Anonymouswizard watches Doctor Who, from the beginning

[Anonymouswizard]

well I must be mad, because I recently decided to watch every surving episode of Doctor Who, in order, from An Unearthly Child. Even more mad because I decided to give my thoughts on every serial, explain what I think works and what doesn't and comment on how the show grew and evolved.

As a side note, I am well aware of the problems for the serials before the casting dalek changed it's views. Some of the views or lines of dialogue would be considered inappropriate, and I have occasionally referred to the first two Doctors as habing been broadcast in 'white and white' instead of in greyscale. I will be mostly skipping over this, so as to not say 'and every actor was caucasian' over and over again.

So, let's not stand on Ceremony!

Spoiler: An Unearthly Child/The Tribe of Gum/100,00BC

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So the first thing to note is that this serial spends half an episode pretending to be a different show, one about Barbara and Ian trying to save Susan from her abusive grandfather. It pulls it off incredibly well, there's something off about Susan, the details of her personal lifedon't quite add up, and everything is especially mysterious. Especially when it turns out that she might live in this junkyard. Even the old man who we presume to be her grandfather is creepy and evasive.

And then Ian and Barbara run into the TARDIS and we get the first appearance of that monster which is to haunt us for another six Doctors or so, bad special effects! The just appear slightly too far into the console room, although it's possible you might not notice that. The old man follows them in and gets Susan to close the door, and what follows is a very well done scene of Barbara and Ian in denial trying to convince Susan that her being from a different planet is just a delusion. It feels a little long but it manages to continue what we were assuming is the main plot of this show ('who is this doctor') and introduce us to the key elements of the actual plot, i.e. time travel and our main character is from the future (kind of).

To set the actual plot in motion the Doctor Foreman decides that he can't let the existence of time travel be known and kidnaps Ian and Barbara to an unknown time and place. Or decides it's a good excuse to finally leave 1963 England, if you want a motivation more in keeping with later Doctors. At the very least it's better than 'Barbara's boyfriend Ian accidentally trod on the button'. We end of a cliffhanger with a strange shadow approaching the TARDIS.

Before exiting the TARDIS the characters have a nice little discussion where they continue assuming this is all some trick, and we learn that the Doctor's surname isn't Foreman. Guess he's Susan's maternal grandfather (or that Foreman isn't her surname either, but we don't know about Imet Ordls yet).

Ian and Barbara finally begin to cotton onto the fact that they're in a science fiction program as the Doctor gets captured as he's searching for samples to identify the time and place. Because have have appeared in the land before years where people wore skins that somehow manage to be tight around their rears while fighting, and a caveman sees the Doctor lighting his pipe with a match and decides to kidnap him to make fire for the tribe. Something something karma, but of course Susan wants to save her grandfather and Ian and Barbara want to get home, so it's off to save the Doctor. But it turns out that the Tribe has two people vying to become chief by discovering the secrets of fire, bad guy Za who is the son of the old chief, wants the secret of fire, and is willing to imprison the Doctor to get it, and badder guy Kal, who kidnapped the Doctor in the first place, is willing to kill people to get what he wants, and wants the Doctor to make fire for him. So I guess we're abandoning a 'kidnapped to avoid information getting out' plot for a 'kidnapped for MacGuffin' plot.

Well the Doctor can't make fire without matches, and was never a member of the Scouts in the 42nd century, so when everybody arrives to rescue him they all get captured andleft in a cave to give up the secrets of fire or die at dawn. We end of a cliffhanger, the skulls in this cave are from those killed violently! Or, well, at least had holes cut in their heads to let the demons out.

