Doctor Who: The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood

Ah, The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood - I had such high hopes for you prior to broadcast. And you took those hopes and quite simply pissed them away. Because this two part story is, for me, the worst Eleventh Doctor story and the worst Silurian story. Yep, this one is, for me, worse than Warriors of the Deep.

There are two key reasons for this bold statement. The first is that this one is simply too long. The first episode, while aspiring to be atmospheric, is actually just elongated padding. There’s no point in basing your episode around a slow build up to the monster when we already know who the monsters are going to be. It’s a bit like one of those episodes of the old series that would be called something “…of the Daleks”, and then the cliff-hanger to the episode would be the supposed surprise of the Daleks being in it. The second episode is largely boring until the end when Rory is killed for the first time – but even that flash of genius seems bolted on for no real reason. Yeah, the Eleventh Doctor has other ropey stories. But at least Victory of the Daleks (Behold the menace of the fat Daleks!) and The Curse of the Black Spot have the decency to be half the length.

Then there’s the Silurians. Anyone who hasn’t been enthralled by the superb Doctor Who and the Silurians probably sat through this edition of the show wondering what all the fuss is about. Here, they are nothing more than the monster of the week determined to plough through as many monster related clichés as possible. Oh look, there’s the misguided scientist. The angry warrior. The kindly, wise old leader. Is this really Doctor Who or have I stumbled into an unusually half-arsed episode of Star Trek?

Yeah, there are other problems – including the script, which seems to turn plot holes and lapses of logic into an art form. I mean, who would honestly have the slightly chippy kissogram Amy Pond negotiating a peace deal between humanity and the Silurians? And this is probably Smith’s worst performance – although he’s not aided by a script that expects him to use the phrase “squeaky bum time” with a straight face. But what I really resent here is the wasted opportunity to do something interesting with the Silurians – who are genuinely one of the most striking of the Doctor’s adversaries. Every other returning monster to the new series has been reinvented in some way. The Silurians are just made blander than bland in this instalment.

If you want to see a decent modern interpretation of the Silurians, I’d recommend A Good Man Goes To War. Seriously, the limited screen time afforded to just one of that species in that episode does far more for that race than the whole of this two part misfire.

And that’s it for the clunkers. For the next five weeks they’ll be reviews of new Doctor Who stories – and here’s hoping that none of those episodes end up in the Clunkers categories. And after that? Well, I have an idea for another series of Who related posts to bridge the gap between The Wedding of River Song and the Christmas Special… But we’ll have to wait and see.

Doctor Who: The Clunkers

Ok, ok, I'm running a little bit behind with this week's clunker. The explanation of why I find The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood to be the weakest of the Eleventh Doctor's adventures will be explained... later. Most probably next week. Because, for the moment, my focus is on what will be broadcast at 7:10pm this evening: Let's Kill Hitler...

Doctor Who: Partners In Crime

Prior to Steven Moffat opening the most recent (half) season of Doctor Who with the Doctor being gunned down and then Amy Pond shooting her own daughter, season openers for the new look Who tended to be quite lightweight. Fun frolics designed to ease the casual viewer into the new season. I can see why RTD felt this was necessary, although I always felt that the season openers were disappointing and lacklustre compared to the episodes that followed. And Partners in Crime is the worst of a bad bunch. It is, quite simply, dreadfully bland and utterly disappointing.

It has Tennant doing his Doctor-by-numbers routine, and Donna is still the shouty chav she was in The Runaway Bride (although this would change as the season went along, demonstrating in the process what a good actress Tate actually is). The direction is flat, and manages to even turn the supposed set pieces (the Doctor and Donna seeing each other across Foster's office, the larking around in the window cleaner's life) into something really flat - and it is further undermined by the jaunty incidental music that plays over many of the (supposedly) more dramatic moments. But it is the script that really lets this down. It is, quite simply, the worst thing RTD has ever written (from what I've seen of his work).

I once read that RTD thought that Partners in Crime should be used to teach script-writing. I can't help but think that this should only be the case if the lesson is how not to write an episode of Doctor Who. The first segment of the story is frightfully unfunny "comedy" as the Doctor and Donna fail to meet, pretty much doing exactly the same thing as each other (so we get to see everything happening twice, effectively) but just missing each other at the same time. It is the sort of thing that you would expect from an earthbound, unimaginative sitcom - not from the opening instalment of a series that has the whole of time and space at its disposal. It's crap, really - a trick I've seen countless times before being done in a lacklustre way.

Then we have the villains - Foster, who is played with some relish but never really amounts to anything more than generic female baddie with two meatheads at her side with very big guns. But nothing than compare us for the Adipose - lumps of fat designed to look cute. They're babies, basically, making their communicative ability even less than your standard Who monster. And they don't do anything other than toddle around, burble for a bit and then disappear. The Doctor even points out that their lethal potential - which we hardly see - is not their fault. The upshot? This is a Doctor Who story with no real sense of threat, either to the planet or to the protagonists. It is only later, in Turn Left, that we get a feel for the awful implications of Foster's scheme. Here, it is all a bit of a nothingness. Of course, not every Doctor Who story can, or even should, have a sense of constant threat and menace. But a complete lack of those things makes this into an edition of 2point4 children without the (albeit very limited) laughs.

