Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to Paul Arthur about his choice of Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1/6)
Transcript
- 0:33Hamster with a blunt pen knife for doing quicker.
- 0:37Hello and welcome to a Hamster with a Blunt Pen Knife, the
- 0:41Doctor Who Commentary Podcast. My name is Paul Arthur and I am
- 0:45sat here with the Master of Ceremonies, Mr. Joe Ford.
- 0:50Hi, Joe. Hello.
- 0:51Do you imagine that Tyrannosaurus rexes are so cross
- 0:55because they've only got little hands and they can't reach their
- 0:58appendages? I think you'd have to be,
- 1:01wouldn't you? What happens if you've got an
- 1:03itchy arse? I mean, how do you scratch that?
- 1:06I mean, Paul, they're not wearing clothes either so I
- 1:08can't see any appendages, so I can only assume they're all
- 1:10ladies in this. Well, OK, we back to that again,
- 1:14aren't we? Oh of.
- 1:16Course. This is a theme for us the last
- 1:19time, you know, trashics before and whether they are women or
- 1:22not. And and now we've got female
- 1:24dinosaurs. Who knows?
- 1:25Who knows? Watch out, I go back into my
- 1:28David Attenborough voice as we do Dinosaur Watch today.
- 1:32Is this why you suggested this story so?
- 1:35I promise, I promise. I sort of was.
- 1:38I was thinking earlier today though, because everybody,
- 1:42literally everybody turned out to be a traitor in this story at
- 1:46one point or another. I'm not sure if you and I aren't
- 1:48traitors in this story if I'm honest.
- 1:51Like. Yeah, yeah, there is somebody on
- 1:53the inside of the ham fam and we need to find out what's going
- 1:55on. I was phrase Gregory for.
- 1:58Sure. Burn him like a witch.
- 2:00I was thinking of pulling, pulling out my sort of Darrow,
- 2:03you know? Have you betrayed me?
- 2:06From the end of. Every time a new traitor has
- 2:09appeared, or what's the thing He says in Time Lash.
- 2:12He does say that, doesn't he? And you are the traitor.
- 2:17Yeah, there we go. There.
- 2:19I mean masterfully. Like, like Darrow was here
- 2:21himself. Amazing.
- 2:23So if you had Paul Darrow suddenly turn up, you know why.
- 2:26All right. And there's plenty of traitors
- 2:28in this story, isn't there? So that's what makes Invasion of
- 2:31the Dinosaurs so fun, is that the reveals every episode seems
- 2:35to have somebody new kind of on the side of the baddies.
- 2:39Some people less surprising, some people very surprising.
- 2:44When you say that when I first watched it, this took me totally
- 2:47by surprise. I mean, I think I first watched
- 2:52it in the in the 90s when I joined fandom and I slowly study
- 2:57kind of watching through stuff. I probably watched on the UK
- 2:59Guild repeat when they started those first first run through of
- 3:02those. I think it's probably where I
- 3:04watched it. And up to that point, I, I knew
- 3:08what he was about, but I hadn't necessarily read all of the, the
- 3:11target books. I don't think I'd read the
- 3:12target book for this one. I didn't know the story very
- 3:15well. I knew the headlines.
- 3:16I knew that the dinosaurs are rubbish and I knew kind of
- 3:20roughly what the story was about, but I didn't know quite
- 3:23how many revelations you get through it.
- 3:26And it was one of those stories where it's a genuine surprise.
- 3:30And I don't I think it can I can count on well, I can count on
- 3:34one hand with three fingers leftover the number of number of
- 3:37stories that surprised me during that period of watching all of
- 3:41the all of the stories I'd only read about little bits of, you
- 3:44know, synopsis of. This is one of those stories.
- 3:47This is one of them. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 3:49What's the? Others.
- 3:51The only other one was Planet of Evil, and it's yeah, and it
- 3:57sounds really bizarre. It's only one little bit and
- 3:59it's just the the cliffhanger where they're being ejected in
- 4:02space genuinely shocked me and I was an adult by this point.
- 4:06I just thought that was like it sounds weird but.
- 4:09Often, that's rather adorable. Well, like normal, normally you
- 4:13Cliffhang is is is always, always the monster reveal or is
- 4:18somebody putting a gun at the doctor?
- 4:20But that was like, Oh my God, they're genuinely being ejected
- 4:23out in the space and you see them kind of leaving the set and
- 4:25you're like, but I this hook line sinker.
- 4:28I was totally sold. So that's the only other time.
- 4:31Got me thinking now about times when on 1st watch when Doctor
- 4:35Who really surprised me. I remember address only one
- 4:39floored me like that. Like, because I used to like
- 4:43trying to figure out how you get out of a cliffhanger and I just
- 4:45couldn't figure a way out of that cliffhanger, right?
- 4:48So I was like, what? They're clearly dead.
- 4:50They've been machine guns for death, right?
- 4:54How do you get out of a firing? Yeah.
- 4:56Because I realized the cheat was there in episode 1 when that
- 4:59Android very discreetly slips into their cell.
- 5:02You know, I'm sorry, we're not talking about case of address.
- 5:05Well, you know, yeah, we've started already on a tangent, so
- 5:08yeah. Well, there won't be.
- 5:09We've got 6 episodes to get through.
- 5:11We're doing three of those today.
- 5:12I'm sure there'll be one or two tangents.
- 5:15Before we jump into episode 1. I would like you to put aside
- 5:22your borrowed embarrassment from your family because I know you
- 5:26did a screening of this last weekend.
- 5:29You know, bravely show the model dinosaurs to your wife and
- 5:34children. Yeah, modern day audience for
- 5:37Paul. Honestly, you're so brave.
