"Just drop him on the nearest airless planet..."
Tachyon TV rubs its hands with glee as it prepares to wave goodbye to Adric. Topics up for discussion this week include: John's tragic and homicidal childhood, TARDIS bickering, Matthew Waterhouse's CV, and tiny dinosaurs.
Note: the theme toon from 'Gangsters' was inserted on the advice of our lawyers. Oh, and it was raining outside (but it's still less noisy than a BSG podcast).
Earthshock - Episode 5
Couldn't let Earthshock pass without a quick mention of the most amusing episode 5. If you ask me, Matthew Waterhouse in plasticine form is even more lifelike than the real thing. Should Madame Tussauds ever feel the need to stoop as low as have a facsimile of Waterhouse then I doubt even his own mum could tell them apart.
And a quick shout out (Christ! I sound like a prospective leader of the Tory party) to Darren, at System Enterprises, the company responsible for this little vignette. I never did take you up on the opportunity of popping over to see all the Who ephemera that clutters the offices in Durham...
Earthshock Part Four:
I'm going to cut right to the chase - I love Adric's death. I bloody love it! But then again, I'm only human.
But why, oh why, oh why are they traveling backwards in time? Eh? Anyone? Considering that Eric Saward thought that wiping out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago was a pretty neat idea (the Great Fire of London again, just on a bigger scale), why didn't he bother to come up with a decent way of getting us there? Adric's throwaway explanation that anything is possible if you hook your BBC Micro up to an Atari is just laughable.
Waterhouse leaves the series with a emblematic scene that sums up everything that is wrong about his performance. For example, how does he know that the keyboard is going to blow up seconds before it does? Look at him - he's trying to key in the numbers on the other side of the room! Then there's the pout, the camera mugging and the nasal whine. 100% concentrated Adric.
But what is truly great about this moment is the realisation that Adric has to die if we, as a species, are going to survive. In fact, if he did succeed in breaking the Cybermen's logic codes then the human race would have been completely screwed.
And there's also a lesson to be learnt: if he hadn't been such a git in episode one then he might have realised that the freighter was destined to smack into the dinosaurs and none of this would have happened (I mean, they were only wondering about that an hour ago; seriously, what are the chances?).
You could make a case that Adric nobly sacrifices himself for the greater good but it isn't altruism that gets him killed - it's arrogance, petulance, stupidity and fate. The poor bastard never stood a chance.
It's just a shame that I can't appreciate the harrowing scene where the Doctor realises that he's dropped a bollock, because I'm far too busy noticing that Sarah Sutton is trying not to laugh...
The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about Earthshock Part Four: The regular cast were laughing so hard during Adric's death scene it took five whole days to shoot it. The resulting overtime came out of 'Time-Flight's' FX budget.
Earthshock - Episode 4
This is piracy! Long John Cyberman and his scurvy first mate have taken over the freighter and turned it into a flying bomb. Remember, turn down the sound and play this when the Cybermen are on the march. Hey presto! Instant none shitness.
The same, however, cannot be said of the dialogue. Frumpy and Mousey are still holed up in the TARDIS and are exchanging pearls like:
Frumpy: "What was that?
Mousey: "I don't know. A robot?"
Frumpy: "They're huge"
Andrew Pixley, whilst digging through Sarah Sutton's bins to gather as much evidence for an Earthshock Archive, discovered that it took 35 retakes to get the required level of disinterest into that short scene.
Tegan's still playing hide'n'seek with some Cyberchumps but eventually gets caught and the Cyberman now indicates that she's it and should count to 100 before coming to get him.
And what happened to the TARDIS' state of temporal grace? Or whatever the hell it was meant to be. Thought that was supposed to prevent weapons from going off in the TARDIS? But at least Frumpy gets it so it's not all a waste of time. Russell T., in the latest DWM Special, proposes that continuity started in the bright lights and garish colours of 70's Who - before then, anything went, anything was possible and didn't need to all add up. Better that then getting so anal about things like a state of temporal grace...
The soppy incidental music every time Adric takes centre stage merely emphasizes the sheer dopiness and uselessness of this tosser. Even mathematicians would be repulsed by this sad excuse for an idiot savant. Thank god we're inches of videotape away from his more than timely demise.
We're still focusing a little too much on the Cyberarse, reminds me of the furore there was when we got to see the Bat-butt in the George Cloony version. Turning attention to the Cybermen who have escorted the Doctor and Tegan back to the TARDIS, one of them seems to be having a de-misting problem inside the helmet, with his chin plate misting up. I've only recently noticed their "eyebrows" and the money-box slot on the top of their heads. By comparison with the 2006 versions these look really shoddy.
And Matthew Waterhouse. Such bad acting at the end as he knows there's going to be an explosion but is too scared to actually tap the keyboard with any force. You can tell he's gingerly pressing the keys because he knows what's coming. It's not as if, if he sustained serious injury, he wouldn't be able to work for a while. It's been 23 years and counting and he's not worked since...
Then we come to one of the most po-faced and ridiculous bits of Doctor Who's entire canon - silent credits as the annoying little turd plummets towards the Earth to die in the wreckage of the freighter. And a nation celebrates. Every time I watch this I feel the need to have a copy of an instrumental version of Little Spanish Flea on stand by to play over the end credits.
Go on. Do it. I guarantee that it'll add the requisite gravitas to the closing moments. And will also make you fancy a tequila.
The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about part 4 of Earthshock: Early plans to show Adric's burning and broken corpse mashed into freighter debris during the end credits were dropped from the production. So you'll just have to go on trying to imagine that wonderful sight.
