Hello, dear listeners, and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety
the only Doctor Who podcast who knows the secret of...
Basically, it's just what happens if you don't eat enough fresh
fruit and roughage.
I'm Brendan.
I'm Nathan.
I'm Todd.
Welcome to our domain.
And it's about to get a great deal scarier in here as we enter a
state of decay.
Boom, boom.
Now, I'm gonna get in and make the obvious joke before you do
Nathan.
This is just where it all goes horribly wrong and the title's a
metaphor, isn't it?
For the whole rest of the series.
Well, the title is actually a metaphor, isn't it?
Because the state of decay, like state media condition, but it is
obviously a state of decay, a political system that's decayed.
And it's decaying in the same way that we saw in Ailes Areas last
week.
Where 3 people, 3 oligarchs, the 3 who rule, who are explicitly
called lords, and there's a king and a queen, so they're royalty
they're the aristocracy, and they're literally and metaphorically
subsisting on the lifeblood of the peasants and preventing them
from progressing, and like the deciders, they control
information.
And so reading is forbidden, and science is forbidden, and the
result of it is a society that stagnated, or even, as Romana says
is evolving backwards.
So we get the same evolution metaphor used for the development of
society. sort of wasting away, really?
They really are.
And the doctor's fabulously, you know, anarchic about it.
He refuses to be cowed by kings and queens, doesn't he?
He mocks their pretensions to protecting the people, you know, the
way that they protect them against all that rich fare, which would
just disagree with them.
And the most Doctor Who line in history where one of them, either
the king or queen says what is, is.
And the doctor says, no, what is, is wrong, you know?
So it's another one where he'll overthrow the society, which is
always a fun one.
And of course, we've got Terence Dix back on writing duties.
Ostensibly.
Yeah, this has got Holmesian sort of touches to it, don't you
think?
Yeah, well, you know, I think because Terrence has had a bit of a
break from Dr...
And you know, he's been writing the novelisation.
So he's been reading lots of other Doctor Who stories, written by
other people, including Robert Holmes, who famously would only
novelize one of his own stories. being the 2 doctors.
The 2 doctors.
Um, Yeah, I think Terrence is sort of distilling his Doctor Who
experience of writing all these novelisations into a doctor who
story that has lots of other elements within it.
But the other big influences on the script, of course, are
Christopher Hamilton did made and the director Peter Moffat.
So this story has a long and tortured history.
Terrence Dix had written the vampire mutational vampire
mutations.
There are different permutations of the title, to open season 15.
And he did that kind of as a favour to Robert Holmes, because
Robert Holmes said, look, you left us with some scripts when you
left the program.
Could you write the 1st script for the new producer, I'll still be
here.
So it'll be an easy one for them because you, you're a good writer
I'm a good script editor.
We can get this done.
And Graham McDonald cancelled it because the BBC had their own
terrible production of Dracula in pre-production.
And so when Bidmeat arrived and there weren't many scripts about
and this was eventually filmed second, they dug up the vampire
mutations, if you'll pardon the pub, and reworked it, they
approached Peter Moffat to direct his 1st time directing Doctor
but he worked much like Terence Dudley with John Nathan Turner on
All Creatures, great and small.
John Nathan Turner approached Peter Moffat saying, hey, got this
great script for you.
It's this Gothic vampire story, but they're actually these
astronauts in a spaceship and et cetera, et cetera.
And Moffat said, that's great, you know, mix the Gothic with the
technological.
That sounds really interesting.
I haven't done a Doctor Who before.
Okay.
Meanwhile, of course, Christopher Hamilton bid me want none of
this Gothic stuff.
And so made it very technological in the script.
Well, you had the vampire mutations.
You had stated decay version one written by or rewritten by
Terence Dix, to include the doctor and Romana and this new young
character, this artful dodger type called Adrick.
Um, with the Gothic touch and what have you, and you had Bidmead's
rewrite, Which made it all a lot more technological.
So, you know, didn't change the story that much.
Terence Dix wasn't too impressed by that, that he's like, well, I
know how it works with script editors, so, you know, the whole
Robin Bland situation, at least it's still my words.
Peter Moffatt came in and said, well, this is boring.
You know, you don't have any contrast in this.
