Hello and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety, the only Doctor
Who podcast, which is powered by the Kinetic Force of Planetary
Movement.
I'm Brendan.
I'm Nathan.
I'm Janet Lee's sacerating shower curtain in this one.
I just get better and bad.
So we're heading down to Zita Minor on a Merestran probe ship.
How'd you know it's evil?
Just because it's God, you know it.
It's not.
That's one of those cases where, which is what I really like about
Robert Holmes diving right in there, he doesn't really like
monsters that are black and white, although this jungle would have
looked pretty ordinary in black and white.
This isn't a heart more storage anymore, is it?
We've left the 60s nice and proper and still until we get into the
spaceship, which is entirely...
In fact, the Sensorite spaceship looked a hell of a lot better
than this Maristran one, jumping ahead.
I do love that they're all dressed up, however, as the Jackson 5
or indeed Casey and the Sunshine Band as the Marestrum soldiers
because what the hell is that scallop neck on those uniforms?
Is it really designation by the amount of chest hair that you have
which is why Vashinsky should really be running the show because
he's got more chest hair than anybody else.
It's really off-putting too, isn't it?
It's a huge clump of gray chest hair.
Fabulous 70s.
You can see Freddie Mercury was just itching.
You know that later on that year, the Freddy, we always think it's
come before, but there's that queen, sorry, Freddy.
It is the name of your band.
There's that queen video clip where you get that red pullback of
Freddie Jaeger's movie monster when he pulls back and queen use
that.
Is it Bohemian Rhapsody?
It is.
Bohemian Rhapsody uses exactly the same effect.
I'm sure they got it from Doctor Who.
I think you'll find it's Kwanye now.
But let's not...
Let's not discuss...
I don't boil any of that up.
That's not discussed, kind of.
I thought that was JZ.
I always get them.
No, no, it was Kanye.
You're listening to radio 4.
So we are on the planet Zeta Minor, for a story which is quite
polarising with fans, when I used to do Pinot Scaro audios, where
I was playing Doctor Who, was slightly Australian Doctor Who.
My sidekick.
Tom was played by the wonderful Simon Hart, who is a very, very
nice chap and always very positive about Doctor Who.
And as such refers to this story as Planet of Wretched Evil
because he hates it so much.
Really, though?
How can you hate it that much?
Well, what is there to hate?
Have any opinion about it, actually?
actually?
It's really not that great.
See, I think it's a story with wonderful buildup.
You have that really atmospheric planet.
Roger Murray leeches back again.
The planet set, we should say.
Look, what happens in this story?
Or do I just say, go and watch Howard Hawk's 1951, the thing, go
and read Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and then watch Forbidden Planet
and you've got the entire story.
Yeah, yeah.
The story itself is a hodgepodge of different ideas.
This is probably Hinchcliffe and Holmes taking old ideas and
making them new again.
This is probably their worst offender with not actually providing
that much new for the idea aside from a new setting.
There wasn't a great deal of anti-master in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
though, as far as I can remember.
No, and I was actually thinking of C. sorry?
You had the potion in that, which sort of had the antimatter
effect.
Well, you know, in the 1st script, the planet was actually meant
to be the changeable, sentient creature, which was very Stanislaus
Lem Solaris.
I mean, you get the sense that that, the creature, what, there
wants a creature originally.
But that creature thing is kind of an avatar of the planet or a
representative.
Exactly.
And it was an add-on.
There wasn't going to be a monster suit.
I think it's a crying shame that they did one.
The creature is most scary when it's just the tinkling
tenabulations in the forest and Sarah's eyes stand out on Mobius
stalks and she just has that. is real horror.
This is one of the 1st, I should say, that I knew, and we were so
lucky, dear listener, in the 70s, before you were all born, that
we are, in Australia, we got to, we got the target books before, a
good 12 months before the shows aired.
So this is one I remember reading what we called babysitting, which
was frying a child on a beach in Australia for 8 hours.
So I'm hiding on freshwater beach, not far from where Nathan grew
up. reading this book and longing to be somewhere dark and cold.
And so I didn't never got the sense of horror from this.
I got that it was one of the Terrence Dix plotters and I've got it
here if we want to pull it out and flash it to the listener.
This makes great radio.
It just really worked as a great traditional SF story and there's
nothing wrong with poaching, the 1950s that gives you a lovely
sheen on your egg yolk.