- 5:39I wanted, well, I I really wanted to get an outsider's
- 5:44perspective on it. They, they kind of, they're all
- 5:47a bit familiar with. Well, yeah, they're familiar
- 5:49with Doctor Who enough, but they've seen bits and bobs, but
- 5:52they haven't seen this. And and like, like I said, like
- 5:55being surprised by this one, one of the things that you know
- 5:59about it is the fact that, you know, going in, if you didn't
- 6:02know anything else, you'd knew that the first episode was
- 6:04called Invasion because they were trying to hide the fact
- 6:06that dinosaurs were in there. And, you know, that first
- 6:09episode was all about them slowly discovering the, the, the
- 6:13fact that there are dinosaurs in London.
- 6:15So I really wanted somebody who wasn't familiar with it to watch
- 6:19it and go, OK, what is going on here?
- 6:22Can they figure it out as they're going on, as it as it
- 6:25kind of unfolds? So that was kind of my impetus
- 6:27for doing it. But like like you say, I
- 6:30suddenly was suddenly kind of that second hand embarrassment I
- 6:33had actually experienced for quite a long time as I'm kind of
- 6:36really painfully aware of the some of, you know, the slowness
- 6:40of it because it's slowly unfolds, doesn't it?
- 6:43It's kind of like one of those kind of opening exploratory
- 6:45episodes where. Like we did last time, right?
- 6:47Like Destiny or the Daleks? Exactly or you know, very much
- 6:51of in the 60s vein, you know, like we kind of in an in an
- 6:54environment and you don't necessarily know what's going
- 6:57on. You don't necessarily know you
- 6:58what where you are. And actually, crucially in this
- 7:01one is is somewhere we should know because it's contemporary
- 7:04London, somewhere where the Doctor is all the time suddenly
- 7:09made to be a little bit a little bit scary and a little bit kind
- 7:12of unnerving a little bit so. So yeah, I just wanted their
- 7:17opinion. I think that's a mood piece.
- 7:19I think episode 1 is one of the best episode ones they did like
- 7:22in terms of pure atmosphere, that weird feeling of the
- 7:28uncanny that like you say, we're she's back on Earth, Sarah, and
- 7:33everyone has gone and there's baby toys left in the park, you
- 7:38know, and cars have been ripped apart and they're finding bloody
- 7:42corpses on the street. I mean, it's, it's it's quite a
- 7:46memorable opener. And then kudos to Paddy Russell
- 7:49for saying, well, I don't care. We are going to shoot in London
- 7:52and we're just going to get up at 4:00 in the morning.
- 7:54Get your cameras ready. That's amazing that that that
- 7:57that story of her just kind of shooting guerrilla style.
- 8:00We're taking one cameraman into the streets and just doing it
- 8:03like the crack. Trafalgar there's no one around
- 8:05shoe go go. I think Bill Bags operates on
- 8:09the same principles you. Know in the late night Oh yeah,
- 8:12ask, ask permission. I have to ask for forgiveness
- 8:14afterwards. Yeah, yeah.
- 8:15But he doesn't do it in central London.
- 8:17He just any old mall, you know. Well, quick, the guards over
- 8:20there shoot, you know, but this, this genuinely is the sort of
- 8:26thing I miss in New Who. And it is slow, you're right.
- 8:29But you get to hang with the regulars.
- 8:31Yeah. It is building up a mystery
- 8:33slowly. It is stylish as fuck because
- 8:37there's so much location work in this first episode.
- 8:39Yeah. And this would all be done now.
- 8:41Well, basically, this is what you get in something like in the
- 8:44Forests of the Night and the pre titles.
- 8:46The camera goes up over the thing, and there we go.
- 8:49The mystery is solved. Yeah, Yeah.
- 8:51Exactly. You would have a brontosaurus
- 8:54outside Big Ben and. And yeah, and they'd be like,
- 8:56oh, invasion of dinosaurs. Yeah, you're totally right, I
- 8:59think. There's space though for this
- 9:00sort of mood setting. Yeah, yeah, totally.
- 9:03And and, and and what I love. I mean, I think there should
- 9:07always be room for that. And I'd without wanting to do
- 9:11down the Cotton Bottom series. Well, I mean, the first podcast
- 9:17I did for you was was a Jodie Wicker story.
- 9:20I particularly love Flux because of that long form storytelling
- 9:26and it's what TV does now. It's like every, every genre TV
- 9:29show is is kind of like a complete story, or at least a
- 9:32complete story over that season. And it baffles me why Doctor Who
- 9:37continues to do a kind of weekly thing where it's different every
- 9:41every time. I think having a longer story
- 9:44gives you would give you that time just to kind of sit in it a
- 9:47bit longer and explore things and and have a bit of mystery,
- 9:50not knowing what's going on. I think it's why the classic
- 9:54Doctor Who fans that generally come down quite hard on Jodie
- 9:57Time love Village of the Angels. There's all those scenes where
- 10:00they're just exploring the village and it feels like a, a
- 10:03really beautifully shot Part 1 of a gothic horror, doesn't it?
- 10:08You know, right, Church in the Mist and all of that and the,
- 10:11the the horrible Weeping Angels coming out of here.
- 10:15Yeah, Yeah, you're right. But it doesn't do it enough, I
- 10:18don't think. We went back to Rusty Davis and
- 10:20suddenly we're back to the point again, you know, and
- 10:22everything's moving so fast. And that is TV now as well,
- 10:26though, right? Like it is it is set pieces it.
- 10:28Is well, yeah, that's true. There isn't a lot of time for
- 10:31you. You are right.
- 10:33I mean, TV, I mean, yeah, has to, has to a lot of TV is kind
- 10:40of designed to be second screen now, isn't it, where they they
- 10:43kind of build in the fact that somebody is not paying full
- 10:46attention and they're on their phone and say, oh, sad, isn't
- 10:49it? Yeah, yeah.