During the night an old woman sneaks into the cave, cuts their bonds, and shows them a way out, because she's distrustful of fire and wants them to leave before they're forced to give it up. Za and his love interest Her discover the old woman just after the group has fled and give chase, eventually catching up because the Doctor is old and has to rest. But just before the two groups meet Za fights a wild animal and gets injured, causing Ian to rush over and give aid, delaying the arrival of the next serial by an entire episode in order to save a life and because the Doctor doesn't know medicine they jury rig a stretcher to carry Za back to the TARDIS, although apparently the Doctor's sharp stone was not a required material. This episode ends with the group being ambused on the way back to the TARDIS, as Kal has convinced the tribe that Za and Her have killed the old woman, and taken away our intrepid band of prisoners in order to keep the secrets of fire to themselves!

Which is also where the next episode starts, and we see some of the Doctor of later eras first emerge when he uses the fact that Kal, not Za, has a bloodied knife in order to convince the Tribe that he murdered the old woman and get him thrown out of the tribe. Unfortunately Za and the tribe recapture the TARDIS crew and imprison them in the same cave (with added guard) and give them the same deal, fire or die. Fortunately Ian was a member of the Scouts and manages to make fire with sticks and stones, which he may or may not have taught to Za, but unfortunately Za decides not to release the heroes because he thinks they come from and want to return to a desolate waste.

Well with the use of fire, skills, sticks, animal fat, and supersition the group manages to convince the tribe they're dead just long enough to rereach the TARDIS before they're recaptured, and take off as stone spears are flung. We see the TARDIS has landed in a stange place with fog and trees, infer that the Doctor cannot control the TARDIS's destination unless he knows his exit time of takeoff, and end on an omnimous increase in the radiation scanner.

All in all it's not a bad first serial, but it falls apart a bit in the last two episodes as the prehistory story looses it's focus somewhat, with Kal showing up for a caveman brawl with Za just as Ian successfully makes fire, and the continual delay of the heroes' escape. This serial might have been served by having a somewhat weaker plot and having Ian and BArbara's suspicions about the Doctor take centre stage.

Although another interesting thing to note is that the Doctor isn't really the main character, not yet. Ian seems to be, being the most proactive of the group, while the Doctor is presented as a villain early on and at times a grudging follower of Ian's plan, although this begins to change in the forth episode where his intelligence and ability to think on his feat begin to take centre stage alongside his Charisma, allowing the show to begin to find it's feet.

However, next time we have the reason I started all of this. The serial that introduced something that kids hiding behind the sofa would never forget. Something so iconic that no British household will ever see a toilet plunger and egg whisk as a peaceful combination ever again. But it's going to be a while, it's seven episodes long and I want to get through them all before the week is up.

Well out with the unseen stories now and a return to the only story of the first two Doctors I've seen in it's original form. As long as I don't see Peter Cushing in the next episode I know I'm on the right track.

[dps]

I really view this as 2 separate stories. The first episode, titled "An Earthly Child" has little connection to the follow-up caveman episodes (btw, each individual episode had a separate title back in those days; they didn't start numbering episodes within a story in place of separate titles until right at the end of Hartnell's run) except to set up how they got there. The first episode is really good, whereas the 3 episodes with the cavemen are merely OK.

One thing that jumped out to me when I first saw this story 7 years ago during the run-up to the 50th anniversary was that fairly early on Ian expresses the notion that the Tardis is somehow alive, which AFAIK we didn't get confirmed on-screen until "The Doctor's Wife" 48 years later.

[comicshorse]

All Doctor Who ??????????
I salute you as you set off on this mighty quest into the murky past of BBC drama.

[Eldan]

Wow. I never got all the way through the caveman parts of Unearthly Child. The first episode on the junkyard is quite good, but after that...

[Razade]

This might just be an uneducated Yank's worry but isn't there like...a ton of Doctor Who episodes that got lost in a fire?

[Eldan]

Tons. And not necessarily lost in a fire, either. Back then, just no one considered TV shows all that important once they were broadcast, so they were often just recorded over when no one needed them anymore. "All Dr. Who" is a difficult concept. Some is lost forever. Some only still exists as copies made by foreign broadcast stations. Some exists as someone's home copy on VHS that got re-published. Some is only the audio. Some is only the audio and still images from promo material.

