With the black and white years of
Doctor Who ranked and assessed during this period of isolation, it’s time to
move on to the Pertwees. Like the Troughton era, it was incredibly difficult to
choose a top spot and the first three positions in my list are probably
interchangeable in terms of my deep affection for them. This is also perhaps
the strongest era in terms of scripts. There are very few duds, very few for
which structure is problematic. Terrance Dicks was the ultimate nuts and bolts
man of Doctor Who, making sure nothing could puncture his watertight
narratives. The worst that can be said of the poorest Pertwee stories is that
they are perhaps a little bit dull comparatively. It’s a wonder to me why this
era has never topped DWM polls. It is solid, powerful and confident. It has an
assured and successful idea of what it wants to be. If there is any era ripe
for reappraisal during the 21st century’s darkest hour, it is the
Jon Pertwee age, and indeed it’s unflinchingly brilliant leading man.
24. THE TIME MONSTER
This is a very strange beast. It
looks like a UNIT story: all the regulars are here and put in their usual
stalwart performances. It does lots of things a UNIT story usually does: a
research centre; a resurrected evil; a gun battle with some Roundheads. But it
doesn’t feel like a UNIT story, chiefly because nobody talks properly. Yates
sounds increasingly odd. The Brig is given lines which make him look incredibly
boorish: “TOMTIT. That’s what it’s all about, TOMTIT,” he is forced to say
without the merest hint of a smile. Guest stars Ruth and Stuart talk as if a couple
of ten-year-olds had been asked to improvise a scene around the theme of feminism.
The whole thing is so mannered and unnatural, it becomes irritating quickly,
and aside from anything else, nothing happens for three episodes. But Part Six –
oh, Part Six! – is where it’s all at. It might be a long journey but after five
dull, off-kilter half hours, it’s in the final instalment where The Time Monster
at last begins to excite. There’s a minotaur; the daisiest daisy speech; the
Master’s downfall; the end of Atlantis; baby Benton. After a tediously long
haul, Barry Letts and Robert Sloman finally prove their worth.
23. THE MONSTER OF PELADON
This flabbier cousin of The
Curse of Peladon will always stand in its predecessor’s shadow and feel
like the lesser of the pair. Compare the differences between these two
tales to, say, the differences between New Earth and Gridlock:
same planets, same characters, but in the latter completely different
reasons to exist, completely different sets of circumstances, new stories to tell.
Here, we feel as if we’re hitting exactly the same beats as Curse, being
asked to thrill at the return of Alpha Centauri just by virtue of her/his being
there, being asked to remember the threat of Aggedor (who we know is not
a violent creature anyway). We have yet another feckless monarch, yet another corrupt
high priest. This time though, the studio lights are brighter, the Gothic atmosphere
gone and compare the Doctor’s fight with the King’s champion to the climactic
fight here between Eckersley and Aggedor: everything here is past its sell by
date, withering or out of steam. The pace increases in the second half and the
Ice Warriors perk things up but there’s little to save this misguided sequel.
22. THE MUTANTS
Watched at a reasonable pace,
there’s a lot of fun to be had with The Mutants. There is some very inventive
direction. The psychedelic tunnels in which Jo finds herself stalked by an
unknown figure in a silver suit is almost nightmarish. The lighting is
excellent. The Mutts themselves look extraordinary. The politics are embedded
in the story Bob Baker and Dave Martin are telling and it feels like this is a
story that is actually about something, that has reason to exist. However,
there are some truly dreadful performances which make the The Mutants
difficult to love: George Pravda and Rick James are at times indecipherable and
even Paul Whitsun-Jones makes for a one-note villain. The best actor, Geoffrey
Palmer, is killed off in Part One and nobody as good comes along to replace
him. The horrible RSC colour of Parts One and Two are also a barrier to enjoying
this serial which for the first 50 minutes looks murky and distant. So there
are many obstacles in the viewer’s way here but a keen televisual athlete should
be able to overcome them and find the gold at the end of the track.