I want to do the Gothic story, and Barry, let's back to him, and
Terence Dix back to him, and to his credit, bid me kind of went
well, you know what?
The writer wants it, the director wants it, the executive producer
wants it.
John Nathan Turner is happy just so long as a story gets made.
Do what you like.
And so we end up with this Gothic contrast, which is wonderful.
It's really interesting.
That is all discussed in the documentary, which I never knew.
And of course, Terrence actually says we have Peter Moffatt to
thank for this version of the script.
As you just said, he saw the original one and then he got this
other thing with eggs and all sorts of pod type things and said, no
forget it.
So he made it a bit less kind of mystical.
Yeah, it was all much more down his scientific road and my foot
didn't want anything to do with it and said, you promised me
this.
I'm so grateful that Peter Moffat stood up and said, this is what
this is what we're going to have because, well, this is my
favourite story up to this point in the season.
Right?
So, Piudos to him.
And I just have to say that I think Tom Baker in his costume in
this story looks fantastic.
He's in a giant red environment in the palace thing, which just
looks amazing.
The costume looks wonderful.
This is where I actually really love the costume.
I think Lala's outfit is terrific, isn't it?
Terrific.
And then later on, when she gets changed, sacrificing, into the
sacrificial frock.
She looks terrific.
It's interesting with Terence and Christopher talking in the
documentary.
It's one of these things where I don't think they possibly are the
best of friends, a bit like David Fisher.
I mean, it's obvious that Terence struggled a bit with putting
Adrik in.
The doctor and Romana don't encounter him until episode three.
He's also had to put canine in.
Canan doesn't really come into the thing until episode three.
They're very much sidelined in terms of that sort of thing.
But we've got the 3 who rule.
Yes, Camilla, Zargo, and Orcom.
I love them.
I think they're fantastic.
Like, they're very still, and they form these tableaus.
You know, they're always sort of arranged.
Like everyone else is playing very naturally stickily despite
their horrific press on BBC beards.
It sounds so obvious.
I need falls.
I never saw that before and then, this time through, I'm looking
at going, oh, my goodness, are you kidding?
Chicago has the most hilarious beard.
I've ever seen on television.
This is good.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
This looks great.
They look like kind of like playing harder off the, as if they're
off the Bayeux tapestry or something.
And I think that they look great.
And I think that they look really quite terrifying, even before
they start donning the fangs or crumbling to dust.
They actually look like vampires, you know, even though really all
they've got is that silly eye makeup.
They're terrific.
They don't even try to hide it.
Like Camilla and Zargo.
They don't even they don't even bother.
Like, you mean, they've been doing this for 100s of years with, you
know, the peasant population isn't getting any bigger, all their
movements, and it's, and they're so, it's an arch.
I don't know what it is, but just the way it's all choreographed
and that sort of thing.
I just adore that.
I mean, it's completely ridiculous, but it's like, oh, we're not
even going to bother to try.
I think once or twice they look a bit silly.
Do you know what I mean?
That's the thing.
They do look a bit silly sometimes, but the actors, the actors.
Rachel Davies and William Lindsay.
They never break character.
No.
To them, they're not silly.
This is just how they move.
If you find this silly, that's fine.
I'm going bite you.
For me, this story as a kid was so much scarier because the off
air copy we had, we would go through periods during the year where
our ABC reception wouldn't be great.
So the picture is a little bit snowy.
So it's slightly indistinct, and then you have all these cold
exteriors, which, you know, kind of look like a horror movie.
It looks like Friday the 13th or Texas Chainsaw Massacre or
something.
It doesn't quite obscure what's going on, but it makes it that
little bit softer and that little bit harder to see and that
little bit darker.
So when the story was cleaned up for DVD release, I actually found
it a little less scary than I did as a kid, just because of that
picture interference.
It's something so unique, you know, no one else would have seen
the show like that.
But, again, I think they're kind of trying to put something into
interest children again because any child knows what a vampire is
you know, and they have all the trappings of vampires.
You know, the word vampire isn't used until quite a bit into the
story to describe the villains.
But you're sitting there as a kid at the screen.
Look at the screen going, that's vampire.
Tom famously had the scene where the vampire bat bites him on the
neck, which, you know, for bats attached to bits of string doesn't
actually look that bad.