Adric and Minnie Caldwell: not exactly a combination you’d normally mention in the same breath, but a significant pairing nonetheless. ‘Who’s Minnie Caldwell?’ I hear some of you ask (or if you’re feeling particularly cruel, ‘Who’s Adric?’). Well, back in the 60s Minnie Caldwell was one of the regular members of the Rovers Return’s matriarchy; led infamously by one Ena Sharples (think Davros in a hairnet with a northern accent). And when Minnie Caldwell’s character was killed off - dying quietly over her light ale in the pub one night - they decided to play that edition’s end credits to total silence. Starting to get my drift?
But enough about that for now. There’s plenty to cover in ‘Earthshock’ part four before we get to the bit where Adric bites the bullet. And to be fair it’s not an episode (like one or two of its stable-mates) that has you watching the clock more than you do the screen. Basically the Cybermen have now decided to turn Beryl Reid’s freighter into a giant bomb; with the ultimate aim of wiping out a conference of planetary dignitaries who would otherwise kick some serious Cyber-arse (pre-emptive strikes…flying bombs; this was screened before September 2001, wasn’t it?). Meanwhile, the TARDIS tag-team of Scott, Tegan and a few other faceless extras have gone on the offence, with Tegan inevitably getting split up and captured by Cybermen (who curiously almost seem to know her connection to the Doctor despite no reason for doing so, otherwise why not just kill her?). And being a Saward script, Professor Kyle (left to mull things over with Nyssa without even her overalls to comfort her) is soon being killed off needlessly in the absence of anything better to do (although her death does at least provoke a flicker of life behind Sarah Sutton’s otherwise glazed expression; only a flicker, mind).
Elsewhere Dame Beryl is still blathering on about ‘warp drive’ as though it’s somewhere she lived as a young repertory actress. But fear not, Tegan - all mouth on legs still intact - is soon being thrust into the mind-games between the Doctor and the Cyber-Leader; with the latter - rather hypocritically - castigating the former for his emotional weakness (big words from a machine who says Excellent! as though he’s simultaneously creaming his pants). Seriously though, Davison and Banks do play these moral tennis scenes very well, with Davison in particular shining (and being granted one of my all-time favourite Who lines about ‘small, beautiful events being what life is all about’…shame Peter himself apparently didn’t like the line very much, as he delivers it perfectly).
Then we’re off to the TARDIS so that the Cyber-Leader and his minions can observe their moment of triumph in comfort (with cream teas and recliners no doubt the order of the day), leaving Adric to fend for himself with the (surprisingly high for a Saward story) gang of freighter survivors. I suppose you’re meant to be touched by that leaving scene between him and the Doctor and Tegan (especially as a sting of ‘Adric’s theme’ from ‘Full Circle’ cuts in part-way through). But by now Waterhouse has become so irritating that it’s all you can do not to shout DIE, BASTARD, DIE! at the TV set (which can be embarrassing when in polite company…)
And for a story not exactly averse to a touch of overdone foreshadowing, the piece-de-resistance has to be the Cyber-Lieutenant’s careless handling of that console’s lever; snapping back like a dodgy handbrake and reviving some of the dormant Cybermen who (for some reason) remained dormant even after the ‘My army awakes’ line of part three (and besides, having revived some 15,000 Cybermen, why is the Leader’s next move to abandon ship and leave 99% of these poor buggers behind? Not exactly efficient use of an invasion force, is it?). Anyway, I wonder if we’ll see one of these recently awakened drones sometime later?
From here on in we’re into the Doctor Who equivalent of the ‘Battle of the Somme’; as extras, Cybermen and even regulars fall left, right and centre. The Cybermen suddenly being killed by their own guns doesn’t exactly do much for their credibility (especially after the mincing emotions of the previous three episodes) and when even the sacred temple of the TARDIS console room rings to the sound of laser fire (so much for Temporal Grace, huh?) then you just know that some serious blood is about to be spilled. But not before the Fifth Doctor gets involved in some uncharacteristically brutal action, scrubbing Adric’s gold-tipped badge into the Cyber-Leader’s chest unit and blowing him away with his own gun into the bargain (and they say Colin Baker’s Doctor was psychotically violent…). It really can’t be underestimated the impact this sight had on fandom at the time; and Davison himself is really excellent again this episode, combining his Doctor’s sense of quiet resignation and righteous anger to a pitch-perfect degree. As later in ‘Caves’, here is a Doctor who for all his perceived, emasculated demeanour is not averse to desperate measure when the time calls.
But perhaps it’s the suddenness with which ‘Earthshock’ ends that still gives it its impact all these years later. With Cybermen falling like Autumn leaves and the Doctor desperately attempting to board the stricken freighter, the screen just flares to white and Adric is gone. Hurray, we all cheered at the time; but I remember being genuinely moved by his exit. He may have died as he lived - an obnoxious know-all brat who never knew when to quit - but Adric and Matthew Waterhouse were certainly given an exit that few fans have forgotten since. Just as Peter Davison said would happen at the time…
So, not exactly the ‘classic’ that we probably all once remembered, but ‘Earthshock’ is still blessed with an excellent first episode, two of the most memorable cliff-hangers in the show’s history and a Doctor who gave the words ‘reckless innocence’ a whole new definition. Better - and worse - would follow, but for me this is still an era-defining story. It’s just a shame this wasn’t the season’s last story and that - as with ‘Twin Dilemma’ - JNT managed to make a sow’s ear out of a silk purse with the following week’s ‘Time Flight’. As they say, the more things change…
(‘The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts’ has this to say about ‘Earthshock’ 4: the silent credits were in fact implemented to block out the studio sound of Peter Davison laughing like a tit while reading the script to ‘Time Flight’)
Before I start reviewing, I have to get this out - with the Cyber Leader, we finally know what happened to Mr Burns. Excellent. It's been a while since I did a proper review, so here's hoping I can still do it!