- 10:50I heard Jamil L Jamil. I can never say her name
- 10:53properly. The the lady who's in the good
- 10:55Place saying that she was at like meetings where they were
- 10:59saying to her, we, we, we need, we're going to assume people are
- 11:03going to be on their phones. So this has got to be in the
- 11:05information has to come in bite sized chunks really obviously
- 11:09with lots of visual stimulation. And she went, no, fuck that.
- 11:12And she goes, they either pay attention or not, you know?
- 11:15But Can you imagine that for if they made this now, like all
- 11:19those shots of empty London and and all you can hear is
- 11:22birdsong? And well, you get them, but
- 11:23they'd be quick, you know? Right.
- 11:25Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, let's luxuriate
- 11:29then, shall we? In the first sort of 20 minutes
- 11:32of invasion of the dinosaurs before, let's be honest, I did
- 11:36ask you about what's the most impressive sort of large beasts
- 11:40in Doctor Who. Oh, we did do that.
- 11:42Yeah, well, I didn't make any say that by the end of this
- 11:45episode, you know. Oh, a whopper.
- 11:47Yeah, absolutely. Dripping fangs, you know.
- 11:52All that. Stretched well you intro
- 11:56Schluckanders in. Yeah, go for it.
- 11:59Thank you so much. Well, we'll go in then.
- 12:01In 54321 now. No, I can't help but notice
- 12:08every time we've done one of these, you've got a new title
- 12:11sequence each time. We have and we.
- 12:13And yeah, I quite like this one as well.
- 12:15I mean, I like the full full size John Pertwee just
- 12:18disappearing here. Always, always strikes me as
- 12:22being quite different. I'm surprised they've never done
- 12:24it for any other titles. You only ever see the face
- 12:26usually. The way he's sort of positioned
- 12:28in the middle there, do you imagine that John Pertwee's ego
- 12:31could plug up the time vortex like that maybe?
- 12:35Just about. I think it's substantial enough.
- 12:38Do you know? OK, now I'm watching the sort of
- 12:41colourised version which looks like a really bad home video
- 12:45that they did. Yeah, straight away when I
- 12:48watched this with my wife, she kind of commented on the quality
- 12:50of it. It does look a bit ropy, doesn't
- 12:53it? But I mean, what can you, what
- 12:54can you do? I mean the fact that have they
- 12:57colourized this or have they brought the colour out of the
- 12:59black and white? I'm never quite sure what the
- 13:01process is. I should know.
- 13:05I'm not sure because they don't know.
- 13:08I don't think they could do the chroma dots thing for
- 13:10everything, could they? So I don't know if this is just
- 13:12an attempt to colour it as best as possible.
- 13:14It's sort of still got a bit of a greyness about it, hasn't it?
- 13:17The colours don't pop, but they usually do when you went to
- 13:20episode 2 and suddenly our eyes will be bleeding.
- 13:22You know that the reprise on the cliffhanger makes a massive
- 13:27difference, isn't? It, I mean, look at this, does
- 13:28she just happen to find a house that had been completely
- 13:31demolished and go that's well. Isn't it?
- 13:33Yeah, yeah, I guess so. I mean, I guess, yeah, Who knows
- 13:37what that is, But I'm guessing there's still quite a lot of
- 13:40World War 2 stuff still not being rebuilt at this time.
- 13:43I I don't really know. The abandoned milk truck we see
- 13:46you, Russell T Davis and the stolen Nerf.
- 13:48Yes, indeed. Yeah.
- 13:50I do love that shot of the kids toys and then we shoot around to
- 13:54the Tardis materialising. There's something really uncanny
- 13:58about those about children playing, but they're not
- 14:01playing. But not there.
- 14:02Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Oh here they are John Perkwee
- 14:06and Elizabeth Slayden that are much underrated team I think.
- 14:11Yeah, I've, I do. You know what?
- 14:13I know everybody loves Sarah Jane.
- 14:16I can definitely see why She's not necessarily my favorite, but
- 14:23I think I genuinely think she probably works better with John
- 14:26than than with Tom. And I know it's.
- 14:29Unusual. Yeah, that's an unusual opinion.
- 14:32Yeah, well, I think they remember that, what they started
- 14:35with, that she's a journalist. And then particularly in this
- 14:37story, she's got loads of agency and her journalism is kind of
- 14:42brought to the fore, but they kind of forget that later on.
- 14:45Her collar is so impressive right now it could be the wings
- 14:49of a pterodactyl. Couldn't.
- 14:50It when I was an art student in the 90s and there was a there's
- 14:55a bit of a thing for the 70s back in the 90s.
- 14:57And so I I used to dig out my dad's old 70 shirts with the big
- 15:01collars and I'd wear them around until.
- 15:04They you look stylish as far. Somebody said it looked a bit
- 15:07like Harry Hill, so I stopped watching.
- 15:09Stop wearing them. Oh, it wasn't bold.
- 15:11Back then you got I wasn't bold. Now it was just the glasses and
- 15:15the shirt I think. I do love John Perry.
- 15:18I just wandering about on a normal day.
- 15:21Yeah, yeah, you're right. There's there's a real
- 15:25competence to Sarah Jane in Series 11 and there's a desire
- 15:30for her to drive stories and she certainly drives a lot of this.
- 15:33Yes, absolutely. Oh, I love all this with the
- 15:37looters. So Hulk, man, you can trust Hulk
- 15:40to think, OK, so this happened, right?
- 15:43Who would be taking advantage of this situation?
- 15:46Yeah, yeah, totally. Well, this is something that my
- 15:48kids clock this pretty quickly. That is, you know, that's the
- 15:52other thing. I wanted to get what a kid in
- 15:541974 would have got from this. And they clocked pretty quickly
- 15:59that he's obviously a very shady character and they realised that
- 16:01he's a looter and. And when you get to the
- 16:05jewellery store, they, you know, could tell quite, you know, that
- 16:08suspicions were confirmed that he's a, you know, he's, he's not
- 16:12on the up and up. But they would kind of, I think
- 16:14they're a little bit held up on that rather than actually trying
- 16:16to figure out there's something else going on.