No, it doesn't. occasionally.
Occasionally a little bat will kind of fly ineptly into the
frame.
I never saw that as a kid, like, you know, because you had you had
to stop footage and then you have that the great sound effect.
Yeah, the sound effect's awesome.
And the fact that it's so darkly sort of linked through that.
But then this time through when there's that little swingy bat in
front of the background, like...
Yeah, I was thinking, okay.
But Tom famously read the script and it says, you know, it bites
the doctor and we see a spot of blood.
And Tom sort of said, oh, well, you know what?
We've got lords up in the castle.
We've never seen a time will bleed before, so he's forgetting
about deadly assassin.
He says, what if I had blue blood?
As a sort of metaphor?
So it was meant to be, he gets bitten, he presses his hand to his
neck, looks at it, and we get this close-up of his hand with blue
ink on it.
And John Nathan Turner saw that in the edit and he said, no, get
rid of that.
Yeah, that's crazy.
You know, which I think for the demystification, we get throughout
the 80s, I think that's an admirable bit of restraint because, you
know, it would suddenly be Doctor Who fans going, well, Time Lords
have blue blood.
Yeah, like Spock with green blood is just stupid.
Yeah, I think John Nathan Turdle was kind of thinking, no, this
means every time the doctor bleeds, he has to have blue blood.
And it wouldn't read his blood. you know, like you you can't go
what's happening?
Yeah, yeah.
Is he made of ink?
Yeah.
Orcon.
Emirus James?
He's just so good.
Just the way he delivers thing.
Just the way he delivers lines and his presence, like the other 2
are, as I said, are very arch and very mannered, but he's a little
so it's very interesting, like they're the king and the queen, but
he's...
I think that they're much more creatures of appetite than he is.
He's smarter than them.
So he really is their leader.
And he just lets them play it being king and queen, or that's what
keeps them happy.
But they're the ones who lose self-control enough to kind of, you
know, examine the blood on Romana's finger and all of that sort of
thing.
That's a wonderful, wonderful scene.
It really is.
Tom struggled with that scene.
But yeah, he says that, so you have, um, you have Tom and Lauer
and you have, um, William and Rachel playing Sargo and Camilla.
And it's the scene where they're having the banquet where we were
talking about...
Yeah, we were adopted. political thing.
Yeah, Tom was just having trouble focussing on his marks.
And of course, at this point, he was quite ill, as we discussed
last week, his hair on curled and has to be put in curlers.
So if you look, especially in the tartar scenes, his hair is
incredibly buffon.
Yeah, he's having a touch of the purtu. having a...
So he just couldn't get his head around.
The movements for this.
And Peter Moffatt said to him, okay, Tom, we're going to treat it
like a quadrille, which is a kind of dance.
And Tom, being a classically trained actor, knew about dancing and
ballroom dancing and what have you.
And yeah, if you watch the scene, there's a rhythm to how they're
moving and that's how they got through the scene.
I want to say something about Peter Moffat, which is a lot of
people criticise his directorial style.
And I've been one of them in the past as well.
But when I was rewatching Doctor Who All the Way Through, what I
realised is his first few goes.
So he does state of decay, he does the visitation, he does Modern
Undead, he does, um, 5 doctors, the twin dilemma, and the 2
doctors.
Personally, I think it's actually during one of those stories that
he gives up and retires from directing.
Oh, when?
And I'll discuss that when we get to it.
But I think here, he's really good in this.
He gets a good guess cast.
We've got Clinton Grain as Ivo... thinking?
We've got Arthur Hewlett as Kalmar, who, of course, who will ever
be for me, Mr. Kimber.
Does he do a Blake 7?
Yes, yes, he does.
I can't remember which it is.
He also does an Avengers.
He's in the season 2 Avengers episode, the sellout, which also
features Frank Gatliff.
Otherwise known as Ortron from The Monster of Paladin.
Who's the guard in the castle?
Is that Habrus?
Cabrus in, rat, train, or a train.
It's quite good, I think.
I think Hebrews is very good.
I think he's, yeah.
And he's got a normal beard.
And Stuart fell.
Stuart fell. plays Roger.
Isn't he a stuntman?
