Dr Who Review, Part 5 - The Tom Baker Era

now I was very happy to become Doctor Who and I finished 30 odd years ago and yet yesterday I was blessing the fans who've grown old and bald and stooped with me and who go on loving me you know that's quite something but don't you ever want to say didn't you ever see me in educating Rita me when people you know when you're a bit chewy is produced you wouldn't you like to be credited as a good actor elsewhere rather than simply in Doctor Who no I don't think so because I don't really rate my acting but my doctor who was entirely Tom it was just Tom I wasn't acting and it just fell into my lap you know and they said how you gonna do it I said I didn't know and I started saying the lines and they and the children loved it you know I thought eh who wants to act I can be Tom [Music] by December 1974 dr. who was riding a wave of popularity it had not experienced since 1965 enjoying an average audience of over eight and a half million viewers for Jon Pertwee's last season the action-packed stories of alien invasions being countered by the unit family with the capable and physically proficient patriarchal third doctor had elevated the program to the heights of a cherished British institution much like that first regeneration back in 1966 a change to this format was a gamble with much at stake after five years Jon Pertwee's incarnation had become the face of the show with young viewers and many adults too in this age before repeats or home video not remembering any other version of their Time Lord hero but key to the success and longevity of Doctor Who is its capacity for change and the incoming production team had a great enthusiasm for embracing that change along with the star the steady hands that had held the tiller for pretty much the whole of the Third Doctor's era Barry Letts and Terrance dicks were moving on their places being filled by new producer Philip Hinchcliffe and new script editor Robert Holmes at the young age of 29 this was Hinchcliffe first producer ship but much like Verity Lambert before him he quickly exhibited a consistent talent for the role redefining the show and becoming one of the chief architects of what has become known as the Golden Age of Doctor Who you're on a knife edge you can fail so easily you know in comedy when you fail because people don't laugh we know very quickly if we fail because you just need one component in the program one small design element like a monster mask or some particular effect model film is I think just to go wrong and the effort you've failed you've destroyed the illusion the stalwart inconsiderate let's didn't just up sticks an abandoned ship right away though there was a transition period with Hinchcliffe shadowing the veteran producer for the first story of the new era robot with Terrance dicks undertaking the writing duties therefore many of the initial script can and casting were undertaken by the old production team and it would be a few weeks into season 12 until the new tone and style became more apparent the inexorable freight train of production steamed forward with the most major decision needing to be made well in advance of Hinchcliffe tenure who would play the fourth doctor as pert we have made the party zone let's was having great difficulty in selecting and casting a suitable replacement his initial idea was to have an older doctor much like his first incarnation and several established stars were considered including Richard Hearn famous for his comic and clownish mr. pastry character and brain Crowden the Scottish actor well known for playing eccentric scientists and doctors and who infamously would go on to realize the most over-the-top and laughably ridiculous villain in Doctor Who history following these two several others were mooted and discussions with agents took place Ron Moody David Warner Michael Benton jim Dale Fulton McKay all were considered but each one was either unsuitable unavailable or uninterested with the clock ticking let's muster pin at his wits end salvation came in the form of a letter the incoming head of drama serials Bill Slater shared with Lance he had received it from a promising actor he had directed back in 1972 who was down on his luck and begging for a job a meeting was arranged and in the BBC bar Slater let's and head of drama Sean Sutton met the imposing Lee tall in eccentric 40-year old Tom Baker who was unaware of the role for which he was being considered with a copy of Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows in his coat pocket Baker enthusiastically discussed the morality of good versus evil in children's literature and quickly convinced the trio that he was the best choice for the fourth incarnation of televisions greatest hero glad Charlie where's John was much more Holmes ian was near a very grand and and he's so shocking be recognized wasn't he's rather like a tall lightbulb is near glitters virtually unknown in comparison to the other star names that had been considered Baker's eccentricity and bohemian style immediately resonated with the producers not an acting part in the sense that the character is very very severely limited that are there are boundaries of a whistle doctor cargo he can't suddenly become interested in romance doesn't have this kind of emotions he's not into he's not at all acquisitive he couldn't be suddenly gratuitously violent so therefore in the ordinary sense of acting the cattle can develop so the problem of the actor is to surprise the audience constantly to truly get a sense of the eccentric and enigmatic character that is Tom Baker I wholeheartedly recommend his 1997 autobiography who on earth is Tom Baker as there's just no way I can capture an accurate sense of great man here prone to embellishment no one can tell Baker story half as well as the man himself his wit and turn of phrase transforming even the most mundane life experiences into bizarre Lewis Carroll esque fairy tales that are endlessly amusing but which cause one to wonder what the full truth is lurking behind the peculiar prism of Baker's perspective and I've been a great beauty in that time said and oh dear and I was used to this I said hello and she said oh and she clutched her bosom rod up erratically and said I am so sorry do I know you or am I going dot here I said gently I said perhaps you've got to grin sue oh yes he said you're a man from Doctor Who good god she said yes as soon as I saw you I knew you