- 16:18They would kind of got bits. Why he was doing that, Yeah,
- 16:20yeah. I suppose at this point, though,
- 16:22like, yeah, all right, there is a mystery.
- 16:24The park's empty. And they do keep saying, well,
- 16:26where is everybody? The rather fantastic Maybe It's
- 16:32Sunday, you know, Great Britain, always.
- 16:33Shuts off. Yeah, absolutely.
- 16:35Not anymore, mate. All right, Jesus Christ.
- 16:40But it could just be that people are on the thief, you know, and
- 16:43everyone else was not broken up yet.
- 16:46Yeah. Well, that'd be a really odd
- 16:47story for Doctor Who to tell the criminals of London, you know.
- 16:51It would. It would be this is where I I
- 16:56got a little bit a little bit embarrassed.
- 16:58That second hand embarrassment. What getting other people to
- 17:01watch were these scenes where you know, there is a mystery is
- 17:05unfolding. We're talking about how we like
- 17:07that and we enjoy it. But when you're watching other
- 17:09people, you're kind of aware of how painfully slow this seems to
- 17:12be moving. But and it starts to pick up
- 17:14right here where we're actually now in central London and
- 17:17they're kind of walk into the shops, but we've kind of come
- 17:19out of that park area. I like a slow build of pace,
- 17:23like as a as a, an older Doctor Who.
- 17:25I mean, obviously I'm used to the pace of this.
- 17:27I've watched it all my life. But I even now I like when I
- 17:31watch something like a horror now and it starts slow and
- 17:34builds and builds. But like, this gets grizzly very
- 17:38fast, doesn't it? What?
- 17:41Yeah. Yeah, I was shocked.
- 17:42Well, we're not there yet. We'll get to the the the car
- 17:45crash scene. Yeah.
- 17:46About the colourisation, people are great fun doing that.
- 17:48It's really very graphic, isn't it?
- 17:52Right, right. And it's only on and again, like
- 17:55it's not something I would have noticed too much watching by
- 17:57myself. But when you when you putting in
- 17:59your kids in front of it, some kids like, Oh my God, what we
- 18:02related? Corpse and this destroyed car.
- 18:04This is what Doctor was like back in the day.
- 18:06Right, right. Yeah, Suffering those days.
- 18:08We watch more, please. Come on.
- 18:10Oh, I'm not sure what's going on with Sarah Jane's haircut,
- 18:14though. It's sort of the Matthew
- 18:15Waterhouse School of hairdressing, isn't it?
- 18:18It's very much of the time and I think my mum had very similar
- 18:20hair like that back in the day. Let's imagine that you and I are
- 18:25in London, OK? And obviously there's dinosaurs
- 18:29about. Everyone's been evacuated.
- 18:30But Joe Ford and Paul Arthur, they forgot about us.
- 18:33We weren't on the list. For some reason, we didn't end
- 18:35up in Leeds like everybody else. So where's the 1st place we're
- 18:38going to loop, Paul? Oh Blimey, let's go to The Who
- 18:41store, shall we, and have a mutual hand in there.
- 18:44The Who store? No.
- 18:44Big no. If we go to the National
- 18:46Gallery, you know, we could get a load of, oh, you're thinking
- 18:49if we could buy The Who store. I was thinking of just sneaking
- 18:53a few targets, but you you want to steal some, there's some.
- 18:56You know the Vermeers tend to get stolen quite a bit.
- 18:59You know they used to go missing.
- 19:02A couple of Van Gogh's perhaps? Nice.
- 19:04Yeah, sorry, I was just saying the other weeks it's fresh in my
- 19:07mind. Oh, sorry.
- 19:10God, she's, she's on the phone and suddenly you hear the crash
- 19:13and then they're dashing out on the streets.
- 19:15Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and as I say, my kids were
- 19:19still a bit hung up on, on the robbery, the looting side of it.
- 19:22So they're like, well, has he just crashed?
- 19:25My wife had to kind of point out that, you know, there was a
- 19:28roar. But also I'd kind of given the
- 19:30game away a little bit because I'd pause briefly.
- 19:32And like you say, the bloody iPlayer gets the, the flashes
- 19:35the title up on the screen. The kids didn't see it, but the
- 19:37wife was like, oh, OK, I I know where this is now.
- 19:40But yeah, so that kind of ruined my my surprise.
- 19:43I don't linger on the corpse too long, but there is blood all
- 19:48over his. Face, it's shocking, and it's a
- 19:50great startling cut to the. 5:00 in the afternoon, that is.
- 19:55For destroying, yes. Oh, here we are.
- 19:57Oh, nice cozy unit. Now we're all right.
- 20:00Yeah, yeah. I was thinking about this
- 20:01because obviously we're going to do episode 2 after this, but
- 20:06although we, we look unit now. So it's kind of a little bit
- 20:08more cosy, as you say. But the fact that the doctor
- 20:11and, and Sarah don't get kind of picked up straight away and
- 20:15they're still having to kind of deal with the bureaucracy and,
- 20:17and the kind of the crisis in, in London.
- 20:21This is a kind of a world away from the cosy unit.
- 20:23And that's what makes it a little bit kind of unsettling.
- 20:26It's a touch of Season 7 again, isn't it?
- 20:28Yeah, yeah, where things weren't quite as I I want to resist so
- 20:33cosy again, you know, But, you know, family friendly.
- 20:36Yeah, cosy's good. That's what why I enjoy the unit
- 20:39stories is that cosiness and why this is a little bit unsettling
- 20:42is because you don't have that straight away.
- 20:44But within like a state of emergency that they're in right
- 20:47now, everybody would be suspected, right?
- 20:50If people turn up. And yeah, the fact that they're
- 20:52mistaken for criminals, the pair, I mean, look at John
- 20:55Perry. What a criminal.