That first episode, huh? If not for the DVD cover, I wouldn't have guessed it was the Cybermen. Makes you wish we could do surprises like that in modern times, doesn't it? But it's an excellent (feel free to strum your fingers every time I say that) first episode, full of drama and suspense. And an infodump that, shockingly, becomes horribly relevent later on. It's all good. But can it last? Well, yes. For the most part.
See, I've heard the Cybermen before. I like how they eventually sound - the electic death is perfect for making you quake in you (moon)boots. But what the hell was this? Remove all menace from the buggers, don't you? Christ. And a few other things. Playing with plastic bags is dangerous, surely? Why are they vulnerable to their own weapons? Why do they have to explain every little detail? But all those points aside, the Cybermen are as deadly as ever.
And yes, the suspense is carried across as the Doctor and Adric defuse a bomb, journey to its origin and are framed for murder (again). Much death and destruction (and a nice impression of Han-Solo-In-Carbonite) later and we've got a pretty good story. But there's one more trick up the production team's sleeve... I'm not afraid to admit that I was choked up when it happened. It was pretty damn moving. It's moments like this that really do make great television. It's what makes Doctor Who so excellent. (Fingers strumming) God only hopes the new series can have moments like this.
Off topic: check out the Outpost Gallifrey 2005 poll. Not so much for the best episode, but the worst... glad to see others agreeing with me for once. And hell with it. All three charity specials on Sunday as mini-reviews. Yeeha.
…as my tinny-voiced Product Enterprises Cyberman would no doubt agree (provided his batteries hadn’t run down). And pretty much underlines why the Cybermen aren’t really a significant threat in this story: giving them feelings has made them just like any other alien race intent on destroying the Earth.
Things do improve this episode; although there’s still much tortuous waffle to wade through first, with the action - such as it is - divided in equal thirds between the TARDIS (where Sarah Sutton appears to have lapsed into a coma judging by her performance), the freighter bridge and the Cyber-headquarters (which appears to be based slap bang in the middle of the hold…begging the question why has no-one found them up to now).
With the Doctor and Adric - surprise, surprise - fingered as the murderers, Briggs at last seems to be bothered about where her missing crew members have got to (although Beryl Reid is still clearly oblivious to the meaning behind any of her lines). The Fifth Doctor’s already in default mode for this incarnation: breathlessly extolling his innocence while no-one takes a blind bit of notice (a mode which reaches something of a catharsis in ‘Caves’ with the line ‘I am telling the truth…I keep telling the truth. Why does no-one believe me?’ To be fair, it’s a wonder he didn’t lose it long before crashing Stotz’s ship onto Androzani Minor).
Meanwhile the Cyber-Leader - keen to ensure the Doctor ‘suffers’ for their past defeats (very emotionless, that) - has his own guard activated in readiness for the next phase of their plan to destroy Earth/disrupt a peace conference/kill The Doctor (take your pick, this is an Eric Saward script after all…). Leading to a scene which surely caused the BBC one or two headaches in the health & safety department, as a waking Cyberman claws a polythene bag off his head as though he’s just come off the production line (you can hear Mary Whitehouse gyrating underground as I speak).
Back in the TARDIS, the whole situation has apparently got too much for Tegan, who suggests a spot of clothes-swapping with Professor Kyle just to ease the boredom. Then she’s off with Lieutenant Scott and some (no doubt doomed) extras to show Ridley Scott how post-Alien, gung-ho females have at last penetrated Doctor Who’s sexist veneer (and as a result, fails miserably). At which point it must be asked just what were those chatty-looking Cybermen discussing while Tegan and co. waited for their chance to strike? The cost of chrome polish? Which one of them’s got the cutest Cyber-arse (of which Grimwade shows plenty of candidates this episode)? Or, perhaps, the merits of their 2005 redesign (in which case, no wonder their gesticulations are so animated). It’s a great (and rare) peek into a Doctor Who monster’s private moments, and something we really should have had more of (personally I always wondered how Davros went to the loo myself…).
Back on the bridge, sneery-old Ringway is at last revealed to be the latest in a long line of Tobias Vaughan-style Cyber-collaborators (after seemingly an eternity of standing around holding a gun on everyone). Which only gives the Doctor an excuse to go off on one about how he and the Cybermen go waaaaay back, with obligatory mentions of gold, Telosian tombs and that pleasant weekend they shared in Cleethorpes one balmy summer. Which leads on to one of the original series’ more impressive special effects, as the Doctor uses some garbled techno-babble (not to mention deft timing) to partially encase a Cyberman in a door (though the result is, inevitably, somewhat less impressive when viewed now).
But if nothing else, the Cybermen are sticklers for the maxim if at first you don’t succeed; as with a strategically-placed Cyber-explosive they are soon marching mincingly onto the bridge for some ‘We meet again, Doctor’ pleasantries. And Ringway ends up the way of all Cyber-partners, in a hale of post-production laser fire and bad acting. ‘You don’t change…’, says the Doctor who clearly hasn’t taken notice of the amount of time the Cyber-race spend watching What Not To Wear (with Trin-EE and Zu-Zana as hosts, no doubt). And as the Cyber-Leader reaches something of a crescendo of smugness (which for him is no small feat) his ‘army’ starts crashing their way out of giant bog rolls to march synchronically towards camera (on which point, Grimwade is much more successful in establishing six extras as fifteen thousand through tight editing, rather than through the mirrored split-screen that ends the episode).
