Continuing my plan to post what I think to be the highlights of every season of Doctor Who, old and new.
For each series I choose 2 or 3 of what I consider to be the best stories, and a selection of also-rans. "Stories" may comprise any number of actual episodes (somewhere between 1-14, typically 4 or 6). Older Who is nearly always episodic, with NuWho most episodes are self-contained. Feel free to expand on my brief comments, agree, disagree etc. This is, after all, purely subjective.
First Doctor
Spoiler
Second Doctor
Third Doctor
Spoiler
Fourth Doctor
Spoiler
Fifth Doctor
Spoiler
Season Twenty Three (1986)
Sixth Doctor/Peri/Mel
This season is unusual in that it is technically all one story - Trial of a Time Lord parts 1-14, although broken up into four subsections. It borrows a concept from A Christmas Carol, with a story from the Sixth Doctor's past, present and future, plus a climactic story.
Partly because of its unusual nature I'm going to give comments on all four sub-stories rather than pick out recommendations. The other reason is that it is probably one of the weakest seasons and thus picking stand-out stories is hard. It's not the fault of Colin Baker or Nicola Bryant who, in their stories together, have formed a more mellow relationship. Some of the behind-the-scenes talent, too, have turned in excellent work elsewhere in Who. Possibly the show's uncertain future at this point in its history was causing morale problems, but it just feels like everyone is just phoning it in and all aspects - script, guest stars, sets, effects, direction - are weak at the same time. At its best, Who manages to transcend its effects budget with great scripts, or with artistic direction, or memorable guest stars, or interesting ideas and in all of these stories we don't get enough of these to outweigh the bad.
The Mysterious Planet – The series starts quite well, with a good opening panning effects shot. The characters of Sabolom Glitz and his sidekick Dibber are pure Robert Holmes, but the man who gave us The Ribos Operation and The Talons of Weng Chiang somehow manages to give us a tired plot full of extraneous and dull supporting characters. At this point the trial sections provide an interesting device.
Mindwarp – forget Brian Blessed essentially playing Prince Vultan, at least this one has the return of Sil, even if he doesn’t do much. Again, a bit too much pointless running back and forth, but there is a level of mystery about the Doctor’s actions which is never fully resolved – how much was him and how much was edited in the Matrix?
Terror of the Vervoids - aka Terror of the Vulvoids. Introduces the terrible Mel and spends most of its time bogged down in pointless subplots, with the vervoids only becoming remotely near terrifying in the last episode. As with much of this era, a potentially good idea (implacable plant aliens) ruined in execution.
The Ultimate Foe - much Matrix-based surrealism, and better than in The Deadly Assassin. Kind of one of the better segments, shame it has Mel.
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2012-03-26, 07:55 AM (ISO 8601)Orc in the Playground
- Join Date
- Jan 2007
Dr. Si's Old Who Recommendations
The Lazy GM series. Lovingly crafted pre-gen monsters for Pathfinder and OGL d20 fantasy.
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