- 20:56We'd make the debonair dandy thief without it again.
- 21:02Yeah, and from the Army's point of view, like you have got this
- 21:05scientific advisor who's not really an employee, then nobody
- 21:08really knows it. Why would they?
- 21:10Why would they trust him? I think it's great stuff, yeah.
- 21:13Especially when they end up alongside that other criminal,
- 21:17you know, he tries to sell them out and then they sell them.
- 21:21Out, yeah. It's great.
- 21:24I love all that stuff. Yeah, but it's also before then
- 21:27we're going to see the pterodactyl attack.
- 21:30Oh, wait. Yeah, well, that was the the
- 21:32what the fuck moment for for the kids was like, hang on, I
- 21:35thought this is a story about they didn't say that, of course,
- 21:38but that I thought this was a story about robbers in London,
- 21:42but suddenly there's a there's a ropey looking pterodactyl in, in
- 21:47a, in a barn. I mean, compared to some of the
- 21:50atmosphere, I think they almost, if you squint, you can get the
- 21:54the bit where it's coming through the window and it's
- 21:57gnashing away at you like it's shot fast enough that you're
- 22:00like, what? The hell I think that's it is
- 22:03like because the action's quite frenetic, the the things moving
- 22:06like really, really quickly. And as you say, it's shot
- 22:08quickly. So yeah, I think they and that
- 22:10noise it makes as well. I think they do get away with
- 22:13that, definitely. I love all these locations, so
- 22:15back streets and warehouses and Eric's would.
- 22:18Man, he'd be having a rat stiffy right now, wouldn't it?
- 22:21Watching this, but it's sort of. Yeah.
- 22:24Where all the lowlifes hang out. I just like Doctor Who's a bit
- 22:28dirty. We have spent a lot of time on
- 22:30Earth in scientific institutes. You know that Thai monster.
- 22:36Bloody hell, we spent three fucking episodes in that boring
- 22:38institute, didn't we, at the start of that?
- 22:41If Saywood wrote this, though, there'd be like a convenient
- 22:44barrel of oil for the doctor to dump these guys in, and they'd
- 22:47be drowning the oil or something like that.
- 22:48Oh. The dialogue would be very ripe
- 22:50indeed, wouldn't it? And of course, there'd be more
- 22:55murders. Oh, 100% yeah.
- 22:58Yeah, I think no, there's a there's enough death in this
- 23:02without labouring the point in a gratuitous way.
- 23:06Yeah, yeah. Well, we just have to go back.
- 23:08Did I miss it? No, no, it's coming up in a bit.
- 23:12Oh, God, it's so great. It's like it's clearly a person
- 23:18doing the voice. Now, look, this is good advice
- 23:22for you, Paul. All right?
- 23:23If you're ever going to be locked up in a warehouse,
- 23:25artist, don't get attacked by a peraduct or.
- 23:27Right. Yeah.
- 23:28Yeah, absolutely. That looks really good.
- 23:31Zooming down the stairs like that.
- 23:33I think that's good. Tell your children now.
- 23:35All right? Yeah.
- 23:39It's not in short enough. I mean, you remember that bloody
- 23:41fly from the Green Death? That's.
- 23:43Yes. Out in the broad daylight.
- 23:45Yeah. On a.
- 23:46String, you're right, and that's not that long before this, so
- 23:49yeah. Snapping his jaws through the
- 23:51glass. Yeah, it looks pretty vicious.
- 23:53Yeah, he's like, bloody hell, John Perry.
- 23:55Yes, I'll have a bit of that. I I think that's pretty
- 23:59impressive and it was a kind of as to say what the fuck moment
- 24:03for the kids where they're like, hang on, this is not what I
- 24:05thought it was. So I could imagine coming to
- 24:08this completely fresh. You would be surprised.
- 24:11That was them in that car. Then that was clearly Elizabeth
- 24:15Slayden in the front of that car.
- 24:16Yeah. John Perk was like, no, no, we
- 24:18don't need stunt double s. Ah, now is that Lisa and Chang I
- 24:24see before me? Indeed.
- 24:26Yeah, yeah. John.
- 24:28Bennett, John Bennett. I don't think I realized that
- 24:30for a long time. It's a very different
- 24:32performance, isn't it? Yeah.
- 24:34Very much that. So of course you can give it.
- 24:37But that's isn't it, isn't it? Like when you suddenly surprised
- 24:40like that, that's when you realise how how good an actor is
- 24:44or how, how impressive the skill of acting is.
- 24:47I think a lot of people, kind of a lot of people not dismissive
- 24:51for acting, but they think they understand it.
- 24:53But it's when you can, when you actually see that the difference
- 24:56in those two roles and you go, oh wow.
- 24:58You know, for me at least, I find that quite mind blowing.
- 25:02I think he does a fantastic job because he has to toe the line
- 25:05between being the sort of stalwart army guy, but also like
- 25:10a bit suspicious as well. He doesn't ever overplay that.
- 25:15He's quite, it's quite a subtle performance.
- 25:17But he's also got have scenes with Sarah where he's a little
- 25:19bit sort of flirtatious and you could believe that somebody
- 25:22could warm to him. And I think he just hits all of
- 25:25those beats. Yeah, no, I think he's very
- 25:27good. And you're right.
- 25:28It's the sort of character we've seen loads through the the
- 25:30Pertway years up to this point. And and so you kind of think you
- 25:36know what you're getting when you when you first meet him.
- 25:39But you're right, he does definitely bring different
- 25:41layers and he's just kind of sinister enough that you think
- 25:46something is going on. Yeah, like you are screaming at
- 25:49Sarah. Don't trust him.
- 25:50Don't go into that filing cabinet room with him.
- 25:54Now this is what I'm going to say is perhaps one of the most
- 25:56egregious things for this story for me with the soldiers.
