Day 595: Terminus Part 4

Terminus is an odd beast of a story. There are parts of it that are actually rather good, such as, for instance, the fact that we discover that the Big Bang was caused by accident due to a load of unstable fuel being released, and that another accident that may end up occurring will cause the destruction of the Universe, which the Doctor must try and prevent. Other parts of the story aren't so good, such as the general structure, which gives almost two parts before half of the regular cast meet somebody relevant to the overall plot, which causes for some unwelcome structuring issues. Each good decision made in the making of the story can be given a counterexample of how bad a decision it is and vice versa. Roger Limb's music is rather poor throughout, but then gets quite touching at the end, for example. The design of the ship is well crafted, but overlit, removing all of its atmosphere. The Garm is a good character on the page, but a weak character on screen. Tegan and Turlough have good character moments at the beginning of the story, but are left essentially pointless by the end. All of these things leave me confused as to the quality of Terminus. Because, on the one hand, I really don't like it, but on the other, I can appreciate what they're trying to do, and I have to give the story at least some credit for that.

These are sentiments that can also be applied to the character of Nyssa, who leaves at the end of this story to go on and fight the space plague by developing a workable cure. She's a character that's more of a traditional Doctor Who companion, being technically minded, trusting of the Doctor, and a rather nice person. But she's constantly written badly, such as in Terminus, where for three episodes she constantly screams and worries about her predicament, or for Earthshock, where all she does is stay in the TARDIS for almost all of the story. But when she's written well, the character does actually work. Snakedance sees her as a loyal assistant to the Doctor, and a kind and caring friend for Tegan. The Visitation has her destroy the robot with a machine she built in the TARDIS, whilst acting as a calmer counterpoint to Tegan's complaining and Adric's whining. All in all, she's a good character, and I will miss her, but mainly because they managed to miss an opportunity with the character, and they could have had something really interesting.

Day 594: Terminus Part 3

So one of the problems with Terminus is the main monster used. It's called the Garm, and is a large humanoid figure with a wolf's head and glowing red eyes. Its purpose hasn't been fully explored in the story as of yet, but we know that it has something to do with the treatment of the people suffering from the space plague. It is clear from the script that the Garm is meant to be a frightening figure, one that lurks in the shadows and steals people away to its lair. This is not entirely apparent when looking at the creature on screen.

It's a figure that looks remarkably cuddly, as if it came direct from a show that I used to watch as a kid. The red eyes add a sense of menace, but the overall fluffy nature of the design kind of backfires on it. It's disappointing, as this is something in the script that could be good, and there is still the potential to make it good, if the lighting in the studio were less bright, leaving it to lurk in the shadows with only the red glowing eyes to add a sense of menace. But, sadly, it comes across as one of the most cuddly characters to be produced in Doctor Who's history.

Post-script: As I wrote this entry, the thought crossed my mind that maybe the Garm did come direct from somewhere in my memory of a show that I used to watch as a kid. Further investigation revealed an Australian childrens' programme called Lift Off, which I have virtually no recollection of, aside from a few brief moments. There was a wolf in the programme, who actually rather looks like the Garm in my opinion (aside from fur colour and the addition of dark glasses and a snazzy suit). So that's nice, I suppose.

Day 593: Terminus Part 2

Given that the first episode of this story was spent mainly exploring the surrounds of where the TARDIS has landed, it seems to imply that this episode is where the plot shall begin. It does do this, but only to a certain extent. We meet more characters in this episode, and observe the fact that there is more going on on this ship than we thought. Aside from the plague victims that formed the cliffhanger to the first episode, there is also a society that is possibly dedicated to treating the plague victims, or possibly dedicated to keeping the plague victims away from the rest of society. The story's a bit vague on that point. And that's the problem with this episode of the story.

Stephen Gallagher, the writer, isn't really advancing the plot in this episode. We observe things happening, but we don't get an explanation of why they are important, or why we should care for the myriad of characters that are being introduced. Instead, we are expected to be intrigued by what is going on, and to continue watching to discover the inner mysteries of Terminus. But we don't care enough about the story to want to continue watching this story. There's an easy explanation for why this occurs, by the way. Tegan and Turlough have been confined to a ventilation shaft for the entire episode. The Doctor, along with a character that we met in Part 1, is still busy exploring the ship and trying to find the TARDIS. Only Nyssa engages with the story of Terminus with the space plague, and even then her involvement isn't large enough for us to truly invest in the story.

But here's the thing about it. If this were Part 1, I honestly wouldn't care about all of this. Part 1 is generally used to learn about the surroundings and to become invested in the plot, or to provide scant details about the plot to intrigue viewers into a new story. This isn't really expected for Part 2, where we want to get a little bit more invested in the plot, and get a strong idea of what the story is all about. This is the sort of structuring issue that should have been fixed in the script editing stage, meaning that blame falls to Eric Saward for this issue that hampers what does actually have some small potential as a story.

Day 592: Terminus Part 1

We've got a bit of a story arc with regards to the character of Turlough. He spent the previous story, Mawdryn Undead, in the employ of the Black Guardian, attempting to kill the Doctor. This plot point was not completely resolved by the end of the story, hence the character is on board the TARDIS, acting as companion to the Doctor but secretly trying to kill him throughout each encounter.

