Resurrection of the Daleks

One of the aspects that distinguished the Hinchliffe/ Holmes era was that, however bleak the scenario, lively dialogue, character interaction and some dark humour gave it more depth. Eric Saward seems to have watched that era but perhaps not as closely as a script editor should because while he brings the nihilistic grit, he omits the nuances that made it more palatable. Sometimes this works giving the show an unexpectedly dark thematic palette. Sometimes however it can be too unrelenting. The Daleks were never a barrel of laughs so one expects their stories to skew grimmer than others and `Resurrection of the Daleks` definitely does that.  

 

Frontios

 Studio bound, dialogue heavy with a bold concept and lashings of incidental music `Frontios` is very much like season eighteen in style, not surprising since it’s penned by that season’s script editor Christopher H Bidmead. It does make you wish he’d done a second season as whatever shortcomings the production has, its intent is steelier, more sci-fi and definitely serious. He writes the main trio so well and the actors each rise to the occasion while the story incorporates some interesting ideas. He did later admit some of these were poached from Nigel Kneale but that you should “steal from the best”. If the results are like this, then why not? Doctor Who had some of its greatest successes with stories filched from outside sources and remade in the series’ style.

Warriors of the Deep

 

I once found myself chatting with Pennant Roberts back stage at an event and when the conversation switched to `Warriors of the Deep` I pondered why he’d not decided to spruce up the atmosphere by having everything doused in emergency red lighting, like that on a submarine. Was it, perhaps, something technicians would not agree with, was it too expensive or was it because it was felt viewers would find the results too murky? As it turned out, it was none of these things. He agreed it would have definitely added something to what is a somewhat over lit production but admitted that, simply, nobody had time to think about it. This was a hint of what we now know was a troubled production that had two weeks’ time taken from its schedule. By those criteria it’s a miracle anything much turned up on screen. Even when things were proceeding as normal there were crazy deadlines and limited scope which was Doctor Who’s biggest enemy whatever the era.

Some thoughts on Doctor Who Season 20

 

I recently bought the twentieth anniversary season Collection so thought that as well as watching the extras, I'd give the actual stories a gander as well. Some of them I'd not seen in ages.  For an anniversary event, season 20 can seem odd with its best stories leaning on the more abstract and its less good ones the more traditional. Not exactly a great advert for the show’s history but a suggestion of a new direction? Forty years distance does allow the more nuanced feel of the season to shine rather more than had it been rammed full of big action stories. There may seem to be long sequences were not a lot happens but the better parts of the season are still rich in content if not pace. So now its recently been released in a great big blu ray collection it’s a good reason to re-watch. Here’s some thoughts on each of them from a 2023 perspective…

Arc of Infinity

Notwithstanding the Ergon, I enjoyed this more than I thought I would. Fan lore suggests a third-tier tale and while it’s definitely not in any danger of being an under rated classic it does open the season with some verve considering the more thoughtful pace of the rest of the stories. It’s a traditional offering with the added luxury of location filming supported by a decent attempt from writer Johnny Byrne to justify the location. Byrne’s behind the scenes interview hints at aspects that perhaps were shunted to one side by the shopping list of contents – Omega, Tegan coming back (having never really left), Amsterdam – that sit awkwardly together. Coincidence is essential in fiction but the levels it rises to here are somewhat implausible. The story does manage to froth up into a decent thriller though would surely have been better had the antagonist been a new character.

Earthshock

 It is forty years since Doctor Who fans got two big shocks with `Earthshock`. I was lucky enough not to know what was coming up in this story so I was able to be shocked indeed.  Anyone who watched the episode live back then will tell you what a big impact it had- the latest DWM has some examples- and all this time later it remains one of those stories that you watch with anticipation. The edge is still there- this is not a cosy watch like for example `Revenge of the Cybermen`, it’s a thriller with bite. It wasn’t just fans who were affected by `Earthshock`. It proved to be a hugely influential story on this period of the series which turned out to be a good and a bad thing. On the positive side it’s style led to a number of subsequent stories pushing the envelope when it came to both scripts and presentation such as `Caves of Androzani,` `Revelation of the Daleks` and `Vengeance on Varos`. However it also started a trend for a more violent streak in the show which ultimately was a contributing factor to the 1985 hiatus.