u/Bijed12472

Though unfamiliar with many of the serials of Hartnell's time before the start of my recent journey, I was aware that a significant number of early stories were 'Historicals'. I did not have high hopes for these. I'm not entirely sure why, as I love history. I guess I just assumed that a familiar setting, especially without the production values to really elevate it, would feel mundane compared to the more creative sci-fi stories.

Anyway, with an Unearthly Child not on iPlayer, and Marco Polo currently lost, the Aztecs was the first story to test this suspicion. Turns out I was wrong, and the Aztecs is comfortably the best serial in the run to this point.

Part of this is the 4-episode nature of the serial meaning the pacing is naturally better the The Daleks, for example. But that's not all the story has going for it, by any means. The plot is simple but effective, and actually takes advantage of it's historical nature to comment on some sci-fi themes, i.e the dangers of messing with history.. The characters are fun - even though he's portrayed in almost a hammy way, I really enjoyed Tlotoxl as a villain. 'Villain' may not even be the correct word - antagonist would be more appropriate as, yes, he's conniving and nasty, and I'm not condoning human sacrifice, but the sacrifice element of his 'evil' is just a product of his culture, and as for trying to expose Barbara as a false god, well, he's not wrong!

The humorous aspects worked well too, with the Doctor inadvertently getting engaged: I laughed out loud at 'Yes, I made some Cocoa and got engaged'. Overall, it was great fun.

The negative I'll mention here isn't specifically a fault of The Aztecs, but it's this story when it became very apparent that Susan just really wasn't doing it as a character for me. One of the only Hartnell-era stories I'd seen before now was 'The Dalek Invasion of Earth' where she leaves. Having seen that, and knowing that she was the Doctor's granddaughter, I'd always assumed that she was an important presence in the early stories and her departure was the shows loss. Sadly, this seems to not be the case. But I don't want this negative note to take away from how much I enjoyed this story!

Thoughts:

• I presume Aztec histories make mention of the legendary warrior 'Ian'? Seriously, this is where we fell in love with him - I know the show would probably rather people appreciate character for aspects other than combat prowess, but him repeatedly flooring the Aztec champion multiple times *whilst poisoned* was great.

Well, this story goes for the somewhat different approach of being several distinct mini-adventures, so lets review it as such!

The Sea of Acid

A pretty solid introduction. The setting with the acid sea is interesting, as is the task the TARDIS crew ultimately embark on by virtue of being morally grey: at best, if the Conscience is used absolutely morally and ethically scrupulously, you're still left with the question of whether it's right to control people in that way whatsoever, though of course stopping the Voord from using it more nefariously is worthwhile. Whilst you could argue it as a cop-out if you wanted, I think overall I appreciated that the crew didn't endorse Arbitan's goal and end up being forced to help him. So overall, while nothing spectacular, it sets the stage for the rest of the serial quite well

As an aside, the Voord that had both a leaky submarine and and a leaky suit is seriously unlucky. I know, as it turns out, the best fate it could hope for is to die in an explosion a few days later, but being slowly dissolved with acid whilst barely able to move, let alone do anything about it, is about as bad a way to go as I can think of.

The Velvet Web

A very solid start to our series of escapades. From the outset, there's a definite sense of creepiness created by the apparent perfection of the setting and how it contrasts with your knowledge/suspicion that this supposed paradise will prove to be anything but. And once the illusion is shattered (for Barbara, at least), seeing the Doctor, still believing the illusion, interact with the true environment as if it's the marvel he still sees is very effective. Thematically strong too, as an effective demonstration of how insidious the Conscience of Marinus could be.

Oh, and I loved the brain creatures! (even if the model doesn't look great in a close-up shot)

The Screaming Jungle

A missed opportunity, this one. What was there was ok - I enjoyed my time with the episode and the trapped room was good fun for the sheer amount of lethality contained within it, but there could have been a really effective claustrophic atmosphere if they'd focussed more on the the jungle aggressively reclaiming it's territory, which was a good concept. It's also weird how a small part of the episode is driven by the scientist not believing that Arbitan sent them as they'd have been warned about the traps and... yeah, why didn't he warn them? It's not a plot hole I'm massively hung up on but it did stand out

Not sure why Barbara was so disbelieving of Susan when she says that the vine attacked her at the beginning of the episode. I know it's still early-ish days in her travel, but she's seen enough by now that she shouldn't be thinking "An aggressive vine? Impossible!"

The Snows of Terror

Ok, I'm a sucker for an icy setting, so I was always going to enjoy this. Which helps because, objectively, it's the weakest part of the serial so far. Vasor was hardly a classic villain, suitably reprehensible (and I was glad when he met his fate), so he worked for his intended role - I guess this episode takes the "Pro-conscience" side of the things by reminding us that yeah, mind control is probably actually quite evil, but there are horrible people like Vasor out there who would be unable to carry out their nasty deeds if The Conscience were in operation. Other than that, I don't think the episode really explored any new or interesting concepts. But, because it portrayed an atmospheric icy setting quite well, I enjoyed it

And the frozen knights guarding the key? Brilliant idea for a fantasy adventure, delightfully weird for a futuristic sci-fi one.

Sentence of Death/The Keys of Marinus 1st half

I really like a good courtroom drama/legal thriller. This... was not really that, but was a good watch anyway, as the simple fact of going up against such a biased system, and how it becomes apparent that the true culprits will go to any length to make sure Ian takes the fall for their deeds, gives a good sense of danger and threat. There's also some nice cleverness on display on how they go about their defence of Ian and solve the mysteries. I'm glad that they were willing to give this storyline more than one episode, as whilst there's no doubt cuts/pacing changes that could have helped it fit into one episode if needed, I think it would have suffered from it.