This makes the beginning of Terminus rather interesting. It sets the scene with some character interactions between Turlough and Tegan, both of whom mistrust the other, as Turlough attempts to sabotage the TARDIS without anyone else noticing. It's nice to see this as it acts as an effective reminder of the events of the previous story, being that the new companion is here to cause havoc, and that nobody really likes him aside from the Doctor. It also gives the impression that the series, at the moment, is less about engaging with the stories and more about engaging with the regular cast members as they travel throughout the Universe, which can be seen by the fact that the plot doesn't really begin to happen until around 8 or so minutes into the story, prior to that it had just been discussions between characters.

However, the plot must start at some point, and tomorrow we'll perhaps have a look at the story of Terminus, as our voyage continues.

Day 545: Warriors' Gate Part 4

As it turns out, I was left nowhere with regards to understanding much of what happened in Part 3 of this story. But I do understand a good deal of the rest of it, oddly enough. The story concerns an alien race called Tharils. They are time sensitives, able to use their powers as god-like abilities in a variety of scenarios. They created an entire empire, and were rulers over it for a considerable period of time. But they were cruel gods, and enslaved both humans and robots to serve them. Naturally, an uprising occurred, and they were left helpless as the humans took control of them as their slaves, torturing them to use their time-sensitive abilities to traverse the universe. Their story is one of reversals, that they were once kings and now they are slaves, doomed throughout the cosmos, which is symbolised in the fact that the Doctor and Romana travel through a mirror to reach the point in history when they were rulers, as mirrors not only reflect incoming light, they present an image which is the reverse of the one which the mirror reflects. So they enlist the Doctor and Romana to help set themselves free, and in doing so create a better future.

This works as a story, mostly because of the way in which the story is revealed to us, through having us figure out their entire history and so we get that sense of satisfaction of figuring everything out. It would be a much less satisfying story if we were presented with a generic 'free the slaves' plotline, instead we get a story about helping someone, and we have to figure out both how they need to be helped and the motive for which we should give them help.

And there's one other thing about Warriors' Gate. At the end of it, Romana leaves. She makes a simple decision that she'd much rather be helping the Tharils than return to Gallifrey. The Doctor gives her K9, bids her farewell and leaves E-Space with Adric. It's a quick exit for two characters who have meant so much to the programme, K9 bringing humour as well as appeal for children, whilst Romana was a character who proved to be an equal to the Doctor in every way, shape and form, something that we often don't see with companions. It's a shame to see them leave, and more than that, to see them leave quickly, but that reflects the new period that we're in, production-wise. It's a period of 'out with the old, in with the new'. Or at least, out with some of the old...

Day 544: Warriors' Gate Part 3

When setting up this blog, I gave myself a few rules to follow. One such rule was no skips ahead. Aside from brand new episodes, I said to myself that I could not watch any episode until the day upon which I have it scheduled to appear on my blog. This has mostly worked well, but there are one or two hiccups that get in the way. One such hiccup is Warriors' Gate Part 3.

I've seen this story at least once before, maybe twice. I've read reviews of it and listened to analyses in the past as well, so I'm readily familiar with the basic beats of the story. I know, for instance, the journey of the Tharils, which we may perhaps talk about tomorrow. But in all that viewing, I can never really claim to fully understand what happens from about halfway through Part 3. Basically, Romana meets one of the Tharils, they hold hands and start glowing, then they walk off and disappear, re-appearing near the titular gate. At no point is any explanation given for how this occurs. It's all a bit confusing, and left me somewhat lost for words that didn't begin with a W, T, or F.

Another instance is the cliffhanger, where the Doctor would appear to be magically teleported from one position to another, because an axe hit the table in front of him. Or it may be that he travelled from one time period to another. It's the sort of thing that gives the idea that the production staff had a perfectly good idea of what was going on, but they failed to effectively communicate that on screen, leaving the viewers with very little idea as to what was going on.

But we get back to the hiccup at the introduction. As the episode concluded, I felt the need to put on Part 4. I needed to see whether an explanation would be made as to what everything means, with full discussions of the various concepts and their importance to the story. And the fact that I wanted to watch the rest of this must say something about the story, and how it somehow manages to draw viewers in, even if it's only to find out what the hell is going on.

Day 543: Warriors' Gate Part 2

An impressive thing about Warriors' Gate is how it deals with its supporting cast. We have a crew who have been similarly marooned at the zero point of the Universe, and through a combination of writing, directing, design and performance, we get to feel that this crew is easily one that is comfortable with one another and their surrounds. Take, for instance, a scene where Packard, a crew-member, gives some gobbledygook order to someone under his command. They respond quizzically, to which he responds by saying that it means to close the door. They promptly do, and so we get a shot of the door closing on his disappointed face, as he relays the information that he'd like it to be closed after he's gone through it. It's a simple character moment, but nice, and adds depth to the story, making it a more enjoyable experience on the whole.

Day 542: Warriors' Gate Part 1

When looking at Doctor Who stories en masse, it's easy to categorise them. There are those that are on alien worlds, those that have alien invasions, those that are less about a group of monsters and are more about just one villain, and those that are all about visiting history and meeting famous figures from the past. But there's another type, one that hasn't been shown very much in the 1970's and is about to make a return in the 1980's. We are about to witness the return of the trippy story.

Trippy stories are weird. Normally high concept, they look and feel different to everything else around it. They can be difficult to understand, but can be incredibly rewarding due to the intricate way in which the story has been constructed. But the main point to make here is that they're a bit weird. Take Warriors' Gate for instance. Part 1 features the Doctor and co. landing nowhere, the zero point that connects normal, or N-Space, with E-Space. We meet Biroc, who moves in such a way that he leaves a shadow in time behind of his past position. It's all very curious, and sparks the beginning of a story that's a bit different from everything else around it.