Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to James Lark about his choice of The Invasion (3/8)

Transcript

Talks to James Lark about his choice of The Invasion (3/8) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:33
  Hamster with a blunt. Pen knife for doing quicker.
• 0:36
  Welcome back to a Hamster with a Blunt pen Knife, The Doctor Who
• 0:40
  Commentary podcast. Hello, James.
• 0:45
  Hi, Joe. I'd like to talk to you about
• 0:48
  Packer, if I may. I'm afraid I'm not available to
• 0:51
  talk this episode. I am trapped in a box and you'll
• 0:55
  have to talk to my feather boa. Oh, OK, well, I won't get much
• 0:58
  sense out of that favour bar, but I'll give it a go.
• 1:01
  Well, I want to talk about, I want to compare Packer to Oh
• 1:06
  God, I can't think of his like Milton Johns's character in
• 1:09
  Enemy of the World. OK.
• 1:13
  Because it's a similar sort of role.
• 1:16
  He's the sort of sinister henchman.
• 1:19
  But where I find Milton Johns's character, Bennick, there we go.
• 1:24
  Yes, I mean, he's extraordinarily camp.
• 1:27
  He's got a terrible hairdo, hasn't he?
• 1:29
  He's. Really sinister and has some.
• 1:32
  Has a couple of scenes with Victoria where he's a bit
• 1:34
  predatory and he just seems to enjoy the.
• 1:39
  I think this is a much more comic turn.
• 1:42
  Oh, knowingly comic. I do think that Halliday pitches
• 1:48
  it about right. There are moments where it
• 1:52
  threatens to become too comic for the story, and I think we're
• 1:58
  gonna arrive at one of those in. Is it when he really goes?
• 2:01
  Squeaky voice. Yes, Yeah, yeah, it, it's coming
• 2:06
  up, isn't it? And it's partly, it's partly a
• 2:09
  decision that may not have been Peter Halliday's, that whenever
• 2:13
  he listens to his communicator watch, he has to put it up to
• 2:15
  his ear. So he ends up doing the sort of
• 2:18
  comic routine you would get in a children's programme where he's
• 2:20
  talking into his watch and then moving it up to his ear and
• 2:23
  rapidly moving it between his mouth and his ear, which is just
• 2:26
  a little bit too much. But mostly I think he's
• 2:30
  established Packer as a character who is violent.
• 2:35
  And there's a good, there's a good moment where he realises
• 2:38
  it's the same scene, in fact, as the ridiculous watch moment
• 2:41
  where he realises that the lift will crush Jamie and the Doctor.
• 2:49
  And he gives this sort of sadistic smile, which I think is
• 2:53
  genuinely quite unpleasant. So you, you, you get the sense
• 2:56
  that this is someone who violence is very much his job
• 2:59
  and he enjoys violence. And we've seen him be
• 3:02
  threatening towards 2 quite vulnerable young women.
• 3:05
  So I think there is a sense of danger with him.
• 3:08
  And we know that he's Vaughan's puppet.
• 3:11
  So even though that's a comic relationship, it's still one
• 3:16
  that can put our our main characters in jeopardy.
• 3:21
  That's that's how I feel about it.
• 3:22
  That's. Where the eight part structure
• 3:25
  of this works so brilliantly because you get to see his
• 3:28
  relationship with Vaughn. Yeah, slowly, slowly
• 3:32
  disintegrate. The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe run
• 3:35
  rings around him. And they know, First off, they
• 3:38
  know full well that it's funny every time Vaughn says Packer.
• 3:43
  That's, I mean, it's so quotable, isn't it?
• 3:45
  And, and the different inflections of Packer and, and
• 3:49
  as he gradually loses his temper with Packer.
• 3:51
  But it all it's, it's all seems to me that it's building up
• 3:54
  because it's funny. He's always out of breath
• 3:57
  Packer. It's funny that he whenever
• 4:00
  Vaughn calls him, he clearly has to run to the nearest camera.
• 4:03
  Yes, Mr. Vaughn. And he appears on that screen.
• 4:06
  Yes, Mr. Vaughn. So that's a visual bag.
• 4:08
  Face fills the screen as well. It's it's it's what?
• 4:14
  A shade away from yes. Oh my.