were special because my titties began to tingle and I isn't that marvelous you know my mother who was a lovely Oh wonder could never have said a phrase like that and I I thought perhaps on my gravestone here lies Tom Baker who made titties tingle sums up the silliness of you know of telly Fame born to a working-class family in Liverpool in 1934 Tom Baker devoted himself to God to begin with joining a monastery in Jersey and later Shropshire as a novice monk from the age of 15 he wanted to be a hero he wanted to do something splendid he wanted to make his mother proud and after a childhood being told by teachers and priests alike that he was nothing Baker desperately sought a purpose but a life of God loose servitude was not for him after six years of silence and loneliness Baker realized he had lost his faith and was allowed to resign his monastic devotions with national service still in force the young Baker had to join up now he was no longer exempt from doing so as a monk he served two years in the Royal Army Medical Corps as an orderly in a military hospital where he got involved in the amateur entertainment organised to maintain good morale after one doctor remarked that he should take up drama professionally something which had not occur to Baker and infused and energized by the affection audiences showed him after being repeatedly told as a child he was insignificant he applied to several drama schools following his national service settling on Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama in Sidcup Baker struggled to break into the business for several years until in 1968 he secured a contract at the National Theatre at that time headed by the legendary say Laurence Olivier by 1971 Baker had appeared in many small stage roles and had begun to appear on television - until he received his first big break into film betraying Russian mystic Rasputin in the epic Nicholas and Alexandra despite the film not being a commercial success he was nominated for awards for his performance and went on to appear in several more films most notably as the wicked sorcerer Cora in 1973's the golden voyage of sinbad which lets and Dix went and saw following Slater's recommendation of Baker for the role of the doctor I make obeisance despite his initial success February 1974 saw Baker without any acting work and employed on a building site on Ebury Street to make ends meet that meeting at the BBC bar was to have an indelible impact on his life however as by the following evening he was offered the opportunity of filling Pertwee's shoes as the fourth incarnation of British televisions greatest hero considering that the Fourth Doctor went on to be considered by many as the definitive incarnation his costume and idiosyncrasies becoming as iconic a part of the show's DNA as the police box and the Daleks doctor you may be a doctor but I'm the doctor the definite article you might say it's a little surprising to realize that Baker was very nervous and anxious about taking over from third tweet further consideration renders this understandable however the third doctor's dashing resolute and reliable character was so established that any deviation was a risk but deviate the next doctor needed to and Hinchcliffe swish for a more unreliable detached yet still heroic version was the starting point around which Baker and the writers realized the far more eccentric and humorous character of the fourth doctor nothing's perfect have to take the rough with the smooth mind you I think inspired by a toulouse-lautrec lithograph of nineteenth-century Musical star at St Brant Baker's costume revised The Dandy --is-- crushed a velvet and frilly shirts of his predecessor into a far more bohemian and slightly battered ensemble with a mishmash of charity shop fashions the new doctors outfit maintained the Edwardian silhouette of his former selves whilst more clearly defining him as a galactic wanderer his pockets full of assembled junk from a thousand planets topping it all was the signature scarf its initial ridiculous 12-foot length the result of the fabulously named begonia Pope is hired to knit the accessory assembling the monster using the entirety of the wool she was given by a costume designer James Atchison instead of choosing just one of the assorted colors the mistake was serendipitous however as both star and designer loved the idea of the fourth doctor striding about the universe enveloped by the resultant ludicrous piece of fashion about the scarf madame Nostradamus made it for me with a battered Fedora placed upon his unruly curls this doctor invited the audience to regard the universe with the same Bogle eyed amusement and grinning wonder that he himself displayed his booming stentorian voice was distinctive and unique equally capable of disarming greeting evil well nobody's perfect but that's overstating individual no I'm the doctor witty riposte doctor you're being charged well of course I am there's no point in being grown-up if you can't be childish sometimes and poetic aggrandizement [Music] Homo sapiens of an inventive invincible species there's only a few million years as they crawled up out of the mud and learned to walk puny defenseless bipeds they've survived flood famine and plague they've survived cosmic walls and Holocaust there they are out among the stars waiting to begin a new life ready to sit eternity the doctor had always been an eccentric but his fourth incarnation took this eccentricity to a whole other level with an injection of the actor's own edigg mattock and unique persona Baker's version is more distant and alien than his forebears unpredictably transitioning between buffoonish silliness my name is from honored Verona London I'm sorry about that is there anything we can out raged moral lecture gratified that you appreciate appreciated appreciate it to commit mass destruction and murder on a scale it's almost inconceivable and you asked me to appreciate it just because you haven't I made a brilliantly conceived toy after the mummified remains a planet terrible storms doctor it is not a toy what's it for what are you doing [Music] he is arguably a more intellectual Authority than his other incarnations name-dropping famous scientists and Renaissance Minds whereas predecessor had primarily mentioned escapologists and other action heroes so Newton invented hunting there's no limit rising due to the phase transitional period with let's and dicks handing over to