Classic Who Reviews: The 7th Doctor

Having recently finished marathoning through Classic Who on iPlayer, I’ve decided to do a series of posts giving short reviews on each story, starting with the 7th Doctor.

Sylvester McCoy as the 7th Doctor

Season 24

Time and the Rani

A story deserving of its reputation. Time and the Rani epitomises every issue that crops up in eighties Who at one point or another. A dull story with lots of corridor running and a constantly screaming companion; there’s absolutely nothing redeeming about this story.

Rating: 3/10

Paradise Towers

Written by Stephen Wyatt, Paradise Towers was, until recently, one of my most hated serials in all of Classic Who. Much like a fine wine, however, it took until my latest viewing to finally appreciate all this story has to offer.

Packaged in a neat punk dystopia aesthetic, the story sees The Doctor and Mel come face to face with a cavalcade of interesting cliques and characters. Vicious residents, rule-stickler Caretakers, and the different coloured Kangs all add to the distorted view of a tower block under the rule of anarchy. Clive Merrison’s performance as the Deputy Chief Caretaker, in particular, is a highlight of the story.

Sure, not everything about the story is perfect. The grungy sets and The Great Architects’ design can take you out of it at times, but they don’t detract too much from the overall fun ride.

Rating: 7/10

Delta and the Bannermen

From a step in the right direction to two steps back. Delta and the Bannermen is yet another story that helps earn season 24 its less-than-stellar reputation.

Doctor Who does Hi-di-Hi in this three-parter. Unfortunately, the premise does very little for me, and the stereotyped Welsh people always seem to rub me up the wrong way.

Rating: 5/10

Dragonfire

The series finale and my personal favourite of season 24, Dragonfire, acts as both the end and beginning of an era.

An underrated classic, the serial takes a darker tone than the rest of the stories in season 24. Iceworld’s titular leader, Kane, greatly contributes to this shift in tone. He easily gets under the main cast’s skin as he knows exactly what to say to get people to sign up for his deadly deals. Moreover, the story does a great job of balancing Mel’s exit alongside Ace’s introduction. 

Rating: 7.5/10

Average season rating: 5.63/10

Season 25

Season 25 Serial – The Happiness Patrol

Remembrance of the Daleks

Remembrance of the Daleks kicks off the new era with a bang. Aaronovich’s script makes for the perfect Dalek Civil War trilogy finale with a renewed 7th Doctor who leads them around by the eye stalk.

What sells this story for me is the effort made into the world-building of the ‘60s era. It doesn’t shy away from the societal strife of the time. Moreover, the story has some great side characters with the Counter-Measures team, making for great historical stand-ins for UNIT. It’s just a shame that Davros’ role in the story is reduced to nothing more than a screaming head.

Rating: 9/10

The Happiness Patrol

A planet where sadness is illegal and those found guilty face the wrath of a killer robotic liquorice allsorts man. The Happiness Patrol is another 7th Doctor serial that I find underrated. It’s got the same punk dystopia aesthetic that Paradise Towers had, only this time, they’ve improved the formula.

The Kandy Man lands on the right side of playful, and Terra Alpha’s secret police force are suitably menacing. The only weak parts of the story come from the bland set design and the lull in the action that happens around episode 2.

Rating: 7.5/10

Silver Nemesis

The last truly terrible story in the classic era, the Sliver Nemesis, ends the Cybermen saga on a rather sour note.

In theory, this story has all the makings of an epic adventure. There’s a cyber-invasion involved, Timelord weapons, 17th-century villains, and the resurgence of the Reich; the story had everything necessary for an action-packed romp. Unfortunately, the end product is an uninteresting runaround that barely puts the main leads under any threat. 

Unlike Time and the Rani, however, this story does have some redeeming aspects. Lady Peinforte has a few good moments. Her liberal views on death and her comedic conversation with the American heiress at least provide something different to the monotonous running around this serial does. 

Rating: 5/10

The Greatest Show in the Galaxy

Rounding off McCoy’s second season at the helm, The Greatest Show in the Galaxy is a strong entry that I’ve come to appreciate over time.

It always surprises me that it took 25 years of the classic series before someone came up with the idea of a story that features creepy clowns. It was well worth the wait, though, as Stephen Wyatt’s take on an alien circus is suitably psychedelic and provides an excellent introduction to the Elder Gods.

Rating: 8/10

Average Season Rating: 7.38/10

Season 26

Season 26 Serial – Survival

Battlefield

As someone who doesn’t usually like unserious and light-hearted stories, Battlefield is an exception.

There’s just something about this story that pushes all the right buttons for me. A tasteful use of fan service and an Arthurian treasure hunt played out with magic and guns, all pulled together by fantastic guest performances from Jean Marsh and Angela Bruce. They give their all to their performances, and it’s a shame we never get to see their characters again on screen.

Rating: 8/10

Ghost Light

In the second serial of Season 26, Ghost Light takes a trip down Ace’s tumultuous past.