• 4:19
  God, I can see the link. But but what you get in the
• 4:24
  final episode is the moment where he calls Packer and they
• 4:27
  look at the blank screen, and then a cyber man's face emerges.
• 4:31
  And so that that that recurring gag becomes a really scary
• 4:36
  moment. I think that's a great shock
• 4:38
  moment with our brilliant sting as well, when the space comes in
• 4:42
  and then he comes running in and all the jokes are gone and he's
• 4:45
  like they're. Literally taking over whatever
• 4:47
  you are and then. Terrific.
• 4:50
  I mean, how Vaughn goes from, you know, you might even give
• 4:54
  him a little persuasion to don't try and lose him again.
• 4:59
  There's a good fellow. Yeah.
• 5:00
  To. You're an incompetent fall
• 5:03
  backer. There's only so many chances
• 5:08
  you'll get with Vaughan, all right.
• 5:10
  Oh, it's great. But like, how long?
• 5:14
  How many Doctor Who stories are of this length where you get to
• 5:17
  see a relationship like this evolve?
• 5:20
  Well, none. No, there aren't.
• 5:21
  There are none. Well, not many.
• 5:24
  I mean, it happens again in the war games.
• 5:25
  I don't think, I don't think it does happen.
• 5:28
  I don't think it does happen again in the war games.
• 5:30
  I think the war games, they, they, they actually struggle to
• 5:32
  keep hold of their characters. And the way the war games
• 5:36
  continues to hold your interest is that it keeps introducing new
• 5:39
  ideas. And with the new ideas come new,
• 5:41
  IT actually means we lose some characters from the first couple
• 5:45
  of episodes who who seem to be developing that kind of
• 5:49
  interesting relationship, but we actually lose them before we get
• 5:53
  to the last two episodes. So we don't get that developing
• 5:57
  relationship that we get in this.
• 5:59
  I mean, I'm thinking specifically of the security
• 6:02
  chief and the war chief in the war games where they have a
• 6:05
  sustained number of conversations which when their
• 6:09
  relationship gets ever more fraught.
• 6:11
  Yeah, I agree, but they're not in the first couple of episodes
• 6:15
  of the War Games and they're gone before the final one.
• 6:17
  So so actually. It's got the ultimate villains
• 6:21
  in there we've. Got the ultimate villains in
• 6:22
  it's it's for good reason that they they actually become small
• 6:26
  fry compared to what the doctor has to face.
• 6:29
  But but that's why I said that the invasion is the the most
• 6:34
  consistent story of this season of of the three that we like the
• 6:39
  best from the season, this is this is the one that has the
• 6:42
  clearest vision, I think, for the for the story it wants to
• 6:45
  tell. I mean, I'll whisper this very
• 6:47
  quietly, but the war games in colour does show that if you
• 6:52
  take out 2/3 of the war games then suddenly nobody's
• 6:56
  motivations make any sense whatsoever.
• 7:00
  Imagine taking out 2/3 of this and colouring it.
• 7:02
  I mean it would be appalling. Yeah.
• 7:06
  I mean you could do it. You could take out, you could
• 7:09
  take out most of parts one to four probably and and colour it
• 7:12
  and it would. Look what a loss.
• 7:14
  But it would be a great loss. And I think it's doing something
• 7:17
  that is it's genre specific because think about your your
• 7:24
  standard spy thriller, think about the Apricus file.
• 7:26
  Think about a, a really good Bond movie.
• 7:30
  You they don't give you everything in one go.
• 7:33
  And actually, a a a well paced Bond film spends the first hour
• 7:38
  with Bond doing some actual spying.
• 7:40
  They a good Bond film gets that you can't just do action
• 7:43
  sequence after action sequence, because then you get something
• 7:45
  that's bloated and ridiculous, like the kind of the the mid
• 7:50
  Roger Moore ones, which are sort of pleasurable, but utterly kind
• 7:53
  of disposable because none of it makes any kind of sense and
• 7:56
  you're just going from one set piece to another.
• 7:59
  A A good Bond film does do story and does do character, and that
• 8:04
  is what this is doing. It's building up to your episode
• 8:07
  4 action sequence and and then it's building up again to, you
• 8:14
  know, what's in the James Bond film is where the volcano turns
• 8:16
  out to be a secret underground base or it turns out to be far
• 8:20
  more kind of sci-fi than you were expecting in the first
• 8:23
  half. And it stops being a generic spy
• 8:25
  thriller and becomes something a little bit different.
