Day 257: Spearhead From Space Episode 4

And I should probably talk about the plot for this episode at some point, shouldn't I? The story concerns a Nestene Consciousness, which is invading Earth by taking over plastics, mainly shop window dummies and the like. What this gives rise to is one of the most iconic scenes in the history of Doctor Who as shop window dummies come to life and begin attacking bystanders. This is at the very heart of what Doctor Who is sometimes claimed to be, a programme for traumatising young children by taking ordinary objects and making them terrifying. Or, to put it another way, to make the ordinary extraordinary. It's a fantastic scene, and one that was brilliantly conceived by Robert Holmes, the writer of this episode. By using these everyday objects in such a way, he is able to show how the series can survive now that it has been trapped on Earth. We are used to seeing alien worlds and alien creatures, but Holmes is able to show us that sometimes what's at home can be terrifying as well.

Day 256: Spearhead From Space Episode 3

One year ago today, I was quite tired. I'd gotten up at approximately 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning to watch a live simulcast of the revelation of the new actor to play the Doctor: Peter Capaldi. This was an interesting decision. Firstly, I knew that the majority of the piece that would be introducing him would be fair at best, aside from the brief interview with the new Doctor at the end. I also knew that I had a Chemistry laboratory later that day, and as we all know, drowsiness and acid go hand in hand. But I watched with anticipation, waiting to see who the new Doctor was, and wanting to speculate on what the new Doctor would be like.

Today, I watched Spearhead From Space Episode 3. After spending much of Episode 1 in a bed, Jon Pertwee is finally beginning to settle into the role of the Doctor (note that I use the word finally because Troughton managed to do it within seconds. But that's just the Power of The Power of the Daleks). His Doctor comes across as more of a charmer than Troughton, but also more serious. There's a distinct lack of playfulness with him, although he is able to give a look that can bring comfort to the most hardened viewer. And whilst he isn;t afraid to be serious, it isn't like the seriousness that plagued Hartnell occasionally, instead being a more warm scientist type, ready to go forth and science. In short, he's different from his predecessors, but the important thing is that he isn't too different. He's still recognisably the Doctor, and thus the audience can trust him. And so this early ability to trust means that we can thus be more willing to accept him in the future, when the Doctor changes a little bit from how we know him, such as fighting with alien monsters using martial arts, or arguing with pretty much everybody. Because at the heart of it, he's still the Doctor.

And in a roundabout way, this means that we can come back to Peter Capaldi. I'm intrigued to see the direction that he will go in, because he'll apparently bring with him so many things old and new to the role. But the important thing can be found in the writing, and in the fact that he's aware of what's come before. The writers are all able to write for the Doctor, and so they will make it recognisable to the viewer. This is why Doctor Who can be successful despite losing its lead actor every couple of years. Because it has the ability to remain constant in character, but building around the theme. This is why Capaldi will be interesting, as Pertwee is as well. Because it's interesting to see how the actors will interpret this theme of being the Doctor. And so when I get up ridiculously early in the morning to watch the simulcast of Deep Breath, I look forward to seeing what interpretation Peter Capaldi will bring to the role. And how he will build on his predecessors, including Jon Pertwee.

Day 255: Spearhead From Space Episode 2

So characters! We've got people old and new in this story. Old is represented by the Brigadier, familiar to viewers from both The Invasion and The Web of Fear. He brings with him a sense of comfort in these strange new times of change. He's also able to take charge with regards to the story, given that the Doctor is in a post-regenerative haze and is out of action for much of the first half. In this role, he performs admirably, showing that at the very least, the idea of UNIT taking over Doctor Who is sound.

New characters come through as well, such as Liz Shaw, the Doctor's new assistant. She's a more professional Zoe, being a scientist employed to be UNIT's scientific advisor. She's got an edge to her, choosing not to take orders from her military superiors, giving the impression that she is quite like the Doctor. It's clear that when Sherwin and Dicks created the character that they decided upon having the Doctor have an intellectual counterpart, as Zoe worked so well in the previous series. In a similar sense, the Brigadier fulfils much the same role as Jamie, being a trusted person by the Doctor and the male action hero. But how these roles will develop will be seen as the series continues.

