The Caves of Androzani (Story #136, 1984)
Viewed 29 Jan 2014
Doctor/Companion: Five, Perpugilliam “Peri” Brown
Stars: Peter Davison, Nicola Bryant
Preceding Story: Planet of Fire (Five, Peri, Turlough)
Succeeding Story: The Twin Dilemma (Six, Peri)
Given that Caves is generally viewed as one of the (if not “the”) best stories in Doctor Who‘s entire fifty year history, I had really been looking forward to sharing it with G. That pesky “Real Life” (RL) thing keeps getting in the way of our viewing, though. Not only has it been three months since we last got together, but this may well be our last session for a good long time, due to other RL obligations. Good thing we had something meaty to tide us over.
As usual, I spent a few minutes updating G on the various changes in the TARDIS crew since she last tuned in. Tegan and Nyssa have moved on, as has a completely different Companion whose entire tenure was between these episodes (that’d be Turlough; I didn’t even bother with Kamelion). And when it came along, I mentioned how Davison himself had wanted an explanation for the dratted celery he’d been wearing these past few years, and that’s why we got the whole bit about if it turns purple.
Mostly, though, the first episode of the serial was spent getting back into the groove and noticing all the stereotypical details. There was an “Eew!” at the cave bat/magma creature/whatever-we’re-calling-it and a laugh out loud at the ensuing panicky gunfire from the humans. There was an “Ooh, that was weird” at our first sight of Sharaz Jek and a “Boy, those are some hairy fingers. … Got the wolfman going here” at a subsequent one. And there was the observation of the obligatory set up: “Every show starts out with a misunderstanding of who he is…” By the time we’d made it to the first cliffhanger, we were back in the swing of things.
It turns out, though, that G has a somewhat different opinion to mine regarding Nicola Bryant’s portrayal of Peri. “She is not a very good actress,” G opines, “but she’s got a pretty good American accent, don’t you think?” Frankly, I’d been thinking quite the opposite; especially in the first episode, Nicola’s accent slips in and out a great deal. And perhaps it’s not her finest role, but she improves over time.
As for the plot, its intricacies tend to leave G confused. Granted, she is often chatting about something that’s just happened as an important plot point plays out on screen, but I do my best to rewind the important bits, and explain whatever might have been missed. She’s on top of things with Trau Morgus, though. From the get-go, she’s suspicious of him, and giggles delightedly at his Shakespearean asides. And when he has his fateful meeting with the President, she sounds the alarm.
“~bwap bwap bwap~ Evil Alert!”
[the President falls down the elevator shaft]
“Too late. They never listen to me.”
By the time the Fifth Doctor’s final episode rolls around, G is fully engaged. She gets frustrated with the exhausted Doctor’s feeble attempts to escape his murderous pursuers (“He’s not even serpentining!”), Morgus’s poorly deduced conclusions about the connection between the President and the Doctor (“But he made that up in his head!”), and Stotz’s gullibility about what Morgus is willing to share (“Oh, he’s such a fibber! Why would you even start to believe that?”).
It’s clear that she’s enjoying the show, though. As the story of Sharaz Jek unfolds, she makes the requisite comparison to Phantom of the Opera, fully buying Jek as a tragic figure. She also watches with glee as Timmin deposes Morgus, declaring him “up the mud creek without a paddle.”
Sadly, the regeneration itself gets little or not comment from G. Perhaps she hadn’t seen enough of Five to really mourn his passing, or it had been too long for her to recognize the players circling his head as he succumbed to the spectrox toxaemia. The entire scene went unremarked until the credits rolled. So what was G’s reaction to Five’s sacrifice and the first appearance of Six?
She had just three delighted words: “Back to curls!”
Verdict: Thumbs up
Looking ahead: The Twin Dilemma
Holmesian Dialogue
Davison was and always will be my favourite Doctor, so I viewed this story at the time with some trepidation. I loved Morgus’ asides to the camera and Holmes always deights with his turn of phrase (“Stinking offal” and “Fescinnine bag of slime” spring to mind.
Two things I have heard about this story – you may have already heard them:
* Eric Saward got the phrase ‘Praxsis Spectrum” from the make of typewriter he was using at the time
* Holmes basically wrote the Doctor as if Tom Baker was the incumbent with the idea that any Doctor’s dialogue could be transposed to another without too much of an issue. It did strike me that Davison was being somewhat more assertive and tetchy in this story compared to much of his previous, so I can believe it
A firm favourite, even if the Magma Beast gives the Myrka a run for its money as least plausible monster of the season.
And I can’t avoid leaving comment on the best cliffhanger ever with episode 3. I have heard a theory that the Doctor was getting precognitive flashes of his regeneration with the flaring effect seen around the planet as the ship headed towards it, I am not sure I buy into that one 🙂
Ged
PS as an angst ridden 17 year old I was in mourning for at least 24 hours after the last episode as my diary page for the day after part 4 was broadcast was left blank!
trivia
I hadn’t heard those tidbits before!
This was a hard one for a lot of fans at the time to take (in terms of emotional trauma due to regeneration), from everything I’ve heard. And it still holds up quite well.