• 8:27
  This is doing exactly that, and I think it's doing it really
• 8:30
  well. I mean I I certainly wouldn't
• 8:32
  object to 24 parters, one the spy fi 1, the Cyberman invasion
• 8:38
  being 2 separate. I think that they could work
• 8:41
  independently. They work brilliantly together.
• 8:44
  I do wonder as well, you know, that if Sherwin had stuck around
• 8:49
  a couple of years, which I think was his plan, he wasn't planning
• 8:52
  on going anyway. It's just that he was summoned
• 8:54
  elsewhere. If we would have had another, I
• 8:56
  would have loved to have seen a Pertway script written by
• 9:00
  Sherwin. Written like this.
• 9:02
  Yeah, what a bit interesting. Well look, let's go and watch
• 9:06
  episode 3 and find out what hideous thing has befallen Zoe.
• 9:13
  Now I think it's my turn to do accounting, which is unfortunate
• 9:16
  because my computer has has frozen and.
• 9:20
  Should worry I can do some hold music I.
• 9:23
  Don't know. It's OK.
• 9:24
  I'll just, I'm going to talk some ALGOL smoke coming out of
• 9:31
  my computer. Now hang on, the alcohol was a
• 9:34
  mistake. Oh my.
• 9:34
  God, I thought you were being genuine.
• 9:37
  James, are you all right? Like the Lego?
• 9:40
  The Invasion episode 3 in 321. Go.
• 9:48
  I really believed you. Then you know you're in genuine
• 9:51
  danger. I was a bit worried about my
• 9:53
  fever boa. This, it's a very murky print
• 9:58
  again. Yeah, it's all going to be like
• 9:59
  I. Think it will.
• 10:00
  We may have to switch to the DVD for the second-half.
• 10:02
  You know I'm. Quite enjoying it.
• 10:04
  It's reminding me of what Doctor Who, like my Doctor Who used to
• 10:07
  look like, like when I first got into it.
• 10:10
  What's this the the quote marks all about?
• 10:12
  Why is it? Why is it in quote marks?
• 10:14
  It's just serious season 6 isn't it?
• 10:16
  Space Pirates has it as well. Are.
• 10:18
  They all in quote. The Mind robber does, yeah.
• 10:23
  The Dominators. I can't remember actually,
• 10:26
  there's a handful. This has all been refilmed since
• 10:29
  last week. Yeah, Jeff, sometimes it's it's
• 10:33
  a much worse version. Isn't it this?
• 10:34
  This is less well performed than it was last week.
• 10:38
  We've done this. Come on.
• 10:40
  Yeah. Let's get this over and done
• 10:43
  with. Jamie the Doctor's standing the
• 10:46
  other way around. I've never noticed that before.
• 10:49
  So this episode is pretty much them on the run isn't it?
• 10:52
  Trying to escape the building and I just love the sequences in
• 10:56
  the lift. The lift sequences are great and
• 10:59
  it's for OH it's violent streaking your nature Packer.
• 11:04
  Although I must admit the situation is provoking.
• 11:07
  Great lines, aren't they? So here you are again.
• 11:11
  You really are beginning to try our patience, you know.
• 11:14
  Oh, my God, can we just say every line?
• 11:16
  He says. Two young ladies.
• 11:20
  Correction, they were, oh, Big Finish.
• 11:24
  If you need me, I'm here to play Packer.
• 11:26
  All right. I love this.
• 11:29
  Looks like you've been chasing each other's tails.
• 11:31
  It's the confidence with which he talks to them.
• 11:34
  But oh really? I just love how amused he is by
• 11:37
  everything. I wish every villain was this
• 11:38
  sake. You know, this this confident.
• 11:43
  Like in Seven, you don't really get a villain, do you?
• 11:48
  Channing is just very, very cold.
• 11:54
  There's there's the Silurian younger in No.
• 11:59
  It's much more nuanced, isn't it?
• 12:02
  It's not doing the same thing at all.
• 12:05
  Yeah, new ones. Boring.
• 12:08
  You've got great characters in Season 7.
• 12:10
  And yeah, Braves about Reagan in ambassadors there, but I think
• 12:15
  he's a bit dull. Yeah, I think I agree.
