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In Pursuit of a Throughline

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Review of The Chase (#16)

DVD Release Date: 29 Jul 20
Original Air Date: 22 May – 26 Jun 1965
Doctors/Companions: One, Ian Chesterton, Barbara Wright, Vicki
Stars: William Hartnell, William Russell, Jacqueline Hill, Maureen O’Brien
Preceding Story: The Space Museum (One, Ian, Barbara, Vicki)
Succeeding Story: The Time Meddler (One, Vicki, Steven)

Who really ever talks about The Chase? It’s one of those early-era stories that neither gets fans excited nor makes them cringe, so there is once again no surprise at finding it here in the ranks of Everything Else. Sure, it’s technically a Dalek story, but it barely feels like one to me. But perhaps I’ve simply missed its hidden charms over the years.

Truth be told, it’s been long enough since I last watched this one that I had barely any recollections of it at all. Before I sat down to view the six-episode adventure this time, all I could remember was broad strokes: Daleks pursuing the TARDIS, Peter Purves as not-Steven at the top of some tower in NYC (that would be the Empire State Building; thanks, brain), the (proper) introduction of Steven, the departure of Ian & Barbara, and—last but not least—the iconic photo of producer Verity Lambert at least pretending to try to light her cigarette with a Mechonoid’s flame-thrower arm.

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Confession #155: I Am Behind on Casting News

I had hardly finished posting the last casting news when more casting news hit the streets. I’m basically a month behind on the news of David Tennant and Catherine Tate’s return, and Yasmin Finney’s debut in Doctor Who, but since Tennant’s rumored return was a hot topic a few months ago, I figured I go ahead and add my 2¢ anyway.

For the most part, my feelings are the same as they were before we knew Ncuti Gatwa would be the new Doctor: I’ll be excited to see Tennant back for the 60th anniversary, but I don’t want him for more. RTD has been very cagey about the whole thing, as he is wont to do, so I don’t believe we’ve had any solid indications of whether Gatwa will actually be portraying the Whittaker Doctor’s immediate successor (rumors to the contrary are rife). Although I will be extremely disappointed if he’s not, I will wait to see what RTD has up his sleeve with Tennant and Tate before making any final judgements.

The fact that they’ve also announced Finney, a Black trans woman who shot to popularity for her role as Elle in the Netflix adaptation of Alice Oseman’s webcomic Heartstopper, and told us her character’s name is Rose, means that (a) RTD is committed to continuing the trend toward more inclusive casting (which I applaud heartily) and (b) he’s totally trolling us. I am over-the-moon excited to see Finney in Doctor Who, and utterly suspicious about how her character will fit into the overall Whoniverse, because there’s no way we’re going to have any real idea until the show actually airs.

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The Doctor Does Dracula

Review of State of Decay (#113)

DVD Release Date: 03 Oct 16
Original Air Date: 03 – 24 Jan 1981
Doctors/Companions: Four, Romana II, Adric, K9
Stars: Tom Baker, Lalla Ward, Matthew Waterhouse, John Leeson
Preceding Story: Full Circle (Four, Romana II, Adric, K9)
Succeeding Story: Warriors’ Gate (Four, Romana II, Adric, K9)

I have to say I was utterly unsurprised to find State of Decay among the titles here at the bottom of the “Everything Else” barrel. As the middle installment of the E-Space Trilogy that sees the introduction of Adric and the departure of Romana (and K9), it doesn’t seem to stand out in any particular way except one: vampires.

Given the recent popularity of the Dracula Daily email list for reading Bram Stoker’s classic in chronological (not chapter) order, it’s a fairly timely coincidence that I have the opportunity now to talk about Doctor Who‘s own take on vampiric myths. Sadly, unlike the Stoker novel, State of Decay doesn’t really give the viewer anything truly gripping or unique to hand onto.

We begin with the Doctor and Romana still looking for a way out of E-Space, initially unaware that they now have an additional crew member in the form of stowaway Adric. When they find themselves on a planet with nothing but a single village and an imposing tower, and the peasants all apparently willing to continue serving their three Lords unquestioningly, of course they need to look deeper. Nominally that’s so they can get a lead on how to get themselves back out of E-Space, but in practice it’s because the Doctor just can’t help himself.

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Confession #154: I’m Psyched for Fourteen

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This past weekend, the BBC announced that Ncuti Gatwa will be the next actor to play the role of the Doctor, breaking the color barrier for the lead actor in the same way that Jodie Whittaker broke the gender barrier. While I was personally hoping for a woman of color (like Jo Martin, who was technically the first on-screen actor of color in the role, though not the lead of the show), I am simply thrilled to have a not-white-dude headlining.