Yeah, I think what really helps it here is that in terms of the
design, and in terms of the writing and in terms of the direction
it's very confident in taking those things, it doesn't attempt to
hide them.
It doesn't attempt to dress them up.
It is saying, yeah, we are doing forbidden planet.
We are doing Dr. Jekyll and Mr. High, I'm used to it.
Better.
The jungle set is so beautiful.
Can I completely disagree?
Really?
Well, there's 2 jungle sets.
I mean, we shoot at Ealing, I think.
Yeah, there's the film one with the water and there's water and
this red lighting and stuff and I think it looks really, really
great.
And I think the moment you move into the studio it just looks
terrible.
Oh, it exhibits Dr. A. Exhibit A is the pool, you know, that black
pool where the walls just look like, you know, no one's ever come
away from Blackpool with anything nice to say, though.
The wolves just look like they're from Omega's powers, you know?
on a quick repaint.
They're terrible.
And then for, then we're off the planet for the 2nd half of it, and
we're in that terrible Morestran spaceship, where some attempt is
being made by, is it David Maloney, so kind of get it lit
interestingly, but it just fails, and it's like the money's run
out.
It is lovely that both Hoover and Gillette have put money into the
design of the Maristan Space Bro, haven't they?
Because it does look like something you'd shave with slash back up
the cat. they had to add.
They had to add a bit onto it.
The lowest bit as you look at the spaceship from top to bottom.
This is the model, right?
The lowest bit of the model.
They had to add that little protrusion onto it because they
suddenly realised that the set that had been built in the studio
that they climbed down under, looked nothing like the model.
As if that's ever mattered in the history of anything.
Surely Hay or Blake 7.
Surely it was just because it looked too much like a 2 litre
detergent bottle, you know, and stuck in front of a ceiling.
With a safety razor on the front.
Yeah, yeah.
It's terrible.
I mean, the money must have run out.
Maybe Roger Murray Leach had splashed out.
No, this is the...
That's how you did spaceships in the 70s on every show.
This was the 2nd story to be produced for this production block.
Pyramids of Mars was actually produced first, but always planned
to be afterwards.
And there is a shot in Pyramids of Mars, which I think is a very
strong indication of this.
I will come back to that when we get to Pyramids and Mars.
So yeah, I don't think the money had so much run out.
Perhaps all the money was spent on the jungle and there wasn't as
much for the ship or they just wanted the ship to look very
pristine and very...
I don't think it looks any better or worse than skybase, for
instance, from the mutants.
I think the uniforms are far worse.
Those horrible scallop net uniforms.
And you know what?
Even if you get, even if you get a man in the modern era with a
lovely, huge chest, he still looks stupid in a scallop neck t
shirt.
Scallop neck t-shirts do not work for any man.
Yes, please pay attention to that at home.
Yes, yeah.
Please wouldn't mind.
They really don't, do they?
Less is definitely more.
Yeah.
But in the 70s.
Yeah, has everyone forgotten St.
Robin Williams?
Oh, so quickly too soon?
What did more wear, but exactly that shirt?
Yeah, but Mork wasn't exactly the height of fashion.
I mean, it was a bit spunky pants. his little sleeveless bomber
jacket and his... and his...
Sesame Street shirt.
And his floppy hair.
You know, floppy hair doesn't work on everyone, but floppy hair
worked on young Robin Williams. did.
Yeah.
I'm Pam Dorber, it turns out.
You know, I miss Robin Williams.
So do I. Gosh.
He would have been great in this.
As the anti-matter monster.
It was all it's almost Sesame Street, isn't it?
already.
He would have been great at Sorenson.
He would have been great in the Vashinsky.
He would be great.
Salamar.
We can talk about salamo.
Yes. the problem.
What is it?
He's played by Prentice Hamler.
He's played by Prince so he's really terrible.
Whom they got as a big deal because, you know, it was terror of
the Zygons that was stealing all of the oompah of Space 1999.
It's Terror of the Zygons, episode 2, where Space 1999 premiered
and the BBC were looking very nervous.
Very nervous indeed.
They needn't have been.
No, they needn't.
Mostly because 1999 never got networked, so it never quite picked
up the jewellers.
You can see with a dip in the episode 6. one backup to 11 point
whatever it was for episode 3 of Saigons.
But for this one, getting Prentice Hancock, who was 2IC in the 1st
season of 1999 made a big deal at the whole thing.