• 12:18
  There's no chance for theatrics with Reagan.
• 12:21
  Well, that's the thing, isn't it, is that Vaughan is a
• 12:24
  slightly heightened villain. He's he's, he is a melodramatic
• 12:28
  villain. Just very, very.
• 12:30
  Too late, I'm afraid. Such a pity.
• 12:33
  His face. All is not lost.
• 12:37
  I'm going down to the factory myself today.
• 12:41
  I mean, Kevin Stoney must have got this script and gone.
• 12:43
  Oh yes, Oh yeah, episodes of this.
• 12:45
  What an absolute gift, Yeah. And I'll get killed by our side,
• 12:48
  man. Wonderful it is.
• 12:52
  It is peculiar though the the two longest Doctor Who stories
• 12:58
  to this today with two, you know, villas with massive
• 13:04
  personalities. They cast the same guy.
• 13:06
  Well, it's the same director though, isn't it?
• 13:08
  So I think, I think Canfield has gone to an absolutely dependable
• 13:13
  oh, Jamie gets in the front seat.
• 13:14
  That's. Don't you remember his stunning
• 13:17
  turn in Revenge of the Sidemen as well?
• 13:21
  Oh, it's if. Oh yeah.
• 13:24
  I couldn't even know which one he is.
• 13:25
  He's the old one, isn't he? He's the one who you can't hear
• 13:28
  a word he's saying because he's. Who's the one that's always
• 13:34
  coughing in his hanky? That's my wisher, isn't it?
• 13:36
  Oh, yes, that's right. Yeah.
• 13:38
  David Collins, you can't mistake him.
• 13:41
  He's the ranting villain. There's some really good now
• 13:44
  he's got he's he's using as deep depth of field as he can in this
• 13:52
  set. So he can have because there's a
• 13:55
  lot of in this episode, there's a lot of just talking in this
• 13:58
  set. And Cam Field is really good at
• 14:00
  not just locking off the camera, doing what a lot of directors
• 14:03
  would have done just from the same angle, doing all of this
• 14:05
  talking. He's constantly putting movement
• 14:08
  into these scenes and having people come from the back of the
• 14:10
  set into into focus, which is really effective.
• 14:14
  I this is going to sound strange, but go with it.
• 14:18
  I am reminded, after listening to an interview with the guy who
• 14:23
  plays Jimmy on the latest Savages animation, just how
• 14:28
  fragile some actors can be. Because he said that in the 60s,
• 14:32
  in the two stories he did and any television work he did, he
• 14:35
  was utterly unconvinced of his ability to act.
• 14:39
  And yet I can't see it at all on the screen.
• 14:42
  And we know Nicholas Courtney come terror of the Autons had
• 14:47
  something of a nervous breakdown.
• 14:48
  Absolutely. You know, crippling.
• 14:50
  Anxiety and there's no sign of it.
• 14:52
  No sign at all. I like the Brigadier.
• 14:55
  It's got a swively chair I like. He's got a swivel.
• 14:59
  What's he called a swagger stick?
• 15:01
  Yes, and we've got helicopters now.
• 15:03
  It gives it a a real. It feels epic, doesn't it?
• 15:07
  I think I'd quite like to deploy a swagger stick, you know?
• 15:11
  I'm sure you can get a swagger stick.
• 15:14
  I'm not saying a word. Oh, here we go.
• 15:17
  We're going into that bit I was talking about earlier where they
• 15:19
  walk in the room and go, my God, it looks exactly the same.
• 15:22
  The same, but they make a virtue of it, don't they?
• 15:24
  It's a it, it, it, it. They turn it into a character
• 15:27
  trait that he's got OCD so he has to have all of his offices
• 15:31
  look exactly the same. And it works because they just
• 15:33
  changed the scenery outside. This lovely tight shot in the
• 15:37
  lift as well. Yeah.
• 15:39
  Yeah, They're right in each other's faces as they're
• 15:41
  talking. It's exactly the same shot that
• 15:46
  Graham Harper does in Kate Androsani.
• 15:49
  He brings the camera. Right.
• 15:52
  Of course, Harper was a protege of Douglas Canfield.
• 15:56
  The delivery of this line, you might even know him in a little
• 15:58
  encouragement coming, gentlemen. It's the fact that he doesn't
• 16:01
  even pause for his thinly veiled threat to land before politely.