So the army is awake and the Doctor and co are up against it - tune in tomorrow to found out who makes it out alive (and more importantly who doesn’t…)
(‘The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts’ has this to say about Earthshock 3: due to newly enforced equal opportunity regulations, much of this episode’s second-unit work was directed by midgets; resulting in much of the scenes involving Cybermen being filmed at no higher than crotch level)
Earthshock Part Three:
I've just remembered yet another reason why I hate this version of the Cybermen so much - visible panty lines.
Now, where were we? Ah, yes, Beryl Reid, the 80's equivalent of William Hartnell. When her first line - "What's the diday?" - spills out of her mouth you just know it's going to be a bumpy ride...
Tegan finally changes out of her stewardess uniform into... a pair of crumpled overalls. It's feminism gone mad, I tell you! She joins the snowmobilers in their desperate quest to involve themselves in the plot, while some faceless members of the freighter crew throw themselves selflessly to their deaths without so much as a "Nooooo!" (or else Equity might have to pay them). It's hardly surprising that they all get butchered because their tactics amount to nothing more than stacking boxes, which might not be quite as silly as it sounds. OK, so it doesn't stop the Cybermen from shooting you in the head, but it doesn't half make it tricky for the top-heavy goons to navigate.
Just when you think the sight of Matthew Waterhouse reacting to some fake heat is the worst thing you've ever seen on television this side of Artemis 81, Beryl steps in with an even worse attempt (maybe he coached her on her performance?). Panto? Yes. Mime? No.
There is, however, a great special effect in this episode when the Cyberman gets stuck (literally) in the door. It almost makes the ten minutes of technobabble that sets it up worthwhile. However, given that the Cybermen simply blow open an adjacent door ten seconds later, you have to wonder why they didn't do that in the first place...
The final mirror special effect, which valiantly tries to make it look like there's fausends (well, dozens) of Cybermen, is a nice attempt. It's just a shame that it cuts off the advancing Cyberman's arms at the end. The idiots.
The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about Earthshock Part Three: Matthew Waterhouse had to be screwed into his costume.
Earthshock - Episode 3
The Doctor and Adric are captured by the oh so butch Ringway. Stamping his little Cuban heels and wafting his weapon around in front of him. Meanwhile, in the TARDIS, mustachioed muscle bound military type is stuck with three of the oddest women in the galaxy: the frumpy one, the mouthy one and the mousey one. Where are the rest of the expedition they brought with them from the planet Earth? Are they all trashing Adric's room in an attempt to find all that stashed porn that he must have in there somewhere?
The cling-film wrapped Cybermen are a little strange. Why go to the bother of covering them in a protective film? Shrink wrapped for extra freshness? Make sure that they're not passed their sell by dates? Or their invade by dates? Given that these metallurgist's nightmares were at their peak in the 60's I'm sure they should be turning fair moldy by now.
Considering we're about 60 minutes into a 100 minute adventure, when the Doctor finds out that it's actually the Cybermen that he's up against, is quite good going.
Although even the sight of bristling nasal hair doesn't do much to ramp up the tension. Yesterday I talked about how unlike the usual structure this story is and, whilst it's still a cut above, it's not the thrill-a-minute ride I was expecting (or had remembered it as). There's not an awful lot happening, to be honest. Lots of skulking around a cargo hold and lots of Beryl Reid getting her surgical supports in a twist. Bless.
By far the worst thing about the Cybermen is the fact that they look as if they've been dressed completely by some bastard love child of Primark and Accessorize. Just get a load of those silver moon boots and the silver trinkets that adorns their body. I'm surprised they don't also sport silver sovereign rings, large hoop earrings and piercing in what's left of their organic matter (which in this case would be a stud through the chin and a neuron clamp on their cerebral cortex). No wonder the Doctor describes them as being far worse than robots. Robots are a man's best friend, doing all those jobs that men hate like defusing bombs, washing the dishes and sleeping with Vanessa Feltz.
And where does this "Cybermen are allergic to gold" nonsense come from? I'll tell you where from - their fear of commitment, that's where. Picture the scene, two Cybermen in a long standing loving and murderous relationship want to express their love for one another and buy each other a ring. But because the gold ones were too expensive they made up some cock and bull story about being allergic to gold and Bob's your cybernetically augmented uncle. If all you needed to do to defeat a Dalek was go up some stairs then all it would take to defeat a Cyberman would be to push them into a branch of Elizabeth Duke jewelers shop in any branch of Argos.
And those two! What are they doing? Having a conversation? All you needed was for a water cooler to be dropped into the scene and they could have been talking about last night's Sex in the City or which page of the Comet Christmas Catalogue made them go all cyber-horney. My money's on the stainless steel kitchen appliances. They're not called stainless for nothing you know!!! And whilst we're on, their catch-phrase. Excellent. What's that all about? What sort of focus group came up with that dumb line? Sheesh. We shouldn't be afraid of these losers, we should piss scorn and derision onto them from a vast height.
However, as the bridge comes under attack, I thought that the Cyberman getting stuck in the door was absolutely fantastic. It's a fairly simple effect and he looks just like Han Solo in that block of carbonite at the end of the Sunderland Empire Strikes Back or whatever it's called. A film so bad, it put me off cheese and tomato sandwiches for quite some time, I can tell you. I can also tell you that Mawdryn Undead put me off a sausage roll for much the same reason. I had a fairly traumatic up bringing, don't you know.
Back to what remains of the episode and we get lots and lots and lots of Cyber-butts jiggling across the screen.
Me thinks someone was directing out one of their deepest, darkest fantasies...
The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about part 3 of Earthshock: The Cybermen originally came from Earth's twin planet, Mondas, and not Croydon as previously thought.
Earthshock - Episode 2
It's just like an episode of Lost as a mysterious hatch is revealed beneath a rock fall. I'm expecting the pot-hollers to tune in a radio and get a mysterious message in French... read out by Gary Downie, and it's Adric's turn for a flashback sequence as we find out that he was actually bullied as a child on Alzarius.
