Before watching
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This is one of the Hartnell stories where I can honestly say that I
know the storyline pretty well before watching it. This is partly through
having several times seen the Peter Cushing film, “Daleks : Invasion Earth
2050” based on the serial, and partly through the Target novelization. While
the film to a greater extent, and the novels to a lesser extent may take a
couple of liberties with some of the plot details, by and large they’re pretty
faithful enough to give you a good idea.
However, I have had it on the word of someone whose judgement on
matters DW that I value – my brother – that this is a bit slow and tedious.
It’s a 6 parter, and they often tend to be padded. Also the word on the streets
is that the effects – albeit that they were made for tuppence ha’penny to use
the currency of the time it was made, are poor.
Therefore – expectations aren’t that high.
After Watching
While not wishing to gloss over any of this show’s flaws, I really
enjoyed it. I wrote about the DWM Mighty 200 poll in my round up of season 1 –
and this story is ranked 44th on the DWM Mighty 200 poll, and I
think that’s pretty fair.
Actually the start of the serial, the first episode, was really on
the whole rather good. I mean, I’d already in the past watched “An Unearthly
Child”, and “The Daleks”, and read the Target novelisation of “The Keys of
Marinus”, but when you see the opening of this, their last adventure together,
you come to realize how they have developed as a group together. You can’t help
wondering what the impact of this episode would have been had they kept daleks
out of the title, and pre publicity for the show, and you hadn’t realized they
were involved until that iconic final shot of the dalek coming up out of the
Thames.
Really and truly, this should be quite disorienting. I am watching
this in 2015, pretending to be London some time after 2164, while all the time making no
effort to look like anything other than 1964. Although the show is set around 2164,
the visuals make no concession to this, and as a result you kind of just get on
with it. If anything it gives the story a nostalgic feel.
Actually, the rather gentle pace of the first couple of episodes,
and the atmosphere reminded me of films such as ‘Day of the Triffids’, and if
anything its maybe a foreshadowing of Terry Nation’s own “Survivors”, his 1970s
drama series about life for a group of survivors of a devastating pandemic
which kills a huge percentage of the human population of Earth.
I don’t know that you can get
the point of the Hartnell shows from just reading the Target books. The stories
I’ve actually seen, and this one in particular give me the strong feeling that
you have to watch them to understand. I
loved the third and fourth Doctors, but there was always a feeling that they
were going to eventually take charge and be more than equal to whatever
situation they might find themselves in. The dynamic is completely different in
the Hartnell era. In “An Unearthly Child” the Doctor has taken Barbara and Ian
off on a joyride to prove to them that he can do what he says he can. This is
an extremely irresponsible, if not reprehensible act, since he knows that there
is no guarantee that he is ever going to be able to bring them back to his own
time and space. In the first episode
they do actually believe that they’re home after all this time, and it’s
the dawning realization that this is not actually the case which adds greatly
to the atmosphere and poignancy. I find that the way that the action and the
driving of the plot is shared out between the Doctor , Ian and Barbara, and to
a much lesser extent Susan, to be really different to what I’m used to as well.
It shouldn’t work, and yet it actually does. For example – the extended
sequences of Barbara and Richard Briers’ wife running through the streets of
London pushing Dortmun should really be laughable. But they aren’t.
Partly this is because of some great acting. Look at Jacqueline
Hill’s face during these sequence. I tell you the woman looks terrified out of
her skin. I cheered when she drove into the Daleks.
OK – the plot, essentially, is rubbish. The Daleks are excavating
the Earth’s core in order to bung a motor in it and fly it around the Universe?
Yeah, right. Nonsense. The special effects shots of the Daleks’ flying saucer
actually flying are rather embarrassing. They must have looked pretty crappy
even back in 1964, which is why you see so little of them. I can’t help
wondering why they needed these shots anyway. If you’re going to do it that
badly, then why do it at all? Then there’s the Robotmen. Their headsets are
awful, and some of their acting doesn’t seem a lot better. Yet harping on about
these things is all missing the point. I concede all of these drawbacks, and
yet I loved it.
This story is all about the triumphant resurrection of the Daleks.
They had a massive part to play in the success of the first season, and as a
reward they get a story which allows us the iconic shots of the lone Dalek
rising out of the Thames, and Daleks trundling across Westminster Bridge and
around Trafalgar Square. The shots of the robotmen overseeing the enslaved
humans dragging wagons into the mine are really good too. There’s some lovely performances too. Bernard
Kay – again, a name you might not know, but a face you surely do – is always
good value for money. It was nice to see Nicholas Smith – Mr. Rumboldt from
‘Are You Being Served’ popping up in the mine scenes too. If you twist my arm
and force me to tell the truth I’d admit that it’s probably at least an episode
too long, and yet I would still far rather watch this than the film version any
day of the week. I would also far rather watch this than ‘The Daleks’ .The
original Dalek serial is too long at 7 episodes, and I’m afraid that the Thals
get on my wick after a while, being, in my considered opinion, a bunch of big
girls’ blouses. And if that wasn’t enough, we have Susan’s leaving scene. This
is neatly prepared for with a couple of the Doctor’s comments as he notices the
burgeoning romance between Susan and David Campbell. Actually, I say
burgeoning, but this was 1964 family viewing, so subtle hints are all we get.
The Doctor has been criticised for his indecent haste in packing Susan off at
the first opportunity, but I think that this is in character, as a protracted
leaving scene would not be something he could handle yet. This was the first
ever leaving scene in Doctor Who, and in my view Hartnell pulls it off
brilliantly. These little emotional moments, where he is called on to put out
real tenderness, really show off what a good actor he was.
Judging by the fact that she was willing to appear in 1983’s ‘The
Five Doctors’, and other appearances on various shows and DVDs about the show,
Carole Ann Ford has come to terms with her time on the show. You can’t help
sympathising with her, since by all accounts she was sold on the ‘unearthly
child’ concept of her role, yet found that the unearthly aspects of her
character were largely ignored, and she became the first in a long line of
screamers. For a lot of her time she was just used as a functional character
whose purpose was there to move the plot forward. She wouldn’t be the last. I
am sorry to see her go, but I think the show will cope without her far more
easily than it would do without Ian or Barbara at this stage.
What Have We Learned
Everything is cyclical. Or, put it another way, London in 2164 will be a dead ringer for London 1964
William Hartnell is capable of scenes of genuine emotional intensity
Daleks keep pets
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