There are a couple of nice moments - such as the conversation between Wilf and Donna on the hill closely followed by the Doctor talking to an empty TARDIS. And the return of Rose at the end of the episode was, at the time, a brilliant little twist that raised my dampened spirits. Yet, it wasn't enough then, and it isn't enough now. This isn't even a slight episode, it is downright disappointing. In fact, it is the worst episode since the show came back, and definitely in the top 10 of the show's worst stories.

NB: next week's Clunker review will be materialising on Friday because, at around about this time next week, they'll be something else to review...

Doctor Who: Aliens of London/World War Three

As Clunkers go, this is a slightly odd one. It is here because, as far as I'm concerned, it is the worst of the Eccleston era. But it is far from terrible. Elements of it are very strong. Other elements are not great. And as this was the longest Doctor Who story since 1989, it is worth pausing to consider why.

The plot: the Doctor returns Rose to earth, apparently 12 hours after she left. However, it is actually 12 months. This causes some ructions in the Tyler household and earns the Doctor a slap from Jackie Tyler. In the meantime, an alien spaceship crashes and aliens launch a coup in Downing Street. The aliens are the Slitheen, a criminal family determined to reduce the Earth to radioactive sludge that can then be sold. The Doctor, using his connections and his newfound extended family in the form of the Tylers, defeats them. Hardly the most original of plots, but entertaining nonetheless.

So what works well? Eccleston is superb. Witness him chasitising the soldier for gunning down the space pig or threatening the Slitheen. This is an outstanding actor bringing real gravitas to the role of the Doctor. And he is ably backed up by Billie Piper as Rose - and pretty much anyone involved in the Tyler side to the story is really strong here. As is Penelope Wilton as Harriet Jones - a character who could have been deeply irritating (the repetition of her name and constituency, for example) is made compellingly human through Wilton's performance. By the end of the show, you want her to become Prime Minister. So we have a number of strong performances here, and we are introduced to someone who would become an important part of Torchwood - Toshiko Sato. Sadly, we also get some pretty OTT and consequently uncovincing performances - see almost anyone playing a Slitheen in these episodes.

The Tyler side to the story is also entertaining and, in its own quiet way, ground-breaking for Doctor Who. "Don't you dare make this place domestic" warns Rose after Jackie and Mickey enter the TARDIS. Well, here the show is made more domestic, and amazingly it enhances the experience. Looking at how life with the Doctor affects not just his companions but also those around the companion is a fascinating idea, and leads to these episodes best moments - the Doctor getting slapped and "maybe because everyone thinks I murdered you" being two examples. This is the first time we really see one of RTD's strengths - bringing the domestic and realistic emotions to the show.

Unfortunately, we also see the biggest weakness of RTD - sci-fi plotting. There is precious little that is original here, and the sci-fi elements of the story add next to nothing to it. Blowing the aliens up with a redirected missile is hardly a satisfying resolution after circa ninety minutes of drama. Nor is the cliffhanger any good - it is padded out for ages, and resolved in seconds with the plotting equivalent of a get out jail free card. I'd waited from 1989 to 2005 to see another Doctor Who cliffhanger - and it was not worth the wait. And much of World War Three involves the Doctor, Rose and Harriet talking about stuff in a room. Likewise, the Slitheen are undermined to a large extent by being vulnerable to vinegar - it is a childish plot device that makes them somehow unconvincing and very silly. Not as silly as their constant farting makes them, mind.

Indeed, the Slitheen were never going to become one of the iconic Doctor Who monsters - they are just a bit too silly for that. But I really don't think they are done any favours by the director here. They could be made menacing, even with all the farting. But the times when they are meant to appear menacing (i.e. before they kill) the direction is really rather flat, and they come across (again) as childish rather than a genuine threat. Which is a shame because, done just slightly differently, they could have been very sinister with their baby alien faces and their plump yet lethal hunter bodies. But the way they are presented meant they were always going to be consigned to The Sarah Jane Adventures and children's TV.

Essentially (and much like the current run of Torchwood) we have two stories here - one very domestic and really rather convincing and one outlandish and just plain silly. And this would be the curse of RTD - he was always great at doing the emotional or domestic, but when it came to plot twists or decent sci-fi, the quality went out the window. It is also why his best story - Midnight - relies on ordinary people facing an undefined and unexplained monster with only the most basic of sci-fi trappings.

So Aliens of London and World War Three are disappointing in some ways, but they are by no means a disaster. In fact, a strong case could be made that these two episodes are the best of what I'm calling the Clunkers. But in many ways they define the highs and the lows of an era - an undoubtedly successful age of the show where the lead writer was exceptional in some regards and sadly very lacklustre in others.

Doctor Who: The TV Movie

I know it has its fans just as I know that Paul McGann has his fans. But to me, this movie is an utter failure. McGann is a failure as the Doctor. And this whole misfire nearly consigned the series to oblivion when it should have been a glorious rebirth of the series.

Yeah, yeah, I know that McGann has got far better as the Doctor in the Big Finish audio plays. And I know that it is slightly unfair to choose a clunker from the McGann era when there is only one TV story to choose from. But it still stands, and as far as I am concerned this movie was and is a massive disappointment.