This is a great story as a character study of Ace. It shows what makes her tick and how her impulsivity can cause problems. Unfortunately, Ace’s character arc is muddied by a slightly confusing story and a Victorian aesthetic that I personally feel is overplayed in media. 

Rating: 7/10

The Curse of Fenric

Usually battling it out for the best-rated story of the 7th Doctor era alongside Remembrance, for me, this story always wins.

A Brilliant setting and flawed yet ultimately human characters set this story apart from all the others in this era. It exemplifies all the wonderful changes made after the disastrous season 24 and why it still saddens me that Classic Who was cancelled just as it was getting good again.

Rating: 10/10

Survival

Whilst it may not be perfect, Survival is my absolute favourite story of the 7th Doctor era. Given that this story holds so many memories for me, and is one of the reasons why I continue to love Classic Who to this very day, it’s hard to think of this serial objectively.

Everything in this story clicks with me. I love how it poses questions for Ace in a way that isn’t facilitated by The Doctor. I love the world-building involved with the Planet of the Cheetah People, the eco-system of the Cheetah People and the Kitlings and how they influence the planet’s longevity. And I love Dominic Glynn’s scoring for the story. The electric guitar motif perfectly underscores the cast’s fight for survival.

Rating: 10/10

Average Season Rating: 8.75/10

If you like what you read and what I do, why not consider supporting me through Ko-Fi. Any donation helps keep this site up and keep me writing.

Doctor Who: Daughter of the Gods Audio Review

Synopsis:

When Zoe reattaches an old piece of equipment to the TARDIS console, she, Jamie and the Doctor are very lucky to avoid a collision.

But the place they find themselves in may be even more dangerous – because there they encounter another Doctor, a space pilot named Steven… and a young woman called Katarina who really shouldn’t be there…. (Source: Big Finish)

My first ever Big Finish Doctor Who review and I thought it fitting that I should start with a story from one of my favourite ranges, the early adventures.

Daughter of the Gods is the second story of the sixth set of releases from the Early Adventures range and acts as a prequel story to the tv story The Daleks’ Master Plan. In this prequel, both the First and Second Doctor end up stuck on the planet Urbinia just as the planet is about to be invaded by Daleks. If the populous don’t surrender, then the Daleks will use their most terrifying invention to date, the Time Destructor, to turn both its people and the planet to dust.

The first two parts of the story detail the events in the immediate aftermath of both TARDIS’ colliding with one another. Part one is particularly strong putting the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe right in the middle of a panicked population attempting to flee to the spaceport. With both the main characters and the listeners unsure of what’s to come, the story reveals that this isn’t the only doctor on the planet as his early incarnations companions, Steven and Katerina are helping get people onto the spacecraft.

These questions are then resolved in the second part, as we get a retelling of events from the First Doctor and crew’s perspective. Their collision allowed them to arrive on the planet three months before the invasion, where they have now settled living amongst the population. At their present point, this TARDIS team has a lot of tension between them, especially between The Doctor and Steven as the two are constantly bickering and the Doctor’s overall lack of sensitivity towards Steven’s role on the planet and Katerina’s can come off as a little uncomfortable.

The second part also starts with the big role that Katerina plays within the story, her nightmares and guilt over surviving Troy, both of which play a large role in the solution at the end of the story. Ajjaz Awad does a great job in the role of Katerina here and whilst I can’t truly attest to how close she acts to the original, since I’ve only seen parts of The Daleks’ Master Plan, she does sell feeling like a character from ancient Greece who has ended up travelling in time and space very well.

Whilst the first half of the story is great, it is the second half where the story and characters truly shine. Now that all the characters have joined up, Barnes does a great job of managing both TARDIS teams by separating them into the most appropriate pairs. Both of the Doctors are together, Zoe and Steven end up together figuring out ways of taking out the Daleks, and Jamie and Katerina pair up and as historical characters have a lot to share and understand about one another. With both Doctors working together, they figure out what went wrong with the collision and where the First Doctor should be, on Kembel stopping the Daleks before they create the Time Destructor.

In order to stop the Daleks, it requires the Second Doctor to leave, going back to the site of the crash and fixing it. This, however, causes a problem. By going back, time will go back on course but so will Katerina’s inevitable death creating a theme of conflict the First Doctor rarely has to deal with. Barnes chooses to focus on an often overlooked aspect of Hartnell’s doctor in, whilst he looks old, in timelord terms he’s relatively immature. It’s this immature side that comes through towards the end of the story knowing that if he goes through with the plan he’ll end up losing a dear friend in Katerina and you can hear his struggle with this thought and just how human he feels within these moments. A highlight even amongst some of the greats Big Finish has put out over the years.

Daughter of the Gods is an excellent story that has a genuinely good reason for being a multi-doctor story and utilises each character in an interesting way allowing for good moments of character development. If I was to truly nitpick any issue and I really would be nitpicking, it would probably be a lack of scenes showing the impact of the Dalek invasion on other cities on world and the weird starting dynamic between Steven and the Doctor, however, this does little to diminish the overall gravity of the story.

My Rating: 9/10