroom, we find out that Kala is the one that killed him (while she's being interrogated later). Before she's caught, though, the prosecutor says he's going to pick up the key and "collect" Kala - suggesting perhaps killing Aydan and leaving with the prosecutor was the plan all along? It wouldn't be that much of a stretch, since Aydan keeps abusing her, so she's wanted to leave for a while. Aydan seems like a huge wuss (as spousal abusers usually are), so I doubt he even wanted to steal the micro-key in the first place - I bet Kala pushed him to do it, so she could eventually leave and/or kill him. We may only be with these characters for an episode and a half, but I feel like there's more there than what we see.


Before all that, though, the Doctor is clearly upset, sitting and ruminating on his loss. The prosecutor congratulates him on a good defense, and the Doctor mindlessly, sadly, thanks him and says he didn't do as well as the prosecution. Barbara then calls Tarron and informs him that Kala killed Aydan, and he brings her in for questioning. She tells Tarron that she was working with Ian, meaning even her confession isn't enough to save Ian (which she must know, meaning at this point she's just angling to get Ian killed out of spite for having been caught. What a fascinating character). Susan says she overheard Kala's phone call with her co-conspirator, saying that he'd come get the key before coming and getting Kala. The Doctor realizes he can set a trap for the last criminal, saying they can catch him when he comes to get the key. I remember thinking, but Doctor, we don't know where the key is yet, how will you set this trap? Turns out the Doctor knew all along, that it was in the murder weapon. He didn't tell anyone since the information wasn't useful until that moment, apparently (why they didn't scan the murder weapon when looking for the key is beyond me. Detectives on Marinus are morons, I guess). When the prosecutor shows up to collect the murder weapon, they catch him, and all is forgiven (apparently the prosecutor isn't as vindictive as Kala, as he could have said he was in league with Ian too, but doesn't). The Doctor says the people of Milennius should read Pyrrho, and adopt his skepticism to improve their legal system. Ian expresses surprise that the Doctor has read Pyrrho, but the Doctor claims not to have read his work, he met the man, apparently. I love when the Doctor drops names, especially this early on in his travels. He's probably lying about it because his statement is all the evidence we have that he met the man, though we do know that he traveled a bit before An Unearthly Child (there are some super, super boring Big Finish* stories set before it, none of which detail this supposed meeting).


They warp back to what I call Good Model Island (so named such because I'm fond of the model work the production team did on it), and we see Altos tied up. Yartek, who helpfully explains who he is here, says he's killed Arbitan and wants Altos to give him the last key to the machine. Altos won't tell him, so he has Sabetha brought in. The Voord escorting her literally trips over his own feet on the way in, almost falling. Poor Voord, in only two episodes of the entire series, tripping over your own flipper feet, getting dissolved in your fish torpedoes because of a tear in your suit, and so on. You're so charming for being so incompetent! Anyway, Yartek plays Altos and Sabetha off each other, and they won't give up the key but want to protect each other because they're clearly in love. Altos tells Yartek the Doctor has the last key, so Yartek decides to set a trap for the Doctor.


Meanwhile, the rest of the group has arrived in the building, and they're trying to find each other. Ian whips his head around a corner and scares the crap out of the Doctor, who yells at him for it, "Oh, you drive me around the bend! I don't know what's going on!" and he mutters as they continue down the corridor. The TARDIS force field has been lifted, apparently, as the Doctor has checked it, so they can leave at any time. Ian and Susan go to find Arbitan while the Doctor and Barbara go to find Altos and Sabetha, since the Voord are still in the building, they discover, when they have to overpower one.


Ian and Susan go to the main room and talk to who they think is Arbitan, but is clearly just Yartek wearing his robe (note the giant Voord headpiece poking through the hood). Yartek, trying to act like Arbitan, lets slip that he doesn't know Altos, which tips Ian off that the person he's talking to isn't Arbitan since Arbitan sent Altos to find the keys originally. Ian leaves the fake key that Barbara found in "The Screaming Jungle" and they go to find the Doctor. They all meet up in the cell with Altos and Sabetha and free them, but Altos explains that when Yartek puts the fake key in the machine, that it'll blow up, likely taking the building with it. That then happens as they escape.


At the TARDIS, we get a mostly boring scene in which every character says goodbye to one another (streeeeetch that screen time out, Terry! Do it!), but thankfully, the Doctor also condemns Arbitans machine when saying goodbye to Sabetha. At least there's that - there's no way the Doctor, in any incarnation, would be okay with a machine controlling the people of an entire planet. It's too little too late, but it's something. We get one last shot of the model island as the TARDIS disappears (still, frustratingly, without the wheezing, groaning sound), and we cut to credits.


Look, I understand that The Keys of Marinus is a bit ropey, with plenty of goofy bad effects and actors tripping over themselves, but I just find the whole thing charming. Kala is an interesting character as I noted above, and Vasor, the brutal mountain hermit, is a terrifying enemy in a way no one has been so far (though Darrius, Arbitan's friend who lives in the Screaming Jungle, is an idiot. Can't win them all, I guess), and I'll always have room in my heart for brains in jars. I'll say it - I think the Keys of Marinus is an underappreciated episode from Doctor Who's first season. I had more fun watching it than Marco Polo, which I realize is probably Doctor Who fandom blasphemy, but it's the truth (though the big disadvantage is not being able to see Marco Polo. I can only imagine how dreadful Keys of Marinus would be if it were missing). Tomorrow is the beginning of the Aztecs, the supposed best story from the first season of Doctor Who. While I may not agree with that, I do quite like the serial.


*I like Big Finish, quite a bit, actually, but they do not do well in the space before An Unearthly Child. According to their story "The Beginning," which is supposed to be when the Doctor and Susan initially leave Gallifrey, the TARDIS they steal is being decommissioned by a man named Quadrigger Stoyn, and he's taken with them when they leave since he's in the ship. They go through a terribly generic adventure and end up leaving Stoyn behind, to be encountered again later by the Second Doctor. We're not told any reason why the Doctor left Gallifrey which is understandable, but implausible considering they literally leave it for the first time right at the beginning, and neither the Doctor or Susan comment on why, not even so much as a "I wonder if mom and dad will be okay." I understand that this release was part of the 50th anniversary year, but I wish they'd have left well enough alone, as it is quite a let down for the Doctor's first trip in the TARDIS. Sorry, Marc Platt, I like your Seventh Doctor work much better.


"Doctor Who" puns so far: 2 | Tomorrow: "The Temple of Evil"