To truly understand why I have so little time for McGann's one TV outing it is worth comparing this failed attempt to relaunch the show with a later - far more successful attempt; 2005's Rose. Because while Rose is far from perfect, it does help to highlight all that went wrong with this TV movie. Rose begins with, well, Rose as she goes about her daily business - getting up, going to work, flirting with her boyfriend, before finally going into the basement of the store where she works to find that the shop dummies have started to move. Then she meets the man who will change her life and he says just one word - "run". It is a brilliant opening, launching straight into an adventure without bringing the complex baggage of 26 years worth of Doctor Who. However, the TV Movie does precisely the opposite. In a pre-title sequence that consists of bad CGI and Dalek voices that sound like chipmunks playing as Daleks, the Doctor in a voice over says:

"It was on the planet Skaro that my old enemy, the Master, was finally put on trial. They say he listened calmly as his list of evil crimes was read and sentence passed. Then he made his last, and I thought somewhat curious, request. He demanded that I, the Doctor, a rival Time Lord, should take his remains back to our home planet - Gallifrey. It was a request they should never have granted."

So, this sequence assumes prior knowledge of (1) Skaro, the home planet of the Daleks (2) who the Master is and (3) people identify the Daleks from their voices - they will know what they sound like even though they don't sound like, well, the Daleks here. So it is an intro for geeks like me, really. Except that it is really unsatisfying even for geeks. It isn't just the Dalek voices, it is the complete lack of knowledge of the Daleks. Yeah, they might execute the Master - that's believable. But they don't do last requests. And they certainly don't invite their mortal enemy - the Oncoming Storm - to pick up the last remains of one of his other mortal enemies from their home world without exterminating him. And why the frig would the Doctor agree to this? To place himself in moral danger in order to get the final remains of his nemesis (particularly given the Master was actually using a stolen body)? Sorry, this beginning is bollocks, and it makes no-one happy; neither the casual viewer or the devoted fan.

Then we have the presentation of the Doctor. In Rose, he is instantly charismatic; a mix of a gurning joker and angry, bereaved loner. He is also alien through and through. The Eighth Doctor, however, comes across like a hyperactive child, rushing around, talking crap and acting like a slightly quirky action hero. As I say, McGann matures in the Big Finish audio plays, but here he is the least Doctorish Doctor there has ever been. And as for that horseshit about him being half-human... please. Why do we need this? What does it add to the story? And for such a continuity filled installment of the show, to piss on 26 years worth of mythology by making the Doctor half-human is both crass and pointless.

Of course, McGann isn't helped by the fact that, for a sizable minority of the story, he isn't the Doctor. Instead, we see the demise of the Seventh Doctor. Now, as noted last week, I'm a big fan of McCoy's incarnation, so it was nice to see him again in this. Nice, but not essential. Not least because the most Machiavellian of Doctors is not felled through his own machinations but rather through being caught in the crossfire in a gang war before finally being offed by his new companion operating on him. Besides, it is a dumb way to begin a new era of the show and to relaunch it to an international audience - McCoy was watched by between 3 and 5 million people in the UK, making him probably the least successful Doctor in terms of viewing figures ever. And it is difficult to imagine many people in America knowing much about the Seventh Doctor. So why open your brand new version of the show with a little known actor who is about to be replaced anyway? Why not just start the new version of Doctor Who with the new Doctor? Like, well, they did with Rose? I mean, just imagine how surreal would have been with Paul McGann in the role of the Doctor for the first ten minutes before he regenerated... into the new (and therefore real) star of the show.

Then we have the adversaries and the companion(s). The Master is the main enemy here and, by God, he's fucking mental in this one. And quite nasty as well. He doesn't mind snapping people's necks or destroying his own stolen body. I guess you could argue that he is pretty desperate here, but it doesn't stop him from camping it up. It isn't that the Master is bad here, more that he just isn't that memorable. In his first adventures, he was always backed up by some other monsters... like, Autons in his first story. And Autons are a simple idea, but very effective. Plastic mannequins that come to life. Much more memorable that a glorified body snatcher.

Of course, companions don't need to be visually iconic or that memorable on paper. The two companions in the TV movie - surgeon and gang member - are far more memorable on paper than Rose Tyler. Yet it is Rose Tyler, with her inquisitive nature and her ability to save the day, that makes her an iconic companion and those in TV Movie also-rans. Rose Tyler is extraordinary despite being ordinary; the two companions in the TV Movie are really very ordinary despite living extraordinary day to day lives. Neither shows any real curiousity about traveling in the TARDIS. Rose? She sprints into the TARDIS at the end of her first story. And quite right too. If the human we are witnessing the story through isn't at least a bit interested in life in the TARDIS, why should we be interested?

Which is why the ending to Rose - with its excitement and promise of future adventure - is actually inspiring, whereas the ending to the TV Movie - with its promise of repetition and its use of a comedy sound effect - just makes the viewer think that no-one is taking this story seriously.