Hinchcliffe and Holmes the fourth doctor's debut robot is very clearly a third doctor story the unit lab the Brigadier and Benton Bessy a sinister neo-fascist conspiracy and military dust-up all the signature iconography and motifs of the outgoing here a feature and this provides the viewer with the opportunity to see how much the new doctor contrasts with his predecessor in an echo of the mixed response to the first regeneration covered in part three of the series Baker's new incarnation garnered both praise and criticism illuminating once more the eternal fear of change to a stale but comfortably familiar format that is repeated every so years nowadays on social media amongst the responses to the fourth doctor's debut with such ironic James's he was too stupid for words my little boy didn't like the new doctor he thought he was too silly and I would like him calmed down a bit because he's crazy others however said that the new incarnation had the more life in humor and that he would buck the series up robot however is not a particularly good indication of where the show was headed it acts as a good showpiece for the new doctor but beyond this it's not very noteworthy due to its covering of ground so very well trodden over the previous five years don't stir much Chancellor I know but we have to try after the debut and with Hinchcliffe firmly installed his producer with robert holmes getting his teeth truly into the scripts the tonal shift is much more evident the stories had been commissioned by the previous production team but the singular vision of arguably the most successful production team zero ensured that a fresher flair was brought to the rest of the season and every surrender said you will be allowed to leave the are the winning hate all humans once we step outside the chamber we'd be attacked I am the swarm leader I guarantee your safety the women will spare your lives but leave the sleepers for us the first clear departure from the five year reign of Pertwee comes in the form of the new TARDIS crew with Royal Navy surgeon Harry Sullivan joining Sarah Jane Smith to become the first male companion since Jamie McCrimmon in 1969 as it had been planned to cast an older doctor Harry's primary purpose would have been to handle the more physical action much like Ian of the early seasons the casting of Baker therefore made Harry's character somewhat redundant and it was decided early on to write a night by the end of the season mates I say could be some sort of survival kit could survive yes you know the sort of thing they shove in lifeboats amazing you're improving habit am i really if your mind is beginning to work it's entirely due to my influence of course he must have taken any credit now what's missing this is actually quite ashamed because Ian martyr brings a likeability to the role and the obvious chemistry of the three regulars energizes their scenes the similarity in age between the two leading men has a touch of competitiveness in their mutual desire to be the heroic savior of Sarah Jane who of course is perfectly capable of saving herself thank you very much such an entertaining relationship between a TARDIS trio would not really be seen again until Matt Smith's eleventh doctor invited amy pond's doltish but dedicated fiance Rory over the time machines threshold in 2010 it's a lot to take in isn't it tiny box huge room inside what's that about let me explain another dimension it's basically another dimension what I've what happen when Prisoner Zero I've been reading up on all the latest scientific theories FTL travel parallel universes are there when someone says it's bigger on the inside I always look forward to that beyond the changes to the regular cast the shift from the ecological parables of the previous era to stories which have a far darker and more horrific tone are soon apparent in the episodes which follow Holmes wanted to move away from the Star Trek like morality tales of some later pertly adventures and set to work heavily adapting the stories already commissioned to give them a far scarier and gothic atmosphere heavily influenced by the successful Hammer horror movies which had been steadily produced since the 1950s just as with those films however which caused controversy with their unprecedented levels of violence and shock this led to Doctor Who becoming the target of increasingly effective complaints and criticism from self-appointed moral Guardians like Mary Whitehouse and her so-called national viewers and listeners Association which would eventually result in a neutering of the show in the 1980s but more on that in a later episode back in 1975 they were still getting away with it and producing some of the all-time classic stories of Doctor Who stories which many fans would argue have never been topped sinners if it's not yet apparent dear viewer let me state it unequivocally here I love all of Doctor Who selecting my favorite stories from each era is always tough but I must admit choosing from the Hinchcliffe Holmes era has been inordinately difficult whether it's the sci-fi body horror of the arc in space [Music] the creepy shape-shifting of terror of the Zygons the repellent Frankenstein's monster ASSA T of the brain of Morbius the vicious vegetation of the seeds of doom the P super suspense of Victorian London in the talents of Wayne trying [Music] there are just so many quintessential slices of Doctor Who to choose from and more besides but choose I must and first up as a story that could have been just another retread of familiar ground which under the masterful influence of Hinchcliffe and Holmes became not just a televisual gem a temple example of quality whoo but his six-part er which would redefine the program and create narrative ripples which affect its mythos to this day genesis of the Daleks [Music] by 1975 and after three appearances in as many years with Pertwee the Daleks have become so familiar that they had lost a lot of their original fearsomeness their fascistic inspiration had become so watered-down that their threat was not particularly apparent their status as the universe's greatest and most implacable foe seriously undermined by easy defeat such as being pushed into icy water hit by Styx [Music] [Applause] and bizarrely suicidal tendencies as taking self-evaluation a little too far [Laughter] to be fair their descent into ridicule began way back in 1965 being thrown about a fairground ride by animatronic automata started