And tomorrow, in a startling display of me being organised, we're going to take a look at our new Doctor

Day 254: Spearhead From Space Episode 1

Different. That's the major thought that I had after watching this episode. This is not really like anything that we've seen before. The story is set in the modern day, filmed in colour, and introduces a new Doctor. The new Doctor is different, something that we'll look at more once he gets into the swing of things. But one of the important things that I noticed is the freeness with which they discuss the alien nature of the Doctor. After years of hiding away in the shadows of the true nature of the Doctor, suddenly by revealing his race we now find out more details about our mysterious protagonist such as the fact that he has two hearts. But not only that, but there's also the fact that the series is now suddenly set in the modern day, and we aren't encountering science fiction premises at every corner, instead seeing mysteries that are to be solved. It's reminiscent of Quatermass, and shows how the series will be for the forseeable future. Tomorrow, we'll have a look at some of the characters that we'll be encountering in this series.

Day 185: The Ice Warriors SIX

One of the lovely things about this journey throughout Doctor Who is that I get to experience some stories that I've never seen before. When I say that, I don't so much mean getting to watch stories that I've heard about for years meaning that I finally get to actually see events that everyone else has been going on about for yonks. Instead, I mean that I get to see stories and be surprised by how much I'd overlooked this story because it's actually quite good. This is something that I've experienced with The Ice Warriors. Previously, I've considered it to just be another Second Doctor story, with the first appearance of the eponymous Martians, but now, I'm able to recognise it as a scientific story. It takes science and shows it all the ways in which it is used, whether it be through misunderstanding of how science works with the bad science present in this story, showing the fact that computers are not the be all and end all of modern science, and that there are other methods that others may prefer, and finally allowing science to save the day in the end. It's a good story, and vastly underrated, and I'm thrilled that this first viewing of this story was so pleasurable for me. And tomorrow, we encounter a story that also gave a very pleasurable first viewing for myself and several others, mainly because we never thought that it would ever happen...

Day 184: The Ice Warriors FIVE

For some reason, the Ice Warriors have been deemed important enough for me to feel the need to devote today's episode to talk about how they're used in this story. This is because they're going to return a couple more times over the course of the series, including in the post 2005 era as well, and so they have an associated aura of 'classic monster' with them that begs for them to be discussed. But I haven't talked about them so far because they aren't really that interesting. The design is nice, being a simple alien monster design that is able to stick in the minds of young children, and their voice, much like the Daleks before them, is instantly imitable, meaning that each little youngster in the playground can be a Martian, asssssss long assssssss they hisssssss the letter ssssssssssss. Their motivation, however, is weak. They're your basic invading alien force, with not much else to say about them. They were most likely brought back because the writer, Brian Hayles, enjoyed having an alien race of his own, and the Ice Warriors will be fleshed out wonderfully in coming stories, it just so happens that, at the moment, they're just another monster, with nothing to elevate them beyond a ssssssssssssupremely cool sssssssssspeech pattern.

Day 183: The Ice Warriors FOUR

Another interesting moment in this story is the death of Storr, and what it says about the way that science is treated in this story. Storr represents the anti-science movement, he resents all that technology brings and feels that it shall further destroy the planet, despite all the benefits that it could bring to his life. Indeed, when he discovers that, at the moment, the Ice Warriors' modus operandi is to attack the scientific base, he attempts to join them, as he feels that by destroying the scientists, good work will be done in the world, and he can assist in this regard. He soon finds out that this is a mistake, as he is promptly killed by the Martians, who see no use for him because they acknowledge that science is useful and that their major quarrel is not with science itself but instead with the people who are performing it, and they need science in order to survive. So, by having Storr die, this represents the way in which critics of the world scientific should be treated, particularly when they fail to listen to the words that are spoken from scientists about the future, as they bring things that will help you with your life, and if you choose to live your life without science, you may find yourselves in a spot of bother.

Day 182: The Ice Warriors THREE

In general, when I write this blog, I'll search for themes within the episode to discuss, such as which characters are interesting, how the direction is different or key elements within the plot. And one of the key plot strands within this story became quite pertinent to my day today. It wasn't that Martians decided to invade my Optics lecture, it was something far more mundane than that.

In real life, I'm in the process of studying for a degree in Physics. This involves regular laboratory sessions, some of which are computer based. These computer sessions will typically involve writing computer code to solve certain problems, and they can range from simple data entry to things that are supremely annoying. Today, I had a Special Relativity computer lab, which consisted of 8 young men taking it in turns to either shout loudly, swear, or place their heads in their hands out of sheer desperation. It's due to computers, which are wonderful things, but also somewhat temperamental. You can give them orders, but you have to do it in the right way and make sure that everything that you're doing is right, otherwise everything will go wrong.

