7. The Sensorites

Before Watching

I have it on good authority – ie – my brother who knows lots more about classic Who than I do – that “The Sensorites” is, and I quote, ‘crap’. Now, in my salad days when I first learned about the Hartnell and early Troughton stories I was always much more interested in the overtly sci fi ones than the Historicals – we live and learn –and so while the Sensorites didn’t quite entice me as much as let’s say The Ark, The Space Museum and The Keys of Marinus, I was still intrigued by the synopsis. I fancy that the Sensorites featured in that first Doctor Who annual as well- and I’m almost certain that the flippin’ Menoptera from The Web Planet were there as well.

As for expectations, well, so as long as it’s another good Barbara story we should get through it relatively unscathed. “The Keys of Marinus” doesn’t have a great reputation, and I enjoyed that one well enough.

After Watching

Well, it didn’t help that Jacqueline Hill must have gone on holiday after the first two episodes. As a result the story is a Barbara free zone in the middle episodes.

Now, one thing I’ve noticed and actually rather like about the stories from the first season of Doctor Who is the rather leisurely pace of storytelling. I love the new post 2005 Doctor Who – but the storytelling is usually very frenetic, blink and you’ll miss it stuff. In fact, sometimes I don’t blink, and I still end up thinking I might have missed something. However, I digress. So I really didn’t mind that the Sensorites is pretty slow moving.

The actual premise is not without interest. The Tardis lands on board a spaceship. On first investigation the TARDIS crew think that the spaceship’s human crew are dead. Actually they are just pining for the fjords – sorry – they are unconscious. It turns out that the ship has come under attack from the Sensorites, a race of aliens with psychic powers, humanoid bodies arms and legs, strange circular feet like dinner plates and overly large, bald bearded heads with tiny eyes and no mouths. Now, the interesting twist is that in the second episode we find out that the Sensorites aren’t actually evil, they are just timid and suspicious, and naturally frightened of humans considering the way that humans who landed on their planet before have treated them. They wish no harm on anyone, but cannot ever allow them to leave the Sense Sphere – their home planet, for fear they will bring other humans back with them.

Now, while the Doctor is establishing working relationships with the First Sensorite, the leader, someone or something has been poisoning the waterhole, and Ian nearly dies from it. Meanwhile the nefarious City Administrator – number 3 in the Sensorite hierarchy, sees a chance to indulge his hatred of humans, and improve his position within the hierarchy, and does away with number 2, while trying to pin the blame on our heroes.

I’d be very surprised if I wasn’t the first to point out that one plot point hinges on the fact that the Sensorites are supposed to be identical – yet they are clearly not! Even their faces are a little different to each other, and as for their bodies – well, they’re none of them giants, but some are short and thin, and some are short and. . . er . . . well, fat , for want of a better word, while some of them are in between. Yet merely changing the bands of office that they wear seems enough to enable them to impersonate each other. Huh?

The very best of Doctor Who stories manage to be more than the sum of their parts. This is somehow less. On paper, the Sensorites are an interesting alien race, but very little is actually done with their psychic powers, and our knowledge of their Society is hardly developed at all during the story. In the end Peter Glaze’s City Administrator is played as a two bit villain, rather than someone who genuinely believes he is doing what must be done for the good of his race, and their future. I’ve no doubt that if it was remade today this is the tack that they might take with it. At least they wouldn’t have too much difficulty condensing all these episodes down into a story lasting less than an hour.

I’m not imagining this, though. The TARDIS crew have become a group who seem to know, like and trust each other now. I know that Susan gets to leave in two stories’ time, in “The Dalek Invasion of Earth”, and Ian and Barbara go before the end of the second season, in “The Chase”. How will the Doctor react to that, I wonder – is he going to revert to type and take it out on the new companions? I’ve been rooting for Ian and Barbara all along, and because the Doctor is part of their group, I’m rooting for him now, which I certainly wasn’t doing before “Marco Polo”. With the exception of “Edge of Destruction”, and the first episode of “An Unearthly Child”, the focus of each story’s plot has never been on the development of the relationships between the TARDIS crew, and yet for all that it clearly has developed by this, the penultimate story of the first season. That’s a strength. I know we shouldn’t compare classic Who with the post 2005 series, but the Doctor’s relationships with his companions has been the main plot element in many of the stories, and taken over the story arcs of the most recent series completely. I’m not saying that this is a bad thing, but using it to outline the contrast with the original series. So going back to the first series, by this stage the relationships have developed so much that Ian and Barbara now trust the Doctor, and although he has been singularly unsuccessful in getting them home, that doesn’t seem to matter so much, and one suspects that the imperative to try to return them to their own time and place will become less important.

Speaking of Ian and Barbara, is it just me, or did anyone find Ian’s constant badgering the Doctor about asking the number one Sensorite to allow Barbara to join them just a little disconcerting? Ian is supposed to be at least the physical hero of the crew, but here he reminds me of nothing less than a whinging child pestering his Dad about when his Mum’s going to be home, after she’s left them to run off with Uncle Frank. On the plus side, this is a much better Susan story. I wouldn’t be surprised if Carole Ann Ford got quite excited when she saw the title of the first episode was ‘An Unearthly Child’, and must have though she’d be getting some juicy action stuff to do. Alas, she was only the first female companion to be lured in with promises, only to find her character becoming little more than a recipient for info dumps, a producer of screams on demand, and a functional character who can be used to blunder into something, or hurt herself, or whatever when the plot needs moving on. In this she is the one who has the telepathic abilities, and she gets a good defiant teen scene with Hartnell.

If I have to deliver a verdict on The Sensorites, then no, it’s not great. Sensorite society isn’t explored or portrayed with any great depth, and at times this is quite sub-Terry Nation stuff. But . . . it has a kind of charm about it. And I can’t lose sight of the fact that the villain of the piece, the City Administrator, is played by Peter Glaze! I mean come on, this is Peter Glaze from Crackerjack (CRACKERJACK!). The man who invented d’oh! A more jolly and cheerful and above all else unvillainous little man you couldn’t hope to meet. I can forgive him any amount of slices of ham that he serves up in this role. So the Sensorites gets by, and we move on pleasantly enough to pastures new.

What Have We Learned?

All Sensorites are identical, although some are more identical than others.

The TARDIS can detect when it’s moving even when it’s stopped.

If you really want to confuse a Sensorite, wait till he’s asleep, then swap his bands of office with somebody else’s.

It’s the shy and timid ones you have to keep the closest eye on sometimes.

Ian’s true feelings towards Barbara may be that he sees her as a mother figure. Susan surely does.