a downward trend it would be difficult to come back from what made it all the worse is the fact that the primary culprit of all this silliness was none other than their creator Terry nation nation had made a fortune from the mid-60s Dalek mania it still had first refusal on any commissioned script featuring the famous Pepper Potts after failing to launch a spin-off Dalek Show he had returned to pitting them against the doctor unfortunately nation had a bit of a tendency to phone it in rehashing the same plot devices themes and even names time and time again after submitting yet another cookie-cutter Dalek tale Barry Letts ordered nation to go back to the drawing board this time with a focus on their origins which had only been hinted at in their original appearance it was an ingenious idea and it certainly energized nation it's unclear how much of the resultant masterpiece is due to nation's original scripting or Holmes's subsequent editing the genesis was to enjoy more repeats on television than any other story of the entire classic era due to its memorable scenes fantastic performances and resonant themes the doctor and his companions are intercepted mid transmat by the Time Lords and find themselves on barren war-torn Skaro during the original conflict between that planet's two races the Thals and the Col Ed's welcome doctor what's going on don't you realize how dangerous it is to intercept the transmat beam oh come doctor not with our techniques we time lords transcended such simple mechanical devices when the universe was less than half its present size look whatever I've done for you in the past I've more than made up for I will not tolerate this continual interference in my life has established in the third doctor's latest illness in exchange for his continued freedom the Time Lords from time to time dispatch more missions where plausible denial is necessary thus the Fourth Doctor is reluctantly forced to accept a rather underhand assignment Daleks we foresee a time when they will have destroyed all other life-forms and become the dominant creature in the universe that's possible tell on we'd like you to return to Skaro at a point in time before the Daleks evolved do you mean avert their creation or affect their genetic development so that they evolve into less aggressive creatures and he and his companions make their way carefully across the lethal landscape to stop the birth of the deadliest foes the universe will ever face as Russell T Davies has stated this is essentially the first act in the eventual time war which has loomed over so much of the modern series what is immediately apparent in this story is a new sense of brutality and ruthlessness which would go on to define the Hinchcliffe era it stands as a rare example of the perennial Doctor Who quarry standing in for an alien planet actually working effectively to reflect a true sense of the desolation and lifelessness of Skaro after centuries of devastating conflict gone are the electrified floor puzzles and shiny disco Daleks this tale has our heroes facing creeping barrages [Music] torturous interrogation and poisonous gas were the only options to grab the respirators from corpses to survive [Applause] [Music] [Music] the suggestion of the Dalek Nazi allegory is far from subtle anymore the black uniforms jackboots and lightning bolt i accoutrement the khaled military directly referencing SS iconography and the files not much better the clear-cut Flash Gordon goodies have not evolved this is a world where there is evil on both sides and goodness hard to find it provokes some complaints but why not after all by 1975 the bloody ethnic cleansing and brutal oppression of Cambodians by the Chi Minh rouge led by Pol Pot was in full swing and only showed signs of intensifying as it was reported on nightly in the nation's homes with the second world war becoming an increasingly distant memory there was a great danger that the lessons learned from Nazism would be forgotten the evil architects of the so called final solution reduced in the public consciousness to caricatured figures of fun alongside this was the ominous rise of insidious nationalist mobs like the National Front [Music] to present to young people the apocalyptic end results of such rhetoric is vital in going some way towards ensuring history doesn't repeat itself when victory is ours will wipe every trace of the files and their city from the face of this land we will avenge the deaths of all Carnot's who've fallen in the cause of right and justice and build a peace which will be a monument to their sacrifice our battle cry will be total extermination of the files and that's what this story at heart is all about rhetoric it's the story where the doctor most memorably grapples with the most fundamental moral quandary do the ends justify the means just touch these two strands together and the Daleks are finished by that right to destroy the Daleks you can't touch it but I do you see some things could be better with the Daleks many future words will become allies that's because of their fear of the Daleks it isn't like that what the final responsibility is mine mine alone if someone who knew the future pointed out a child to you and told you that that child would grow up totally evil to be a ruthless dictator who will destroy millions of lives could you then we're talking about the Daleks the most evil creatures ever invented you must destroy them you must complete your mission for the Time Lords do I have the right and of course in the other corner we have the personification of you Genesis rhetoric Davros turn right exterminate as iconic as the Daleks themselves their creator is the linchpin of this story never better either in performance or narrative function than here his introduction the fascistic pepper potts are marginalized in the story to make way for the real star of this morality play and Michael wisher brings a Shakespearean sophistication to the megalomaniacal monster at its heart which elevates every noise the Daleks before wishes decision to have Davros as demented diatribes escalate into the familiar staccato monitor of the products of his malevolent genius is a clever touch which concentrates their evil into one character literally giving their fascism a face it's telling that this face is twisted and damaged this body crippled maimed by war a pertinent lesson and how violence only begets violence although they are restricted to all