It's a similar scenario that the Doctor faces in this story. He's offered the option of a computer but turns it down, preferring a pen and paper instead. Some of you who are reading this will think that this represents the Doctor being a Luddite, and rejecting technology in favour of the old ways of doing things, but in my mind, it made perfect sense. Because whilst computers can be useful, they can also be annoying, and there are also tiny subtelties that you can't always get when using a computer over working it out with pen and paper, like how the actual processes work so that you don't just know what the right answer is, but you also know how you got there and gained a greater appreciation of the science behind it.

I may have railed against the writer of this story for featuring some bad science a couple of days ago, but here it feels like one of the more accurate depictions of science that I've seen for a while.

Day 181: The Ice Warriors TWO

One of the most interesting characters that we meet in this story is Clent. He's the leader of the group, and prone to barking orders at anyone who'll take them, constantly checking with the computer before making any judgment, in order to get the best possible scenario for his team. However, in doing so he is blind to the other needs of his crew, and their need to do things in a different manner, such as Penley, one of his former scientists, who left the group because he was restricted by the methods that Clent was forcing upon him. Arden (another scientist) states of Clent that "he's not a proper scientist, he's an organiser. He should've been born a robot." He represents the things that restrict the world, the people who come along and organise things so that they all work in a manner that suits them. And it's appropriate that he should come across the Second Doctor, as he's the Doctor who looks at this sort of thing and brings it down (cf The Macra Terror), and indeed in any other story, Clent would be the main villain. But here, we've got other things to contend with.

Day 180: The Ice Warriors ONE

New story, new location. This time, we're in Earth's near future, and it's both amusing and terrifying to see how things will pan out in the history of Earth, according to Doctor Who. This is because this story has climate change as the background. Right now, you're probably thinking "Wow, wasn't Doctor Who really forward thinking in the 1960's, having a story all about climate change before we realised how much it truly affects us" (unless you happen to be a idiot, in which case you're probably thinking that because climate change appeared on a science fiction program, it is therefore science fiction, at which point you shall resume diving into your pools of cash, Scrooge McDuck style). But, this episode gets it slightly wrong. And by slightly, I mean catastrophically. You see, it is stated that all the plants have died out, causing a lack of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This is wrong. Plants convert carbon dioxide into oxygen, thus meaning that we can still breathe without having to wear face masks all the time. A lack of plants would mean an excess of carbon dioxide, which would enhance the Greenhouse Effect. The Greenhouse Effect is that carbon dioxide and other 'greenhouse gases' form an atmospheric layer around the Earth, meaning that heat from the Sun is kept within the Earth's atmosphere and thus ensuring that we don't all freeze to death (as is happening in this episode, incidentally, meaning that it was right about something, a lack of carbon dioxide would cause things to become rather colder). Therefore, if the Greenhouse layer is increased due to more carbon dioxide, due to the lack of plants, then that would mean that we would experience a sort of 'global warming', or a 'climate change' which would mean that humanity would be somewhat doomed. So, in conclusion, this story has some poor scientific choices, but it is nice that the writer, Brian Hayles, did consider the environment when constructing this story, even if he had no idea how to go about it.

Also, I'd just like to give a quick thank you to both Lesley Wong and Mitchell McLeod, who both backed up my scientific hypothesis. The moral of the story is always back up your scientific claims before you post them online.

Day 169: The Evil of the Daleks Episode 7

The ending of this episode is quite big, featuring lots of destruction as the Daleks rebel against each other, half of them being pure Dalek and the other half having the Human Factor implanted within them. And as it ends, we realise that this is it, the Daleks have finally been destroyed for the last time. And to an extent that's true, it'll be years before we encounter them again, and so we have to realise how interesting this move in the series is. It's because the Daleks have been intrinsically linked with Doctor Who, ensuring that the series remained reasonably popular over the past couple of years, and by taking them away, the series is going to have to resort to other means to draw viewers in. Fortunately, it's got Patrick Troughton, who over the course of his first year in the role, has made the show more interesting, making him into a more mercurial figure and thus giving the show a new life. Also, the writing has remained strong, and there are probably other methods that the show will go down in order to ensure its survival. We'll just have to wait and see what comes up.