Of course, bad luck could play a part here for McGann. In a sense, comparing his debut story to the relaunch of the show by a lifelong fan and talented writer in his own right taking a hell of a lot of creative control, is unfair. I mean, other Doctors - both of the Bakers and McCoy for example - had disappointing debut stories. The difference is, of course, that for the other three those stories were part of a (highly) popular, long-lasting TV series. In the case of the McGann story, this was meant to be the (re)launch of a very British brand internationally. Put simply, it couldn't afford to be anything other than fast-moving, light-weight yet compelling entertainment. It certainly shouldn't have been an often nonsensical piece that pleases neither the casual viewer or the fan. This TV movie was beaten by a season finale of Roseanne. And, as much as it pains me to say it, this TV movie deserved to be beaten by an episode in a series about a fat woman and her working class family. Indeed, given the success of Rose, it is interesting to conjecture what might had happened if the Eighth Doctor hadn't met Grace but instead a girl from a working class family with a mother like Roseanne...

Now, the reality is that, one day, Doctor Who will disappear from our screens again. But it is also true that, a few years after that disappearance, someone will decide that it is the right time to resurrect it. And let's just hope that they use, for all its flaws (like the bin that burps), they use Rose rather than going for this terribly disappointing and completely mishandled attempt to relaunch Doctor Who.

Doctor Who: Time and the Rani

Now, it may seem strange to say this - especially as I have classed this story as one of the Clunkers - but I actually really like Time and the Rani. Part of this is pure nostalgia, since I was eight when I first watched this story - surely the perfect age to be caught up in the story and not see its numerous shortcomings. And now, as I watch it again, it brings a smile to my fact to think of when this story represented four weeks worth of excitement when it was first broadcast. Of course, I can also see what it is - a big fat misfire; a childish story that represents another failed attempt to relaunch the show after the troubles it experienced in the mid-1980s. The Rani states "this is idiotic" after an unconvincing pratfall from the Doctor; unfortunately, she could be referring to the whole story.

One of the things that the clunkers so far have shown is that even the worst of Doctor Who can have a great performance from the man playing the central character. Unfortunately, this outing is not an example of this phenomena. McCoy here plays the clown and... nothing else. He falls around, he looks confused, he dresses like an arse (seriously, who tucks their question mark tank top into their trousers for God's sake?) and he appears to be very, very stupid on occasion. We shouldn't agree when the Rani refers to the Doctor as a cretin. Of course, McCoy got much better in the role and became, in my eyes, of the greatest Doctors of all time. The frustrating thing is that it isn't seen here - despite the fact that, if you watch his audition on the DVD, he had already had the potential to be a great Doctor.

But even here McCoy is streets ahead of Bonnie Langford as Mel. There have been some terrible performances from companions over the years, but Langford's Melanie Bush is the worst of the lot. She screams, she nags, and the flounces around pontificating in a breathless voice. She also dresses like, well, a massive twat. She looks like a shop assistant in a seaside candy floss booth. The moment she joined the TARDIS crew was a nadir for the show; the moment she left and was replaced by Ace was a real step forward for the programme. "Don't hold that against me" says the Doctor when someone mentions that they have met Mel. I don't hold it against you, Doctor. I hold it against the cretins who ever thought that she deserved a place in the TARDIS.

But it isn't just the Doctor and his companion that are the problem here. The enemies leave a lot to be desired. I always wonder why people expect the Rani to be returning in the new series - that River Song might have turned out to be the Rani, for example. Why? The Rani was in two (well, three if you want to be pedantic) stories - each one worst than the last. She is often made out to be the equivalent of the Master but she really isn't. The Master is genuine Who icon, having caused the death of the Doctor twice. The Rani has managed once (possibly), and is also played with one dimensional zeal by Kate O'Mara. There is nothing to the Rani other than shouting orders and looking dismissive. Why bring back the Rani? You may as well bring back Glitz. Then we have the Tetraps. Well, they scared my brother, but he was six when we first watched this. Physically, they look like ALF after a bad car accident. They sound like a sex pesty phone call, especially when fawning to the Rani. They are slow moving and apparently very stupid. And they seem to shoot some sort of glittery ejaculate from their guns that can knock people out and render them inanimate. The Doctor has faced many rubbish adversaries in his time, but only a post-regenerative Doctor could struggle as much as the Seventh Doctor to foil the schemes of the Rani and the Tetraps.

And the Lakertyans? Either boring, preachy or boring and preachy. They add nothing to the story - literally, nothing. Pull the Lakertyans from the story, and you lose nothing but padding.

The production values also leave something to be desired. The sets are, at least, occasionally well lit, but the whole thing looks like the production team wanted to get as many sci-fi cliches into their set designs as possible. Furthermore, there are embarrassing moments, such as when the Rani is bashing on the cabinet's glass in the fourth episode, that show just how constrained the budget was. Then there's the incidental music. Those who criticise the music of much of Murray Gold should be made to sit through this soundtrack on a loop for a day. It is truly atrocious - it sounds like someone who has bought their first synthesiser and (a) believes that it is the best thing in the world and (b) has found out that it can also make "crazy noises" (the breaking glass when the Doctor puts on the Fifth Doctor's costume, for example). At its best, the score for this show is unobtrusive. At its manic worst, it sets your teeth on edge and is possibly the most terrifying thing on offer here.