Yeah, so I think he's one of the one of the guards who, one of the
people who gets attacked when they're running around the castle
later on in the story.
I do love that scene with Hebrus towards the end where he comes to
his lords, you know, what shall we do?
What shall we do?
Die.
That is the purpose of guards.
And you come back to his face and that's the moment he realises
that actually these people are evil.
That gives you the double realisation of he's believed in what
he's been doing all this time.
You know, he's not a villain.
He's always been like he helps Ivo out, doesn't he?
Yeah, yeah. gets him extra food and stuff.
They have a fair whack at establishing a sense of community and a
sense of culture, which didn't necessarily happen in Megloss, and
we were quite critical of that.
You know, just by having a few characters and they meet Adrik.
And I think Terrence Dix is very clever in the way he integrates
Adric.
He keeps them away from the doctor in Romana because, you know
with scripts being written with such a short turnaround, he
wouldn't necessarily have known how.
Adric would relate to the doctor in Romana in the previous story
and in the subsequent story.
So he tries not to introduce massive elements that will disrupt
what's around him, which is a very professional trait. and it's
something we've come to expect from Terrence. very good on
character.
What do you think that Adrix, you know, it's only apparent, isn't
it?
His apparent desire to join the vampires.
Yeah, I think it is a trait.
Terence is very wise to introduce, which gets misused by later
writers. that he's just an idiot who always sidles up to the
feeling and wants to be their friend.
That's right, and I don't think that's what he's doing in this at
all.
And I think it's really good that he's, you know, he doesn't meet
the doctor in Romana until later in the story.
I think Matthew, with the other guest cast, is actually holding
his own.
Matthew with Ivo and his wife are pretty good.
Yeah, she's very natural and trying to get the cheese and that.
He's always after food, Patrick.
We don't we don't get to see him meet the 3 who rule.
Like he's revealed unconscious, is that right?
Or...
Well, remember, he's in the lineup?
Or what?
So he meets he meets all...
You know, and it's such a, it's a funny thing when as you watch it
because, of course, Orcon knows everybody in the village.
There is only the village, you know?
Yeah, but he doesn't care about them because he's do you know what
I mean?
Like he wouldn't be bothered knowing anyone's name or anything
because he's a lord.
Like they all know each other, but to the Lords, I'm sure they're
just a sort of vast, undifferentiated mass of cattle.
How many people do you think are in this village?
Yeah, they have 2 selections in 2 consecutive days.
So decreasing numbers.
I know.
It's like if we're doing this, I mean, how can this village just
sustain itself, you know, there are, there is nowhere else, which
when they talk about, oh, you know, they're strangers.
But how do they know what a stranger is if everybody in the
village knows everybody in the village and there is nobody else?
So there's a few little things like that that I always kind of
again, it's my little thing of, yeah, does it really sit more with
me?
You've also got the model shots into the village and end of the
tower and there's model shots.
You know, the big mistake and they did it last week is having
those little foamy architect tiny trees.
Oh thank you.
That's what it is.
They had them around the starliner as well.
They just look awful.
That shot just doesn't work, you know?
This one shot of the tower at night, which I think works quite
well.
Yeah, yeah, the night shot at the tower is nice.
Something I found out about model work recently, which I think
could have been used to great effect on Doctor Who. when you have
spaceships taking off and whatnot, is something that Jerry
Anderson used to do in Super Marination series, which is if you
have a vehicle taking off like a plane would normally take off
going along a runway, what you have is you have a stationary
camera, you have a treadmill made up to look like the runway.
And behind that, you have a treadmill turned on its side with the
skycloth on it.
So you move the ground at one rate, you move the sky slower, and
then you just have the model in place and lift the model off and
move it out of shot.
And yeah, it gives you a parallax effect, similar to scene sync, as
we discussed. a few weeks ago.
The funny thing is the model itself of the ship. looks great.
But yeah, it's just not shot terribly well.
And I think another problem is the village just looks too small
next to it.
Like, I know they're trying to dwarf it, but that means you also
lose detail and they just look like monopoly houses.
Yeah, yeah.
No, it's not a good model.
And the when later on when the ship takes off.
Wow.
It's really, terribly bad.
It's a firework, isn't it?
Yeah.
Okay.
