A Desperate Venture

"All they had left was a game they played."

A feeling of suspense akin to the first episode is created in the early cave scenes as the Doctor and Ian gingerly explore.  There's some more great music from Norman Kay, but ultimately our foes are revealed as the terribly well spoken giant pencil people! Hey ho.

I rather like these men who behave like a cross between 'Zulu' and 'It Ain't Half Hot, Mum'. The Captain is rather good and we return to the early theme of paranoia. He's completely crackers, poor man.

It's interesting that with John's dreams of huge mineral resources on the Sense-Sphere and the Captain's pleasure in being able to afford another ship that these missions into space appear to be privately funded. They behave more like mercenaries.

One of the best things about this episode is that Barbara is back. Yay!

She's swapped with Carol who leaves John this utterly charming note...

"John, Have gone up to spaceship, Carol."

Just imagine, "Jean, have gone up to moon, Buzz."

Everything is rather easily resolved. But... what's that you say, Skip? We need some tension for a cliff hanger to make people watch next week?  Crikey, we'd better have the Doctor get in a paddy with Ian for no reason at all and threaten to throw him off the Ship at the next stop.  There, that'll do it.  Fancy a pint, Skip?

I have to say that, after an extraordinarily promising first two episodes, this story slipped between the production team's fingers quicker than a planet full of Molybdenum!  Ah well, they're allowed the odd clunker.  After all, they are quite new.  In contrast, I can't wait to start a story that I don't know very well at all, perhaps because of its missing episodes and what were very ropey existing VHS copies for many years.

Keep your head and join me soon for....

Next episode:  A Land of Fear

Look, there's a prescient letter this week in the Radio Times....

Kidnap

"You are sad for the friends you have lost; rejoice for the friend who has been returned to you."

Aw.  I'm pleased for John and Carol.  At least all that wonderful acting on the spaceship wasn't wasted.

And the Doctor isn't lost, as you can see he's been busy discovering deadly nightshade...

Before he can tell anyone, however, he is attacked and his coat shredded!  I suspect the Mandrels....

He is given a new and rather fetching cloak by the Sensorites to replace it.  I wonder where they got that from?  Never mind, because he is utterly delighted, "Beau Brummell always said I looked better in a cloak!"  Glorious.

More of the same in this episode as the poor old Second Elder is bumped off and the City Administrator promoted.  Horreurs!  There's so much of Peter Glaze in this that it's like Crackerjack in space.  Only without the jokes.

"To see all the time is not a good thing."  I'm with them on that one.

Just as we're all wondering if we've missed something given the episode title, Carol is grabbed from behind!

Roll on...

Next episode: A Desperate Venture

(There's an echo in here somewhere...)

A Race Against Death

"There is no hope, your friend is dying."

See, told you.  Poor Ian, all he did was drink a glass of water and he gets left on the floor for the first half of the episode!  Not to worry, the Doctor is on the case.  And John has decided to get his hair done...

Lovely.  There's a moment reminiscent of 'Marco Polo' as the Doctor ponders to himself, "Will they let me into my ship?"  Some great scenes in this episode, but the clunky paranoid Sensorites plot drags on as it dawns on them to simply swap sashes.  Add in a great bit of ventriloquism by the Administrator and we could well have been convinced except that the Second Elder also appears to have, ahem, put on a bit of weight suddenly.

The Doctor comes over all Time-Lordy with the First Elder even if he doesn't know it yet.  "Don't set yourself against me!"  Well, he knows it, obviously, but we don't.  Not until 'The War Games' which is way, way off.

Everyone does their best close-up acting.  Here's William Hartnell with test tubes...

And what neat handwriting the Sensorites have!  Ten out of ten.

The City Administrator has a Professor Zaroff* moment with what is a rather bold claim in the circumstances, "I see victory for all my plans!"  Well I'm glad you do, dear, because I don't think you've got a hope in hell.

Again, this episode is nicely directed (the camera even helpfully rises up to include a microphone boom in the cave sequence) and the black and white really lends itself so well to shadows and lights as the Doctor hears something growling in the dark.

Next episode: Kidnap

What fresh hell is this?

*What do you mean, who?  Call yourself a fan.  One of the best over-the-top performances ever to grace Dr Who occured in 'The Underwater Menace'.  You've got a bit of a wait for that one, too.

Verity Lambert

Happy Birthday, darling. And thanks! X

Hidden Danger

"I'm not a child anymore, Grandfather, I'm not."

Confrontations galore at the start of this episode with Ian and Barbara very much in their roles as protective teachers concerned about Susan going it alone down to the Sense-Sphere. What a glorious name for a planet. And then the Doctor and Susan in a battle of wills which, I suppose, ultimately leads to her leaving him in 'The Dalek Invasion of Earth'.

Very adult themes of mental illness and loss are explored through John and Carol with touching performances from Stephen Dartnell and Ilona Rogers.

I rather feel this episode, and indeed the whole story, loses something when we accompany almost everyone down to the (rather dull as it turns out) Sense-Sphere.  Only Barbara has the sense to stay put and that's only because Jacqueline Hill was heading off on holiday for two weeks. Good old Barbara, sensibly missing the two dullest episodes.

The Sensorites are well realised in terms of their masks with the beards combed across their mouths, but the costumes are a little dull and the sash system a little clunky especially when it is explained at length. This is also true of the water situation. You don't need to be Miss Marple to figure this one out. As the Doctor says, "It might be a clue!"  I'm confused that a story that deals initially with complex ideas of mental breakdown and burgeoning teenage assertiveness resorts to such clumsy devices.  It would've been quicker to walk round and shoot our travellers than to programme the 'disintegrator'.

There's an interesting volte-face when the First Elder tells the Doctor why they felt they had to put the spaceship crew to sleep and why John, the mineralogist, is so badly affected by their telepathic powers, "We saw the pictures he formed in his mind and we saw that it was the end of our way of life..."  I'm anyone's for a bit of motivation.

I have a feeling that down on the planet I will be yearning for more spaceship scenes in the way I longed to see the inside of the TARDIS again when we were stuck in those prehistoric caves for three weeks, but let's see shall we.

Next episode: A Race Against Death

Oh, and HB DW again!

51

Well, here we are on this day of days, the fifty-first anniversary! Well done, Doctor, I hope we all enjoy many more together. What's that you say, where have I been? Well, I've been here, where have you been? Uniquely, there was a one week gap between 'The Unwilling Warriors' and 'Hidden Danger'.  I have tried to honour that with a similar gap of... um, three years and eight months since the last blog entry.  Sorry.  What's changed in that time? Well, quite a lot. Empires have risen and fallen and the Radio Times Dr Who Archive has gone completely so apologies if some links no longer work. Anyway, on with the motley, but just before we rejoin our Strangers in Space, let's raise a glass with the old boy. Happy Anniversary, Doctor!