Day 168: The Evil of the Daleks Episode 6

One of the most interesting characters that we've encountered so far in this serial is Theodore Maxtible. Once again, it's not so much the performance or the direction that causes interest here (although both are very good indeed), instead it's the writing of the character. Maxtible is a man who appear to have been forced by the Daleks to follow their orders. However, there are hidden depths to the character, as he is far more willing to work with the Daleks than everyone else, due to his greed for power and his pursuits in trying to find equipment that will turn base metals into gold. He represents the antithesis to the Human Factor that the Doctor searches for, and finds in Jamie, as Maxtible brings with him the less desirable aspects of the human condition, and this allows the story to have depth. It's not a story about how all humans are better than Daleks, instead it's able to show the true Human Factor, why the humans are able to defeat the Daleks for the most part, and also why they are able to occasionally win. But now we wait for the serial's inevitable conclusion...

Day 167: The Evil of the Daleks Episode 5

One of the best things about this serial is the conclusion to this episode. It's not a cliffhanger, but it's still thrilling nonetheless because it represents a key movement forward in the plot of the story. The Daleks have just been injected with the human factor and they pick the Doctor up and carry him away. But not in the sort of Evil Dalek way that we've come to expect from these diabolical pepperpots. No, instead, they're more playful, as the Doctor says "They're playing a game!". Suddenly, everything that we know about the Daleks is wrong because they have gained playfulness, emotion, they have become human. This is the thing that Whitaker is not afraid to do: have cliffhangers without action. This cliffhanger doesn't feature a scare, but it does develop the plot in such a way as to ensure that interest is held. The audience may not want to tune in next week to find out how our heroes will get out of this sticky situation, but they might tune in to see how the plot develops, and what will happen now that things have changed completely. The Evil of the Daleks has somehow become The Playfulness of the Daleks, and this viewer can't wait to see what happens next.

Day 166: The Evil of the Daleks Episode 4

So the Doctor has been forced to work for the Daleks as they search for the 'human factor' and so Jamie is used as an unwitting test subject in order to observe the behaviour of humans. But what makes this so well done is that the Doctor must keep this test a secret from his companion, and so he has to coerce him into doing the test (rescuing the daughter of one of the characters in the story from the clutches of the Daleks). The way that he does this is by making Jamie lose faith in the Doctor, and so he'll go forth and do the adventure by himself and not wait for the Doctor's orders. It's the sort of thing that could only happen at this point in the series, where Jamie has been not been in the series long enough to trust the Doctor no matter what, but it also has to be a fair way into the series such that Jamie's accusations of betrayal still hit hard, because the audience has grown to like Jamie over the past serials that he's been involved in, and to see him be betrayed by the Doctor is a saddening moment, even if you know that it is for the greater good. This also shows the hidden darkness of the Doctor, that occasionally the ends may have to justify the means, and what makes this more unsettling is that the ends haven't entirely been revealed to us. But we'll get to that tomorrow.

Day 165: The Evil of the Daleks Episode 3

And so the Daleks' quest in this episode is to find the 'human factor'. It's because they're fed up with being defeated by humans all of the time and they want to figure out what's different about humans so that they can become stronger through it. It's a wonderful idea, because it shows the Daleks as clever beings. Terry Nation, the Daleks' creator, claimed that he never thought that David Whitaker 'got' the Daleks. This is obviously not true, because Whitaker understands how to make the Daleks work. They exist in a world full of monsters, each one of them waiting to jump out in front of you and give you a scare. And this is how the Daleks have operated previously, relying on direction and design to give the thrills that audiences need. But Whitaker understands that these are cheap thrills, and in order to give a longer lasting impression, he is to give the Daleks menace, and make them cunning. He makes it so that they learn from their mistakes, and are intelligent monsters, not the average creature that you'd expect to see on Doctor Who.

Day 164: The Evil of the Daleks Episode 2

And so this episode, not content with just having the Daleks involved, also decides to involve time travel. The ways in which it's involved are wonderful though. For a start, it's used to travel from one place to another, which means that the story is able to flow seamlessly from the previous story. Instead of having the harsh jump between a modern day adventure to a Victorian Dalek story, now we get to slide and so the series feels more real, so that the characters feel slightly realler because of this sense of continuity making the stories seem more real, not just a generic science fiction show. But time travel is also used for a Victorian gentleman to take pieces from his time, and sell them as antiques in the future, which is such a wonderful idea, showing that Whitaker is able to play with ideas and concepts, which draws curiosity for this viewer at least as to how this story will play out over the next couple of episodes.