I'm not sure this is how it was meant to be taken (I suspect the opposite!), but this story could be viewed as an argument in favour of reactivating the Conscience? As, if people are literally unable to commit crimes due to mind control, Ian and others like him (i.e. people set up to fall by criminals) need never fall victim to the nonsense justice system? I think the simpler reading of "One society's version of 'justice' may be nothing of the sort" is what they were going for

The Keys of Marinus 2nd half

And so we finally meet the Voord again! I understand their absence from the mini-adventures in production and story terms (lets the episodes focus more on their own settings etc, and why would Yartek risk Voord collecting the keys when he knows there's outsiders potentially bringing them straight to him?). But it does mean that, after an actually decent enough introduction, have been completely undercut as villains. Yartek himself doesn't really elevate them. He's portrayed as intelligent and perceptive enough, but he's not really memorable.

Also, whilst I praised giving Sentence of Death 1.5 episodes to tell it's story, it comes at the expense of the final showdown. Whilst there's not really a huge amount more they could have done with the overall setup, it does all feel ultimately a bit rushed. I like the actual solution of tricking Yartek with the fake key though - it's simple but believable.

Overall, The Keys of Marinus isn't the strongest serial by any means. Once you get to the end, it's very apparent the the central concept was just a means to send the crew on a series of escapades and the overall story is a disappointment for it. I'm in no hurry to rewatch the serial.

On the other hand, some of the individual components are quite strong, and the structure, I imagine, pretty much allows rewatches of them in isolation to work quite well - and I'm quite inclined to rewatch at least The Velvet Web at some point. So a mixed bag overall with some good highs, but an overall average result.

Ok, so let's start with the conclusion this time: I don't *enjoy* this story. I also think it's a good story, with flaws.

What don't I enjoy about it? Everyone acting weirdly. Not the fact that they are in itself - I'm perfectly on board with that as a story concept. I think they just do it a bit too well! I ended up being unnerved by it rather than simply caught by it as a hook for making me wonder what is going on. Maybe, though, I'll enjoy it more on a re-watch down the line, hopefully being able to appreciate the performances without being caught off-guard by the strangeness of it all

The actual premise though, is good. The idea that something is wrong, but no-one knows what is strong and the performance weirdness (random door openings, melting clocks) reinforces it well. It's also welcome from a world-building perspective, both in terms of introducing the idea that the TARDIS is alive and reinforcing that, even though they've been on some adventures, these four travellers by no means have a harmonious relationship (and in fact proving to be the catalyst that goes a long way to shifting that, and it was genuinely nice to see them all getting on at the end).

I'm back-and-forth on the ultimate reveal of what was going wrong. The danger itself (going too far back in time) is suitable and beleivable, no problems with that. The cause being a broken spring? Hmm. What I very much do appreciate about it is there's not an overly technobabble-y explanation for what went wrong. It's a simple mechanical fault. But, after all the weirdness beforehand, the mundanity was a bit of a whiplash. The switch being labeled in permanent marker was funny though.

Thoughts:

• I'm not sure the characters' weirdness is really explained adequately? I get that it's all a result of the TARDIS trying to warn them, but that goal and the results in how the characters are affected seem a bit nebulously linked
• Whilst I can sort of buy the explanation for why the Fault Locator wouldn't flag the spring/switch thing (the switch being on for ages isn't necessarily not working as intended), it feels a push that the TARDIS. with it's sophisticated systems, wouldn't have a separate system to warn of this properly/specifically, like a specific warning light for"Look, you may be well aware and perfectly fine with this, but the Fast Return Switch has been on for an awfully long time"

So, just to briefly give context, I'm a fairly casual Dr Who fan (watched some classic DVDs growing up, watched the first few years of the revival) who's just started watching the classic era from the beginning with my partner. Strictly on iPlayer, meaning we start with: The Daleks!

I'd seen the film adaptation of this previously, but never this version, so it was nice to see the origins of the series most iconic villain. Quite a high proportion of other classic series stories I've seen have been Dalek ones and whilst those later episodes are often better for whatever reason, this is probably the most interesting portrayal of the Daleks themselves. Whilst it would obviously be a stretch to describe individual Daleks in this one as distinct characters, they did have a sense of individuality which I don't think I've really seen before (in the sense that they come across as a functional hierarchy of scientists/others that now inhabit the casings) and they do feel like the remnants of a fallen society rather than the merciless hordes of destruction of later years.

The story itself is pretty alright, but there are definite issues with it's execution. In particular, pacing. Across these 7 episodes, there's a lot more total runtime than the film and (with the caveat that it's been a while since I watched that), there was nothing that came up in this that made the serial feel notably more fleshed-out from making use of the extra time (I know that's backwards thinking given this came first, but you know what I mean). In particular, the trek though the swamp, and moreover the caves took far too long.

It being from the 60s, there's of course some set-work etc that looks somewhat cheap and dated, but I'm not intending to hold that sort of thing against classic episodes unless it's stand-out bad even for the era.

Overall, good enough and in fairness, I think I'd appreciate it more if I hadn't already seen the adaptation.

Random thoughts:

• When the Daleks are ambushing the Thal leader, Ian could have warned him *considerably* earlier than he does, right?
• I really like how they show only a glimpse of the mutant removed from the Dalek casing that Ian gets into, even though the Dr/Ian clearly see it in it's entirety. The bit you see suggests a severely deformed/mutated humanoid, whereas their later/modern appearances are so alien as to lose that connection to their origins