I don't see space green, by the way.
Do we know?
No, I don't think they ever explain.
It's just different.
Do they intend it to be green?
Yes.
Yeah, that is deliberate.
So I thought that was part of the picture distortion when I was a
kid.
Because this is the only one I had on video as a child.
And when night falls on this planet, it's a slightly greenish.
Yes.
That's because the sky's green in e-space.
I'm gonna thought about it.
I think deeply about these things.
The cliffhangers are interesting.
The 1st cliffhanger is really not a cliffhanger at all. just a
whole heap of flying bats, you know, the servants are going out.
It's atmospheric.
I kind of like that.
But it's a fake out.
Yeah, it's not exactly peril.
The 2nd one is I am Orcon. welcome to my domain.
I think it's great.
Yeah, I do too.
You know, with the music and that heartbeat and all that sort of
stuff.
And the 3rd one, of course, is with Romana and Adric under attack
from Zargo.
You know, I think it's great that throws the knife to stop him and
shows that he's not just under their influence.
So I think the character here, they use the character well in that
he's in there, but he's really not buying it, whereas Quip said
later on, like in Water Doomsday in particular, he falls under
monarch spell, but it's so stupid.
I mean, in a sense, it is hard to tell where his allegiances lie
for the audience.
It's not played very well and he does need to explain at the end
you know, no, I was just going along with them and Romana says, yes
I know, you know.
Like it's not that well done.
I do think that's effective. in this occasion, but I agree later
on in Florida Doomsday.
That 2nd cliffhanger, welcome to buying domain, that wasn't the
cliffhanger in the script.
Really?
Episode 2 was underrunning.
Episode 3 was overrunning.
The original Cliffhanger for episode 2 is the doctor opening up
the tanks and saying it's blood.
Yeah, you can tell in blood.
That's...
You're right.
Yeah.
The sequence running time, whatever.
Welcome to my domain.
That works as an excellent cliffhanger because they've been
snooping around.
They've been completely unobstructed.
And suddenly the guy we know is the most scary of the 3 villains
has found them.
But, you know, I like all those sets.
I like the throne room.
I like the catacombs.
I like when he's going up the turret, you know, and the way in
which the new technology and the sort of the Gothic has come into
it.
It just all adds to the atmosphere of this.
The red of the throne room and the corridors in the in the tower
is just terrific and, you know, it's blood again.
Do you like Kelmar's little hidey hole?
His little technicothica.
Which reminds me of something.
A TARNIS does a short hop from the forest into his Heidi hole just
because the doctor can do it.
It's one of these things that in the 1980s, I think. becomes a
standard thing.
A trope that I think is...
Well, the tardis is becoming more of a thing.
You know, like the Tartar was always initially just a plot device
to get us to the story.
And, you know, like in the early years, they'd have to kind of
separate the dog from the Tartar, so he'd leave immediately, you
know, and not have an adventure.
And then eventually the doctor decided that having adventures with
his thing and so they didn't need to do that anymore.
And, you know, eventually he'll be able to pilot the TARDIS more
or less accurately.
So, here, we're getting to the stage where the TARDIS is actually
I think he goes back to it.
You know, they were carrying it around the Marshman last week.
We're going to use it as a battering ram.
You know, it actually becomes more of a character.
Hmm.
It reminds me of the scene in the TARDIS where he's having to find
out about the history of the great vampires and such.
And we're now introducing another backstory to Gallifrey, and the
fact that this giant vampire has escaped into e-space.
I don't think it necessarily, in this instance, has a major impact
on the casual viewer that it's something from the doctor's past
but it's the 1st in that list of, you know, something from
before.
And then Tom gets that ticket tape, like the old cash register
role, and he just goes, it's so unconvincing in that one sequence
when he pulls it out.
Are you objecting to it being something from the time wards past?
No, not necessarily, but I think it's something they're going to
fall back in the trap of, you know, the time Lord's getting known
and other things.
I don't I don't, you know.
I mean, The show's had to introduce those things like Omega in the
10th season and things like that.
I don't have a problem with it.
You know, it is there, but it is another thing that's very 1980s
to me.
Yeah.
It ups the stakes, I guess.
Boom, boom.
That was totally deliberate.
But that's the thing.