It was a big issue.
Yeah.
In the days before that meant anything.
Well, he's not that good, but the dialogue is Thunderbirds without
the, without the laughs.
The weird thing is, what I decided to do with the stories I was
looking at this season was I decided to watch them episode by
episode and for my opinion based on each episode and it's not
until episode 3 that Prentice Hancock gets really bad and in
particular his character just takes a lurch out the window.
The 1st 2 episodes, I actually think he plays a character who is
out of his depth and struggling to maintain control.
I think he plays that very well, and he plays that stress very
well, because sometimes he'll bark at Visinsky, but sometimes
he'll listen to him.
So there's an inconsistency there that makes sense.
So, you know, I do definitely understand that he's a character who
is out of his depth, then Prentice Hancock viewed him as a
character who only got his command because Daddy was very
powerful.
Does that come across in the script?
I think it comes across in Prentice Hancock's performance.
Prentice Hancock has said in later years, he considered the script
quite thin, and I think... that's a that's a that's a that's
coming from Prentice Hancock.
You know, I actually have to say that I think he's an astute
critic because one of the problems with this story is that there
are virtually no recognisable characters at all.
Like Mashinski is...
Shinski shines in this.
Yeah, I'm not just looking all that all that platinum blonde
chest.
No.
But I mean, name one personality trait that he has.
Do you know what I mean?
Like he's nice, I guess, but there's really not very much to him.
Sorenson's a little bit more...
Yeah, but you know, like he's a bit more of a recognisable
character.
I like Lewis Marty, although blinking you miss him.
Yeah, Token newsreader from...
And also...
Nice to blink there.
He is too. you.
My goodness.
I'd forgotten.
Because he's old Danny Shipton.
And do you know what other cult role he had, which people will
find very recognisable?
He's the doctor in that faulty tower.
Mr. Faulty, you must get as much rest as you can.
He's in the Germans.
He's the doctor to whom Basil has a very bad reaction.
Let's just leave this.
He's really good in this.
Yeah, yeah.
And again, they kind of, it's this one where everybody dies now.
But what I quite like is most of the soldiers and the scientific
crew, the actors play them quite naturalistically.
Like they sort of play them like jobs worth. like Dahan is pretty
much just Sergeant Benton.
Actually, Dahan is nearly a character, all that bitching about
carrying things and going...
Dehan, the leader wants us to carry this into the ship and out
again.
Thank you, Michael Wisher.
And my wisher gets a dual role.
Yes, he's Morelli.
Yes, and then he's Ranjit or whatever his name is.
Yes, you're doing a comedy... brains from the new Thunderbirds.
The thing is, they make such a big deal about the split level
effect of this set and how it was so up to the minute.
I'm thinking, oh, come on, boys.
Okay, we know you're trying to mirror the moon-based alpha split
level set.
But space 1979, sick, was the most expensive thing, their episode
ever made for television in the history of the medium in 1975
six.
Not until roots came along, about 78, 79.
That had Geordie from...
Yes, LeBar Burton.
Otherwise, we wouldn't bother watching it.
But no, it's actually very good.
But yeah, you can't compete visually.
So you have to do it with scripts and then you have to do it with
actors.
And I think the cast is bad.
I don't actually think that Salamar is, like, I just can't say the
actor's name out loud.
I guess that Salamo is such so poor.
His his role, his script as it's written, is so bland.
What else is he going to do with it?
Yeah, yeah.
I think the main problem is...
In the 1st 2.5 episodes, all of the tension in his character and
his insecurity is coming from Prentice Hancock's performance.
Now, I will say Prentice Hancock is not the best actor in the
series.
You get a fulsome career afterwards, do you?
But I do think of his 4 Doctor Who appearances.
This is his best performance because he is having to invent it
himself and he is getting sort of tension in there and what have
you.
The main problem is because there is no tension ramping up in the
script, when he goes mad at the end of episode 3 and goes with the
realisation that, oh, you know, now we've got to kill the doctor
and Sarah, it comes out of nowhere because initially he's
suspicious of the doctor and Sarah, but then he actually observes
that they know what they're talking about.
So he trusts them to an extent.
Isn't he just an intransigent base commander who goes mad?
Yeah, yeah.
Do you know what I mean?
haven't we seen this 100s of times?
In episode two.
It starts looking like he's leaning back the other direction and
then he just goes full force back and you're like, but this
doesn't make any sense.
