Talkin' TARDIS

Reviewing every (available) Doctor Who story in order.

[madmarkinabox]

Hi there! If you're reading this on the front page, and haven't clocked my blog description, you may be wondering what this is about. Well, now that roughly 800 episodes of both Classic AND Modern Doctor Who are available on the iplayer, I thought it might be fun to watch the lot and review it here on the [fondly] Hellsite. My name is Mark, and I will be your host. Having seen a good amount of Classic Who since they started running repeats of the Third Doctor's run in 1993 (my first story was Planet of the Daleks for the record) AND most of Nu Who, I do consider myself quite the Whovian. But I will readily admit there is so much I haven't seen, so a lot of this will be very new for me too. I won't be doing this to any sort of schedule, just as and when I feel like it. Allons-y!

[madmarkinabox]

Season 15

The Invisible Enemy

The TARDIS picks up a distress call from Titan, which is under attack from a swarm of microscopic parasites, and the source Nucleus for their next spawn has already made itself comfortable within the Doctor's mind. Putting himself into a coma to protect Leela, the Doctor is taken to a nearby medical centre, where he clones himself and Leela and they are shrunken down to enter the original Doctor's body to battle the parasite directly. But outside, the Nucleus' army is growing, and becoming increasingly desperate.

Back on more familiar ground with this one. A little more silly, a little more camp, the spaceship effects are wobbly again, we're back in the white TARDIS control room, Leela's back in her leathers. But in terms of new stuff, this story gave the BBC a new character on the show to sell toys of. IT'S K9!! YAY! I'm sure not everyone likes him, I guess he could be a polarising figure in the same way the Ewoks or Jar Jar are in Star Wars, but I like him. Honestly, the introduction of K9 was the main reason I was looking forward to this story because I didn't know anything else about it.

So quite early on in this one, I couldn't help comparing it with the Masque of Mandragora. Weird floating thing in space, cult-ish behaviour, you can see where I'm coming from here. But it also feels a little like Carnival of Monsters with the Fantastic Voyage-ish trip into the Doctor's head. Has he entered his own mind like this before? Sounds like he has. Must be useful if things are a bit cluttered in there. Honestly, the story's real problem is the minions of the Swarm, their unusual makeup and the design of the Nucleus. It's all very cheesy, and probably unlikely to win over today's audience. Yeah, the Nucleus is monstrous and ugly, but I just don't think it's as effective as the Wirrn given what they keep harping on about.

In fact, you know what? This is a Greatest Hits compilation. Nothing really new (except our favourite robot good boy), but still enjoyable. If you can look past the cheese factor.

Next time: Image of the Fendahl.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 15

Horror of Fang Rock

The TARDIS arrives on the small island of Fang Rock, where the youngest lighthouse keeper has just spotted something falling from the sky into the sea. Now a strange creature's roaming around the island, and a sudden thick fog has blanketed all in sight. Will anyone survive the night?

Now we're talking! Gothic horror vibes! If The Brain of Morbius was taking cues from Frankenstein, this one takes a few notes from Dracula. I couldn't help thinking of the Count's voyage/killing spree on his journey to England on the Demeter. And this is a pretty well-told story to boot, with a snappy 4-episode length and a menace that keeps you guessing throughout.

But, I do have gripes. The reveal of the true form of the creature, the Rutan, is a letdown. A kind of giant hairy radioactive glowing cabbage thing? And THESE are the greatest rivals of the Sontarans? Also, the character of Adelaide, one of several aristocrats who joins later, is a useless load. She's worse than Victoria - at least Victoria tried to be useful. I can't blame Leela for rolling her eyes when Adelaide faints. Incidentally, this is the part where I turn into a typical man, but Leela is infinitely more fanciable in her lighthouse keeper outfit than the finery she starts out with here or wore in the last one.

Not a story that'll set the world on fire, but still pretty fun. Me? I'm going to go watch the '92 Dracula movie...

Next time: The Invisible Enemy.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 14

The Talons of Weng-Chiang

The Doctor and Leela's trip to the theatre in Victorian London goes pear-shaped as they run afoul of a sinister magician and a Chinese cult devoted to their ancient god.

Oh dear. Ohhhhh dear. I know this story has fans, but I must ask WHY. Time has definitely not been kind to this one. It's absurdly racist, dropping slurs left and right, and, yet again, we have a white guy playing a caricature of an Asian. I realise this may come off as virtue signalling or SJW stuff, but I don't care that this stuff may have been accepted in the 70s, or the 1800s when the story is set; this shit simply does not fly in the 21st century.