Why can we see the chins of this iteration of the Cybermen? You can't tell me that these silver nonces have had all remnants of their humanity expunged apart from their brains and their chins? What about shaving? Do they still need to do that? Perhaps it's only there so that, in one of their more pedantic juvenile moments they can rub their chin and taunt the Doctor with "Chinny Reck-on"? I'd like to think so.
These androids, with the explosive palms (quite possible as a result of ensuring that they don't indulge in a little onernism) areapparently too valuable to waste. Perhaps the Cybermen are paying for them on the never-never. It's also deduced that, as they're logical automatons, you can create confusion in their logic circuits by attacking the hatch and bending their poor little logical brains round a spiral staircase. They're basically fighting a bunch of Texas Instrument calculators. Attacking what they're programmed to defend. Programmed to do that and display the number 5318008 which, when they swing upside down, displays the word BOOBIES.
Here's a typical extract from the dialogue of episode 2:
"Is the second android fitted with visual monitoring?"
"No, Leader. That was an additional 450,000 credits, so we went with the own-brand version which was considerable cheaper and meant that we could also afford this lovely console that was a reject I bought off CyberBay from someone claiming to be Lucas of George."
Cyber technology is too advanced for humans. That's a miracle, since most of it looks like it originated from a Dixons high street retailer, including the bomb which itself resembles a Dixon's own make Sashio Ghetto-blaster, circa 1980. You can just imaging the Cybermen marching into the store and being dealt with by the master of disinterest, a 16 year-old retail drone, who really isn't interested in anything other than Final Fantasy 17 and girls with angry chests. I'd imagine that they would have had problems flogging extended warranties on any items that the Cybermen purchased.
Arming procedure. Tension's mounting. Display readout incomprehensible. Acting terrible. Perhaps the Cyberworld's Staff Development Unit is going to come under some fire as a result of the poor performance from these two imbecilic tin heads? Performance development reviews all round and a very stinging probation report from Cybermanager as a result of his minions ridiculous performance.
I absolutely loved the clip montage when I first saw this. I know I shouldn't. And it's geeky. And just plain wrong. But I loved it. Back then I'm not completely sure I knew who the old buffer and the chap with the pudding basin hair-cut were but I thought it was wonderful. Mind you, for all this advanced Cyber technology that was knocking around you'd have thought that they would have invented VIDFire to improve the quality and fluid motion of the clips they played from their archive.
Shifting the action mid way through the second episode makes the whole story feel much bigger than it actually is, and probably guarantees that you don't get that usual third episode lull as people run around the same corridor set for 25 minutes. We're basically starting again, except this time we've got - typecast as per usual - Beryl Reid in her toughest and most uncompromising role to date... as a jaded freighter captain. I must go back and read a bit about what she thought she was doing but for her entire screen time for this episode she seems to be labouring under the impression that she's actually been lined up for a guest stint on Last of the Summer Wine and it's all one of Foggy's harebrained schemes.
Wasn't she heard to mutter "Warp Drive? Isn't that off Tottenham Court Road?" or some such insanity? Is it any wonder the poor love didn't know what she was doing...
The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about part 2 of Earthshock: Beryl Reid made life for the production team a living hell as they had to pander to her every whim. Amongst the outrageous requests she made were: freshly baked ham was to be made available to her, in her dressing room, at all times; she needed the private use of Terry Wogan between studio sessions and needed her entourage, which consisted of 14 blue rinsed old dears, to be plyed constantly with gin and orange.
Earthshock Part Two:
I hate the Cybermen. I've said it before and I'll say it again - they are rubbish. Unfortunately, the breed of Cybermen that manage to wind me up the most are this lot: the David Banks brigade.
"Excellent!"
I can't begin to explain to you how much this word infuriates the continuity cop inside me. The Cybermen are supposed to be emotionless brutes - even the script still thinks this is part of their character - so why are we subjected to more over-the-top emoting than your average episode of Neighbours? It wouldn't be so bad if the word "excellent" was spoken in an emotionless monotone laced with irony, but just about everything that comes out of David Banks' mouth is dripping in ham; from quizzical belligerence to angry and impatient fist clenching, he's not exactly Spock, is he? At one point he even manages to say the word "excellent" with eight syllables!
My favourite moment of pure emotion happens when he talks about Voga, the planet of gold. When he says the word "gold" he launches into a scary vibrato, as if a shiver just went down his spine and he's cacking himself just thinking about it. It's priceless.
Sadly, it isn't just the wide-face prats dressed in bacofoil who disappoint in this episode; just how bad are those ray beams? Even in 1982 they would have provoked laughter and disbelief. Who thought that making them candy-coated would be a good idea? They look like lethal sticks of Blackpool rock and I sense an abortive cash-in attempt. And who thought that turning a bomb into a ghetto-blaster would knock our socks off? Hmmm?
Ah, lovely, a bomb disposal scene. At least they didn't revert to pissing on it and banging it with a hammer, I suppose. Davison is pretty good here as he breathlessly battles against the thingummy with a whatsit, and you almost believe that it might do some damage. It doesn't half drag on though...
The Doctor and Adric eventually make-up during a tender and touching scene where you find yourself wishing you could tear MATTHEW WATERHOUSE'S HEAD OFF! When he smugly informs the Doctor that he doesn't really want to go home after all, I dredged my memories to see if there was a time when I actually liked Adric. Was it really possible that I might have greeted this news with a joyous punch in the air and a whoop of delight? No; even at the age of 12 I wanted to gouge his eyes out with a spoon. Thankfully, I can now enjoy this episode because I know that the smug look on his face won't stay there forever...