Anything good? Well, there is some great FX work - particularly when the rocket takes off in the final episode and whenever the bubble traps are launched. The cliffhangers are also all good - especially the first one, where the post-regenerative Doctor watches his companion apparently spiralling to her death without realising who she is. There is also something curiously satisfying in seeing McCoy wearing his predecessor's costume, although I can't quite put my finger on why. And for a kid the whole thing is tremendously exciting - and if you've never had the chance to watch this one as a child, then you'll just have to take my word for it.

But this is the clunker of the McCoy era for me quite simply because it is the worst of the McCoy stories. Even a story like Delta and the Bannermen has more going for it, despite its numerous flaws. And one of the great tragedies is that this was the first of the McCoy stories. What should have been a big relaunch of the show with a new actor in the lead role was actually a long, boring exercise in playing it safe. There were some great McCoy stories to come - some of which did very original things with the series. But his first outing was an exercise in treading water; a dull cast-off of a story clearly designed for his predecessor rather than for McCoy. The poor opinion many have of McCoy may have been down to this story; had his era started with a story like Remembrance of the Daleks, Ghost Light or even Paradise Towers people might have a better opinion of the criminally underrated McCoy.

The eight year old in me loves Time and the Rani. The thirtysomething in me laments a massive missed opportunity to relaunch the show. A theme which we will be returning to next week...

Doctor Who: Timelash

Poor Colin Baker. Poor, poor Colin Baker. When he first took on the role, he said that he wanted to be the Doctor for years. In the end, he got three years - and the show was only on the screen for two of those. And the odds were stacked against him in a massive way. It isn't just the costume - although having your lead actor dressed in a costume apparently designed by a colour-blind mentalist is always going to give him a tough job. And it isn't the fact that his Doctor was initially made to be arrogant and unlikable. In fact, the Eleventh Doctor is arguably both someone who dresses badly (although his lack of fashion is nothing compared to the visual abomination that is the Sixth Doctor's costume) and is often arrogant. So why is the current Doctor so much more successful than the Sixth incarnation?

It isn't just that Smith is more of a leading man than Baker the Second. It is, to a large extent, down to the stories the latter got. Smith has had some of the best Doctor Who stories of all time; Baker the Second got none of them. Even the very best of the Sixth Doctor does not stand with the all time greats of the show. But, by God, the story we are talking about today is not one of the best of the era of Baker the Second. It can actually make a strong claim to being the worst of the ones during his time in the world.

For a start, this story shows the Sixth Doctor at his worst. He is boorish, patronising, and dismissive of just about everyone. The contempt he shows for Peri is particularly jarring. Banter between the Doctor and his companion is often a staple of the show; here, there seems to be real dislike. And watching two people snipe at each other is not great entertainment - a particular problem given the Doctor and Peri don't enter the real story for the first 20 minutes. Even worse, the TARDIS safety belts and the moment(s) when the Doctor gets a chipmunk style voice come across as absolutely excruciating. And the bit where a character observes that "the force is too great" after the Doctor has abseiled into the Timelash - yeah, I know that part of that force pulling on that rope is the Timelash, but a viewer might only see that the rather portly Colin Baker needs numerous people to hold onto the other end of a rope that he is swinging from. There's precious little dignity for the Doctor here, and Baker the Second - who is a better actor than he is often given credit for - does his best with a script designed to make him look pompous but, unfortunately and understandably, never manages to look anything other than pompous.

Still, Baker the Second turns in the best performance here. The competition isn't fierce. Nicola Bryant is given nothing more to do than whine and scream; she does so with aplomb, but it is difficult to call a performance based on such requirements as in any way interesting or likable. But she still shines next to the bland inhabitants of planet Whatever and the Adric-like performance of Herbert. Only Paul Darrow puts effort into his performance - sadly, he thinks he is playing a pantomime villain. Quite how the other cast members didn't spend their time hissing at him is utterly beyond me.

And as for Herbert; the twist that he is H.G. Wells is not without some merit - particularly since his time with the Time Lord apparently inspired him so. Indeed, that is a trick that the new series has pulled off with other creatives, such as Charles Dickens, William Shakespeare, Agatha Christie and Vicent Van Gogh. But with each of those people, the new series has explored perhaps lesser known elements to their lives. And H. G. Wells led a fascinating life. He was more than just a science fiction writer; he was engaged actively in the politics of his era, and this could have made the story more eye-opening and interesting. Imagine the Doctor meeting H. G. Wells and in doing so V. I. Lenin. Of course, to pull that off would require jettisoning the vast majority of this script and replacing it with something good else. But that really shouldn't be a problem.

What about the script, I hear you ask? It is terrible - apparently scribbled on the back of a beer mat after a hefty session on the gin. Why? I'll explain one day.