Narratively, it's one of those stories that actually needs to be 6
parters, just a 6 parter, just to get its flow. how much fun that
would have been this time.
But not really.
It actually does need that space for development.
I think we're quite glad it didn't bother.
But I do also think that really characterisation is a low point
for this episode because even the characterisation of the doctor
and Sarah isn't very good.
The rapport is lovely.
Their rapport is lovely, but their motivations within the script
are very strange because we must respond to this distress signal.
They respond to the distress signal.
They get caught.
They get...
Nothing bad's ever happened from responding to it.
Hello, Ridley Scott, you're watching this, aren't you?
They get cool.
They get chucked in a cell, of course.
They decide to escape.
And then when they get caught again.
They say, don't worry, we're here to help.
I have, I found myself thinking, uh, you've just tried to run back
to this Hartus and leave everyone to their fate.
You're not there to help.
You're there because you got caught.
Nicely observed.
It doesn't make a lot of sense, does it?
Do you really think that Sarah, in the real universe, in our
universe anyway, would be packing heat before she even steps out
of that blue box?
Because really, it's not the 1st time someone's come the nasties
at you, Sarah.
Don't you think she'd be just a little bit?
Okay, you can choose not to carry a gun, but I'm wearing I'm
wearing Sigourney Weaver's exoskeleton for this entire story and
don't you even start?
If she was too stupid to get back in it, you know, like, why
didn't we get back in the tennis thing?
Well, she keeps being told Cassiopeia and Florana and bugger
that.
It's always bright and pier or you know, some slop quarry
somewhere outside Dorset. at unit headquarters.
They've been in South Croydon.
I was just going to say, how bad must Croydon be?
Really?
She's off in Zita Minor on the very boundary of our universe.
And it's still better than Croydon.
Thankfully, Liz is wonderful though.
And we get something we didn't mention last week with Zigons, where
we had the 1st instance.
This is the 2nd instance of...
Which is an amazing Liz Trump.
That's a real problem for me, and I think maybe you as well, Nathan
with Liz's performance of Sarah Jane Smith, in that it's just too
good.
It's too realistic.
So when she experiences real fear and real horror, it's never the
same as when Joe Grant did, that was still within the realms of
the fun of the show.
This is palpable.
I know she's suffering, and it just makes it much worse.
I don't think Joe ever suffers the sort of things that...
I never did anything as horrible to her.
You know that you know that the master might have given her a
slightly inferior brandy had he?
He had a directed a cutting remark.
And that's it, yeah.
They had it easy in them 70s, didn't they?
Not the girl from 1980.
I will say listeners on a related note, if you ever meet big
finishes, Nigel Fairs, he does he does a wonderful impression of
Sarah Jane's can't breathe.
I won't even... how that came about.
No.
Cheers, Nigel, if you're listening.
There are other things to look at in their story.
There's Hayden Wood who plays O'Hara very briefly.
He's rather pretty to look at and then becomes a desiccated
coconut.
Yeah, I was going to say, not after.
No, no, not after.
It's a bit up the Orinoco, isn't it?
The tribes of the hakawi because there's all that, there's all
that.
Again, we go back to Edwardian stuff, that, you know, the horror
is that you'll be turned into some zombie tribal effigy.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Because they still managed to be racist without even trying.
Don't they?
And they try not to be racist here because all the morastians.
It must be a human colony.
They all have last names that come from different cultures.
Yeah, and they still hint that there's no sense of being earth.
Although they, she does say, oh, we're from Earth.
And he says, that's impossible.
So I'd like to think they're in the year 37,000 or something.
I'm not going to get too nerdy about it.
37,166. to do that, didn't you?
And listen, you were thinking exactly the same thought at exactly
the same time, weren't you?
We love you to keep listening.
Oh, also, there's an iTunes thing if you want to comment in case.
Did we mention that?
Yeah, I don't think we've ever said that before.
Go on.
No, no.
But guess who else is on the crew?
And doesn't get killed by the alien menace.
It's Terry Walsh.
In fact, he's not dead?
Well, he is by the end.
He gets killed by printer's girlfriend.
I think he does get killed by the alien menace, in fact.
I think that...
Did he get killed twice?
Yeah, I think he gets killed twice.
There is a scene, I think, in episode 2 where they're all shooting
at the at the creature thing from the outside of the ship, which
is actually a bit of the set that I don't mind.