21. COLONY IN SPACE
Malcolm Hulke’s tale of the
doomsday weapon is rock solid. Sadly, it’s also rock-coloured. Drab-looking and
beige against a grey clay pit, there’s nothing arresting about it this snotty-looking,
smeary story. There are two almost identical cliff-hangers which makes more pronounced the
feeling that we’re watching the same things, the same colours, the same people,
over and over again. Despite a cracking fight and his later outstanding work on
the show, Michael E Briant’s direction here is rough stuff. Look at the
ploddingly directed cliff-hanger of Episode 5, in which the Master’s finger creeps
pantomimically ever closer to the kill switch. Compare it to the Master’s knife
throwing in The Sea Devils cliff-hanger to see how fast and assuredly
Briant would develop as a director. All this is a shame because Malcolm Hulke’s
world is a thoroughly developed, politically interesting and cynical extension
of 1970s Britain. The character work is strong and realistic. The villains have
grounded motivations and the corruption we see feels meant. There is a strong,
strong foundation here for a cracking yarn and the Target Book illustrates what
a terrific story it is. Unfortunately, on television, it swims around in a sea
of lacklustre, grey-brown design work, clay-coloured wigs and dreary, wet quarries.
20. THE THREE DOCTORS
You may think me heathenish to rank
The Three Doctors at such a lowly position but, aside from a few very
quotable lines, this feels more like a desperate attempt for new ideas, rather
than a celebration of the show’s history. Indeed, it was developed cynically as
a gimmicky first story to grab the Season 10 audience on opening night. Its
problems are mainly down to design. The TARDIS looks gorgeous but nothing else
does. Omega’s castle is not a castle. Removing all the furniture from the UNIT lab
reveals what a flimsy set of walls it really is. And as for the corridors: they
must be the ugliest in Doctor Who history (and they’re up against a hell of a lot
of corridors – perhaps The Invasion of Time should come in a close second
in the ugly category). Perhaps it’s because we spend far too much time in the
TARDIS set that the designer Roger Liminton spent all the money on some real
walls for it. At the end of Episode 2, the Second Doctor does what the Third did
at the end of Episode 1. His story has progressed precisely nowhere for 25 minutes;
he’s been on hold. There’s a feeling that now we have the Doctors reunited,
nobody really knows what to do with them. For a story which changes the lore of
the programme with a narrative approaching the mythic, it’s a shame that it looks
so completely naff and that rather than exploring its mythology, Rex Tucker literally
runs around in a circle instead.
19. PLANET OF THE SPIDERS
Another classic I’m about to
knock off its pedestal, I’m afraid. For fans of a certain age, Spiders
is a story which embodies the joy of the Pertwee era. As I said at the top of
the article, I love the Pertwee years but this, to my mind, is a very weak
conclusion and one of the era’s weakest uses of the regulars. The Brigadier
looks to have become completely thick and even Pertwee himself spends almost an
entire episode asleep and fifteen minutes inside a webby cocoon. The extended chase
sequence fails to be gripping in any way, Barry Letts directing in a workmanlike,
point and shoot style, and at the end of it all, unforgivably, the pursuit proves
to have been utterly pointless. There are, of course, things to enjoy. Mike
Yates’s self-reconciliation feels like apt subject matter for a story taking personal
reflection as its key theme. Richard Franklin and Elisabeth Sladen have an
instant chemistry too, and he becomes far more likeable and attractive than he ever
was alongside Katy Manning. The retreat is an innocuously spooky setting and the
damaged men within a cult of realistic villains. John Dearth’s Lupton is a
terrific, pathetic adversary. When we leave Earth, however, things fall apart. Metebelis
3 doesn’t feel real: the sets, the actors, the rules of this world are shallow
at best. At worst, they’re appalling. Perhaps rescuing the ho-hum feel of the
last three episodes is the final scene. Jon Pertwee is majestic here. He’s
playing a death scene. We see the light go out in his eyes and Elisabeth Sladen
cries real tears. It’s a scene of abject, heart-breaking beauty after a series
of cliff-hangers which include Sarah looking a bit disappointed and Tommy definitely
not being killed. What a shame that these five great years end on such a
ham-fisted bun-vending note.