The production values make this look more like a fan made story rather a BBC production. The whole thing looks cheap; and not just cheap, but cheap and nasty. And the Third Doctor's portrait; the Doctor observes that he has forgotten what he used to look like. Actually, he may not have done because the portrait looks nothing like the Third Doctor. And then we have the monsters - the Borad works, and is perhaps the only real success of this story. The rest of the monsters are just plain crap. The Bandrils are sock puppets that should never have been allowed on screen. The Morlox are not much better, looking more like a prototype rather than the finished article. Then we have the android (an android that appears to smirk at one point) - all blond hair, blue face and stupid voice. The sets are largely bland and only really memorable because they look like, well, cheap TV sets, while the Timelash itself looks like a Blue Peter Christmas set built by idiot children. Honestly, if there's no money left for a story, then stop trying to spend money. Have one monster that works, and then fill the rest of the space where you want other monsters to reside with unseen menace and darkly-lit sets. Don't make it look like a shit episode of Star Trek: The Original Series that has no money.

The whole thing also sounds atrocious. The special FX sounds are all crass, while the music is dreadful: particularly at the start of the second episode as the Doctor fights the android with a mirror, which is amongst the worst incidental music the show has ever produced.

It is the worst of a really rather lacklustre bunch. So poor Colin Baker, he never really had a chance. And if you ever want to see precisely why, watch Timelash.

Doctor Who: Revenge of the Cybermen

While I was re-watching Revenge of the Cybermen for the purposes of this review, I was also introducing our cat to our kitten. As anyone who has tried to introduce house cats to each other, it doesn't often go smoothly. So as Vogans argued and the Doctor insulted Harry onscreen, the living room was filled with feline skirmishes, much scrabbling of claws, guttural growling and vitriolic hissing. I mention this because the Battle of the Cats was far more terrifying than anything that happens in Revenge of the Cybermen.

Of course, it may be unfair to expect Doctor Who to be terrifying, especially to a 32 year old man who has seen the story before. But a successful Doctor Who story should at least create a sense of excitement through putting the main characters in peril - this one certainly manages to put the main characters in perilous situations, but it is only really the climax to the third episode that a true sense of menace is created - which is where the ignorance of Harry jeopardises both the Doctor and him.

Monsters are important to the sense of menace, and here the story is blessed with one of the series' most iconic villains - the Cybermen. What a shame it utterly squanders this opportunity. This isn't quite the worst onscreen representation of the Cybermen (that occurs in Attack of the Cybermen, fact fans, when a Cyberman runs slowly from a room waving his arms and shouting "hurry!"), but it is a close run thing. The decision to make them shoot guns installed in their head is farcical, meaning that they have to stoop slightly to aim (perhaps another cause of their loss in the Cyber war was bad backs caused by constant stooping). But that is nothing compared to the most strikingly awful Cyber leader in history. You can tell he's the leader has part of his head has been painted black. Furthermore, he wanders around barking orders in a slightly constipated voice. But he is perhaps the most temperamental Cyberman in history. Easily wound up, he exudes far more emotion that any of the Vogans - which is odd, since the Cyber race are meant to be devoid of emotion. Even the Doctor is forced to comment on this, saying at one point "nice sense of irony. I thought for a moment he was going to smile." And it is not the first time in this story that he demeans the main villains - his oft-quoted speech* at the Cyber leader (which does wind him up so) is a classic example of the kiss of death on any monster. If the Doctor can't take you seriously, why should anyone else?

The Cybermen are not the only aliens in this story, though. We also get the Vogans. Who are also really shit. In fact, they are shitter than the Cybermen. Part of the problem is that the make-up the actors playing them are supposed to wear actually make it largely impossible for them to actually act. But that's not such a big problem really, because we only have two Vogan characters who say or do anything other than carry shitty guns and fail to look menacing. They are the old leader and the slightly less old rebellious would be leader. And they bicker and they snipe at each other, one being tetchy, the other being pious, without every hitting that Holy Grail of actually being fucking interesting. The day the Vogans return to Doctor Who is the day the show needs another rest.

The humans are a dull bunch, and even Harry seems to be having an off-day. The Doctor and Sarah Jane are the only ones who really put any energy into this - indeed, Tom Baker, like Matt Smith in this day and age, shows how clearly he had taken ownership of the role from his predecessor. It wouldn't last, of course, and Baker would turn in both lazy and unconvincing performances during his long tenure as the Doctor, but here at least he is giving it his all and owns the screen in each and every scene he appears in.

And the story? Pure padding. In the first episode, the Doctor even plays the old childhood game even of "you've got to get across the room without touching the floor". It's a shame, as Gerry Davis came up with some good plots in the past, but this feels exactly like a rough draft of a script from a man who has forgotten what Docor Who should actually be about.

Is there anything good? Well, the production values aren't bad, and it was a great idea to film in Wookey Hole. And as I've mentioned, Baker turns in a great performance in the lead role. But that's about it, really. This comes across as a massive missed opportunity.

And that's what I resent most about this story, really. It arguably isn't the worst Tom Baker story, but coming after three great stories and before a further season of generally high quality instalments of the show, this is just a massive letdown. The same production team had managed to redefine the Daleks just one story before - here they take the Cybermen and make them into ineffective and second-rate adversaries for the Doctor. This should be one of the iconic outings for the Silver Giants and it should complete a great run of strong stories for the show. Instead, it is a massively underwhelming disappointment.

*"You've no home planet, no influence, nothing. You're just a pathetic bunch of tin soldiers skulking about the galaxy in an ancient spaceship."

