TV Review: Doctor Who: The Keys of Marinus (1964)

Doctor Who: The Keys of Marinus (1964) written by Terry Nation and directed by John Gorrie

The First Doctor (William Hartnell) lands on a strange island on a strange planet called Marinus. The beach has sand and glass, the ocean is acid. One-man submarines (they look more like torpedoes) deliver some locals to the island. One of those locals menaces Susan (Carole Ann Ford), so they must be the bad guys. The Doctor and his companions head to the only building on the island. Inside they discover Arbitan (George Colouris), the last scientist in charge of the Conscience of Marinus, a machine that eliminates evil inclinations and thoughts from the planet's population. The machine was shut off when the Voord (those are the guys from the subs) rebelled and started taking advantage of the people who would not fight back against the Voord's violence. The scientists have decided to restart the machine with a stronger setting to overcome to Voord. The only problem is that four microchips from the machine have been scattered across the planet. All the other scientists, including Arbitan's daughter, have gone to get the chips but never came back. Arbitan enlists the Doctor's group to help him. Well, he throws up a force field around the TARDIS so they can't leave until they help him. They reluctantly agree.

They travel all over the planet, encountering different people in different situations (a forest full of evil plants; a trapper on a frozen mountain; a big city). They eventually join up with the daughter who helps them out. The story follows the standard solve problems/get captured/escape from capture routine that is in a lot of Doctor Who stories. The variety of problems is nice and viewers get a sense that the planet has all sorts of people on it. That part is fun. They could have been stand-alone single episodes except for the overarching mission.

The sets exhibit a variety of quality from well-done to barely finished. One city treats the TARDIS crew to a luxurious life and the room has plenty of statues and hanging decorations. On the other hand, there's an ice cave that looks like plastic wrap on cardboard boxes. The rubber-suited bad guys at the beginning are locals wearing rubber suits to protect themselves from the acid ocean, so it is not as bad as it looks.

Recommended--I found the show entertaining and I make allowances for their low-budget.

TV Review: Doctor Who: The Sensorites (1964)

Doctor Who: The Sensorites (1964) written by Peter R. Newman and directed by Mervyn Pinfield and Frank Cox

The First Doctor (William Hartnell) lands the TARDIS on an Earth spaceship from the 28th century. The ship is trapped near the Sense-Sphere, where the locals (the Sensorites) have kept them. The locals do some brain manipulation on the humans but are otherwise not hostile. One of the crew has been driven mad--he was a geologist who discovered a valuable mineral on the planet. The locals fear being wiped out by humanity when they come to mine their homeworld. The Doctor works with the future humans and the Sensorites to resolve the situation.

The show is fairly interesting. The Sensorites' government is clearly patterned after Plato's Republic, with a leader class, a warrior class, and a working class. These classes live in harmony for the most part. The occasional bad eggs are messing up the system with their personal ambitions and xenophobia. They want to solve the problem by killing the humans. The good leaders are very mild and forgiving. The conflicts with the humans and the hard work of peaceful negotiation and trusting others makes for good drama. Even the costumes and makeup for the Sensorites looks good by Doctor Who standards.

Recommended.

TV Review: Doctor Who: The Five Doctors (1983)

Doctor Who: The Five Doctors (1983) written by Terrance Dicks and directed by Peter Moffatt

The Fifth Doctor (Peter Davison) experiences some cosmic illness and is sucked back to the Time Lords' home world of Gallifrey. But not to just any part of Gallifrey--he's been pulled into the Death Zone. The Death Zone is an ancient area where combatants were placed to provide gladiator-style entertainment. The Zone was sealed off by Rassilon, a Time Lord with great powers and an even greater moral sense. As it happens, not only is the Fifth Doctor hijacked, but also the First Doctor (played by Richard Hurndall, replacing the late William Hartnell), the Second Doctor (Patrick Troughton), and the Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee). The Fourth Doctor (Tom Baker) is also kidnapped but he gets trapped in the time vortex and does not arrive on Gallifrey.The four Doctors travel to the Dark Tower at the heart of the Death Zone. The Tower is Rassilon's tomb, a place that legendarily can grant amazing powers.

The other Time Lords see the disturbance of the Doctor's timeline and send in the Master (Anthony Ainley) to get the Doctor out of the Death Zone. Sending in his worst enemy seems like a bad idea and none of the Doctors wants to work with him. They go through a lot of shenanigans to get to Rassilon's burial chamber, where the true mastermind behind the scheme reveals himself and tries both to achieve immortality and eliminate the Doctors.