18. CARNIVAL OF MONSTERS
I’m not taking the piss. I realise
these last three stories are heralded, absolutely heralded, but I just can’t get
the love for Carnival. It’s not terrible by any means. Indeed, there are lots
of fresh, imaginative elements. I absolutely love the Drashigs. But I hate
Vorg. Leslie Dwyer is charmless and ordinary, phoning in a performance which should
be the size of Henry Gordon Jago. It means I can’t care about the plight of the
heroes of the Inter-Minoran strand of the story, as delightful as Cheryl Hall’s
Shirna may be. On the inside of the Miniscope, Robert Holmes ironically plays
his giant hand too early and the repetitive scenes quickly start to grate. Frustratingly,
it feels as if Carnival is a draft away from brilliance. If the Doctor
and Jo had a mystery to solve which didn’t present its clues to them when
necessary, and if the Miniscope itself were in more affirmative danger on
Inter-Minor, it might give the story more much-needed propulsion. As it stands,
Carnival is full of ideas, but none of them feel terribly dramatic.
17. INVASION OF THE DINOSAURS
“What about the man we saw in the
garage?” asks Sarah in Part Two. Despite its titular monsters, this is a story
very much of the 1970s. It is earthed by its realistic characters and dialogue
such as Sarah’s. Its locations are broom cupboards, offices and classrooms. The
film footage of deserted London streets could never be re-mounted today and the
politics and philosophies Malcolm Hulke explores are relevant, meaningful and
complicated. For a story often overlooked in the face of that bloody T-Rex, there’s
a refreshing exploration of ideologies on display here and it ought to be more
celebrated. It’s also a six-parter which truly rockets along, includes a chase
sequence for Pertwee with far more meaning and menace than that in Planet of
the Spiders, there's a terrific twist in the middle and it’s the last time we see UNIT as a properly functioning, government
backed army battalion, sweeping in at times of emergency to aid Britain. We probably
need UNIT more than ever right now.
16. THE TIME WARRIOR
It’s such a peculiarity to see
Pertwee in a story set back in time. It makes The Time Warrior feel as
if it’s not quite the real McCoy, as if it’s not quite the era we have come to
know and love. Pertwee is there but he’s doing things he hasn’t done before.
With no Jo and no exile to fight against, he’s free to go wherever he pleases
and it’s nice to see him jumping into the TARDIS boyishly to go and explore.
But we still have UNIT tugging us back to Earth, now seemingly for no good
reason. Despite the freshness of The Time Warrior, it definitely feels
like the beginning of the end. The architecture of the show is changing. The
Doctor doesn’t need to be a scientific advisor anymore. He doesn’t even need to
fit in. More precisely, he needs to be Tom Baker. With The Green Death
being the great climax to this era that it was, the following story, however
outlandish and fertile (and we have the genius of Linx here and the arrival of Sarah Jane Smith!) was always going
to feel like the comedown after the party.
15. DEATH TO THE DALEKS
It’s easy to palm off Terry
Nation as a hack. By his own admission, he “took the money and flew like a
thief” when commissioned to write a Dalek story. There’s no denying, however, his
ability to produce scripts with dynamite up their arses. He is a restless
writer, keen to move on to the next set-piece, monster or trap. There is a
simplicity to his tales but a pulpy, boys’ own spirit, motoring them along. Death
to the Daleks is the fastest moving story of Season 11, its only agenda to spin
an entertaining yarn. Michael E Brient directs the first episode in particular with
atmospheric style. There may be more worthy stories out there, stories with
better reasons to exist even, but for sheer entertainment value, this rollicking
four-parter wins every time. Its only major issue is that bloody Dalek music.
14. FRONTIER IN SPACE
Now, there’s not much in the way
of structure here to speak of. We’re taken from one prison cell to the next and don’t
seemingly get anywhere. I can understand how that could be problematic for some
viewers. But like Marco Polo, it’s not where we’re going but how we get there
which is important about Frontier in Space. There’s loads to look at in
each new location, new faces, new sets, new monsters – all very well-designed
and acted. Roger Delgado turns up at his most assured. We’re safe in his hands;
he knows what he’s doing. Above all, it’s a chance to discover this world, the future
Earth with its female President and lunar penal colonies. It’s a world that feels,
as in Colony in Space, all too familiar. The politics are rich and believable.
The disturbing newsreel footage brings with it a verisimilitude. And even
though what it amounts to is the Doctor and Jo escaping a series of jails, it’s
nevertheless fascinating to discover the similarities and differences of this imagined future.