Doctor Who: The Time Monster

Ok, so let's get this out of the way straight off - The Time Monster is, arguably, not the worst Jon Pertwee story. It is not as boring as The Mutants or Colony in Space; it is not as anti-climatic as The Monster of Peladon (which also manages to be pretty boring in its own right). And yes, the monsters are not made out of barely animated plasticine, like in Invasion of the Dinosaurs.

But for me, this is the clunker of the Pertwee era. Partly it is because of Pertwee himself. Whereas the actors playing the Doctor in the first two stories in this series gave their all even to terrible scripts, Pertwee just comes across as a smug tosser in this story. He treats Jo as one might a slightly retarded child, while displaying open contempt to anyone who stands in his way or even dares to disagree with him. As far as I am concerned Pertwee is one of the weakest Doctors, but was still capable of turning in the occasional great performance. Unfortunately, The Time Monster sees him at his boorish, truculent worst.

Then we have the treatment of UNIT, who are nothing more than a way to pad out the storyline. When UNIT first appeared, they were a source of dramatic tension on the story, as the largely anti-establishment Doctor attempted to get on with an organisation happy to kill in order to carry out its job of defending that establishment and the country/world as a whole. Here, they are a comfortable family largely incapable of carrying out any effective military work. Even Jo Grant - as one of the most sympathetic members of that organisation - is treated poorly, being given little else to do other than confess to being dim and talking about groovy dresses until the very end of this long story. However, the treatment of UNIT reaches its nadir in the treatment of Benton who, having been allowed to briefly outwit the Master at the beginning of the story, is then reduced to a man wearing a nappy as a punchline to a poor joke. At the very end to the story you can see how the production team has ceased to take the programme seriously - which does rather raise the question of why the hell I should take their story seriously when they clearly can't be bothered to do so.

The story is also padded out, to the extent where the first two cliffhangers are largely the same. There seems to be a sense in which the whole story just wants to get to Atlantis because that's where the interesting stuff is going to happen - yet the Atlantis side to the story is dispensed with in a couple of hurried, breathless episodes that may as well have taken place on Peladon.

Then we have the central monster to the piece - Kronos. A great concept, sadly realised by a man in crappy bird costume. And this is the formidable, nightmarish, all-powerful creature that can be enslaved by the Master without him even breaking a sweat. And the Master himself, while generally played well (if slightly hysterically at times) by Roger Delgado, is only memorable because of the calibre of the actor playing him. The script leaves him as little more than a plot cipher - a way of moving a largely pedestrian plot slowly, and grudgingly, forward.

And this is perhaps the reason why I most resent The Time Monster - not because it is unmitigated crap, but because there is, on some level, a decent story here struggling to get out. The problem it has, though, is that the production team seem oblivious to the need to make that hint of a decent story into something that is actually good, or, at the very least, credible. I remember reading once that The Time Monster has, as a season finale, and end of term feel to it. This is true, but only in as much as the teachers just don't give a fuck anymore.

A wasted opportunity and, surely, an insult to those people who, unlike me, rate Pertwee's Doctor.

The Time Monster

If you came here looking for my review of The Time Monster... then you're going to be disappointed, as it won't be emerging until Monday. But in order to whet your appetite, in case you are interested in The Clunkers, my review will contain the phrase "why should I take a story seriously if the production team doesn't?"

Doctor Who: The Dominators

I want to love The Dominators, I really do. Patrick Troughton's Doctor is my favourite, and unfortunately there are precious few stories of his left in the archives. Unfortunately, The Dominators has one massive problem - it's utter crap.

There are four key reasons for this:

1. The Quarks. They are just dreadful in every way. The design is rubbish - they look like what they are; kids in cardboard boxes who occasionally wave their "arms" in a completely unconvincing and unthreatening way. Furthermore, as enemies, they are pretty crap. They burble every now and again like a Sat Nav that has just inhaled helium, and they need recharging every 5 seconds like a really primitive mobile phone. Finally, they are pretty easy to defeat - you just push 'em over.

2. The Dominators themselves. While they look pretty formidable, and they display a penchant for cruelty, they actually achieve very little since they spend nearly all of their time sniping at each other. After a while, it just becomes really, really boring.

3. The Dulcians. The emphasis is very much on dull. They do remarkably little other than talk to each other in a pious and pompous way. As the story progresses, you start to wonder whether it might just be better if the Dominators win out. The most interesting thing about this race is their curious style of dressing, which seems to consist of vests and curtains.

4. The story. It is essentially a rewrite of the first Dalek story - itself not a striking classic of plotting. It is all about the limits of pacifism, and the need to fight sometimes. The problem is that point can (and is) made in about five minutes, leaving us with a couple of hours of not much happening.

Is there anything good about it? Well, Troughton and Hines are as great as ever. Troughton always seems to give his best, even if the scripts really don't deserve it. Cully is also a relatively interesting character - something that is slightly undermined by the fact that he is a youthful rebel who looks like a portly, balding bank manager. And that's about it really. I seem to remember reading that one of the reasons why Troughton left was because he felt that the quality of the scripts was declining. Given his first story was the superb Power of the Daleks and his second season opener was perennial favourite Tomb of the Cybermen, it is easy to empathise with any despair he may have felt when faced with The Dominators to open his third season as the Doctor.