Add to that the ridiculously hammy villain who should really have been the Master, the terrible looking giant rats, and the fact that it's so DULL, it all feels longer than it actually is. The only good stuff is the Doctor dressing as and playing Sherlock Holmes, and the bits where Leela gets to cut loose and fight people. Don't bother.

Next time: Horror of Fang Rock.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 14

The Robots of Death

The Doctor and Leela arrive on a mobile sand mining facility. However, the service robots aboard the base have begun picking off the crew one by one. But who is ordering them to, and why?

Not the first time I'd seen this one. It came in a boxset with Tomb of the Cybermen and The Three Doctors. Compared to how much I've gushed about them, The Robots of Death is the weak link. But that's not to say it's bad.

It starts off as a pretty decent whodunnit, with suspicion and paranoia rife. No one even considers the robots, even as a corpse marker - an indicator that a robot's been deactivated and needs repairs - is found on every body. It's hard not to remember your most heated arguments in Among Us. But as the story goes on, it turns into another "don't trust them robots" fable. And rightly so. Nobody in our world paid enough attention to these cautionary tales and look where we are now. There's even a damn techbro here. Quite literally. He calls the murderous reprogrammed robots his brothers because he was brought up by machines.

So, yeah, this is a pretty enjoyable story. The robots are gorgeous and the exterior shots of the mine give me major Thunderbirds vibes - Just imagine a mix between the Crablogger and the Sidewinder. The bots' red eyes as they're in kill mode bring the Ood to mind too, but they're a LOOOONG way off yet. Not a story that'll set the world on fire, but still a fun one.

Next time: The Talons of Weng-Chiang

[madmarkinabox]

Season 14

The Face of Evil

Materialising in an alien jungle, the Doctor encounters a tribe of primitives, the Sevateem, who mistake him for their arch-enemy, known only as The Evil One, master of their rivals, the Tesh. Partnering up with Leela, an outcast of the Sevateem, the Doctor must discover the truth of the tribe's god, Xoanon, and why it sounds like him.

Oh, this one was FUN. What happens when interstellar travellers go native in the wrong way? Well, something like this is a possibility. Near-total collapse of modern civilisation, at least on one side. Ever see those Hammer cave girl films? Stuff like One Million Years BC or When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth? This has notes of them, but with technology gone wrong instead of dinosaurs, and no continual shrieks of "akita!" Still got the pseudo-religious zealots though, on both the Sevateem AND Tesh sides, the latter doing the whole more-enlightened-than-you thing. Leela is a nice addition as our latest companion too. Yeah, she was likely created for the dads watching at home, and she definitely has the sexy savage thing going on, but is also a very likeable character at the same time.

Yeah, The Face of Evil is just plain fun, especially after the tension of The Deadly Assassin. Check it out, it's a good time all round.

Next time: The Robots of Death.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 14

The Deadly Assassin

The Doctor is called back to Gallifrey, and has a terrifying vision of what looks like himself assassinating the retiring President of Time Lords. When this appears to come to pass, the Doctor is left with 48 hours to clear his name. And worse, lurking in the shadows is the Master, on his last life, and desperate to find a way to live on.

For the first time, the Doctor is alone, and in real trouble this time. His mission to clear his name and work out who REALLY killed the President puts him in serious danger as he enters the Matrix, a computer system and virtual world made from the digitised minds of deceased Time Lords, and much like the later film series of the same name by the Wachowski sisters, and Sword Art Online after that, if you die in there, you die in the real world. It's pretty hellish for the Doctor, who just can't wrest control of it away from the Master. And talking of the Master, he finally makes his return after his very hasty exit in Frontier in Space, and he's clearly been through a lot since then if he's this far gone. He's basically a walking corpse, only keeping himself going through sheer hatred. The makeup for his skull-like face isn't fantastic by today's standards, but I can appreciate what they were trying to do. It's kind of like an early version of the Tarman from Return of the Living Dead, which would come out nine years later. It must have been terrifying for kids in 76. And probably terrifying for Mary Whitehouse.