- 26:00Egregious. Yeah, with this, with the
- 26:02soldiers, worse than the dinosaurs.
- 26:05I've I've not got any beef with the dinosaurs in this, but worse
- 26:08than that is when they pretend they're.
- 26:10Lizards. They ain't cows.
- 26:12Well, I've got, Yeah. Well, I've got no scales with
- 26:15this. Yeah.
- 26:16Scale of the scales with this Yeah but what I I find most
- 26:20annoying about the invasion of dinosaurs is when they pretend
- 26:22they're shooting a gun and they're clearly just kind of
- 26:24waggling the. With a sound effect, it's.
- 26:30Like better than that, honestly. Yeah, come on now, we've seen so
- 26:34many bullets flying. The purple era.
- 26:36Surely you've got some ammo left.
- 26:37No. Yeah, I still.
- 26:39I think they must have, must have only got to the last season
- 26:42and they're like we've got no money for anything.
- 26:43Havoc is far in blanks at this point, unfortunately.
- 26:48But what I really like is that the Doctor hasn't been treated
- 26:51like this on Earth, Yeah, since Inferno episode 3.
- 26:56You know, when he goes to the alternative universe and they're
- 26:58brutal with him and we've not seen this level of brutality
- 27:01towards the Doctor since then. And that idea of martial law in
- 27:06the just like, you know, something like that happening
- 27:10that as an adult, that kind of scares me the, the, the military
- 27:13being in charge. Because it's plausible, right?
- 27:15Well, yeah. One move, one wrong opinion.
- 27:17You could have a gun in your face.
- 27:18Right. Right.
- 27:19You know, And they're empowered to shoot.
- 27:21Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, very top.
- 27:25He's having the best time here. Look, it's a short stun.
- 27:29Yeah. It's when the Brigadier sees the
- 27:34pictures and goes, oh, good God. Right.
- 27:38He couldn't take it seriously, could he?
- 27:39No. And Sarah look like she's
- 27:43scared, but she's sort of joining in with him, you know?
- 27:45I think he makes her feel safe. Yes, yeah.
- 27:50And then, I mean, this is she's quite new at this point.
- 27:52I mean, like, you know, so she's been on a on a trip into the
- 27:57past and she's still getting used to things.
- 28:01What are they accused of? Stingling again?
- 28:03What's in the back of that van? Some furs.
- 28:05Weren't it furs and jewels? Sarah Jane, she loves her fur
- 28:08coat, you know. Well, yeah, yeah.
- 28:10She needs it when she needs to infiltrate for her next story.
- 28:13You know some rich bitch. In in the yeah, in the fashion
- 28:16industry. Oh.
- 28:17Imagine that. Could we not see that story?
- 28:19It's got a huge cigarillo and a fur coat, you know?
- 28:25You've just frozen there, Joe. But you know, still here you
- 28:27don't worry. But you know that that's what
- 28:29they would have done in canine The company an 80s fashion
- 28:32story. Oh, please, I yes, I would be
- 28:35delighted with that. Oh, here's that, man.
- 28:38Look, we've got nothing to be cheerful about.
- 28:41No judge or jury, mate. We're in an episode of Porridge
- 28:46now. Right, right.
- 28:47What? The fuck is going on?
- 28:51Oh my God, what is? This right and he's.
- 28:57He's like, hello, popping his head out of the building.
- 29:03When he when he pops up, my kids were like, was he in the house?
- 29:06They like they, they couldn't they, they?
- 29:08It was the second when they're like, is he behind the house or
- 29:10so we just couldn't imagine him sitting at home having a cup of
- 29:12tea. It's sort of squeezed in through
- 29:14the back door so he could sort of, it's a bit like the Doctor
- 29:18in Vampires. The finish when he pops out the
- 29:19cake, you know, surprise, he's a playful sort of T Rex.
- 29:26You know what, Right. OK, yes, That is a truly dismal
- 29:30special effects, that dinosaur, right?
- 29:31And they very often are. Why do you love all the little
- 29:34dioramas? They put them in the buildings.
- 29:37You know, you wait till later. We've got one of those sort of,
- 29:40you know, where the lollipop lady stands.
- 29:42They're in the middle of the road with the little cones and
- 29:44everything. Now I, I honestly generally
- 29:46think most of the dots of the dinosaurs kind of work quite
- 29:49well, maybe where they don't work so much.
- 29:51I think at the end of this episode where the difference
- 29:54between this, the unit soldier or the the soldiers and the
- 29:58model seems a bit that that diorama doesn't quite line up
- 30:02with the filming location stuff. Oh.
- 30:03I should keep a good eye on it. Yeah, yeah, for me.
- 30:07You better not be coming from my man big man T Rex, you know I.
- 30:10Mean. Oh no, he's, he's brilliant.
- 30:11He's fantastic. Oh my, all he wants to do is
- 30:14eat. I mean, I empathize.
- 30:16Yeah, of course. Yeah.
- 30:17Yeah. Jesus.
- 30:18Christ, if I was a dinosaur I'd be eating a lot of you.
- 30:21Paul, you look so tasty right now.
- 30:23Well, thank you very much. Slab a bit of BBQ sauce on you,
- 30:26go down a treat. Well, you'd have a trouble with
- 30:29your little dinosaur hands, though you wouldn't be able to
- 30:31get. The deal?
- 30:31I'd be very frustrated. I'd be very frustrated.
- 30:36T Rex. Oh, look, no one can.
- 30:39Do you know the comedy like Nicholas Courtney?
- 30:42Can they? Oh God, he's like Jesus.
- 30:46What does he look like? But actually still by the end of
- 30:52this episode they still haven't picked them up.
- 30:55So I I for me this doesn't feel like a cosy unit story until
- 30:59like 5 minutes into episode 2 still.