of 15 minutes of screen time in a six episode story the Daleks themselves are far more memorable and powerful here than in several of their preceding stories like Hannibal Lecter in his debut novel red dragon where he is similarly used sparingly they are ultimately the victors and make the deepest impression on the viewer as their creator in his hubris developed them to see all life unlike themselves as inferior including him [Music] [Applause] it's not registered in my vocabulary by his extermination is the poetic culmination of his hateful ideology having been unleashed they no longer need him and he is just an obstacle in the way of their ascension to ultimate supremacy [Music] [Applause] we are ain't no but we live up this is only by mating we will play pair we will go stronger when the time is right we will take place as the same [Music] Dallas is a remarkable character and I understand the desire to bring him back following this classic but really his purpose is exhausted in her story and his subsequent appearances only served to diminish the power and significance of his creations and one false move and it goes right down inside his chair I turned Davros snooze life-support system into scrap metal mouse back off it was not until 2005 that Doctor Who's most iconic villains would get the opportunity to remind us that how truly fantastic they are in their own right I've come to help and the doctor [Music] as season 12 drew to a close it was clear that the gamble had paid off the new doctor had made an immediate impression on viewers with the average audience numbering 10 million Tom Baker had become the new face of the show and enjoying his popularity amongst fans and children was regularly appearing both on screen and off in character and costume to further cement his incarnation as definitive in the minds of the audience the Liverpool lad who'd spent his formative years being told he was nothing was suddenly experiencing an adulation and hero worship there was only to intensify in the years that followed he took his status and influence very seriously making sure he was never caught smoking or drinking when off-duty so as not to shatter any childhood illusionist it must have been an all-consuming role but nevertheless entirely seductive to suddenly find oneself a hero to millions of young people as a character whose persona and dialogue was so intrinsically based on one's own must have been a compelling and addictive drug I think it was here that the longevity of the Fourth Doctor was insured as Baker would continue to inhabit the role both on and off screen for far longer than his predecessors or indeed any of his successors thus far the great man even admitted much later that perhaps he stayed too long but I can't blame him after the miserable silence and solitude of monastic life and that building site on eBrush Street who wouldn't want to live the life of a national institution for as long as possible with the success of the fourth doctor's first season under their belts inch Kevin Holmes set to work on the follow-up now free from scripts commissioned or casting decided upon by their predecessors season 13 would see the distillation of their mutual creative vision into its most concentrated form resulting in a string of classic whose stories which are required viewing for any self-respecting fan no I don't think it was ever intended to be a just for children it's it's not made by the children's department it's made by the drama group in the BBC and it was originally intended to fill a gap on Saturdays at tea time and it's always been classified as family entertainment the second story of this season sees the gothic horror tone introduced by the duo most explicit it's a story which I rented so much from a middle school library and must have nearly worn the old VHS tape out and is probably one of the most rewatched in my collection pyramids of Mars like many children I harbored a fascination for Egyptology and the assorted spooky myths and legends which go hand in hand with the discovery of long sealed tombs the mysteries of this ancient culture which are still to this day being unraveled by explorers and archaeologists is fascinating in and of itself but also ripe with opportunity for the creative mind long before stargates and ancient aliens on the so called History Channel Doctor Who gave us a story where the ancient past and the extra-terrestrial were interwoven intending to return to unit HQ in the present day the TARDIS actually lands in 1911 at the old Priory a stately home which occupied the site long before the headquarters was built the house is packed full of Egyptian artifacts which the owner professor Marcus Carmen has brought back with him from his many excavations of ancient sites but Marcus has not returned from his latest expedition and an anti-social and antagonistic Egyptian Ibrahim Nemean is staying at the old Priory frightening the butler not least with his incessant organ playing [Music] disturb me get out at once he is in fact a member of the cult of su tech zealots who worship an evil demigod and plan for his return Masai antara kill him personally come to us indeed [Music] and return he does using and disposing of servants enslaved his mighty will in his efforts to be released from the prison in which he was placed by his fellow alien a sirens on whom the mythology of ancient Egypt is based after seven thousand years of imprisonment with a small army of robotic mummies su tech strives to unleash his near limitless power and brings four decks like any mummy story it has a great debt to the original 1933 The Mummy filmed by Universal Studios remade and supposedly updated countless times up to the present day but more specifically the tone and style are more explicitly influenced by the hammer version of 1959 set around the turn of the century and with the iconic horror stars Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing in front of the lenses lest anyone hurl accusations of plagiarizing Aughra fee and thematic influences are but one layer to Hinchcliffe Holmes classics what makes them so excellent is how these elements are interwoven with the science fiction narrative of Doctor Who's to result in elevated uniqueness and besides talent borrows genius themes once the missile is projected you see how to destroy my enemies the alien who dares to intrude the humans animals birds fish reptiles pyramids of Mars sees the normally frivolous