Oh yes, that old bat... As head of the National Viewers and Listeners Association, she certainly had a lot to say about this one. People had already long been asking "is Doctor Who too violent for children?", one pundit even cheerfully considering if it was actually too violent for the parents. But Mary Whitehouse was often whinging about it, and The Deadly Assassin seemed to upset her the most with the cliffhanger for part 3 showing the Doctor in the process of being drowned. She fretted about that image being in the minds of the kiddlywinks for the rest of the week, but, as my Dad pointed out, THAT'S THE POINT, MARY. Why else would they be back the next week? That cliffhanger's still been edited out on iplayer, probably so no else kicks up a stink. It's no wonder there were a good few songs and other shows making fun of her and her ridiculous crusades. But I digress.

The Deadly Assassin isn't perfect. It gets off to an unusual start and I guess it takes a little while to find its feet, but once the Doctor enters the Matrix, it takes right off. Still worth a look, especially since it's one of those rare stories without a companion. And this is also the first mention of the Time Lords' regeneration limits, and I think the first time the Cloister Bell sounded in the TARDIS (and that means you're REALLY in trouble). Check it out!

Next time: The Face of Evil

[madmarkinabox]

Season 14

The Hand of Fear

Returning to present-day Earth, the Doctor and Sarah are caught in a blast in a quarry, where Sarah comes into contact with a petrified severed hand wearing an ornate ring. When she comes around, Sarah is possessed by the will of the hand's owner: an ancient alien lord, Eldrad. And Eldrad is starting to regenerate.

Every companion has to move on eventually, and now it's Sarah's turn. At least for now. But what a note to go out on. A snappy 4-episode story with terrific tension and intrigue. Eldrad is a wonderful creation too. Initially like a gorgeous blend of Mystique and Gozer, later becoming more like a high fantasy troll in build, and constantly keeping the viewer guessing as to what their true motives are. Even a note of Sauron when you factor in the ring and how they tied their life to it. And in a curious bit of foresight, has anyone else noticed that Eldrad can be an anagram of Aldred? As in Sophie? But she won't be joining the Doctor for another 10 seasons yet. Still, it's fun to think about.

The Hand of Fear makes for a solid, fun, exciting and intriguing story. I'm sure I could happily watch this one again anytime.

Next time: The Deadly Assassin.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 14

The Masque of Mandragora

A mid-flight encounter with the Mandragora Helix, a vortex with a living presence in its centre, drives the TARDIS off-course, landing the Doctor and Sarah in 15th century Italy. But a fragment of the Helix, which stowed aboard the TARDIS, is on the loose and looking to use a local cult and the royal Astrologer as part of its designs for Earth and her people.

Another pretty solid story of science and magic, this time with a more historical bent. I'll admit, the first episode almost lost me right off the bat with a sudden heavy lean on the historical setting and the royal politics that came with it and the later arrival of the cult of Demnos. I was thinking "I've seen a lot of this before, it's nothing new, The Daemons did it better." However, it picks right up as we launch into the second episode, and simply doesn't let go until the end. Even the royal politics, which made me instinctively reach for my phone, are significant. It all fits together as the story goes on, as Classic Who stories are so wont to do, and Tom Baker continues to be an utter delight as the Doctor, clearly enjoying himself enormously as he effortlessly flip-flops from eccentric to deadly serious. Hieronymous is a good villain too, definitely channelling Christopher Lee for his grand deliveries. Imagine HIM as a Who villain. Imagine him as the Master! Ooooh, that would have been good.

Do I have any complaints about this one besides the first episode? Not necessarily. The Masque of Mandragora is definitely worth a look.

Next time: The Hand of Fear.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 13

The Brain of Morbius

The TARDIS is dragged off course by outside forces to the planet Karn. The Doctor and Sarah face danger on two fronts: the Sisterhood of Karn, who fear that the Doctor and Sarah have been sent to steal their Elixir of Life, and insane neurosurgeon Solon, who plans to use the Doctor's head as the final part of a new body for the dismembered renegade Time Lord Morbius.

No, not THAT Morbius, put the memes down. Ever wanted to see a Doctor Who take on Frankenstein? This is the story for you. We've got the misshappen patchwork creature, the crazed scientist who made it, the simple-minded assistant, the creature going on a rampage... But it also goes into wilder, more surreal territory as we dabble in science mistaken for magic again with the Sisterhood, and, unlike Frankenstein, the creature in question is immediately out for revenge, not because it can't mingle with people, but because all that's left of Morbius following his (undoubtedly long-winded and painful) execution at the hands of the Sisterhood and the Time Lords is the titular brain, and he is justifiably annoyed at the state he's been left in.