It's kind of word perilly.
Like, it doesn't really add anything.
It's the only thing that's available, though, because you've got 2
timelines in the cast. you know what I mean?
Like, it can't be a, you know, the Earth people thought the great
vampires in a great spacewalk, because no one's from Earth, and so
no one would care.
No, I think it works in that respect and having him in e-space as
well. like to get away from the time lords, where else you, you
think to shoot them all over space and time.
Yeah, so this really does work very well to have it have it here
in this story.
There's a wonderful conversation between Lala and Tom.
Is it the hermit?
Up the mountains of South Galafray.
Might be in the cell, very difficult.
Yes.
I like the bit when they're in the throne room and the doctor
tells Romana, but she's wonderful.
Oh, yes.
Sorry.
That's the one I'm thinking of.
She just does that big giant smile.
And of course, Romana, I found the inspection hatch because she
just found it. yeah.
That scene in the settleboat. that also the scene where Tarik
played by...
A BBC press on beard stuck onto the following actor.
Is Tara the one that keeps rescuing them?
Yeah, Fame Betney hits Tom Baker in the face with the door.
That's not deliberate, is it?
It's not deliberate.
It is an accident, and Tom takes a few seconds to recover.
And because obviously what's meant to happen is he's meant to
burst in the door and Lala's just meant to stroll out casually.
And I think Tom is meant to be behind the door, but he's also
meant to come out because the same bet he sort of looks to his
left to react.
Tom's not there.
So he looks behind the door and Tom bursts out. they walk out and
Tom sort of rubbing his nose.
I'm like, oh.
Wow.
I feel bad about laughing at that last night actually now.
Well, you know, it's funny.
And that's the thing.
Tom would have thought, oh, you know, this will look like a joke.
Let's keep it in as a joke rather than me saying you've hit me. you
hit me in the face with a door, you Burke. with a stupid beard.
What do you think of the giant vampires claw?
Do you know, it's better than the puppet?
The puppet is really bad.
Like you see the puppet for just a second.
Like that little shot of the puppet under the tower over Kalma
screen thing.
Like it's terrible, but it's over quite quickly.
So it's sort of all right.
Yeah, whereas it should remind you of a Zaal, you know, they've
decided to keep it cheap by not hiring another actor, but it's
like, really, I would have liked you to hire another actor.
Don't forget how terrible Azar looked, though.
Yeah, but he looks better than that puppet.
Yeah, and then the whole... hand, the giant hand. spike coming
down into that.
Yeah, that is a bit crummy, isn't it?
It's a great concept.
Yeah.
But what's not crummy is their deaths because of that.
It's terrifying, isn't it?
It's really protracted.
Yeah, as they age.
Yeah, yeah.
I think...
Fantastic.
The king looks like a skull head.
He just looks completely different.
It's really something.
There's a sort of slow pan.
Is't there across all 3 of them or something or a 3 shot where you
get to see them all and they all just look really great.
It's tremendous.
And shortly after that, when the villagers turn up, there's a very
interesting moment, which I think again is unscripted.
Clinton Grain as Ivo walks up to the doctor and puts his hand on
the doctor's shoulder.
The doctor slaps it.
Like he raises his other hand and just whacks him one.
And from Clinton Green's reaction, I don't think that was the
doctor.
I think that was Tom saying, don't touch me for whatever reason
because Clinton Green just looks really shocked at his hand and
almost misses his next lie.
Isn't he going to thank the doctor for Kano?
Because doesn't he have some?
Yeah, because I'm confident that you're going to apologise.
Yeah, the doctor says I think you should thank canine, but I don't
think the doctor's slapping his hand because he was rude about
canine earlier.
It doesn't come across that way.
It comes across as Tom having a difficult day I'm like, don't
touch me.
Kino's very good in this.
He does attack very well.
And there's that rousing speech from Henry V that the doctor makes
up, which I thought was pretty excellent.
Tom and Lala are having bad days on set here.
Yeah, I think this is around the time where they were kind of
getting back together-ish kind of thing.
And the way Peter Moffatt describes it is, you know, we'd have one
day on location, where they won't look at each other, even on
camera, and that's where they're standing around outside the
diners.
And if you watch, they do not look at each other during their
dialogue.