Ncuti is best known for his role in Sex Education, a comedy show about which I’ve heard good things, but have never watched myself. I imagine that I’ll give it a go some time before November 2023, though perhaps I’ll wait until the frenzy dies down a bit, as thousands of Doctor Who fans check it out in the wake of this announcement. Given how glowing Russell T. Davies’s comments about Ncuti and his audition were, I’m excited to see some of his work.

After the announcement, and before ever hearing the man speak, I read somewhere that Ncuti is a Scottish actor, originally from Rwanda. (I believe this makes him the fourth of fourteen lead actors to be from Scotland…) That really made me wonder what his natural accent would sound like. To my mild disappointment, there was no burr to it; it strikes me as a fairly standard British accent easily enough understood by us poor Yanks. At least there shouldn’t be complaints on that front.

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Sink or Swim

Review of The Sea Devils (#62)

DVD Release Date: 03 Jun 08
Original Air Date: 26 Feb – 01 Apr 1972
Doctors/Companions: Three, Jo Grant
Stars: Jon Pertwee, Katy Manning
Preceding Story: The Curse of Peladon (Three, Jo)
Succeeding Story: The Mutants (Three, Jo)

After last week’s special aired, I knew I was in for a treat when I came back to re-watch this adventure. The potential to compare and contrast the depictions of the Sea Devils in this, their initial outing with their most recent on-screen appearance with Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor felt like a golden opportunity.

And since Delgado is my favorite Master, despite his ubiquity during this era of the show, I enjoy watching what have become his “usual tricks” play out here where they can still take the Doctor by surprise. To wit, his “team up with someone else to destroy humanity in order to upset the Doctor” game.

Because that’s what this story boils down to. The Master has found these “sea devils”—who only gain that moniker from the rantings of traumatized sea fort workman—and decided to manipulate them to his own ends. The Doctor recognizes them as kin to the Silurians, and they give the same account of their reasons for going into hibernation as that other reptilian species. They also [spoilers] come to a similar end, having at one point reached a tentative peace with the humans thanks to the Doctor before the British military makes a first-strike move.

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Ships and Shipping

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Review of Legend of the Sea Devils
Warning: This review may contain episode-specific spoilers and wild speculation about future episodes.

The middle installment of Jodie Whittaker’s last hurrah of three specials, one that thankfully has nothing to do with Easter or any other holiday despite the timing of its broadcast, Legend of the Sea Devils is enjoyable nonsense. Although certain details of the plot don’t make a whole lot of sense (par for the course), it had a great soundtrack, fantastic costuming, and impressive effects—just the sort of thing one needs for a fun one-off episode.


Source – bbc.co.uk – © 2022 BBC

I had really, really been looking forward to finally getting a story set in historical Asia—something I think we could use a whole lot more of; anything outside of Britain/Europe, really—and I think this episode proved that it’s possible to do that respectfully within the Doctor Who format. But I had to laugh at myself for how, after more than two years of soaking in Asian dramas, I just couldn’t make sense of the panicked villagers shouting to each other in English in the opening scene. (Yes, yes—TARDIS translation circuits. That’s just not what my brain was expecting in that setting.)

There was a lot to love here (and a fair amount to decide not to look at too closely). Having Madame Ching herself on screen was fabulous (though I felt they could’ve done more with her; after all, at her height she commanded hundreds of ships). The rebooted Sea Devils looked fantastic (though we never really got an answer as to why this particular individual had such extreme views or how they rose to power). And the cast all did a fantastic job with what they were given (though I might personally have given some of the guest characters something different/more to do).

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Confession #153: I Need More Content

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These long breaks between new episodes are killing me. I know everyone has been having a rough time of it these last few years, and I’ve talked about it more than once here myself, but the way my brain has been coping with the pressures of the global COVID pandemic has made me less and less interested in Western visual media. There are very few properties made outside of Asia that can still garner my attention.

While Doctor Who is admittedly one such property, I’m not finding much comfort lately in retreading old ground. That is, I’d rather read or watch something brand new, something I don’t know at all, than go back and watch something I’ve seen multiple times, even if it’s been ages since I last watched it. There are plenty of Classic—or even modern—Doctor Who adventures that I haven’t seen in years, but right now I’ve got absolutely zero interest in revisiting them some evening when there are so many other items on my to-watch list that I’ve never seen before.