[Anonymouswizard]

I really view this as 2 separate stories. The first episode, titled "An Earthly Child" has little connection to the follow-up caveman episodes (btw, each individual episode had a separate title back in those days; they didn't start numbering episodes within a story in place of separate titles until right at the end of Hartnell's run) except to set up how they got there. The first episode is really good, whereas the 3 episodes with the cavemen are merely OK.

One thing that jumped out to me when I first saw this story 7 years ago during the run-up to the 50th anniversary was that fairly early on Ian expresses the notion that the Tardis is somehow alive, which AFAIK we didn't get confirmed on-screen until "The Doctor's Wife" 48 years later.

Sure, I was thinking about doing the two separately, but AUCE1 doesn't give me too much to talk about beyond 'it's good, it's really good, and it spends half the episode pretending to be a different show'.

Although I did notice that most of the details given in the unaired version are remarkably consistent with The Doctor is a Time Lord fro Gallifrey'.

All Doctor Who ??????????
I salute you as you set off on this mighty quest into the murky past of BBC drama.

Every last surviving or reconstructed Episode. So no Feast of Steven.

Wow. I never got all the way through the caveman parts of Unearthly Child. The first episode on the junkyard is quite good, but after that...

Yes, I'd very much agree, I'd very much recommend skipping from 'An Unearthly Child' to 'The Dead Planet', it is a much better serial.

This might just be an uneducated Yank's worry but isn't there like...a ton of Doctor Who episodes that got lost in a fire?

Most were recorded over, the same with a lot of BBC shows. You might be thinking of the props which got destroyed by K-9.

But yes, as I said, every surviving or reconstructed episode. Which means skipping a lot of Trouton.

[GloatingSwine]

Tons. And not necessarily lost in a fire, either. Back then, just no one considered TV shows all that important once they were broadcast, so they were often just recorded over when no one needed them anymore. "All Dr. Who" is a difficult concept. Some is lost forever. Some only still exists as copies made by foreign broadcast stations. Some exists as someone's home copy on VHS that got re-published. Some is only the audio. Some is only the audio and still images from promo material.

Everything that has been recovered or reconstituted is available on Britbox now. (Streaming service/archive of all the old British TV.)

[Anonymouswizard]

Okay, after a brief period of insanity where I tried to talk to people I dragged my arse back to BritBox to watch the next serial/

Spoiler: The Dead Planet

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So again, we have an incredibly good first episode. The TARDIS arrives on a strange planet, and the slow response time of the radiation meter means the group assumes it's safe to explore. We are introduced to the mystery of the dead planet, where the plantlife is all petrified and the animals seem to be made of metal, and the strange city. However Ian and Barbara want to get back to Earth and the Doctor wants to explore the city, and so the Doctor declares that there's a fault with the fluid link that requires them to explore the city for mercury.

The episode ends with the group exploring the city and beginning to suffer from radiation poisoning (most notably the Doctor), until at the very end Barbara is menaced by that most terrifying of items, a plunger!

Yes, the actual commonly accepted name of this serial is The Daleks, but I kind of consider that a bit of a spoiler, because we spend an entire episode without seeing the Daleks, and their conflict with the Thals doesn't become the primary plot until about halfway through the serial, we've still got to solve the radiation sickness plotline.

I'd also like to take a moment to talk about the Doctor Who canon.

Spoiler: This is essentially a long rant about alternate continuities and interpretations

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Because, you see, early Daleks are weird. Their pathetic aspects are played up a lot more, there's no actual implication they are or have ever been a major power in the universe, an the all-consuming hate that came to define them isn't really present yet. Especially in this serial their conflict with the Thals seems to be based on two factors, them each needing environmental conditions fatal to the other, and an age old grudge that they haven't let go of.