- 31:01Well, and then it sort of settles into that and then it
- 31:05takes Sarah off out into space in inverted commas where it
- 31:08totally flaws you again. And then the doctors on the run
- 31:11from unit, right. So like it, it almost is defying
- 31:16your expectations that if we move this story, like it gets
- 31:19you cosy and then it sort of wrenches.
- 31:21You away, pulls you pulls it away, Yeah.
- 31:24Yeah. Oh, and then we get a diff from
- 31:25my lower low. We've got some treats coming in
- 31:27this what's happening now. Oh, right, they're trying to
- 31:32think how on earth we're going to.
- 31:33Escape where the John puts on his best working working class
- 31:38accent. What is this like the village
- 31:39hall that they're in? I mean, that's quite nice as
- 31:41well. Village hall, school rooms.
- 31:43They've just taken whatever they can to.
- 31:45Yeah, I, I was reading before, before this tonight actually the
- 31:50the exteriors of this, they did go to a school to do it, which
- 31:53it seems a bit of an odd thing to do, but it does actually kind
- 31:56of lend it that real world thing where they've had to had to kind
- 31:59of commandeer, you know, like real in places.
- 32:03It's a one time set designer on this and he is on the DVD
- 32:09commentary and he's like, I was so excited to get Doctor Who and
- 32:14then I realised apart from building 1 spaceship set I was
- 32:18just doing all the sets I normally do for normal dramas.
- 32:22But it's they're good sets, they're detailed, You look.
- 32:26The. Classroom that they're in,
- 32:28there's stuff all over the walls and like.
- 32:30Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have thought about it.
- 32:33Yeah, totally. Oh, let's just not.
- 32:35Remind you of the war games? Yeah, When it goes, yes.
- 32:38And they just can't talk their way out of it.
- 32:40Yeah, yeah, I found it. See.
- 32:44Oh, you. Oh God, what a great cotton are
- 32:46you? Oh yeah, you're not from
- 32:48Crawley. You're having a laugh.
- 32:51And yeah. Having a bubble.
- 32:55So I think I might have interrupted you then.
- 32:57Was you going to say something? No, no, I don't think so.
- 32:59I just just, yeah, I this is great.
- 33:03I think, as you say, like we said all the way through the
- 33:06fact that they can't get to speak to anyone.
- 33:09And he and he says, oh, you're, you're friends with the
- 33:12Brigadier, are you? Of course you are.
- 33:13Yeah. OK, mate, Yeah.
- 33:15She goes, we found them, see exactly what the criminal says.
- 33:18He goes, yeah. And you're going to hand them
- 33:19in, right? Yeah.
- 33:20It's great. No one believes them.
- 33:23Oh, look at Perwick. I saw.
- 33:25I'm scientific advisor to units. I suppose he's no friend of
- 33:30yours. Oh how interesting, you've been
- 33:33found guilty and looted. Oh, great stuff.
- 33:38Oh, yeah. But you know, I've been happy
- 33:40for Malcolm Holt to have written every other story in the poetry
- 33:42era. I think he's a fabulous writer.
- 33:44He is a fantastic writer. I've I, I kind of like, I love
- 33:51this one, but I think I tend to like he's quite serious writer
- 33:54Hulk. And you know, his themes are
- 33:56quite, quite serious. I, I tend to like more black and
- 34:00white who I think and there's a kind of layer of kind of grey
- 34:04morality around. Oh.
- 34:05Really. See, I prefer the the the middle
- 34:08ground where you're sort of, you know, but here, you know, you
- 34:11get the left wing extremists in this, don't you?
- 34:15Right. We should, you know, nowadays
- 34:17that's a way where we have an interesting conversation when
- 34:19they turn up. Yeah.
- 34:20Yeah, sure. Yeah.
- 34:24So I mean, I definitely respect what he what he did and I I
- 34:28think all, all of his stories are incredibly solid.
- 34:31This is definitely my favorite of, of, of his.
- 34:34It's. My favorite?
- 34:34Yeah, I think this is probably my favorite as well.
- 34:37Well, it's just got a great idea as heart, isn't it?
- 34:41I mean, that is a fantastic idea, isn't it?
- 34:44Having just like bringing dinosaurs back and plopping them
- 34:48into our into our contemporary world.
- 34:50Unusually for Barry Letts, he said that he did the Philip
- 34:54Hinchcliff line and said, can we do this?
- 34:57Yeah, Normally he didn't care. He just went, right, we'll do
- 35:00it. Yeah, we'll give it a try.
- 35:01We've got these new Chroma Key effects and can we do this?
- 35:04And they went, yes, we can give you very sophisticated models of
- 35:08dinosaurs. And he goes and they lied to me.
- 35:13Oh, Barry. I mean, when that's what you're
- 35:16hanging the whole story on. Yeah, I mean, you know, I'll
- 35:21never, I'll never knock Doctor Who for being ambitious.
- 35:23But like, you know, we did come of monsters.
- 35:26That wasn't that much longer before this.
- 35:28What made him think that other people could do dinosaurs any
- 35:31better than the BBC could? Or.
- 35:33At least have a look at them you know before.
- 35:36Yeah, yeah, figure out. Yeah, spend the money first.
- 35:39Even if you're not going to use them and you're going to do
- 35:41another story, you can throw dinosaurs in somewhere.
- 35:44Yeah, yeah, it is an odd choice that.
- 35:47Matters very wooden go into the detention centre, don't you
- 35:53think? Well, there's so many good
- 35:55performances in this. I could, I could forgive it
- 35:57because you get loads of loads of good performances in this.
- 35:59But here's where I was saying we came into the cliffhanger and I
- 36:02was saying where the the filming location stuff doesn't quite
- 36:06line up with the diorama. It looks kind of a bit
- 36:08different, You know, just where they're standing.
- 36:11Doesn't feel quite like. What I think does really work
- 36:14really well though, is whenever you see people in the foreground
- 36:18and then dinosaurs in the background.