Maybe it's just because I re-read Frankenstein last year, but I really liked this one. If it does have any weak links, it's some of the stuff with the Sisterhood and their theatrical rituals. But of course, it all fits together in the end. If you're after a bit of gothic sci-fi horror, give The Brain of Morbius a go. It's only a little under two hours, you've got nothing to lose.

Next time: The Masque of Mandragora

[madmarkinabox]

Season 13

The Android Invasion

The Doctor and Sarah arrive back in their own time, but something is off. They're being pursued by robots in haz-mat suits, and every person they meet seems to have been replaced with lifelike androids, including their friends in UNIT, as part of a plan by the reptilian Kraal to conquer Earth.

Another pretty good story. This season's on a roll so far. Going into this one mostly blind helps too. I have to confess, the first time we see a glimpse of a Kraal peeping through a spyhole, I thought it was a Sontaran. Would this story have worked as well if it WAS the Sontarans behind the invasion? Probably! Would it have worked if the androids were Autons instead? Absolutely! But could the Sontarans and Nestenes work together to conquer Earth? Oh, definitely not. So, it's all original foes here with Terry Nation back in the writer's chair. The Kraal are pretty good as baddies go too. Like a mix of Sontarans and a variant of Silurian - imagine a Triceratops evolving into a biped and dressing like a Sea Devil, and that's a Kraal - with the familiar motive of their own planet dying so they intend to conquer another.

Top that off with the unsettling idea of versions of the Doctor and Sarah capable of killing without remorse, the Body Snatchers vibe with not knowing who to trust, and some great effects work with the androids (I'm pretty sure the scene with android Sarah's face falling off to reveal the gears and circuits below with the wide staring eyes spooked me as a kid) and it all adds up to another solid classic Who adventure.

Next time: The Brain of Morbius!

[madmarkinabox]

Season 13

Pyramids of Mars

A powerful force throws the TARDIS off course en route back to UNIT HQ, and she materialises in the building but in 1911, where it's being used as storage for Egyptian artifacts. And the launching point for an invasion. The Egyptian god Sutekh is seeking to escape his prison on Mars with a small force of robot mummies and a reanimated corpse at his command, and he will destroy everything if he succeeds.

Holy LORD, this was good. We revisit ideas pushed in The Time Monster - the idea that human mythology was inspired by alien encounters - and this is, of course, nothing new when it comes to Ancient Egypt. The speculations and conspiracies about how the pyramids were built, the fact that they were already ancient when the Romans arrived... But this story is a different beast, with a fantastic villain pulling all the strings. It says a lot for how dangerous Sutekh is when the Doctor's gone against Davros, the Master, the Dalek Emperor, Omega, and THIS is the one that worries him the most. Frightens him even. He's masterfully played by Gabriel Woolf: cold, sinister, quiet, a bit like Omega but less angry and vengeful, just plain vindictive. Remorselessly evil.

Add to this, the pretty well done robot mummies, Sutekh's primary operator being a man he killed and reanimated to effectively be an avatar for him, the terror of the Doctor losing his own autonomy (which is, of course, one of the things he values most in life), the sense of urgency throughout the story's tight runtime, and you really can't go wrong with Pyramids of Mars. Well, I guess there is that bad bit of casting where we have a white man playing an Egyptian, but he doesn't make it past the first episode anyway, so hey ho. Pyramids of Mars? Unmissable.

Next time: The Android Invasion

[madmarkinabox]

Dammit, Terror of the Zygons isn't available to stream for me. And I can't be arsed to go shopping right now. I was looking forward to it too. The joys of modern "conveniences". Maybe I'll do a retrospective of stories I initially had to skip later on. Stuff like The Celestial Toymaker and The Savages. Probably after the TV movie. But for now...

Season 13

Planet of Evil

Picking up a distress call, the Doctor lands the TARDIS on Zeta Minor. But upon arrival, all but one of the survey team who sent it are dead, and the squad sent to retrieve them proceed to blame the Doctor and Sarah. The planet straddles the barrier between this dimension and that of anti-matter, and it's fighting back against attempts to plunder its resources.