You know, there's that, the sort of outside of the ship set and
they're all shooting.
And I think Terry does a headlong plunge off the side of the
sheet.
Oh, very nicely too, into the thing.
I think that's almost certainly, Terry.
It's a little bit hard to see his face, but you do see him before
then.
And then later on, he's a guard who is there.
Oh, right.
So Terry Walsh plays twin brothers in this, is what you're
saying.
I think I think that's probably it.
We don't get Terry Walsh. credited as an actor for a long time
after this one.
No, that's true.
He's had his he's had his big role previously where he got to
deliver lines and A line and be A person.
Yeah, he's going to be Mensch later on in Power of Kroll.
Yeah, that's right.
He is going to be one of Lady Adraster's guy.
Wolf weeds?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
One of the wolf weeds, yeah.
But he won't get a sort of credited acting role, although he will
still do some stunt arranging.
Well, we should mention that one of the, have we mentioned this?
One of the reasons that we, apart from the fact that we just think
he's great, is that Terry Walsh's son was kind enough to contact
us at the podcast and say that he's listening.
I think we just worried that we called an episode punching Terry
Walsh in the face.
As a description, not an instruction.
I point out once again.
He does do the stunt for Tom in this one as well, falling into the
pit of oblivion.
And I would like to know how Terry was feeling about Tom wanting
to do more of his own stunts.
You see more of that as the season goes on.
Tom starts to do more of his jumping from a great height stunt
stuff.
How did they actually do that thing?
I don't know how they realise the pool?
The pool is obviously black because it's CSO.
Yeah, it's the, it's black drape.
It's actually just black velvet.
They do a bit of CSO as well, though.
It is a CSO drape inside, which is coloured black, which is why
it's a very flat black and there's no reflection.
And yet they might as well have not bothered because it's still
not that interesting.
Whether that's it, that's a terrible sense.
What I really like about it, though, and I don't know if this is
deliberate, of course, I love to think that it's Omega's spa.
Well, that's what I'm saying.
When the doctor falls into it, he's in a black void with swirling
lights just like Pert we was when he was fighting the dark side of
home because mind.
Or travelling from world to world in Inferno, actually. same Yeah
the same difference.
Without Catherine Skill menacing him in, you know, latex.
Jabberwocky And Tom in there, half of it is him.
And half of it, I believe, is Alan Chuntz.
Chunsey was back.
You mean Mr. Humphreys' chauffeur from the Seeds of Doom?
That's right.
Yes.
Yeah, so he's sort of floating around in there.
This is the top of episode three.
Now we do get a little bit more interesting stuff from Salamar
here.
Some of them are essentially starting to go mad for no reason, but
he has a few interesting comments. issues.
He's got a few issues as well.
When Sarah's saying we've got to go out there and get the doctor
Salamar talks about his command being at risk, he doesn't talk
about his crew.
He does, doesn't he?
He's more concerned about his image.
The other thing is, he says 7 men have died.
That's the 7 men of the research party.
He's not counting his own crew amongst dead because that's their
job.
He does spend a lot more time apparently doing his hair in a
lovely Joanna Lumley Purdy style and he does paying attention to
numbers.
Have you noticed how elegantly and precisely quaffed Salamar is in
this whole episode?
Everyone's looking a bit unruly and scruffy, but no.
No, he, he, yeah.
He's gone back and got the brush out.
And interestingly, in this bit, and Nathan, I will give you a
screen grab to put on the website.
When the oculoid tracker, which I love, the little floating camera
Babylon 5 nicked it for an episode called The Day in the Life.
Did it have a cat's eye?
It had an eye lens in the middle and Bill Mooney of Lost in Space
Fame headbutted it.
He wasn't available for this one, was he?
No, sadly not.
When the oculoid tracker is looking at the pond after the doctor's
fallen in...
There is a face on the screen.
There is a face on the screen that can't possibly come from any of
the guest cast because there's no reflection at CSO.
It's a really wispy little face.
And it's quite clear to see that David...
Hancock's future career.
The ghost of Bill Hartnell.
The only thing I could think of is David Maloney is trying to put
in like a distorted reflection of Michael Wisher, but then where's
Prentice Hank?
Not a beautiful fan. and Ewan.
But I don't think it's that.
I think it's some kind of some kind of glitch.
Do you think it's a woo-woo feedback?
It goes to the machine.
Yeah.