That’s why the long breaks between new episodes these last few years have taken such a toll on my personal fandom. I’m no longer “fanatical” about the show in the sense that I love to think about it all the time. If there’s no new content to latch onto, I’m just not going to think about Doctor Who unless something external forces the issue (like, for instance a posting deadline…).

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First Arc Flat

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Review of Full Circle (#111)

DVD Release Date: 03 Oct 16
Original Air Date: 25 Oct – 15 Nov 1980
Doctors/Companions: Four, Romana II, Adric, K9
Stars: Tom Baker, Lalla Ward, Matthew Waterhouse, John Leeson
Preceding Story: Meglos (Four, Romana II, K9)
Succeeding Story: State of Decay (Four, Romana II, Adric, K9)

I have to say I wasn’t surprised to find Full Circle among the ranks of Everything Else when I looked over all the stories I hadn’t yet reviewed. It’s one of those stories that flies easily under the radar, certainly not a “really good” story, nor an entirely awful one. And as Adric has never been one of my favorite Companions (though I don’t think I dislike him as thoroughly as some fans do), his introduction story has also not really been one I think on often.

As such, my impressions of Full Circle have been pretty minimal. I’m pleased to say, though, that I did at least remember the main conceit of the story, and knew what the big twist at the end was going to be. Being able to watch things unfold with that kind of foreknowledge is one of the fun parts of re-watching a show for me, so I appreciated being able to take advantage of that small bit of familiarity with the plot this time.

Right off the bat, we get a major plot point that will follow the Doctor and Romana through this trilogy of stories, known collectively as “the E-Space Trilogy”: the TARDIS has been pulled off course into Exo-Space, a dimension outside of “real” space where our own universe exists. Instead of having landed on Gallifrey, then, they are on a planet called Alzarius, right when an every-fifty-years event called Mistfall is beginning.

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Confession #152: I’m Experiencing the Cycle Differently This Time

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Even though her successor hasn’t yet been announced, with the second of Jodie Whitaker’s final three specials confirmed to air at Easter time, it’s finally starting to hit home that the Thirteenth Doctor is on her way out. That inevitable cycle of grief, denial, and acceptance of each Doctor’s incarnations is having its way with me again.

I remember the last time we were here. Capaldi’s Doctor was one of my favorites, and I was extremely sad to see him go. In particular, I really wanted to see what he could do under the pen of a different showrunner. Alas, that doesn’t seem to be something I will ever get with a modern Doctor.

I actually discussed that with friends at Gally this year: although in modern Who we’ve occasionally seen Companions stay with the Doctor into another regeneration (Rose, Clara), there has never been either a Doctor or a Companion who has bridged showrunners. That strikes me as a real failing of this era. Wouldn’t it be more interesting to see multiple captains’ hands on the tiller for any given Doctor? Alas, it’s long been clear that Jodie and Chibnall were a package deal. Despite my wish to see Doctors transcend their showrunners, now is most certainly not the time.

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Devils Under the Sea

Review of Warriors of the Deep (#130)

DVD Release Date: 03 Jun 08
Original Air Date: 05 – 13 Jan 1984
Doctors/Companions: Five, Tegan Jovanka, Vislor Turlough
Stars: Peter Davison, Janet Fielding, Mark Strickson
Preceding Story: The Five Doctors (Five, Tegan, Turlough)
Succeeding Story: The Awakening (Five, Tegan, Turlough)

One of the unintended benefits of this year’s “Everything Else” themed reviews is that I get to talk about the Sea Devils, who are slated to appear in the next special some time this spring. (My guess is on or around Easter, which is April 17.) In fact, I get to review both of their on-screen appearances, first this month in Warrior of the Deep and then at the end of April (presumably shortly after the aforementioned special) in their debut story The Sea Devils.

Somewhat ironically, while the Sea Devils are the eponymous warriors here, what most people remember about this story (when they bother to remember it at all) is the non-sentient monster of the piece, the Myrka. Before listening to the recent Verity! podcast episode about Warriors, I had forgotten pretty much everything else myself. But the Myrka is actually a relatively small player in the overall story, while humanity’s willingness to annihilate itself, and individual humans’ willingness to exploit each other, are more immediate threats.

Watching Warriors nearly forty years after its broadcast (which makes me feel really old), I get a strange sense both that I completely agree with Tegan’s point that very little has changed in the 100 years since her time (~60 years from now) and that things are quite different. To wit, the last time I watched it, I have a vague recollection of having felt much more sympathetic angst about the destruction of humanity.

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