- 36:19I think all of those shots. Yeah, there's quite the
- 36:22Stegosaurus. Yeah, in 2 is pretty good, yeah.
- 36:26You see at the end of this when you see the 2 two soldiers kind
- 36:29of kneeling down and and then the dinosaur in the in the back,
- 36:32but John peeping for the. Oh boy, oh boy.
- 36:40My God, look at those teeth. Good God.
- 36:44I mean, you know. What it is, looking at it now,
- 36:45it's the sunny sky there in the diorama, and then when you see
- 36:49the soldiers, it's kind of the slightly grey film.
- 36:51The funny thing about that dinosaur is if there's no
- 36:54fluidity to it, there's no movement, it's clearly just a
- 36:58dull that can only be sort of tipped forward, and that's.
- 37:01Yeah, yeah, yeah. When when we start the next
- 37:03episode and he's he's been driven off by the the fire and
- 37:08he doesn't turn around to kind of walk away.
- 37:10No, the whole. Body moves, Yeah.
- 37:15God Almighty. I mean they tried, right?
- 37:17But it's iconic. I mean, that is that's as iconic
- 37:20an image of Doctor Who for me is I know like, you know, Daleks
- 37:25bursting out of the the wall in Destiny, which we talked about
- 37:28last time. It is one of those images that T
- 37:32Rex, especially in Part 3, where he's bursting out of the wall
- 37:36Well. It's the sort of thing, right,
- 37:38that when you're younger that is just agonising because you're
- 37:42scared someone's going to walk in the room and see it.
- 37:45But when you're older, say in your 40s, right, and you're
- 37:49watching it with a mate over a Zoom call and it's just the best
- 37:52thing in the world because you can just laugh your head off and
- 37:55enjoy like we are. I know, I know you've watched
- 37:58it. We're sort of over this stuff
- 38:00now, aren't we? When When it's just us.
- 38:03Most mostly over it. Yeah, yeah, totally.
- 38:05Like and and I was a bit surprised I reacted a bit that
- 38:08way with with the wolf and kids. But like, it's only really my
- 38:11wife who reacted to the dinosaurs and she had a lot for
- 38:14them. Like, I don't know if I said it
- 38:16on this, on this or before the call, like as far as my kids are
- 38:19concerned, if this could be from 1974 or 1984 or 1994, that it's
- 38:24all still old to them. And as far as they're concerned,
- 38:27all old stuff looks a bit janky. So they're, they're not
- 38:29expecting anything else, you know, so.
- 38:32What I really, really love about this first episode is not only
- 38:36do you get the sort of very well known, famous London locations
- 38:42sort of empty, then like I said, you get all the dingy warehouses
- 38:46and things like that and nefarious activity happening in
- 38:49backstreet jewellers and stuff. And then right at the end there,
- 38:52they're literally going around just normal streets, and you
- 38:56don't see normal streets. Weirdly, for a period where so
- 38:59much is set on contemporary Earth, you or maybe near future
- 39:04Earth, maybe the 80s, it hasn't quite been Dunos.
- 39:06Yeah. You don't see just normal
- 39:09houses. Now you're right.
- 39:10Here, very often you don't see carnivals popping their heads
- 39:13out of them. How is all about scientific
- 39:16establishments and bait, you know, like big research
- 39:20institutes and in heavy industrial kind of places.
- 39:24And it isn't about that. You know, modernity isn't isn't
- 39:27about that suburban. You know the those scenes that
- 39:31will be saw at the beginning with the park.
- 39:33You don't see that stuff. In fact, really, you don't see
- 39:35that stuff at any point during Classic Who Really?
- 39:38Or. Why?
- 39:40Why would we got there in survival?
- 39:41Wasn't it when we landed on? That finally, yeah, we were
- 39:44like. What the hell is this?
- 39:46Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's probably yeah,
- 39:50that one of the only examples I can think of.
- 39:52And then Russell saw that and went right.
- 39:54That's the that's the blueprint for the way forward, yeah.
- 39:57Yeah, you're right. It could be on the on our
- 39:59street, which is great. It's also as well that episode,
- 40:02the ultimate example, I think. I don't think there's a more
- 40:05vivid example of the everything else kind of works.
- 40:09The direction is good, the acting is mostly good.
- 40:13Yeah, that one special effect. It's just like that's that's
- 40:17your money shot and you didn't have the money.
- 40:20And that's Doctor Who in a nutshell for me.
- 40:22Even when you've got the perfect story, I don't know, Genesis of
- 40:26the Daleks, That fucking clown is there in The Cave.
- 40:29You're gonna have a clam, Yeah. The caves went Rosani, that
- 40:32stupid monster. Caves.
- 40:35You know, like it, you just nothing is ever perfect in
- 40:39Doctor Who. Kind of why I love it as well.
- 40:42Yeah, I mean, but those are the things that we talk about.
- 40:45We talk about those kind of imperfect bits, you know?
- 40:48You know, things are more interesting with the imperfect
- 40:51stuff, isn't it? I don't think you see, I don't
- 40:54know if Star Wars fans sit around talking about like,
- 40:57they'll talk about the the law and like, but do they talk about
- 41:00like when, when I, you know, like that lightsaber effect
- 41:04didn't look quite right? I don't know, do they?
- 41:06I don't know. They're an angry bunch.
- 41:08You know, They are an angry bunch.
- 41:10They're really angry. Good grief.
- 41:12Yeah. Yeah.
- 41:13I don't. Don't.
- 41:14Don't roll and pull. All right, what?
- 41:17I'm coming over here. We're alright with our ropey
- 41:20effects, thank you very much. Well, I couldn't be more excited
- 41:23to go and watch episode 2 and see some more dinosaur.
- 41:25You know, by the end of the story, Paul, I can promise you
- 41:28dinosaur on dinosaur action. How exciting.