This is because there is no definitive 'right' for Doctor Who. The radiation-dependent technocratic scientist Daleks are just as valid as the later hateful monstrosities. Sure, we have theoretically noncanonical stories like Scream of the Shalka and Curse of the Fetal Death, but they have never actually been declared noncanonical (Scream of the Shalka works well as an alternate post-Time War continuity, for example). But in some ways the only reason that the Scream of the Shalka Doctor can't be one of the Doctor's regenerations is because it would then require the audience to see it to understand where the Doctor is in his regeneration cycle, but it is still possible that a broad-strokes version of the story happened with the eighth, ninth, or war Doctors. Now I'm not going to argue for a parody such as Curse of the Fatal Death being as canon as Day of the Doctor, but I will point out that it's not officially noncanon because nothing is.

Doctor Who doesn't care about continuity in any real sense beyond the last handful of years, details and characterisations will change somewhat to make the current story better, while archetypes stay rougholy the same. History itself seems to be mutable in Doctor Who, on the universal level the broad strokes are the same, but the changing details can look pretty massive to us down here, while at the same time resisting intentional change. From the universe's point of view it doesn't matter if eight regenerated into war and joined the Time War, or if eight fought in a time war against a non-Dalek foe, regenerated into Richard E. Grant, and was forced into being an agent of the time lords (presumably in this theory later regenerating into a Christopher Eccelston who is suffering from PTSD for different reasons, and we get something roughly equivalent to the TV series including a Day of the Doctor with John Hurt replaced by Paul McGann and/or Richard E. Grant.

But what does this have to do with the Daleks? Well, we essentially don't have to torture a 'these were an alternate version of Daleks that Davros abandoned' explanation, instead they represent a version of history where the technocratic scientist Daleks were dominant and never got to the level of trying to exterminate the galaxy (if we want to replace them with an existing DW species I'd suggest we make this a timeline were the Cybermen try to upgrade everything), with the Daleks in this story being an off-shoot of the main Dalek faction who decided not to go to space.

Although I think the more important point I want to make is, I wouldn't mind more stories with Daleks more akin to the ones in their original appearance. It's certainly better than that attempt to turn the Cybermen into Daleks in David Tennant's first series.

And also that I want to pretend that the Timeless Child is noncanon.

So Episode 2 mainly revolves around introduces us to the Daleks, and setting up the need for Susan to fetch the anti-radiation drugs to cure everybody. The former is really the more interesting part, we get to see this wildly different Daleks to later serials, less brute force and more cunning manipulation. They use Susan's quest for the drugs to confirm if the Thals still exist, before convincing Susan to write a message of false friendship and delivering it to the Thals. This forms the better part of two episodes, and honestly there's not much reason to talk about beyond the Thals all being blond haired white farmers, confirmation that the Daleks aren't stupid when they find the second box of drugs the Thals give Susan (but let her keep it for as yet unknown reasons), and their manipulation of Susan to make her believe they're interested in peace. Their only major mistake is not moving the TARDIS crew into a new cell when they destroy the camera in theirs, which allows them to hijack a Dalek casing and begin their escape.

So Episode 4, the TARDIS crew manages to escape with a little bit of fast-talking to get to a lift, and then using the lift to reach the surface and get out of the city before the Daleks catch them, leaving Ian to warn the Thals.

The Thals have arrived to find the food and friendship offered to them, although arguing over if they can trust the Daleks, and find the room with the food and four Daleks waiting to ambush them. However, impied to be fue to the fact he can't see the Daleks the Thal leader is the only one to enter the room, and requests to actually speak to them. Ian arrives just before the Da;eks launch their ambush and warns the Thals, with most of them escaping.

The rest of the Episode is spent arguing with the Thals over whether or not they should fight the Daleks, ending with the revelation that the Thals used to be warriors. This sets up our moral, 'pacifism is not always correct'. As our cliffhanger we discover that the fluid link was left in the Dalek city during the escape, as the Daleks took it when searching Ian. Dun dun duuuun.

And I shall be splitting serials of more than four parts into multiple parts, to help preserve my sanity. But the verdict so far: a very interesting story with a villain I wish Who would bring back.