• 16:07
  Oh, is that the bit you were talking about where Packer sort
• 16:09
  of looking very smug? He's like.
• 16:11
  No, we get a similar, we get a similar look.
• 16:13
  He's. Rubbing his hands together.
• 16:14
  Garen Good, I can go and beat him up a little bit.
• 16:17
  That's a great wrap around though, isn't it?
• 16:19
  The the we, we feel like we've we've moved N we're in in the
• 16:26
  countryside now. And I'm very pleased because
• 16:28
  there's not a lot of it in 62 that we're doing a bit of the
• 16:31
  old Papa on the floor there. Do you see that?
• 16:34
  Very much. I love it as well.
• 16:38
  You know when you go to the base.
• 16:41
  Well, yeah, there's a lot of pop art in the war games, and some
• 16:43
  of it works and some of it doesn't.
• 16:44
  And it's a bit, it's a it's trying a little bit too hard.
• 16:48
  Whereas this actually does feel kind of effortlessly cool.
• 16:51
  Again, it's you're being. Far more anti war games than our
• 16:54
  figured you. Would I'm not anti war games,
• 16:55
  but but the war games I, I, I feel like again, it's the nature
• 16:59
  of the script is there's a point at which you can feel the war
• 17:02
  games struggling to keep up with the, the number of ideas being
• 17:05
  introduced. And it is just sort of drapes
• 17:07
  with some fancy holes cuff in them.
• 17:09
  Whereas because this has been so cleverly scripted, it never
• 17:13
  feels like it's run out of sets. And because it hasn't, it's been
• 17:16
  so efficiently designed. And this is a really, it's a
• 17:19
  really good set and it does put me in mind of The Avengers
• 17:22
  because it's that slightly pop arty, slightly, slightly art
• 17:27
  Deco, slightly too modern, but it doesn't feel like it's trying
• 17:30
  too hard. It just feels like he's, you
• 17:32
  know, it's the office of someone who's a bit of a wanker.
• 17:35
  The doctor's not doing anything buffoonish in this thing.
• 17:38
  He's just sitting there taking it all in.
• 17:41
  I love that about him. Like I, it's that thing about
• 17:46
  nobody's really watching him, You know, it is exactly what
• 17:52
  McCoy does. It's that sort of trampish
• 17:54
  figure that everyone sort of misunderstands.
• 17:57
  And yeah, he's, he's clever and he's, he's figuring it all out.
• 18:02
  And unlike McCoy does best, there's a a stillness that
• 18:06
  contrasts completely with this clownish physicality of the
• 18:09
  time. Oh, they both clown beautifully.
• 18:12
  Yeah, if only we could have had the two doctors with Patrick
• 18:15
  Trout imagine them both running down the corridor of Paradise
• 18:19
  Towers or something like that. But the doctor I've caught, like
• 18:25
  Jamie is so such an idiot. He's, you know, he's given him a
• 18:27
  radio and that's it, He's sold. Whereas the Doctor, he knows
• 18:33
  something sinister as a foot. I love that this is, I mean,
• 18:39
  Vaughan has the confidence to basically bring them here.
• 18:45
  They know he's up to no good. He knows.
• 18:47
  They know. He, they they all know.
• 18:49
  It's all in pretense. He just doesn't think it
• 18:52
  matters. That's right.
• 18:54
  He's about to. Did you?
• 18:56
  Start exchange it. Sorry where he goes.
• 18:58
  She's a pretty girl. Be ashamed to spoil.
• 19:00
  Though Oh yeah, so this is what I mean.
• 19:01
  Packer is genuinely a threat. What a vicious sadist you are,
• 19:06
  Packer, is Eddie Burnham's response.
• 19:09
  Great. He's.
• 19:12
  A Oh, I think he's a really interesting character, The
• 19:16
  professor. Watkins.
• 19:17
  Yeah. He's very well played, I think.
• 19:21
  The the sequence where he uses the machine on him and makes him
• 19:25
  fright. That is so terrific performance,
• 19:28
  isn't it? It's just, it's, it's really
• 19:30
  nasty. No sign of a nutty professor
• 19:32
  there. Much as I detest violence,
• 19:38
  indisputable talent, persuasion, you see, he it's just.