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
It's Beryl Reid! No wonder they wanted to keep this story quiet. Stunt casting gone mad. I mean, what were they thinking? A Nazi, leather-clad sitcom actress in charge of a spaceship? Margaret Thatcher in a fright wig? Bonnie Langford's grandma? Ellen Ripley with a bus pass?
The only saving grace is that she hasn't got a clue what's she's doing there, either.
The cliffhanger is yet another rehash of one of Doctor Who's hoariest cliches - the good old "we've just caught you near a body so you must have killed him" routine. That's twice in two episodes! Have they no shame?
The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about Earthshock Part Two: During the production David Banks' voice modulator would accidentally pick up the sound of Matthew Waterhouse crying in a corner.
Right, let’s get this out of the way shall we. And bearing in mind how I wasn’t too enamoured with the new look Cyberman which appeared on websites and newspapers last week, then it may seem I’ve got it in for the silver giants from Mondas. But I’ve got to say it; and so I shall.
Those Cyber-voices are shite, aren’t they?
Now I remember thinking the 80s Cybermen were the bee’s knees when I first saw them. After all, just as you usually make an attachment to the first Doctor you see, these were the first Cybermen of my viewing lifetime (and yes, while I was around when ‘Revenge’ was on, that story still falls into the BPM - Before Pyramids of Mars - period of my life (check out my ‘Meet the Authors’ entry if you’re at all interested/bothered).
So, as I say, these were my Cybermen. And even now I must say that their sleek helmets and glass jaws still stand up after all these years (in fact rather more than certain other Cyber-looks which may-or-may-not have appeared on the Internet recently…).
But those voices…
Now, again Cyber-voices have had something of a chequered past to them (all the way back to Peter Hawkins’ frankly ludicrous inflections in ‘The Tenth Planet’). But my issue with these particular voices all these years later is just how ridiculously earnest they sound. Here we have a race of former humans who, over centuries, have erased all emotion and physical fallibility from their make-up. So why do they now speak to each other as though the very idea of conquest and power is giving them a tight feeling around the Cyber-crotch? And why has the word ‘Excellent’ suddenly become the only way to express satisfaction? It’s said so many times during the course of this story alone that it would be 1988 and Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure before it would be used as much in any TV show or film again. And that’s not exactly, um, excellent is it?
But as always I’m getting ahead of myself here. Because this episode’s biggest problem is not the positively emotional new Cybermen, but the fact that this feels more like a part three than it does a part two. And considering the skilful build-up that part one had established, this second part has an almost obscene amount of padding; with first the seemingly endless bomb disposal, then the aimless wandering around the freighter pretty much stalling the pace and intrigue set up last time. I’m not sure who to blame the most; Saward’s script for taking its foot off the accelerator, or Grimwade whose direction suddenly seems pedestrian in comparison. Either way, this is a severe disappointment, especially so given that it occurs so early in the story.
And any talk of padding can’t ignore the scene where the Cybermen decide to get the old home videos out and give the viewer what then would have been an unprecedented look at Doctor Who’s past. I mean, ‘The Tenth Planet’ (wonder if they’ve got part four?), followed by ‘Tomb’ and ‘Revenge’ - you almost expect the Cyber-leader to start blogging at one point. Needless to say, this excessive pandering to the fans would prove to be an enormous hit, cropping up in various stories for the next few years. But in truth it adds absolutely nothing to the story, only amounting to a rather more picturesque way of info-dumping the Cybermen’s heritage onto a new audience.
Notice too how the Cyber-Leader recognises the TARDIS, as though all his predecessors’ encounters with the Doctor have been passed on like some cybernetic race memory. And what exactly is the Cybermen’s plot given the evidence seen so far? Presumably, but for the Doctor’s intervention, the bomb hidden behind that hatch would have suited their intentions quite nicely - so why all the palaver with the freighter and their human traitor later on. Just like the Daleks in ‘Resurrection’, it seems that the devil’s in the detail for our silver friends.
Speaking of the freighter, once onboard it’s quite clear that Eric Saward’s idea of characterisation is taking its cues from the gritty, post-Alien manual of archetypes (making Beryl Reid’s casting all the more bizarre, but then this is the 80s and putting bums-on-seats was always more important than cohesion any day of the week). As for Dame Beryl herself, not only does she get second-billing after Davison in the end credits, but she also gets one of the series’ most iconic leather jackets until 2005 (and that bouffant hairdo is something else too…). Which is all sadly undermined by the fact her character remains so unconcerned by the crew-member disappearances (I mean, where does she think they’ve gone?)
Elsewhere, the Doctor and Adric get to share a painfully pointed reconciliation scene (making it quite plain that one of these kids ain’t gonna make it past the end credits) and Waterhouse is generally quite awful in this episode (looking at one point as though he’s just told Davison - like Richard Todd before him - how exactly that camera thingy works). Fortunately, Peter himself is still on top form, literally holding what has swiftly become a mess together virtually by himself (and remains effortlessly Doctorish, be it defusing the Cybermen’s bomb or waltzing around the freighter as though he owns the place).
Add to that some clunky dialogue (‘You could hide an army down here…’ says one of the doomed freighter workers rather helpfully) and you’ve got an episode that scores a pretty spectacular own goal following the triumphs of part one. Living in Wales at the time of this episode’s broadcast, I’d have given my eye teeth not to have to wait two whole nights to see this. Now I’d be tempted to have a look at what was on the other side.