13. THE CLAWS OF AXOS
If there’s a four-parter that best
encapsulates the UNIT era at its most typical and at its height, it is The Claws
of Axos. It’s a good show for all the regulars and a strong, original alien
invasion story. Bob Baker and Dave Martin prove themselves instantly to be a perfect
partnership when it comes to steering the Doctor’s adventures, so assured and
tight is this script despite its big budget ideas. The onscreen realisation is
weird and stirring, very definitely screaming 70s colour TV licence. If the
UNIT Family is your bag, then there’s not much to dislike in this confident, sometimes
nightmarish vision from Michael Ferguson and his team. This is bread and butter Doctor Who at its finest.
12. DAY OF THE DALEKS
The first timey-wimey story and
it works a treat. Long before the Day of the Moffat, Doctor Who rarely toyed with
the paradox as a story-telling concept and its rarity makes the final episode
of Day of the Daleks a satisfying surprise. Like The Claws of Axos,
Day is a well-paced, perfectly structured thriller. Aubrey Woods is
mannered and stagey as the Controller. The Daleks sound as if nobody had watched
the earlier stories and the voice artists based their interpretation on what
they had heard in a nearby playground. (To be honest though, the dialogue’s the same: “Doctor?
Did you say ‘Doctor?’” says a Dalek, gobsmackingly.) It’s also painfully notable
that there are only three of them. However, there is a feeling that this is a
very definitive Dalek story. This is the story of their return from defeat. And
by the time this tale begins, they have already conquered the Earth. It cements
their reputation. They are monumental. This is the Daleks saying, “We’re back,” and this time, they were
here stay. And incidentally, watching Pertwee gargle red wine and wax lyrical
on the delicacy of gorgonzola is supreme comedy entertainment.
11. SPEARHEAD FROM SPACE
Perhaps not quite the once-revered,
golden opening chapter of a new era many dyed-in-the-wool fans would have us believe,
Spearhead’s reputation has slowly dwindled over the years. That’s mainly
because it was only meant to be seen once. And those first impressions are
massive: it looks gorgeous (all on film), the cutting is slick and dynamic, the
dummy moves!, that high street massacre, the brilliant Nicholas Courtney as new leading
man, the car crash, the blood, the awful scene when the poacher’s wife discovers
the mannequin in her kitchen. It’s vivid, visceral stuff, but it only really
works once. Now, we’ve seen all the shocks and surprises Spearhead has
to offer, it’s easier to see that there’s no great depth to this simple, curiously
slow story of alien infiltration. In fact, the Doctor doesn’t become
engaged in the plot until a good way into Episode 3. So next time you try Spearhead,
ignore the Target book, the other Target book, the VHS, the other VHS, the DVD,
the other DVD, the blu ray, the steelbook and the other Target book, and imagine
you’ve never seen it before. You might just capture some of that thrill of the
original.
10. THE CURSE OF PELADON
It’s a credit to the original that
The Curse of Peladon has never felt tainted by its lesser sequel. Unlike
Monster, it feels original, brave and vital. The world is real and
unusual, its politics clear but complicated and turbulent. It serves as, aside
from The Unicorn and the Wasp, Doctor Who’s only effective murder
mystery. There’s a clear and confident four-act structure, highlighting an
assuredness about the ideas in play here. Brian Hayles doesn’t just know how to
come up with new ideas; he knows how to dramatise them too. What’s more, there’s
moody lighting (missing from the sequel), a thunderstorm and firelit corridors,
making for a Gothic, Romantic edge. It looks different to the stories around
it, yet we feel safe here. Because this production team so clearly know what
they’re doing.
9. THE DAEMONS
I can see how this was once
hailed as the best. It’s got all sorts of elements to excite the teenage horror
fan: walking gargoyles, sacrifices at the altar, the actual devil. It’s true
that after Episode 1, The Daemons has done everything it’s going to do
and ends up playing the same beats over and over again. But what beats! Like listening
to a favourite song, it can easily be enjoyed repeatedly. The seemingly-innocent
threat of the Morris Men has got to be an example of what makes our show so special.
Where else could images like a hero tied to a Maypole be so well-suited? The
Daemons is scary, silly, charming and iconic. It’s comfort food Doctor Who,
the sort that we can languish in to our hearts’ content.