The episode celebrated the twentieth year of Doctor Who. Baker did not want to come back for this special episode, so footage from an unaired episode was used to shoe-horn his Doctor in. The plot is a nice excuse to bring back not only the previous incarnations of the Doctor but also a lot of beloved companions and villains, some in minor cameo roles. Viewers need a bit of familiarity with these Doctors in order to appreciate a lot of the jokes and references. Without that background, the episode is probably much less interesting and enjoyable.

Recommended, but be sure to have some knowledge of the first several incarnations of the Doctor.

TV Review: Doctor Who: The Edge of Destruction (1963)

Doctor Who: The Edge of Destruction (1963) written by David Whitaker and directed by Richard Martin

The First Doctor (William Hartnell) and his crew barely escape from Planet Skaro when the TARDIS seems to crash. Everyone is knocked out. When they come to, several have amnesia. The amnesia quickly dissipates but they are suspicious of each other. The view screen only shows pictures of previous trips, not where they are now. The doors won't open. Every time Susan or the Doctor approach the control panel, they get massive headaches. Is there some malfunction or is there a malevolent presence on the TARDIS?

The show is only two half-hour episodes. Even with the short running time it feels long and very odd.  The actors performances are off, which may be accounted for by the amnesia but really seems like they didn't know what the story was leading to. The ultimate solution is a bit of a let-down. The whole story takes place on the TARDIS, so this looks like low-budget filler episodes to offset the other stories that had a lot more production costs.

Not recommended except for Doctor Who completists.

TV Review: Doctor Who: The Daleks (1963)

Doctor Who: The Daleks (1963) written by Terry Nation and directed by Christopher Barry and Richard Martin

The First Doctor (William Hartnell) lands the TARDIS on an unidentified planet. The local plants have all been petrified and radiation is high. As the Doctor and his companions investigate, they spot a seemingly abandoned city. Earthlings Ian (William Russell) and Barbara (Jacqueline Hill) are eager to return to Earth (this being their second adventure with the Doctor, and indeed the second series of the show) and aren't interested in exploring the city. The Doctor is interested and contrives a reason to go to the city (the TARDIS is out of mercury!). Once they get there, the group is separated and Barbara is the first to be captured by the citizens of the city--the Daleks! They were at war with the Thals, a war that went nuclear, turning the planet into a wasteland five hundred years ago. The Thals are back in the area looking for food and to make peace with the Daleks, so everyone can live happily on the planet.

This is the very first appearance of the Daleks. The story includes a lot of background for the Daleks that has remained canon. They are cunning and xenophobic and do say they will "exterminate" enemies in their monotone, robotic voices (the shoutiness comes later). They have an aversion to stairs and are yucky little monsters inside that big metal casing. No wonder they became the iconic villains of the show.

The plot moves along slowly (it's seven half-hour episodes!) but intelligently. A lot of character development happens, something you don't quite expect from a show that was aimed at children. The Doctor's selfishness is depicted negatively, which surprised and satisfied me. Everyone has their flaws and their strengths. Overall, it's a great series.

Highly recommended.

TV Review: Doctor Who: An Unearthly Child (1963)

Doctor Who: An Unearthly Child (1963) written by Anthony Coburn and directed by Waris Hussein

Two school teachers, Ian (William Russell) and Barbara (Jacqueline Hill), are worried about one of their star pupils. Susan Foreman (Carole Ann Ford) knows more science and history than they do but she doesn't know how many shillings are in a pound. Susan's excuse is because Britain is not on the decimal system yet. Barbara lives with her grandfather. When the teachers sneak off to the address, they discover a junk yard with a police box inside. The grandfather (William Hartnell) shows up and tries to shoo them away. Barbara comes out of the police box and the teachers force their way in, only to discover it is larger on the inside. It is in fact the TARDIS, a time and space ship that the Doctor and his granddaughter use to travel. They take Ian and Barbara to pre-historic Earth where they run into a tribe that's just lost the only member who could start fires. One of the natives sees the Doctor lighting his pipe, bonks the Doctor over the head, and takes him back to the tribe. The others try to save the Doctor and get dragged into the political conflict between two guys who want to be the firestarter and thereby the head of the tribe.

These are the very first episodes of Doctor Who and are a fun introduction to the show. The beginning is very mysterious and slowly reveals the fantastic premise of the show. The primitive tribe is a little bit cliche, though the show probably needs some familiar stuff so that everything isn't completely off the wall. Hartnell is a fascinating Doctor, grumpy and secretive. The rest of the cast does a good job and the pre-historic setting meant that they had no rubber-suited monsters or really cheap-looking sets. They will have plenty of that in the future.

Recommended, especially for Doctor Who fans.

