Day 688: Ghost Light Part 3

So what is Ghost Light about really? Well, there exists a creature named Light, who travelled around various planets, cataloguing all the various life forms that existed. There existed others who worked with him, such as Josiah, whose role on the ship was that, for each planet that they landed on, he took the form of the dominant species. This was in contrast to Control, whose job it was to remain in isolation and be the experimental control to Josiah's evolution. One day, Josiah decided to hijack the ship, and take it to Earth, where he would hopefully evolve to become head of the British Empire, through instigating a plot to assassinate Queen Victoria. So we've got this idea of evolution present in the story, as characters change their appearances to reflect changes in society. Control, who is locked up in the ship for much of the story, is almost always kept as a woman in rags, but slowly she forms herself into a proper Victorian lady, or ladylike as she refers to herself as.

But then, when Light awakens, he is rather cross. Firstly, at the fact that he's been left alone for all of that time, but also because, in his absence, Earth has evolved. Creatures such as humans have been able to change and adapt to their surroundings, while others such as the Neanderthal have been left to die out. Light decides to ensure that humans can never evolve again, by deciding to destroy all organic life on Earth, such that then nothing will evolve and everything will stay the same for his catalogue. But he's ignoring the very beauty that nature is. It changes as time changes, evolving and developing into new forms of life. It is a pointless exercise to catalogue and write down everything, instead it is far better to learn and understand what is going on, and to evolve as these notions evolve.

This is all a really interesting concept to base the story around, and there's plenty more within it that's hidden away in the depths of the adventure. But there is a massive problem with it. Almost all of this only really becomes apparent within the last third of the story, and even then, a fair portion is only accessible if close attention is being paid to what is going on. There's no scene where everybody sits down and explains the plot, instead we all are expected to pick it up as we go along and hope for the best, and that all will become clear by the time of the final act. It's why I've been avoiding talking about the story for the past few blog entries, because it's difficult to talk about something when it hasn't been made clear yet. One can only imagine having to watch this weeks apart, as it was originally transmitted, instead of watching it days apart for the purposes of the blog.

So we end up with a noble failure, something which reaches for the heavens, but doesn't quite get there because of the nature of the programme (it would probably work far better as one 75 minute story, or when everything is viewed in bulk). But in the undercurrents of this story, there's something very intriguing happening. We delve into Ace's past. A haunted house that she destroyed because she sensed something evil. But the Doctor is explicitly testing her, using her and traumatising her. A darker Doctor who plays and tests his companions. The next story in particular will look at this, and how Ace feels about it. And it's a story that I've been looking forward to for a while...

Day 687: Ghost Light Part 2

The next step in my understanding of Ghost Light came when I was around 14 or 15. My grandparents, out of nowhere, gave me a book that they'd found in a local bookstore about Doctor Who called Through Time: An Unofficial and Unauthorised History of Doctor Who. Written by Andrew Cartmel, script editor for the Sylvester McCoy era of the programme, it purported to be a potted history of the series, dipping into various stories throughout the years that Doctor Who had been on television. I began reading it, and it began a slow process in my mind of widening my horizons to the world of Doctor Who.

The book itself provided an in depth analysis of individual stories, examining their strengths and weaknesses as well as what the stories were ultimately about. I found this to be interesting, because I'd previously only engaged with Doctor Who as a viewer, getting excited about things appearing on screen but never really engaging with the text on a deeper level. So I guess that that book was a sort of catalyst for me starting to write this blog, trying to engage with stories and see why they are so good or so bad, or what is inherently interesting within them.

Now, the book wasn't perfect. I don't recall much from it, but I seem to think that Cartmel looked down on The Ribos Operation, which is something that I fundamentally disagree with. He also spent the chapter of the book dealing with his own time on the series in an unnecessarily fawning way, describing almost everything he did as some sort of masterpiece, which jarred with me at the time. But, he did spend some time on Ghost Light, where he examined the story and explained it. It was all about evolution, he said, and he doesn't see why this story is so hard to understand. And, once you know that, you can agree with him. I now watch this story with a degree of interest that I didn't have when I was 11 and first watching it, because I can see the hidden meanings in the story. But this doesn't necessarily mean that the story is good, nor does it mean that I would recommend it...

Day 686: Ghost Light Part 1

I have almost no doubt that I am the only person who got to watch Ghost Light thanks to Woman's Day magazine. You see, my mum was friends in high school with someone who would later go on to become editor of said magazine. Clearly, whilst they were having a catch-up session, my mum must have mentioned that I was interested in Doctor Who, and so I received some old review copies of Doctor Who DVDs that they clearly had lying around the office. All of this led to an interesting relationship with an interesting story.

My memories of watching this episode for the first time at the age of 11 or 12 are vague. A few shots here and there, a line of dialogue maybe, the excellent score by Mark Ayres, small things that stick in your mind after the adventure is over. Which leads me to have to fill in the gaps in my memory, to try and figure out what I thought of this episode. All I can come up with is that I was completely apathetic to this episode. I probably watched it, but it was all white noise, in one ear and out the other. It's because this story is not very good at enticing young kids into the world of Doctor Who, particularly after the rip-roaring adventure that was Battlefield. It's all a little bit too odd, and there's not quite enough that's being explained to really entice you into the story at large. But as I grew older, I began to understand...