8. PLANET OF THE DALEKS
Much vilified as the boring Pertwee
Dalek story, I’ve never understood the muck that Planet gets thrown at it. Like Death,
it’s a pot-boiler of the highest order. It’s unashamedly a lad’s own caper of
ice volcanoes, poison swamps and killer plants, as well as escapes through
tunnels, vents, and most inventively of all a vertical cooling shaft. There are
invisible aliens, space plagues and lethal jungle fauna. This is Terry Nation
writ large. As an eight-year-old watching the 1993 repeats, this was perfect fodder
for the imagination. I’ve never apologised for loving Planet of the Daleks.
It is the perfect 60s Dalek story rescued from its monochrome origins and as
colourful as they come. I adore it.
7. DOCTOR WHO AND THE SILURIANS
To say the production team was in
a state of flux, there is one man who very definitely knows what he is doing:
Jon Pertwee. Just look at him – from his very first scene, his Doctor is right there.
The insecurities of his sometimes over-comic tendencies in Spearhead are
gone. He is the show’s star, as if Hartnell and Troughton had never existed. By
the time he’s stripped down to his jeans and T-shirt, he could be wearing anything
so resolutely is he the Time Lord of the moment. Aside from the towering presence
of Pertwee, The Silurians is a storming story. The encounters in the barn
are frightening, the reveal of the Silurian at the close of Episode 3 shocking
in its ordinariness; the Doctor meets the thing in a darkened living room! As
the world is infected by the issuing plague, the scenes of the fallen Londoners
are harrowing. Timothy Combe establishes a terrific cast: Peter Miles, Norman
Jones, Paul Darrow – all deliver and then some. Only the second story, and a
seven-parter at that, Doctor Who and the Silurians feels supremely confident
and it all filters down from that amazing leading man.
6. THE MIND OF EVIL
With one foot in Season 7 and one
in Season 8, The Mind of Evil is a curio. It’s got the hardness and relative realism of the former season but the charm and warmth of the latter. The best comes earlier
on, with the Chinese delegation business proving to be a road down which Doctor
Who rarely travelled again. Perhaps surprisingly, real world politics only seem
to affect Day of the Daleks after this point. I can’t think of another
episode apart from The God Complex with scenes set in hotel rooms and it
says much about the earthliness of Don Houghton’s take on the show that we have
those here. We even have subtitles! Later on, it becomes the more recognisable
UNIT fare, but it’s no less interesting, no less well-directed than the first
half of the story. But The Mind of Evil ought to be treasured mostly for
dipping its toes in a world of prison riots, peace conferences and missile
transportation. It's a story with true grit.
5. INFERNO
All the seven-parters of the Pertwee
years work for different reasons. Here, we get to see the fall of Stahlman’s
Operation Inferno in almost real time. Knowing that disaster is coming lends a
tragic tone to the dark story, a feeling that everything is spiralling out of
control, that not even the Doctor can save these people. Over the three hours,
we come to know the characters, to like them, to love them even, and then we
have to say goodbye finally, before we see them again in another world making the
same mistakes as we watch everything going wrong a second time. Inferno is bleak,
mostly humourless and grim. The silent movie-like Episode 3 sequence in which
the Doctor is chased across the barren wastelands is riveting stuff. Episodes 5
and 6, with our team desperately trying to survive, their voices getting louder
and louder against the motoring noise of the drill head, the sound of their
doom, is nail-biting television. It’s not a typical Pertwee story, but it’s certainly
one of his best.
4. TERROR OF THE AUTONS
There are many instances in
Doctor Who when a clean slate is introduced. Most are obvious: Spearhead
from Space, The Leisure Hive, Rose, The Eleventh Hour and The Woman Who Fell
to Earth. Terror of the Autons is another, more subtle, reboot.
There’s a feeling that Barry Letts and Terrance Dicks, after the maelstrom production
of Season 7, have finally had a chance to sit down and thrash out what they
want from the show. Here it is, a distilled, simple and bold new take on the
programme, far removed from the grim, perhaps more adult world of the previous
year. Characters are broader, and introduced with a cleverer shorthand, the
storytelling is more concise, linear and, in a word, poppy. Jo Grant is
established fully-formed with incredible thrift and Katy Manning is an instant
charmer. Likewise, Roger Delgado's seminal, gentlemanly Master is captured with fierce economy in his opening scene. This is the show that would become a huge success once again. It’s neater,
brighter, more comic book. It may not quite have time to explore the darkness and
humanity of Season 7, but it’s extremely frightening and very exciting. So much
happens in Terror of the Autons, so much incident, that it leaves Spearhead
from Space looking like it’s moving at crawling pace. Concise, scary and efficient,
this is Doctor Who re-imagined, breezier and destined for incredible success.