TV Review: Doctor Who: Twice Upon a Time (2017)

Doctor Who: Twice Upon a Time (2017) written by Stephen Moffett and directed by Rachel Talaley

The Twelfth Doctor (Peter Capaldi) winds up in Earth's arctic at the same time as the First Doctor (here played by David Bradley though in the 1960s by William Hartnell). They both refuse to regenerate and might have gotten into an interesting conversation about it if a British World War I officer hadn't blundered into their meeting. Naturally, that's quite odd for the arctic in 1986. The Doctors begin to investigate and find that some crystalline people have been snatching other people on the brink of death for mysterious purposes. The adventure is afoot!

This Christmas special features several old standbys for Doctor Who--multiple Doctors, the regeneration (which is a farewell for one actor and an introduction of another), and tying off some loose ends. The two Doctors are fun together even though it is a bit odd to have a different actor playing the First Doctor (Bradley had played William Hartnell before in a TV movie about Doctor Who's early years). Bradley does a good job though the script goes out of its way to portray him as sexistly old-fashioned (mostly for comedic effect), something that rings false with what I've seen of the Hartnell episodes. The First Doctor's resistance to regenerating is also something shoehorned into the story (it had little basis in The Tenth Planet, when Hartnell's Doctor regenerated). It makes an interesting parallel to the Twelfth Doctor, so it's less bothersome. The rest of the plot is rather run of the mill for Doctor Who--fun but ridiculous. Some old companions (and one old nemesis) show up so Capaldi can have a farewell and some closure. Capaldi does a good job with his big final speech before regenerating. The one or two really beautiful moments are outweighed by a lot of weaker moments in the story. The whole episode feels a bit perfunctory and follows the recent trend of good actors trying to make the best of mediocre to poor writing in the show.

The new Doctor (Jodie Whittaker, who played the mom in Broadchurch) shows up for two minutes and tries to keep the TARDIS from falling apart. She has hardly any dialogue, just bits of action (though not picking out a new outfit as new Doctors often do). It's hard to make an assessment of her, other than it seems like a desperate ploy to be trendy and relevant by having a female take over a male role (which really isn't an assessment of her as an actress but of the situation in general). It looks like a politically correct choice rather than an artistic choice, which generally means we'll get bad art. I hope I'm wrong but only time will tell.

Overall, this hasn't inspired me to jump back into Doctor Who. I can't quite recommend it.

TV Review: Doctor Who: The Tenth Planet (1966)

Doctor Who: The Tenth Planet (1966) written by Kit Pedler and Gerry Davis, directed by Derek Martinus

The First Doctor (William Hartnell) has his swan song when the TARDIS lands at the Earth's south pole in 1986 (which was twenty years in the future from the original broadcast date; now it is over thirty years ago!). He and companions Polly (Anneke Wills) and Ben (Michael Craze) arrive at a base directing various space ships. Things go haywire when a new planet shows up, coming toward the Earth. The new planet is absorbing energy from the Earth (and the space ships). If that wasn't bad enough, a ship from the new planet lands by the base and the aliens who come out are Cybermen (in their very first appearance).

The story has a lot of fairly convincing science (writer Kit Pedler was a medical doctor in addition to being a science fiction writer) and impressive looking sets. The "mission control" set has plenty of levels and sciencey equipment. The humans have a hard time getting their space ships back on the Earth; they have a missile that could be used to destroy the other planet, but as usual for Doctor Who, the characters discuss the moral and physical ramifications of using a planet-destroying weapon. Will the earth be in jeopardy too? Can they kill off a whole other race? I found the story quite interesting.

The production did have some challenges. Hartnell collapsed during the second episode, requiring some quick redistribution of his lines while his character recuperated in a different room for a couple of episodes. Hartnell recovered enough to act in the last episode. The end of the episode features the first regeneration of the Doctor (thus the first appearance of Patrick Troughton as the Second Doctor). Unfortunately, the fourth episode was lost in the BBC archives and only bits of it are extant. All the audio was available. This DVD has an animated fourth episode that works to finish the story. It also has a version of the fourth episode that was released on VHS--photos were substituted in for the missing video with subtitles to explain any story details. The reconstruction is less satisfying than the animated version but still interesting.

The Cybermen are great villains--they are basically humans that have taken so many cybernetic attachments that they all they have left are organic brains. Everything else is robotic. In the process, they've shed emotions, living solely by reason (it would be interesting to see a match-up between Cybermen and Vulcans). If the Cybermen are in trouble, it's only logical to take what they need from others, even if that involves the death of others. Their cold-hearted methods makes them unnerving. Their voices have a computer cadence that is also off-putting. Considering other 1960s Doctor Who baddies, the Cybermen costumes are impressive though certainly not as sleek as their 2000s counterparts.