Fourth Doctor in a rather morose and reflective mood somewhat mopey at the beginning with a smile Shirley what does that matter you should be glad to be going home the earth isn't my home Sara I'm a Time Lord oh I know you're tired oh you don't understand the implications I'm not a human being I walk in eternity it means I've lived for something like seven hundred and fifty years still be middle aged yes and revealing his other nurse must overtly when being reprimanded by Sarah Jane for not seem to care about an individual's death Oh sometimes you don't seem human typical of Saturn simplicity a mother's just been murdered for men Sara five you include professor Scarman himself and they're made of the first of millions unless fatigue is stopped know thine enemy admirable advice seriousness Baker brings to the role here lends a real sense of peril to the antagonist which in all honesty he somewhat undercut in later stories as is sometimes flippant attitude implied a lack of threat here when facing the mighty godlike powers of SU Tech one can believe that the Fourth Doctor is truly unsure whether he'll survive the encounter serve you so tech your neighbors have dominated in every civilized world with an app named beset Satan said Oh Sara she pits your puny were against my suit in my presence you are a termite a base yourself your groveling insects every performance is on point here and the production design is excellent overall but the real jewel in the crown is Gabriel wolf as the villain but suit X great powers held in check by the eye of horus he is confined to his chair unmoving his features covered by a mask therefore all his Menace is concentrated into his voice and wolf gives an apse we bravura performance choosing to deliver the lines with a silky smoothness yet with the rich base of his speech hinting at the immense power he could wield if only he could get free the truly powerful have no need to shout destroy when I trade I leave nothing but darkness this story set the bar higher than ever before and is as damn near perfect as you can expect from 72 it is essential viewing by 1977 doctor who was wrapping up its 14th season with an average of over 11 million viewers longtime companion Sarah Jane Smith had moved on don't forget me don't you forget me and the doctor had been joined by savage tribes woman Lila played by Louise Jameson who despite being squeezed into a very objectifying set of leathers a bleary lized a more capable and practical female companion that had been seen before acting as the Eliza Doolittle to the doctors professor Higgins effect this a yo-yo it's a game I thought you were enjoying it enjoying it you said I had to keep it going up and down I thought it was part of the magic magic magic there's no such thing as a magic exactly to the rest of mine nothing is an xsplit book only unexplained the program had never been so popular such a firm Saturday night fixture and the buzz in the playgrounds after each installment must have been electric but it was not just children who could be considered fans any longer a generation had by now grown up with the show and their passion laid the groundwork for one of the earliest of what we now call fandoms that may the Doctor Who appreciation society was founded by a committee of grown-up fans and was the first such club to be officially recognized by the BBC they began to produce a monthly magazine for their members and to organize conventions from August of that same year the program's audience was growing and now encompassed a much wider demographic than ever before with this firmly committed following would come a greater sense of audience and teittleman however as core fans regarded the series in a very serious way and were fiercely protective over what they considered the definitive style and tone but it was also very cliched it was very routine running up and down corridors and silly monsters without the option of rewatching older episodes however this idea was bound to be affected by unreliable memory and nostalgia and such attitudes would go on to arguably damage the show in later years well I'm glad you said that it was me being extremely stupid despite the popularity and success of season 15 the indefatigable campaign of Mary Whitehouse and her cohorts had begun to successfully convince the BBC drama department the Philip Hinchcliffe sinter protection of the show was unsuitable for children alongside this Hinchcliffe had begun to spend over budget in an effort to bring far greater production value to the flagship series both of these concerns are much more major than they may seem to those viewers unaware of the BBC's unique status as a Public Broadcasting Company their funding depends on a licence fee which the British public are legally bound to pay if they own a device capable of receiving a television signal this means that there is strictly no advertising on BBC channels and that their primary obligation is to provide programming which entertains and educates the nation I strongly that it should be turned into a public corporation the first of its kind and their world opposition to that it also means that unlike commercial television their responsibility is solely to the public and any programme produced or salary paid is frequently subjected to intense scrutiny to ensure that society is being properly recompense this responsibility also includes moral obligations [Music] while it's true that sometimes the line was crossed in Hinchcliffe era with some graphic violence that would never pass the senses if they tried it in the modern series the moral panic that the national viewers and listeners Association tried to whip up was far from proportionate it's telling that the membership of this association seemed to be comprised of typically fussy and somewhat elderly busybodies who always seemed ready to jump to the defense of children but without really talking to the subjects of their passionate and pious protection the final shots of the program with the image that was left in the mind of the child got rid of anyway I think all human beings like to be scared which is why people get a late night horror film in the cinema but you've got a basis of security which is a framework which prevents any real harm being done I think we watch as a family I think they know that these creatures are make-believe whilst I respect the concern these people had for the safety of children I think it's rather insulting and