It's quite, it's quite scary.
Can we put a pickup of that?
would love to see that.
I do find it.
Because I've only seen this story so few times.
I do find that one area this story succeeds in is atmosphere.
The soundscape and the forest set design and the sound effects for
the monster.
I don't think the anti-man Sorensen monster is particularly well
realised, as Rob said at the time.
Werewolves, why is it always bleeping werewolves?
Well, I mean, it's Jekyll and Hyde, and you kind of think, why
even really bother doing that?
And what does it have to do with what's gone on before?
It does just seem to be to sort of disconnected halves of the
story.
Yeah, for me, I think that the major failing of the story isn't
what we've touched on with the acting and it isn't even really the
scripts.
It's the monster itself.
It should have remained, the anti-Guia principle, as it originally
was.
The planet was the monster.
So the existential threat of just the sacerations and maybe the
leaves being turned up a knob and going a brighter red when the
monster moved through.
That, I think, would have been really interesting.
We really didn't need a shower curtain, blobby man in reflection.
I loved it as a kid, though.
Yeah, that's good.
Interestingly, when I when I was a kid.
Because of course, when you're a child, it doesn't matter if
you're seeing something that was made yesterday or you're seeing
something that was made 20 years ago.
As a child, it's all together in one place.
So I had Planet of Evil as a kid.
And my cousin had a Sega master system, which was a video game
console, which came in with a built-in game called Alex Kidd in
Miracle World.
And one of the enemies in Alex Kidd in Miracle World is this giant
headed frog that swims up and down and it's got 2 bulbous eyes
coming out each side.
The anti-matter monster looks like that frog from Alex Kidd in
Miracle World.
So I kind of took that as a video game reference.
What I think it looks like.
I think it looks like a fomasi that's crash landed on the planet
is haunting Zeta Minor ever afterwards.
You see, for Nathan and I, Brendan, hearing you tell these stories
of video games, it's like we've dived into a mega spa and come out
in an alternate universe.
Whole other world.
I will once again put up a screen grab of the giant frog from Alex
Kidd in America.
I haven't moved away from Pong and Tetris.
I'm still in 1979 playing pong.
This isn't that far off.
The game was made in 1986, I think.
So that's like 10 years on from Pong.
But I keep coming back to Prentice Hancock, and I do think...
Yeah, we do butt, though, don't we?
Is this his last ever performance?
No, no, it's the 2nd last...
I want it years too.
I want to come back to Brendan's shine in that one.
Because I think the character of Salamar embodies what is wrong
with the story.
And I don't I don't think it's Prentice's fault.
I don't blame Prentice.
He does the best with a pretty slight job.
I do.
I like the idea of the rivalry between him and the Shinsu.
Yes, I love that mentor.
The reversal of it. very Luke Skywalker...
Yeah, yeah.
Obi-Wan actually, isn't it?
Vashinski is trying to help.
Vashinski is never trying to undermine his authority.
Yeah, and he's never pushing his own agenda.
He's never about his own vanity or on his own role. yeah.
And I mean, the problem comes from that when...
Salamar finally breaks, it just happens too quickly.
There hasn't been enough leader.
Like, he's kind of barked at Visinsky a few times, but at the same
time, you can imagine that it's more of a telling someone off for
breaking the chain of command by giving an order without his.
Yeah, both Trek and TNG, and maybe more tellingly next generation
managed to do exactly the same scenario many, many times over in
the space of 45 minutes.
So why are we not able to get that character arc correct in 4
episodes?
Absolutely.
And you could still have Salamar end up at the same place at the
end. without having to weaken the character because I do think his
going mad weakens the character and weakens the way that Prentice
is playing it.
Because he should be mad.
I think he should still be cogent and it's like narcissism of the
Nazis.
That's a Stalek story we never got to see.
It's a character flaw, not a madness.
I just think it's stupid.
I think it's a way of like upping mistakes.
I don't think anything.
Have you met Harrison before?
No, it's nothing thoughts being given to these characters at all
as far as I can see.
It seems like...
I think that's a fair call, actually.
Lewis Marx has just thought in episode three.
You know what?
We've already got a monster and we've got a villain in anti-man.
If I throw in another villain, it's just going to become even
bigger and it's like, no, it doesn't work that way.
It's like, I'm making a cake and I like eggs.
If I throw in another egg, the cake will be even better.
No, it won't necessarily. know that here at the podcast.
