Day 154: The Macra Terror Episode 2

Much like several stories that we've encountered before, The Macra Terror is not too big on showing the monsters for the first couple of episodes. This breaks Doctor Who away from other series of the same genre, because it encourages storytelling over effects. In doing so, it means that this story is able to actually have a purpose, and do things with how it is told, rather than just be reduced to cheap scares in some B-Movie style generic action adventure. There's a brief interview with the director Gordon Flemyng, where he is asked about why he took on his latest film, an adaptation of The Dalek Invasion of Earth, and he responded by saying that, whilst he enjoyed 'message' films, he preferred to make 'entertainment' films. It's an interesting division to make, because it draws to attention the fact that Doctor Who can straddle the line between entertainment and message, due to having monsters, but also having decent stories to tell as well. This is yet another example of why Doctor Who is different from other series on television, it's not afraid to hide its monsters if it's got a bigger story to tell.