You can't tell from the way they're saying their words that they
hate each other at the moment, but yeah, they won't look at each
other.
You can see Tom doing that with Louise all the time.
But Peter Moffatt says, as soon as we got into the studio, it was
sweetness and light.
It's not a liberty for me to say what happened between them two.
But yeah, it looks like between the location shoot and the studio
session.
They'd gotten back together.
And Tom had to have his hair permed.
Yeah, looked terrible.
Well, this story was broadcast late in 1980.
Viewing figures aren't great still.
Like 5.800000 for the 1st episode and all the others are less, one
which is only at 4.4.
I give this show another year. tops.
So up to the end of this story.
Only one episode of this season is inside the top 100.
And about another 2 inside the top, 110, it really is.
That bad.
People watch the hell out of season four, who go figure.
No, actually quite like season four.
And the weird thing is, you know, I wouldn't say that the
quality's dropped off.
I wouldn't say that the acting, I think the acting's actually
improved across the board, to be honest. on average.
No, I think the quality's higher than I'm always conflicted
because season 17 is so great, but I think season 18 looks just
vastly better.
You know, for a long time, I think people thought you had to like
one or the other.
I'm allowed to like both.
You're allowed to like both.
But that's gonna make my life so much less complicated.
This is a safe place.
And also, this was the last show broadcast in 1980, because they
took a season break before going onto Warrior's Gate.
Oh really?
Yeah, yeah.
So, um, state of decay was broadcast in.
November, December.
Yep, November, December, and Warriors Gate came back in the
January of 1981.
I didn't realise, so they were like trapped in e-space over
Christmas.
Yeah, must have been miserable.
And, you know, that was pretty standard. it had happened before.
Yeah, and I think it last happened in season 15 or 16.
They decided not to delay Horns of Nime on it.
They broadcast that over Christmas, possibly because they didn't
have another story to go on to after that.
But yeah, that kind of season break wouldn't happen again. until
2011.
Series 6?
In fact.
Are you sure?
Yes, I am.
Well, unless unless you count, um, um, Russell T's season's
usually breaking for Eurovision, spending one week off the
Eurovision.
Oh, season 7 broke.
Oh, season 6 did it first.
And then season 7 did it again over a longer period.
Over a longer period.
Gosh, we're hard done by, aren't we?
And we don't get a whole season this year.
It's very, very cruel deprivation.
I can't believe they treat us like this.
The whole thing about the 3 who rules name going from their real
names into Orcon Zago and Camilla.
I'm never convinced by that.
Like when they start doing it.
I understand the concept, but I, as Romana does it, I just kind of
go, there's a bit of a jump.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, the vowels change and stuff as well.
And in fact, O'Connor's consonants don't soften at all.
They're identical.
He just drops the last syllable.
And Camilla again.
She just drops the 1st syllable on the last letter.
It's not actually an example of Grim's law in effect in any way at
all.
So, like Grimm's law explains why, you know, the Latin word pata
meaning father becomes our English word father, you know, like
eventually the P turns into an F. But there's no example of that
at all.
No, yeah, it's still recognisable, but that would happen.
Like if you if you look at Chaucer or any sort of middle English
literature like that.
And, you know, life is written LYF.
So it's still the same, still the same kind of sound, but it was
more pronounced like lif, you know.
So that's the great vowel shift.
Yeah, that's that's, I mean, it's not a consonant thing.
So he kind of pulls it out of, you know, yeah, and it is almost
certainly bid me trying to teach us a valuable lesson about
historical linguistics or something.
Yeah, you can sometimes tell the bits that bit means grafted onto
a script, usually because the plot comes to a hold.
It's interesting that you move back to Big Mead because by going
back to a much earlier version of his script, I think his
influence is far less.
It's really just the CVE stuff, that which we're just talking
about.
And the stuff with perhaps the scanner and Kalmar, that sort of
thing might be his stuff.
Like, you know, far less of an influence on this story than the
rest of the season.
Yeah, we've had scientists in every single story so far, if you
include Kalmar, and that's not what Doctor Who normally does.
It's interesting that it is continuing to build on the power of
the individual.
You, of course, have the doctor and Romana in each of these
stories coming in and making a difference, but you have
individuals, you have a harden and you have charis in Megloss sort
of fighting to make a difference.