Exactly.
What I think should have happened in episode 4 is that Salamar
should have still grabbed the proton accelerator or whatever it
is.
So, no, that's the thing the doctor's got.
Spectral accelerator.
I don't know.
And he should have still...
Betrum's pursuit thingy.
No, it is a proton accelerator.
Yeah, and pretty much he has his Captain A ha moment of, you know
I'm going to hunt down this monster and then Vashinski, you're
finished in the space fleet. when actually he should have been
motivated more as Scott of the Antarctic.
It should have been.
He's been going on about his command and how proud he is of his
command.
He should have had the chance to prove that by saying, I'm going
to sacrifice myself.
So this mission will succeed.
And you know what?
That's still a slightly mad thing to do, and you could have still
had it slightly unhinged, but it would have redeemed the character
somewhat.
Now, despite what you may hear, that's not an antimatter monster
and he'd be very hurt to be called so.
It's Todd.
He's looking surprisingly well for his age, but...
Fry crotchety of alert.
He is.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, guys, it's just me.
It's not the anti-matter monster.
Frederick Jager returns as Professor Sorenson.
I never liked Professor Sorenson, and I was really surprised that
at the end of the show, the anti-matter monster actually allows
him to live.
Yet he's the cause of so many deaths.
Do you think he should have lived or died?
Oh.
My space giant bubble is picking up some sort of signal.
Oh, it's an SOS, and it's coming from Mars.
I must investigate.
Because we then have that very uncomfortable moment at the end
where Salamar's been killed off, but Sorenson survives.
Yeah.
I think you've really hit on something there.
If this story was drawing more on the actual histories of Mawson
and Scott of the Antarctic, and there were certainly plenty of
those films going around in on television and in the cinema, in
the 50s and 60s in Britain and Australia, much more interesting a
take because this is really one of those South Paul expedition
stories that goes horribly, horribly wrong.
We all end up eating K 9.
You know, you know why?
survives, though.
Philip Hinchcliffe steps in and says that the death of Sorenson
where he originally gets lost in the pit forever, was to Green and
Bleak, and it's kind of like, where was where were you, Mr
Hinchcliffe last year?
We were being threatened by Nazis every week.
You know what I mean?
tea time in children's television.
So he had he got religion suddenly about being too grim.
How do you feel that ends up, though, with Sorenson being
redeemed?
I like that the doctor kind of puts him on a different paths both
to keep the planet safe, to keep Sorenson safe and to save their
culture.
I don't I don't think Sorenson should have survived.
It undermines when it undermines when the doctor says we are
scientists and we must take responsibility for our actions.
Hinchcliffe's decision there is very is very questionable.
It's possibly, it's possibly geni-laired award-winning, I have to
say.
I don't feel that this story can possibly be turning up at this
point in the season because surely he's just filmed brain of
morbidness and looking at this, thinking, oh, I think we went a
bit far.
But he didn't.
It's before.
I mean, I suppose the other thing is, um, if Sorenson doesn't
survive, there is no, there is no one to back up Vishinsky story
when he comes back with the ship with most of the crew dead.
I actually need someone to give the lesson to about power, you
know, like this is about upsetting the very balance of nature and
transgressing, you know, the book boundaries of the universe in
order to get power.
And so the doctor has to kind of step in and fix that.
And so he does that by giving Sorenson that lecture about, you
know, kinetic potential of planetary motion.
And I quite like the fact that Sorenson's a little humbled and a
little disoriented by what he's been through.
What about the doctor and Sarah in this one?
Well, you know, like one of the reasons that we like this series, I
think, or that we have like this series, is they're at the top of
their game, but this is actually the 1st time ever. that the show
has just had a male and female lead and no other semi-regular
companion.
Yeah, yeah, you're right.
Unit's gone at the very beginning of the next story, we're
throwing unit, you know, out the airlock and we'll talk about that
next week.
And so, although we think it's normal for the doctor to travel
with a young woman and that's all we have.
Well, it's in fact, is it normal?
Well, it's, yeah, no, that it's weird.
But it's in fact something we've never had before.
And I actually think that it impairs.
Except before the cameras ever started to roll, which is why I
feel, or we could look at Quinas, couldn't we?
Yeah, which is like the Sarah is the doctor's granddaughter in
apotheosis, which is why he should never snog them.
Stephen Moffatt.
It's been a while since you've said that.