And why is this the clunker for the Troughton era? Well, there is another bad story in the archives, namely The Krotons - but that story is faster paced, shorter and with marginally more credible monsters (if only because they are taller than the Quarks). And, of course, The Underwater Menace is hardly a classic, but I can't include it as I can, and only ever will, see two episodes of this. And that is the real tragedy here - we have all five episodes of The Dominators and all four episodes of The Space Museum. Yet we cannot see the fourth episode of The Tenth Planet, or the vast majority of Evil of the Daleks or The Web of Fear. It is bad enough that large swathes of sixties Doctor Who were wiped back in the day; it is unforgivable that they wiped some of the best and preserved some of the worst.

Doctor Who: The Space Museum

Received wisdom would suggest that The Space Museum consists of an excellent opening episode followed by three deeply lacklustre episodes. And while this won't be the case with all of the stories I'll be watching as part of the clunkers, in this case I feel little reason to argue with received wisdom. That said, the difference between the first episode and the remaining three is not as vast as I remembered it to be.

The first episode does what many Doctor Who stories have done well - it sets up an intriguing mystery at the same time as setting up a story that it was always going to be next to impossible to resolve satisfactorily. There is much to enjoy, including the ongoing revelations that the four time travellers might not actually be where they think they are (or perhaps when they think they are). It all builds to a satisfying cliffhanger as the TARDIS crew actually arrive and begin their desperate struggle to avoid becoming embalmed exhibits in the space museum.

Well, I say "desperate struggle", but what actually happens here is a sort of tepid, muted adventure that barely sees the Doctor, Ian, Barbara and Vicki breaking a sweat in their attempts to survive. Hell, at one point Barbara even complains that she, Ian and Vicki should stop standing around and complaining and actually do something. She's absolutely right, of course, but it is a bit of a problem when your characters start pointing out the flaws with the script - a bit like the moment at the beginning of the second episode when the corpulent oaf leading the planet complains about how boring his life is. I mean, that's our introduction to the planet, for God's sake, and it is a complaint about how boring it is. Still, at least it is accurate.

Because the planet Xeros has to be one of the dullest the Doctor has ever and will ever visit. The ruling elite are all slightly overweight colonial types dressed in the brightest of whites (a Daz commercial if ever there was one) while the rebels, if we can call the insipid bunch of black clothed weasels with stupid eyebrows rebels, just don't deserve the help of the regular cast. It is like planet of the Ken Clarkes against the planet of the Ed Milibands. By the time we see Daleks for the second time in this story at the very end, the revolution is over and very sadly it has been televised.

Don't get me wrong, the first episode isn't perfect. The scene where Vicki is stopped from sneezing is the sort of thing that an eight year old would write if they had watched too many crap cartoons. And, in part because it is never really explored properly, the talk of jumping a time track is never quite convincing (especially given the lame explanation for the events of the first episode right at the end of the story), even if it does lead to the story's most interesting and unsettling moments. Likewise, the following three episodes, for all the endless capture/escape/recapture padding and dreadful, childish lines about "ray guns" are not all bad. In particular, the scenes where the Doctor mocks his captor in the second episode are excellent and very Doctorish - and I say that as a fan who really does not rate Hartnell. In fact, Hartnell is on form throughout this story, making it a shame that he doesn't really appear in the third episode at all.

I guess The Space Museum couldn't really happen in today's Doctor Who. At some point, someone would make the writer tone down the first episode and raise his game with the final three. As a result, we'd have a bland, inoffensive and yet watchable Doctor Who story. Which is both a blessing and a curse, since we'd miss out on the boredom that makes up three quarters of The Space Museum, at the same time as never getting to see the really rather innovative and interesting first episode. And as a result The Space Museum is actually a good microcosm of the Hartnell era, which was experimental and therefore scaled some great heights at the same plumbing some terrible depths. And it has Daleks, the Hartnell era - it's all right here, in The Space Museum.

Doctor Who: The Clunkers

In order to distract myself from the summer break between A Good Man Goes To War and Let's Kill Hitler, I'm going to be watching and reviewing a story from each of the eleven Doctors here every Saturday. But, since Doctor Who fans are often far better at slating their favourite show than praising it, I'll be watching eleven of Doctor Who's all time clunkers.

In the unlikely event of anyone wishing to join me in this quixotic quest I am only choosing stories currently available on DVD. However, if don't own the DVDs and don't want to buy some of the more disappointing entries into the Doctor Who canon, then you can also find most Doctor Who stories over at DailyMotion. And for anyone interested, the running order will be:

The Space Museum
The Dominators
The Time Monster
Revenge of the Cybermen
Time-Flight
Timelash
Time and the Rani
Doctor Who (1996 film)*
Aliens of London/World War Three
Partners In Crime
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood

So join me here, next Saturday, to read my review of The Space Museum. If you don't find this whole idea tedious, that is...

*Yeah I know there isn't any other choice when it comes to the Eighth Doctor, but in about nine week's time I'll be explaining why this is one of the weakest Doctor Who stories of all time regardless.