Hardly excellent, by any stretch of the imagination…
(‘The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts’ has this to say about ‘Earthshock 2’: Beryl Reid’s hair colour was specially flown-in from Laboratories Garnier in Paris just in time for her first studio day; later it was found to induce cancer in small rodents)
Of course, direct comparisons between Earthshock and the last three films in George Lucas' Star Wars epic are inevitable. Especially if you're a walking one man obsessive compulsive disorder with an impeccable sense of poor timing and ability to ask questions that would put even Jeremy Paxman to shame.
Earthshock - Episode 1
World of Quarry. You know how they said that they weren't sure that they could get away with the portrayal of an alien world on the new series (or whatever their pussy-faced excuse was). Well even a quarry must represent an alien world. Somewhere. Mustn't it? Rocks. Sparse vegetation. Knackered old Early Learning Centre "My First Radar Station" (very popular during the Christmas of 1981 [and even popular the week afterwards as the bin-men carted them away in the thousands]). Yes, it's Carry on Camping with, instead of superb crumpet being spirited away by the hippies next door we have paleontologists, geologists and other sorts of ologists being knocked off one by one by a flaring on the radar screen. A radar screen so sophisticated that it could only pick up mammalian life. Not that much of a leap of deductive reasoning then to imagine that it's actually a massive, rabid, haddock that was committing these heinous crimes. But do they leap to the obvious conclusion? Hell no.
As well as all manner of ologists the camping group seems to have some of the stiffest mustaches in Christendom. Only matched by the unbelievable stiffness of Matthew Waterhouse's acting. Moving through the emotional range of a filleted goat he goes effortlessly from 38.6 on the Nicky Campbell Pompositude Scale to insufferable little twat in less time than it takes Jeremy Clarkson, at speed, to get right on my tits.
The Doctor doesn't appear to be giving any thought to exactly what this dreary little mathematician might actually be doing in his bedroom as he body checks the door open. It's a good job the egotistical little testicle wasn't pleasuring himself over some top-heavy fractions otherwise that could have resulted in some very awkward silences for the rest of the show and prevented the Doctor from actually shouting. And shouting quite a bit.
And Adric's room. Please. Is this the bedroom of a teenage son or the pit of Stephen Hawking? Where are the usual teenage things? Where's the stash of porn hidden beneath the badly fitting floor boards? The depressing black decor? And the posters of the Alzarian version of Destiny's Child (posing with only strategically placed river fruit to hide their modesty).
But, back to the plot. Hang on... the disgraceful little turd's a lefty too. Never before have I been more ashamed to be left-handed. I even feel like hacking it off in disgust. Plot... concentrate... plot...
Things are getting right good down in the caves as people start disappearing left, right and centre. Turning into stick mess at the hands of faceless automatons. The Doctor embarks on a small history lesson for Tegan and Nyssa, talking about how the dinosaurs were the most successful species to inhabit the Earth. I, however, fail to see how a species with brains the size of Jordan's could have ever been that successful. I mean, any genus of life that failed to create even just one reality television programme can't be classed as big a success, can it? There's then a quick reach up to the bumper book of standard Doctor Who cliches as the new arrivals are accused of murder most messy but wait... What's this? The faceless ones are merely the tools of...
Bugger me!!?! The Cybermen. Never saw that one coming.
Jurassic Park.
The Bumper Book of Made-up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about part one of Earthshock: the DVD release includes the option to watch the story with state of the art special effects turned on which dub over every single one of Adric's lines with music from a Mariachi band.
Earthshock Part One:
It's almost impossible to believe now, but there was a time when the World Wide Web didn't exist. As such, it was possible to watch an episode of Doctor Who without having the foggiest idea as to what you were going to get; unless you read the Radio Times, the title was something like 'Revenge of the Cybermen', you were Ian Levine, or you could decipher anagrams of Anthony Ainley, in which case you probably had a pretty good idea.
Earthshock is one of the few examples of the Doctor Who production team intentionally attempting to pull the rug out from under our fanboy feet. And, bizarrely enough, this was all at the expense of some much-needed publicity for the show (ie a Radio Times cover); a fact made even more bizarre when you consider that the media-whore JNT was at the helm at the time. Keeping it out of fanzines wouldn't have bothered me in 1982 as I wouldn't have recognised a fanzine if I was eating chips out of it, but they managed this too when they took out an injunction against Andrew Pixley. Probably.
Part One of Earthshock is legendary for the simple reason that we just didn't see it coming. Anyone who saw it during the original transmission will undoubtedly remember that moment for the rest of their lives, and to this day I still measure "shock surprises" by the Earthshock benchmark (Serenity recently beat it. Just.)
But I'm getting ahead of myself. There's more to episode one than the last 30 seconds.
When we initially join the TARDIS crew we are treated to some multi-layered pathos as Adric whines about the fact that everyone considers him a "joke:' when he says "everyone" he is actually referring to the characters, the audience, and the cast. It's enough to make you feel sorry for him and when he bleats about returning to his own people you find yourself practically begging the 5th Doctor to put him - and us - out of our misery. If only we knew...
We're treated to some classic Davison-era bickering in this episode. Davison has never been more petulant and Adric has never been more irritating; it's like watching your family disintegrate in front of your eyes. I actually enjoy the banter when I watch it now, but I distinctly remember being disturbed and annoyed by it when I was 12 years old. If I wanted to listen to a blistering argument I would have switched off the telly and listened to my parents instead.
The crew arrive in some caves on the planet Earth in the year 2526. As luck would have it these caves are currently populated by a squadron of gung-ho, yet strangely panicked, soldiers who are reenacting scenes from Alien as they are systematically picked off by a couple of Lycra-clad androids who look uncannily like minimalistic Supremes singing 'Stop In the Name of Love'. It's pretty atmospheric stuff, helped enormously by an ominous, doom-laden score and some taut and claustrophobic direction.