3. THE AMBASSADORS OF DEATH
The Ambassadors of Death is
endlessly fascinating. I first saw Episode 1 at a convention in Manchester (Manopticon
3) in colour. A few years later, I saw the remainder all in black and white on
UK Gold. Then, after years of waiting, the VHS came in its piecemeal black and
white/colour cross cutting. Finally, the DVD arrived, in complete colour at
last. It still feels as if there’s another iteration to come. That piecing
together of Ambassadors mirrors the bitty, unfocussed nature of the
story itself. With at least four writers known to have worked on its seven episodes, it’s
not quite sure what it’s about or where it’s going. However, it flies by at
such a lick, jumping from one startling moment to the next. There are genuine
thrills here: Liz flying over the weir, that fantastic second cliff-hanger, the
ambassador’s visit to Quinlan’s office, the helicopter heroics, the warehouse battle.
Ambassadors is never short of drama, of action and Dudley Simpson
provides a staggeringly original and rousing musical score. So many minds went
into the construction of this tale of peculiar intricacies and exciting divergencies
and it’s thrilling to see them all coalesce together so startlingly. An unruly, untamed, big budget beast, The Ambassadors of Death is a story quite unlike any other and it's all the more unique and idiosyncratic for that.
2. THE SEA DEVILS
If only Nicholas Courtney were in
this, it might well get the top spot. This is the perfect tale of the Doctor
and the Master, the perfect tale for the Doctor and Jo at this stage in their
adventures, at the height of their powers. It is the perfect tale for UNIT but
alas, they aren’t here. Truth be told, we don’t miss them. There is plenty of
sea-faring action to distract us. Edwin Richfield’s Captain Hart is perhaps the
only Brigadier substitute of the 70s to work. He is completely charming. The scenes
on the fort are the stuff of prime-cut Doctor Who and the playful, angry sword
fight between Pertwee and Delgado (or Derek Ware, take your pick) is perhaps as wonderful as their relationship is ever going to get. The third cliff-hanger on the
beach represents the most thrilling of adventure serials and the Sea Devils themselves
are at first frightening, seen in silhouette in the dark tunnels, then later a
credible threat as they arrive from the ocean to attack the military base. This
is a story that doesn’t feel compromised in any way. They really have employed
the navy to tell this action-packed tale of two worlds at war which at its
heart is a morality story, as if typical from the fundamentally fantastic
Malcolm Hulke.
1. THE GREEN DEATH
If The Sea Devils is the perfect
encapsulation of the Doctor and Jo at the peak of their relationship, then The
Green Death is the most wonderfully perfect tale of their separation. Like
the saddest break-ups, it comes after the couple realise they no longer need
one another. It’s all there in Part One, and yet - even though he knows she’s
gone - the Doctor rallies against Jo’s departure all the way through, at times with
childish jealousy. The scene in which he drags Dr Jones away from Jo after seeing
them close to stealing a kiss shows this Doctor at his most petulant and selfish:
it’s heart-breaking. The eco-politics are well-meaning, never patronising and
still sadly very relevant (and incidentally, isn’t it wonderful how the Brig is
shown to be on the other side of the fence, celebrating “cheap petrol and lots
of it, exactly what the world needs.” It adds a realistic complication to the
idealism on offer here). But what gives The Green Death its heart and
the reason why it is so very treasured is not the message nor the maggots; it’s
that central relationship, which we have loved for so very long, that of Jon
Pertwee and Katy Manning as much as the Doctor and Jo, breaking down in a
series of realistic and sympathetic stages. The last scene at the wedding, much
celebrated and indeed copied by Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat in Sherlock,
is televisual beauty. The loss is unspoken, felt by Mike Yates too but most
keenly by a staunch and distant Jon Pertwee. It’s not a blissfully happy ending
for Jo, although we are thrilled with her choice in Dr Jones; it’s messier,
unfinished and inarticulate. Very much like life. What a thrill it was to spend
some of it with the Doctor and Jo.
JH
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