Gotta be honest: I wasn't expecting much with a title like "Planet of Evil." I'm not really sure WHAT I was expecting. But I was pleasantly surprised with what I got. Zeta Minor looks great from a visual standpoint, like a nightmarish red mix of Skaro and Spiridon, and the bodies drained of everything by the planet's anti-matter monsters are sufficiently gruesome. The monsters themselves look pretty good too. How did the production team achieve that effect? Rotoscoping? Greenscreen? A bit of both? Whatever it was, it looks good. The departure of Harry hasn't harmed the dynamic between Sarah and the Doctor either. In fact it's better than ever here, the way they can just bounce off and complement each other. And the spaceship effects are actually pretty getting darn good by this point. No wobble, no visible strings. Obviously, it's no Thunderbirds, but there's massive improvement.

Of course the story's got its problems. I get that it's only a four-parter, and it is kept pretty tight, but I do think the story begins to flag a bit in the second half when we're mostly stuck on the Morestrans' ship. I think we could have spent just a bit more time on the planet. And Sorenson's physical form when he becomes the Antiman (sounds like a contrarian superhero, no?) just looks and acts like a crackhead or a spice zombie. He's no Primord if that's the sort of thing they were going for.

Not perfect, not going to set the world on fire, but you can also do a whole lot worse.

Next time: Pyramids of Mars.

P.S. Does anyone else get vibes of 42 with this? My boyfriend did once I gave him the rundown. I'm inclined to agree.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 12

Revenge of the Cybermen

The Doctor and friends return to Nerva, but thousands of years earlier than when they left, with no TARDIS, and the station being steadily infiltrated by Cybermen, seeking to destroy the nearby gold-rich planet Voga.

After bloody ages, the Cybermen return, looking a lot like they did in The Invasion, just a bit beefier. And this story marks a change in them. They're far less zombie-ish in the way they move, and their speech is far more, dare I say, human. It's ironic, the way the Doctor talks about them, you'd think they were pure machine, but they're so much more alive now, especially the Cyber Leader. That's not necessarily a good thing either, he's quite pompous, grandiose, theatrical even. Good design (digging the black helmet) but a few things have gotten lost on the road to their return. Namely the quiet horror of what is or isn't under the Cyber suits, and the electronic sound of their voices. You can hear the performers trying occasionally to sound more machine-like, but it's just not as effective as the buzzing monotones of Tomb or Moonbase, or even the sing-song tone of Roy Skelton in The Tenth Planet.

Add to that, the strange wood-like masks of the Vogans (no, not Vogons, Douglas Adams wasn't on the writing team yet), and their dull civil war/politics, and the story doesn't make for the glorious fanfare we should have for the return of the Cybermen. Was I expecting too much? Did I get my hopes up? Was I just spoiled by Genesis of the Daleks right before this one? Probably yes to all three. Maybe if some of the Voga stuff had been shaved off, it might gel with me more, but Revenge of the Cybermen simply can't hold a candle to the brilliant stuff we saw from the silver giants in the 60s, even if Kellman looks and acts a bit like a younger version of Vaughn.

Next time: Terror of the Zygons.

[madmarkinabox]

Season 12

Genesis of the Daleks

Foreseeing a time when the Daleks have become the dominant lifeform in the universe, the Time Lords interrupt the Doctor's journey back to Nerva to send him on a special mission: return to Skaro, to the Daleks' infancy, and prevent their creation.

This is it. The Big One. The story that routinely tops the fan polls for favourite classic story. Incidentally, it was also the first Classic Who DVD I owned. But does it meet that hype? Honestly, yes. Is it the best ever for me personally? Time will tell, but it's damn good, damn good indeed.

By now we know full well how the Daleks work and think, but this takes us back to the very start, to the end of the thousand year war on Skaro, when both the Kaleds and Thals were getting desperate and virtually indistinguishable from each other in their hatred and violence, and in their treatment of the Mutos, the genetically imperfect and mutated victims of war; Kaleds and Thals united only in their rejection. But while we know the Thals will ultimately reject this road and mostly choose peace, and we even see the beginning of their taking this path when it looks like they've won, the Kaleds are always doomed to go the wrong way. As far back as the Dalek Invasion of Earth, there's been something inherently Nazi-ish about the Daleks, and it's very obvious when we see the people who would eventually become them. Their rhetoric, the young soldiers' vicious tempers, the boot clicks and little salutes, the uniforms, Nyder's even seen wearing an iron cross a few times for crying out loud. And in a lot of the Kaleds' dialogue, "Davros" can easily be replaced by "the fuhrer" and it wouldn't change much.