The Doctor is suddenly distracted by some dinosaur fossils and we are treated to a rare nod towards the series original remit to be both entertaining and educational. It's a mini-science lesson from the Doctor as he patiently explains to Tegan what happened to her planet 65 million years ago, and I find it amusing that two aliens know a lot more about Tegan's homeworld than she does.
But the lecture doesn't last long as the dwindling remains of the shambolic military unit eventually dovetail with our heroes. Unsurprisingly, they immediately blame the Doctor for leaving a trail of jellyfied corpses in his wake, but before they can arrest him for being in the wrong place at the wrong time (again!) the androids turn up and divert suspicions by blowing people up.
And then we get that cliffhanger.
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
"Destroy them! Destroy them all!"
Just imagine what it would have been like to wait a whole week for the next episode! Thank God for soap opera scheduling!
The Bumper Book of Made-Up Doctor Who Facts has this to say about Earthshock part one: Peter Davison purposefully annoyed Matthew Waterhouse during this production by whistling the funeral march whenever they were waiting to film a scene.
Here’s a game for you: cast your minds back some nigh on five months to the day of ‘The Parting of the Ways’ transmission and imagine that you didn’t know Christopher Eccleston’s Ninth Doctor was about to make his last stand. In truth, it’s a scenario that very nearly came about; as seemingly only the careless, knee-jerk reaction of a BBC spokesman torpedoed what would have been one of the great television coups of all time.
Now think back another twenty-three years to the night of ‘Earthshock’ part one’s inaugural transmission: same programme, same carefully handled surprise; but this time no one to spoil the party. You could of course blame this modern failing on the constant, saturation coverage of the media that is the reality of this Internet age we now live in. And yet what prevented Eccleston’s departure being as big (no, make that bigger…much, much bigger) an event for the Who faithful still came down to one, solitary error. Had that BBC spokesman not already spilled the beans, whether we would have made it to the 18th June still none the wiser is of course a moot point. But it would have been lovely to have tried, wouldn’t it?
Which all underlines how it’s rather difficult to review ‘Earthshock’ without mentioning that cliff-hanger (or should that be those cliff-hangers; but more of that on Thursday…). Say what you like about the many triumphs (and tragedies) of the JNT era, but back in March 1982 I imagine that several million households sat in stunned silence as the Cybermen were revealed to be the puppet-masters behind those oh-so-creepy androids who’d spent the previous twenty-five minutes bumping off palaeontologists, geologists and soldiers by the bucket-load. Even now that final reveal still reminds me of the jaw-dropping effect it had on fandom at the time, maintaining its place as one of Who’s all-time ‘where were you’ moments.
And watching ‘Earthshock’ all these years later reminds me how even the greatest Doctor Who stories combine the very best and the very worst of the show in microcosm. Such as the clichéd quarry setting yielding a very effective studio set (with Dick Mills dripping-tap sound effects helping sell the idea that we are miles underground), or the risible dialogue (with Scott’s ‘I realise going down again must be (pause) hard’ in particular) completely undermining Peter Grimwade’s fluid and stylish direction; instilling ‘Earthshock’ throughout its four episodes with a strong sense of impending death (making Grimwade, in my opinion, second only to Graeme Harper in the list of best 80s Who directors). And rather off-beam here, but notice how he uses the same trick with the androids as he did with the Watcher in ‘Logopolis’ (keeping them in the shadows and having them pass behind other characters across the screen).
But as so often in Who, it’s the work of a director with vision and command of his medium that lifts a script from the ordinary into the rather special. Being only his second bona-fide story for the show, ‘Earthshock’ nevertheless has all the hallmarks of Eric Saward’s subsequent work, both as writer and script-editor: a mixture of civilians and the military in an already fraught environment, some rather gratuitous culling of a largely faceless guest-cast and a Doctor pretty much kept on the back-foot. What is refreshing here is that the show seems for once to be remembering its original remit to entertain and inform, with the Doctor, Tegan and Nyssa’s discussion of the Dinosaurs’ ultimate fate not only neatly foreshadowing the story’s resolution, but reminding longer-term fans that their first (and arguably most important) history lessons often came as a result of the good Doctor’s travels.
Of course there are weak elements. Considering it’s the year 2526, Scott and his soldiers look more like a bunch of paint-ballers on a team-bonding exercise than a crack, military unit. While already the JNT era’s use of arbitrary continuity (with the TARDIS scene between the Doctor and Adric alluding to both ’Black Orchid’ and ‘Kinda’ rather pointlessly) is in full force for largely anal reasons And dare we even mention the words Matthew and Waterhouse in the same breath (though in his defence it’s sometimes hard to tell when Adric’s being written as irritating, and when it’s just the aforementioned one’s natural, arrogant self coming through…). The other regulars apart (particularly Davison, who’s already effortlessly his own Doctor after just five stories, and Fielding, whose Tegan is by far a better match for the Fifth Doctor than the drab Nyssa) the rest of the cast all display that typical level of am-dram so redolent of the original show (though Scott-as-Brigadier-clone - who, like the later Chellack from ‘Caves’, even has a Courtney-esque manly ‘tache - is a neat touch)
But this is still an episode that reminds you of how - at its best - Doctor Who can thrill, scare, entertain and literally leave you breathless with just one moment. Had the new series’ return of the Cybermen next spring been kept such a secret, then perhaps those halcyon, pre-Internet days of ignorance would have enjoyed one last hurrah…
('The Bumper Book of Doctor Who Facts' has this to say about 'Earthshock' Part One: viewers in BBC Wales - denied the chance to view the episode's cliff-hanger resolution until WEDNESDAY night - took to their roofs in order to alter their aerial's reception. Often with tragic, Rod Hull-style consequences...)