Don't just blame Moffat.
Russell started it.
Actually, Philip Siegel started it to be fair.
Yeah, Philip Siegel has a lot to answer for.
It's deep.
Such as where Spielberg?
Yes.
The problem is that it impedes world building, but they're in
their little cocoon, aren't they?
Yeah, now the adventures become like a disconnected series of
things that could happen in any order.
There's no, you know, world to go back to. a really good point.
The Avengers, which is the closest thing we can think of in many
ways to this.
It wasn't that long ago in television history, either, that we had
Stephen Steven, his lady.
But they had the home counties.
It was always in the safe place of a recognisable place, just like
Pertley's unit years, where odd things would occur within the
safety of the home counties.
But here, we don't even have.
So there was always a cyclorama, if you like, of recognisability
and the characters, therefore, were part of our world.
So we were the Avengers were somehow in between reality and
dissonance.
But whereas here, it's simply like you've thrown four-dimensional
figures into a three-dimensional space.
We don't fit into it at all.
We are no longer reflected in the character of Sarah, Sarah, has
not been one of us for a long time.
Yeah, yeah, a big problem about this dual lead situation, and I'll
be talking about this more next story, is Sarah starts losing her
humanity.
Do you think she becomes callous?
No, the thing I wouldn't quite use that word, but yeah, there is a
loss of empathy, I think.
For the other characters.
I think so.
I think it's what Jackie fears for Rose in Army of Ghosts.
Yes.
Yeah, yeah.
Where she's a woman.
You know, she'll be on a moon or an asteroid or in a market
somewhere and she won't be Rose Tyler anymore.
And I just think she stops becoming a recognisable character.
Look, I'm not a big fan of Peter Davidson's characters.
I don't like, I like Tegan, but I don't like...
Oh, I thought we were talking about Peter Davidson's characters.
Sorry, the doctor.
Yeah, Oliver has very peculiar practice.
That character in The Tomorrow People with a Duslem pin.
Oh, God.
No, not Davison on tomorrow, people.
Please.
So yes, I agree with you.
I'm not fond of Davidson's characters.
I think I may have meant to say companions.
Is that what he calls him?
But, but there is an attempt at world building and stories do have
a consequence beyond their sort of figure. and the stories are
terrible.
Do you know what I mean?
But can't you looking forward to that?
But the world building.
There's an attempt at world building and I really, really miss
that whenever it's just the doctor.
I agree. companion.
And, you know, the most recent series of Doctor Who, as we record
is series 8.
And, you know, it is just Capaldi and Jenna Coleman.
But there was Danny. anchoring it and there was...
And Cole Hill students coming along and some of those other kids.
And they were really trying.
It felt a bit tenuous, but at least Moffatt was recognising that
that needs to be there.
And of course it was a huge feature of Russell's Doctor Who.
And so for the next little while. you know what I mean?
For the next few years, in fact, for the rest of Tom's time until
season 18, really.
That's going to be the model and I'm not a big fan of it.
I just dropped something.
Did you hear that?
It was a shock.
Actually, let's have a moment, Brendan.
I actually agree with Nathan.
On that bombshell, dear listener.
That's all the time we have for Planet of Evil, so we will...
So is this just our Jenny Laird episode?
Well, we'll find that out in a few weeks time.
Next week we'll be back discussing, and I am right this time
something which is regarded as a classic of the Hinchcliffe era, if
not Doctor Who, as a whole.
Nathan, stop grimacing.
It is Pyramids of Mars.
Until then, please find us online at FTE podcast on Twitter, flight
through entirety on Facebook and iTunes, where you can leave a
review and flight through entirety.com.
Also, you may want to check out and subscribe to a website called
Bond Finger.
There are exciting things coming up there. until... intrusive.
Until next week.
Thank you very much and good night.
Good night.
Why is it pyramids plural?
There's only one pyramid.
That would reflect your entirety.
Nathan doesn't read, Brendan Jones and Richard Stone.
This episode, where Spielberg was recorded on the 5th of July.
The next episode will be released on August 9th.
Did you know that you can now derive power from downloading our
doctorary commentary on bondfinger.com?
Are you going to hold it this time or?
Okay, darling.
So, yeah, hold it, hold it about here. aware that I keep brushing
it or is that not happening?
I just leave it off.
I couldn't I couldn't hear it.
Oh, okay.
I have nothing to say about this.
I have lots.
It's good.