Day 163: The Evil of the Daleks Episode 1

Like most Dalek stories, the Daleks are hidden for the first episode, in order to build tension for their arrival. This can either lead to the awkwardness of not acknowledging the enemy, or building up the story before the characters begin to get involved. Thankfully, this episode is written by David Whitaker, who is able to clearly define his story whilst building up an element of tension. It's only halfway that the science fiction element begins to seep its way through the script, before that it was a simple piece about trying to find out who has stolen the TARDIS, however slowly but surely, odd moments begin to appear. Hidden rooms and unknown forces guiding the characters, and yet the Doctor and Jamie are kept largely away from this action. But this doesn't matter because both story paths are good, we find out about the villain's plot by watching them, instead of having them explain it to the Doctor, and we get the Doctor and Jamie exploring the world as well, discovering more about the story. Through this, it means that when the Daleks do appear, while it's expected, it still brings with it a certain aura of having another problem to deal with besides the other issues that have been witnessed in this story. But questions still remain, the answers to which we might get sooner than you'd think...

Day 134: The Tenth Planet Episode 4

It's just like any other final episode of a serial. The Doctor issues orders, the young male lead partakes in some action sequences, the young female lead gets captured and the baddies are defeated once more. But something feels different this time. The Doctor states when he wakes up that his body is "wearing a bit thin". It's an odd turn of phrase, it feels alien. We forget that the Doctor isn't one of us sometimes, but we put it down to him just being odd, and go on with our business watching the episode. After the Cyber-threat has been dealt with, we see the Doctor once more, but he's more aloof, more mysterious. Something is definitely happening as he goes off to the TARDIS, hurriedly sending it into flight. And even the TARDIS sounds different this time, reminding us that this now normal part of our lifestyle is secretly alien. Thing are different, changing before our eyes. The Doctor collapses onto the TARDIS floor. Again, this is nothing new, part of the way that the series works is that the Doctor is thrown into peril at the end of a serial to draw viewers back next week. But this is no ordinary peril. The camera moves to the Doctor's face and as the familiar wheezing groaning sound of the TARDIS engines roars away, we see a light envelop it, as the once familiar face of the Doctor becomes unfamiliar. Hartnell's grumpy old face that we've come to love, becoming the heart and soul of the programme and one of the primary reasons that we tune in week after week is dying, but a new face is coming. A younger face. New life is brought into this dying old programme. We don't know what is going on, how this is happening or indeed why this is happening, but it is. Doctor Who is changing, no, it's regenerating. Taking something that was hurt and bringing it back to life, albeit with a few changes. It could fail, it could succeed, we really don't know. But what we do know is that this series isn't just going to sleep. It's Got Work To Do.

Day 133: The Tenth Planet Episode 3

Can Doctor Who survive without the Doctor? It's a nice question, and one that comes to mind as we witness the Doctor collapse at the beginning of this episode and not appear at all, leaving the plot to be filled with the supporting cast, as Ben and Polly take the action and compassion roles respectively, whilst a helpful scientist becomes this serial's ally and a headstrong general becomes an antagonist, leaving the Doctor without a role in this serial at all. So because his appearance is not necessary, it's becoming apparent that perhaps Doctor Who could survive without the Doctor, and just make it a series featuring a blue police box that travels through space and time. But this serial is a bad example because it doesn't quite feel like Doctor Who. As mentioned before, the Doctor barely appears, and so the supporting cast fill out the rest of the story. This gives the end result of the programme feeling like a generic (although rather good nonetheless) science fiction serial. But with the Doctor, the series gains a purpose, being able to bring things back to the original concept, about people travelling through time and space, and not just travelling through time and space. Doctor Who does need the Doctor, or rather, a Doctor.

Day 132: The Tenth Planet Episode 2

This episode is of course famous for introducing the Doctor's number two foe, the Cybermen. Created by the writer Gerry Davis and the scientist Kit Pedler, they are monsters with similar concepts to what we have seen before, but presented in a new and profoundly unsettling way. We have seen, particularly with the Robomen in Dalek Invasion of Earth, the idea of humans having their humanity taken away from them, something key to the Cyber-mythos, however it's presentation is different here, because it's willingly done. The inevitability of death, disease and destruction coupled together with the growing rise of technology leads for people to slowly lose their humanity and give into the cold heart of the machine. This is something that's depressingly plausible, and makes these foes different from anything else that's come before. The Daleks succeeded because of their design, while the Cybermen succeed due to their idea, the fundamental horror behind them. Their design accentuates this horror, showing us a human face behind the mask, and human hands, but still there is the machine and the mechanical voice. These creatures are terrifying, as they show us not the inevitability of death, but the inevitability of technology.