Recommended.

TV Review: Doctor Who: The Aztecs (1964)

Doctor Who: The Aztecs (1964) written by John Lucarotti and directed by John Crockett

First Doctor William Hartnell lands the TARDIS in 16th century Mexico. The Spanish Conquistadors have not yet arrived and the Aztec culture is in full development. Except that there's been a drought and the people are hoping for the gods to save them. High Priest of Sacrifice Tlotoxl is ready to perform a human sacrifice (a common thing in Aztec culture) to bring back the rain. The TARDIS lands inside a temple and companion Barbara (the school teacher whose expertise is history) is the first one out. She is mistaken for a reincarnation of their god Yetaxa. She not only thinks it will be good fun to be divine, she also plans to end the evil parts of Aztec culture so that when the Conquistadors do come, they won't wipe out the Aztec civilization.

The Doctor (who is mistaken for her servant) strongly objects to altering history, saying it is impossible. Barbara insists on trying, which arouses the suspicions of Tlotoxl. Another high priest, Autloc, is the High Priest of Knowledge and more willing to change their customs. Barbara is encouraged by his reaction but as the story goes on, it's clear that Autloc is the odd man out and Tlotoxl represents the views of most Aztecs. Since the TARDIS is stuck behind a one-way door in the temple, the Doctor and his companions can't just run away immediately, making their stay longer and more perilous than they would like.

The show is a fascinating look at and discussion of pre-Columbia Aztec culture. While clearly condemning the abominable evil that went on, the show walks a fine line in presenting the barbarity of the culture while showing that not every aspect of the culture was evil. The supporting characters (even the villains) are well-developed and understandable if not always sympathetic.

The show also benefits from the high production values. The sets and costumes look great and the actors all give fine performances. The bad guys don't chew the scenery and no rubber-suited aliens are on display. One or two fight sequences are slow and unexciting. The cliff-hangers for the four parts of the story all work well.

Highly recommended.

Movie Review: Odd Man Out (1947)

Odd Man Out (1947) directed by Carol Reed

Johnny McQueen (James Mason) has been hiding out for six months since breaking out of a Northern Ireland prison. He's an Irish nationalist and has been planning a big heist to finance the nationalists' activities. His friends (including his new girlfriend) try to convince him not to go on the heist since he's been out of the action for so long. He goes anyway. Things go awry during the getaway and Johnny is left on the streets of Belfast with a bullet in his shoulder. As he tries to get back to the safe house, he runs into a variety of people who have a variety of reactions to him and his predicament. Some want to help him out, some want to sell him out, some want nothing to do with him. His girlfriend and some of the other nationalists are also looking for him. The cops have all the streets blocked and are ready to bring him in, if only they can find him.

The movie is not at all a political diatribe for either side of the issue. Johnny is a dying man who is more of a pawn than a player. The story moves a little slowly at points but the stark noir visuals and the constant introduction of new characters who could be allies or betrayers keep viewers paying attention. The details of their personalities are quite rich and evocative--one cop isn't interested in whether people are good or bad, only in their innocence or guilt; a Catholic priest wants to help but the only payment he'll offer is faith. The actors, even in small roles, do a good job (William Hartnell, the First Doctor, plays a saloon owner!).

I certainly wouldn't describe this as a fun movie, nor would I call it a tense thriller or a great heist/chase movie. It is an interesting look at a desperate man at the mercy of the people around him and how those people treat him. I found the ending unsatisfying but understand it narratively.

TV Review: Doctor Who: The Reign of Terror

Doctor Who: The Reign of Terror directed by Henric Hirsch, written by Dennis Spooner

First Doctor William Hartnell tries to return Ian and Barbara to England in their own time. He misses by a hundred miles and lands outside of Paris. He also misses by two hundred years and arrives in the middle of the Reign of Terror (which is the guillotine-iest part of the French Revolution, in case you don't know). The Doctor and his companions (including granddaughter Susan) are soon caught up in the political intrigues of Citizen Robespierre's worst days (which naturally involves a lot of prison time for the characters).

The story is interesting with the usual turns of luck for the Doctor and his friends. The nice blend of humor and drama is kept up, with Hartnell being especially silly in his period costume. They even manage to have one or two thoughtful conversations about both sides of the French Revolution and England's role during it. The original broadcast was in six episodes, though the videos for episodes four and five are lost. The audio still exists and some rough animations have filled in. The animators had plenty of reference material from the other episodes but it looks a bit jarring. Even so, watching the animations is definitely preferable to listening to the audio by itself (all those action scenes without dialogue would be hard to understand).