patronizing to try to hide all the evil of the world from young people after millions of their parents generation had been slaughtered by supposedly civilized societies only 30 years previously with many more being contemporaneously exterminated in Cambodia and other hellholes was it not paramount that young people should come to terms with secular moral questions and the consequences of violence White House's greatest error was considering television an escapist piece of modern recreation and not a great tool for education in 1977 however the BBC felt the need to act on the complaints and without consultation Hinchcliffe was transferred to a more adult and post watershed program with experienced producer Graham Williams brought in to replace him Robert Homans would soon follow thereby bringing the golden era of the show to an unfortunate end I had mixed feelings towards the Williams era on the one hand he was responsible for introducing some new and exciting concepts such as Doctor Who's first story arc the linked installments of season 16 s key to time which was an admirable effort if somewhat anticlimactic in reality the key to time is a perfect cube which maintains the equilibrium of time itself it consists of six segments and these segments are scattered and hidden throughout the cosmos when they are assembled into the cube they create a power which is too dangerous for any being to possess also he oversaw in the introduction of the first official time lady Romana finally giving the doctor a companion who is his intellectual equal when she was used properly I may be inexperienced but I did graduate from the Academy with a triple first I suppose you think we should be impressed by their - well it's better than scraping through with 51% of the second attempt that informations confidential also cropping up in this period was the now-famous k9 it was part of a trend of cute robot sidekicks that began in sci-fi movies and television and which would reach its peak in star wars which arrived in the UK in late 1977 and like a nuclear explosion would shake popular science fiction and audiences expectations of it - its very foundations I must admit I'm not a massive fan of k9 mainly because the expensive prop it cost 793 pounds an astronomical amount at the time was so temperamental frequently breaking down and going haywire on the radio signals used for communication between the gallery in the studio floor that the vast majority of the time the writers had to come up with ways of putting him out of the action and he becomes rather superfluous what you needed for much like the later chameleon I feel his was an idea that came before the practicalities of his inclusion were really thrashed out I think one of the reasons I don't enjoy this period of the show as much is due to the preponderance of outerspace stories I tend to enjoy the more convoluted plots of pseudo historicals which would we be seen again until after Tom Baker had departed the closest we get is 1979 city of death written by the late great Douglas Adams who served for a time as the show script editor which enjoyed the largest-ever audience through an episode of the program thanks in part to a strike which to gravel ITV off the air nobody's allowed to see Leonardo really he's engaged on important work for captain Tancredi you know no Williams had to overcome arguably greater issues than his predecessors however crisis what crisis the 1970s saw great economic troubles for Britain with the advent of a three day working week and rolling power cuts as the result of industrial action and general strikes over pay working conditions and the dismantling of industry in favor of cheap ports these issues would blight the nation for the rest of the decade building to the so-called winter of discontent of nineteen seventy eight and nine as the budget for doctor who was set at the beginning of the financial year the passing months or a devaluation of an already tight allocation of funds as inflation rose this led to the show becoming more cheap looking than ever before at a time when young people were being swept up in the impressive visuals in his scape estoppel and substyle Wars science fiction was back in a big way with innumerable movies and television programs commissioned with comparatively enormous budgets by American production companies visually dr. who just couldn't compete and many would argue that it didn't have to that the ideas themes and character or what makes the show special but that didn't stop incoming producer John nathan-turner from trying nevertheless Graham Williams moved on but Baker stayed he has said since the perhaps he should also have left in that January of 1980 but the doctor had become such an important part of his life that he couldn't bring himself to do so just yet he had become very proprietorial of the program and was very vocally critical of directors and writers who diverted from his understanding of the character like Hartnell before him he'd seen companions monsters and production teams come and go and he had a very sure some was a bloated sense of his importance to the program I feel I know more about the program and the writers do quite naturally I do they think they know more about it than me as a question of who wins Nathan Turner had been working on the show for far longer events in Stratton's time and had progressed up through the corporation from for assistant to the new producer if anyone had a deep understanding of the program in its essentials one would expect it to be nathan turner he also wasn't going to take any of Baker's egotistical pomposity and the star soon found he now had far less influence over the scripts and casting than he had enjoyed previously season 18 Baker's last is markedly different from what went before Nathan Turner approached his producer ship with a new broom attitude replacing pretty much the entire production team and completely redesigning the look feel and sound of the show after 17 years of the familiar Delia Derbyshire theme a new arrangement was composed by Peter Howell which with its synthesizer sound also ushered in far more electronic incidental music more cutting-edge visual effects were made use of to try and approach the sophistication people were by now getting used to in movie theatres the iconic bohemian style of the doctor was evolved into a similar but far more contrived and refined version a sign of how the subsequent outfits of his later