Review of The Doctors Revisited – Eighth Doctor

In any rundown of all the Doctors, Paul McGann’s Eighth Doctor always seems to get the short end of the stick. The same is true here, as the eighth installment of Revisited is about a two-thirds the length of any of the previous episodes. Further, McGann himself is conspicuous in his absence, the only surviving Doctor actor to date not to appear in his own retrospective.

Source – bbc.co.uk – © 2013 BBC

Granted, since the series seems to be sticking tightly to televised stories—an oversight, in my opinion, since alternative media like audio adventures are where Eight really comes into his own—we can hardly have expected a long homage to a Doctor who only had 70 minutes on screen. Even bringing in Sylvester McCoy to discuss the regeneration barely padded things out.

However, Companion actors Daphne Ashbrook and Yee Jee Tso (who appeared in interview snippets, along with Steven Moffat, Marcus Wilson, and Nicholas Briggs) make a valiant effort to express to the audience why McGann’s Doctor, and The Movie as a whole, should be of interest to those (presumably primarily “new series” fans) who are as yet unfamiliar with them. Their fondness not only for McGann and the rest of the cast but also for the entirety of the story is clearly evident.

Focusing as always on the positive aspects of McGann’s run, rather than its admitted flaws, Revisited emphasizes the ways in which The Movie bridges the gap between pre- and post-Hiatus eras (as I’ve mentioned a couple of times before). For one thing, it involves a “proper handover,” as Moffat puts it, with an actual regeneration scene between the Seventh and Eighth Doctors, and McGann provides us with a persona recognizable as the Doctor because he uses quick wits to further his ends rather than brute force. Further, it introduced the idea that the Doctor might actually have a romantic side, with the at-the-time controversial first on-screen kiss.

The Companions are also interesting characters, each unique in their own way. Dr. Grace Holloway (Ashbrook) actually kills the Seventh Doctor (though that’s not precisely her fault) and believes the Eighth to be a lunatic before finally getting on board, while Chang Lee (Tso) switches sides between Doctor and Master as events progress and the Master’s powers of persuasion confuse matters.

Speaking of the Master, he is the only “famous foe” in The Movie. While previous incarnations had an almost oily charm, this one is pretty much just nuts. He’s creepy (and eventually campy), but has just enough of his old style to take in Lee with his lies. While it’s not necessarily the most successful interpretation of the character, Eric Roberts brings just enough menace to the role to make it (mostly) work.

Wrapping up the special and continuing into the introduction to the screening of The Movie, Moffat again talks about how it makes such a good transition between old and new. He also talks about how much potential it had as the beginning of a new story, and that McGan “got it completely, completely right.” Unfortunately, it turned out to be no more than a one-night-stand, and fans realized they’d seen the show’s last gasp. “Funny how things work out.”