You have the deciders literally making the 1st decision that makes
a difference in their culture for 40,000 generations or 40,000
years, I think it is.
I actually didn't mention it, but I love how you don't see it.
Like the 2 remaining deciders are staring at each other.
And for one horrible moment, I actually found myself thinking, oh
they're not really going to decide.
They're just going to keep going.
They're like repairing things.
In this story, the peasants just need someone to lead them or
someone to say, yes, you're doing the right thing.
Go, go, go.
But also this season, what you've had is warnings about what
happens when you allow stagnation.
And we've talked about stagnation previously.
So the argolans have stagnated because they can't reproduce.
And Meglos has stagnated because, you know, he can't get out into
the universe, but also because he wants to rule the universe.
That's why he stagnates that he's unimaginative.
I also think, you know, Tigella stagnates because of
obstructionism.
Because of Edward Undertown.
No, because of obstructionist religious people.
Oh, with fabulous hair.
With fabulous hair.
We didn't mention her wig.
No, we did.
A giant gray braid.
Buffon platty.
It's interesting how different season 18 is, but how it's carrying
on the same themes, which I imagine were prevalent in society at
the time.
It's inherent in the premise of an action adventure show, really.
Do you know what I mean?
Like the doctor has to arrive, something has to be wrong and it
needs to be fixed and very frequently, you know, in Doctor Who.
It's been something's been wrong with the society, the way the
society's constituted.
You know, there are too many dress wearing pacifists who don't
like the Vietnam War in this society or, you know, the taxes are
too high or something like that and the doctor comes and sort of
fixes it.
Oh, some mad computer has stolen your golden race bank things and
just protecting them under a sword and a CSO.
What happened in that one?
don't know.
What's that one?
I don't recall.
My favourite so far of this season and I bet it's not your
favourite by the end of the season.
That is correct.
I don't think you're allowed to say each one's my favourite so
far.
But I think you're planning to. aren't you?
No, I'm not.
I think there was a season where you did that.
Is it?
This is my absolute favourite.
But I absolutely adore...
I absolutely dore Tom's outfit from here on in.
And it's this older doctor whose time is fast approach in the end
even though I don't necessarily realise it as a viewer at this and
it really ultimately adds to the feeling of this season, a passing
of time.
And, uh, a moving board of the show.
If I was a vampire, I'd scrunch my fingers up, like Camilla.
I think she's fabulous.
I think she's the best vampire ever. on television.
It's not the way Orcon has to sort of keep them under control
because they're ready to pounce and he's got to just pacify them
back.
God damn it, kids.
Well, our necks are feeling a little dry as we depart the Planet
of the Vampire Lords.
Please come back next week when we take on one of my favourite
stories, Warrior's Gate.
You can find us online at FlightthroughEntirety.com, flight
through entirety on Facebook and iTunes and FTE podcast on
Twitter.
Similarly, there are no vampires in our James Bond commentaries
over on Bondfinger.com, Bondfinger on Facebook and iTunes and
Bondfinger cast on Twitter.
Until next time, if any of you know what the wasting actually is
please write in and tell us, but until then, thank you very much
for listening and good night.
Good night.
See you soon.
Backwards, flight through entirety with Todd Bielby, Nathan
Bottomley, and Brendan Jones.
This episode, why is E Space Green, was recorded on February the
20th, 2016?
The next episode will be released on May 1st.
I don't know if you've ever given this much thought, but...
You're wonderful.
I, um, I do recommend if you've got, like, two hours to spare and
want something mindless, lesbian vampire killers.
Matthew Horn and James Corden and Paul McGann.
Yeah, I think you've mentioned it before.
Yeah, it's the film where I suddenly realised that since 1996, Paul
Magann's just been playing the same character in every movie.
So I, how do we construe lesbian vampire killers?
Is it people who kill lesbian vampires?
or is it lesbians who kill vampires?
No, it's it's straight people killing lesbian vampires.
I like the other way around, much better, I think.
Yeah.
I guess the presence of James Corden, who's unlikely to be cast as
a lesbian probably, is the big giveaway.
You're going to listen to the big new big finish audio?
State of decay too?
Electric boogaloo.