incarnations were more costume than clothing for good or ill doctor who was ready for the 80s the only slight anachronism was the star himself and throughout the season Baker seems visibly less enamored at the role his ill feeling and argumentative nature clearly bleeding into his performance but we've got communications devices but not a police box hungry watching the seasons I found it far more enjoyable than when seeing its stories out of sequence with those that went previously after some frankly tatty looking stories of the Williams era like the invasion of time where a disused hospital quite obviously stands in for the TARDIS interior's and the alien enemies were literally pieces of tin foil being wrapped about there's an energy and freshness imbued in season 18 a new sense of purpose like it or not Nathan Turner's debut year returns to the experimentalism which marked the earlier Pertwee era and one really gets a sense the shake-up was necessary to end the staleness which the show was steadily sinking into a story which sums up this new approach is warriors gate the last episode of which I caught on UK goal back in 1993 as part of their 30th anniversary celebrations of the show it was visually and conceptually bizarre and I'm not sure I would have truly grasped the story back then even if I had seen the first three episodes it baffled a lot of viewers at the time being more high-concept than the traditional monster story people we used to but it's visual innovation and clever narrative structure makes it an enigmatic an enduring piece of drama an appreciation has grown over the last three decades since his transmission worries gate concerns a time sensitive slave race the Farrell's and their desire for freedom from their oppressors morally bankrupt humans who use them as navigators the there´ll leader Barak brings the TARDIS to a surreal white void where the slave ship is trapped the only feature of which is a gateway which leads to our universe but the plot of this story is not as important as the thematic ideas being explored and far more visually than ever before gone are the standard expositions of earlier stories the explanations of prior and current events and the viewers treated with a little more respect to absorb and interpret the underlying concepts on their own part of the confusion arises from the difficult and disrupted production experienced as a result of disputes between the director and the studio workers industrial action and extensive rewrites the Stephen Gallagher's original script in order to make the filming of his outlandish ideas more practicable this led to a watering down of some of the themes but the major ideas become clear with repeat watching this is a story about imagination and creative freedom being constrained and tainted by commercialism and capitalist amoral greed there's a very literary feel - warriors gate the crew of the slave ship are clearly heavily influenced by that other gang of disgruntled shipmates seen bickering and griping about pay and bonuses in the previous years alien which also refined the used universe style of Star Wars that would become so integral to a lot of subsequent sci-fi dystopia and evident here in the graffiti which marks the walls of the interior of the slave ship beyond this though the insane captain robux grumbling underlings also recall the title characters of Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead where the minor characters of Shakespeare's Hamlet look on confused the great events happening offstage over which they not only have no control but very little input oh well we better leave it to them how do you know so much about it you see they've done before and I'm not gonna ship someone usually goes wrong they don't like it yeah because it means their bonuses up the spout but we're on the Olin contract this idea of being swept up in predestination of making no real impact on the eventual outcome is unusual for doctor who were making impact and change is central to the heroic motive for the main character but here after 18 years of joining the doctor on his adventures he joins us in observing the inevitable emancipation of the ferals our hero not really acting as a prime mover in the narrative once do nothing [Music] it was the right sort of nothing season 18 had ushered in a bold new era for the show paying its respects to the past while shaking up an increasingly stale format but the long-running series was now facing fierce competition in the form of glossy American imports like Buck Rogers in the 25th century shown on rival ITV and it was costing the show millions of viewers after a set of seasons healthily garnering over 8 million viewers the latest iteration of the show was now only averaging a concerning 5.8 million the show had undergone a regeneration but its leading man was yet to submit to the process himself and early into production on season 18 Tom Baker finally decided to call it a day [Music] after the fourth doctor falls to his death saving the entire universe his companions sit by his broken body convinced that they are finally witnessing the Time Lords end [Music] the seven-year history of this doctors era flashes before his eyes and for many young viewers this would have represented their childhood their growth with the show it's the end but the long does beautiful but there is a watcher in the wings and the Companions look on in fascination as the mysterious mutant enigmatically involved himself in this final battle for peace and justice merges with the fallen hero reforming him into a far younger incarnation than had ever been seen before could a 29 year old truly play the doctor [Music] [Music] you [Laughter]

Channel: Clever Dick Films

Views: 1,162,995

Keywords: Dr Who, Doctor Who, DW, Doctor Who Review, BBC, Sci-fi, Science-fiction, Documentary, Review, Fan, Fandom, William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy, Paul McGann, John Hurt, Christopher Eccleston, David Tennant, Matt Smith, Peter Capaldi, Jodie Whittaker, TARDIS, Philip Hinchcliffe, Robert Holmes, Seventies television, 70s, Genesis of the Daleks, Pyramids of Mars, Warriors Gate, John Nathan Turner, Mary Whitehouse

Id: Wm-DM6Hx82M

Length: 62min 25sec (3745 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 01 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/opethadvent]

I've watched all this guys videos regarding each doctor. They're pretty insightful and entertaining!