Talking of Davros, he finally makes his first appearance, and is immediately compelling, expertly played by Michael Wisher. Quiet and coldly calculating one minute, screaming and deranged the next, yet always thinking, always plotting. How many moves ahead is he thinking? How much of what transpires did he actually plan once he was certain the Daleks were ready? But his own pride, hubris, monstrous ego and own creations ultimately prove to be his downfall. This is the essence of Davros: a mad, ranting lunatic who thinks he's immortal, wanted to play God and thinks emotions are a weakness. Hitler if he was a scientist rather than an anti-semitic politician, with the cold, slimy Nyder as his ever faithful right-hand man. This one also does a wonderful job with the Daleks, filming them in shadow a lot, these mostly silent machine killers, until they decide they don't need to be told what to do anymore. I love the shots of them atop the trenches in the dim light, wreathed in smoke.

Ultimately, Genesis is damn near perfect. Harry becomes less of a joke (him being a military man, having to deal with people with guns is probably more familiar territory for him), a classic unforgettable foe is introduced, we have the wonderful "do I have the right?" and hypothetical virus exchanges, and not a single moment is wasted. If you're a Who fan at all, Genesis of the Daleks is required viewing. I just hope we haven't peaked too soon with the fan-favourite Classic Who story this early into Tom Baker's run.

Next time: Revenge of the Cybermen!

[madmarkinabox]

Season 12

The Sontaran Experiment

Beaming down from Nerva to fix the station's transmat receivers on Earth, the travellers find that the planet is not uninhabited as believed, as they tangle with desperate marooned soldiers from another colony, and a Sontaran running experiments on them.

The first two-parter in a while! Is this the first we've had since The Rescue? I think it is. And I also realised with this story that this season is running a clear continuing narrative where each story flows into the next. Last time we had that rather than an adventure/monster-of-the-week thing was Frontier in Space and Planet of the Daleks. But I digress...

I wasn't how sure how well this story was going to work. A 2-parter that brings back the Sontarans? Surely we need more time than that, the last time we saw a Sontaran, it was a four-parter. But it does the job very well, packing a lot into a mere two episodes. Styre is a very different Sontaran to Linx, far crueller and colder, seeing his test subjects as mere things, a stepping stone for the intended invasion of Earth by the rest of the fleet. I do think the makeup was done better on Linx to a point, he was far more expressive, but I guess you can't have everything.

The Sontaran Experiment is worth a look regardless, especially if you're following the season's running narrative properly. I'm always happy to see the Sontarans, hope to see them again soon. But the journey from Nerva didn't go too well for the Doctor and co, and the journey back is going to be even nastier....

Next time (drumroll, please...) : GENESIS OF THE DALEKS!

[madmarkinabox]

Season 12

The Ark in Space

The TARDIS arrives on a space station carrying the last of humanity and their history until they can be revived. But the insectoid Wirrn stowed aboard some time earlier and are starting to use the cryogenically frozen humans as unwitting hosts for their eggs.

Not to be confused with The Ark from Hartnell's run, with the Monoids and Refusis. No, this is a different beast. Parasitic creatures using humans as hosts to spawn more of their kind, in a massive space transport? It's impossible not to think of Alien. I'm no film expert, so I was genuinely surprised to find that The Ark In Space predates Alien by 4 years. Perhaps Ridley Scott was subconsciously inspired by this and it just got more Freudian when Giger was brought in to design the Xenomorph, the Facehugger, etc.

This is a pretty good story. We also revisit the class aspect from Hartnell's Ark, but these are far worse people. Specially selected, elite scientists, the best to restore and repopulate a ravaged Earth, and don't they know it. These people are the sort who Elon will likely pick to try to colonise Mars. In fact, I wasn't even sure Vira WAS human when she was revived. I thought she was an android. Man, I just keep comparing this thing to Alien. Her walls only finally really came down when the mission commander was obviously completely gone. Incidentally, it looks like a major chunk of that little reveal has been edited out on the iplayer. I know there's a similar edit in Dragonfire too when we eventually get there. Body horror, I guess, objected to by the likes of Mary Whitehouse. I'll get to her later and all.

Editing aside, it's solid. Some say this is where Tom found his groove as the Doctor, not Robot. I'm inclined to agree. That great "indomitable" speech, ray guns and the bubble wrap monster. What's not to like?

Next time: The Sontaran Experiment!