• 19:42
  It's he goes just. He goes.
• 19:46
  I shall hand her over to Packer. This is so much more threatening
• 19:52
  than it would be if there wasn't that sense of humor running
• 19:55
  through it. And actually, the fact that
• 19:56
  Packer is a buffoon doesn't remove his ability to be a a
• 20:00
  nasty sadist as well. Well, I mean, I think Trump's a
• 20:03
  buffoon, but you can do a lot of damage, you know?
• 20:05
  Exactly that. Yeah, yeah.
• 20:11
  And just like Kevin, Sony's just not afraid of the camera, Is he?
• 20:15
  It's right in his face for this whole 8 episodes.
• 20:20
  I I think that's, again, Cam Field has cast people he can
• 20:24
  trust to be to be absolutely filling the screen.
• 20:30
  Besides, there's always is about to consider, isn't there?
• 20:36
  Oh, I feel as if we should do a lot of quoting, you know, as we
• 20:38
  go along. I feel like we have been
• 20:41
  already. People are going to think this
• 20:43
  is not a commentary, it's just us.
• 20:46
  Audio navigation. Oh no, those the the the the
• 20:50
  close up the telescope is pointing at the three golf
• 20:53
  balls. Is that a real?
• 20:55
  I think they used to be something like that in.
• 20:56
  Yorkshire deep space communications satellite I
• 21:00
  believe. Yeah.
• 21:02
  Something to do with the moon, perhaps?
• 21:04
  The dark side possibly. It was, yeah, North Yorkshire
• 21:10
  Moors. There used to be, I think maybe
• 21:12
  not three, there used to be some golf balls and it was one of the
• 21:17
  great disappointments of a family holiday to Yorkshire that
• 21:21
  the golf ball said to have been recently replaced, so we've
• 21:23
  never got to see them. It's astonishing Riot, this
• 21:26
  sequence now where the villain has let let's the doctor talk to
• 21:30
  the person and he just don't. He's like, they're never going
• 21:34
  to get out of here, so go on. And he's honest as well.
• 21:38
  The professor's honest with him, he says.
• 21:40
  Tart of everything. Oh, this is lovely.
• 21:43
  This is lovely. The Doctor doesn't want them
• 21:45
  talking about the TARDIS. Is this a bit over the camera?
• 21:51
  The way it is, yeah. So look at the way he's looking
• 21:53
  around for sizing them up. And Strange Doctor's been
• 21:56
  another planet Packer. Oh, he's holding his face.
• 22:00
  Packer, he I Do you think that Packer was named in the script
• 22:05
  this often or do you think he's just decided that he's going to
• 22:07
  say it's? Possible.
• 22:09
  You know, we need David Gillespie Pratt.
• 22:11
  He'll have the script somewhere. David, tell us how many times
• 22:15
  Packer's in the script. So far on my tally, he said
• 22:18
  Packer's name 17 times. You're not really writing it
• 22:21
  down, are you? Oh yes, on a wall Packer, that's
• 22:24
  18. Or a bit of paper.
• 22:26
  Yeah, on a wall. Can't lose a wall.
• 22:34
  I just missed it there. There's a lovely shot when the
• 22:36
  doctor covers up the camera and then you you go into the next
• 22:41
  scene with the two of them pulling away from that.
• 22:44
  Yes, yeah, lovely. Camfield is so good at thinking
• 22:48
  about how to move from 1 scene to another.
• 22:50
  I mean, I think they're pretty lucky in the six.
• 22:53
  You've got Camfield in that, you've got David Maloney.
• 22:56
  Who does some? Good work with very little
• 23:00
  money. And you've got Michael Ferguson
• 23:02
  as well. Three of the best, three of the
• 23:06
  greats. And at a point where sort of the
• 23:09
  scripts are in trouble a bit and we're running out of monsters
• 23:13
  and money and the audience is goodwill.
• 23:16
  But there are no monsters, are they?
• 23:17
  I mean, that's the thing that Toby Haddock has been saying
• 23:20
  about the war games. You know the number of weeks
• 23:22
  that that viewers of Doctor Who had to go without any monsters.
• 23:25
  And the Space Pirates. So it's another six and even
• 23:27
  there. I mean, this is a monster story,
• 23:29
  but we've not had any monsters yet and it's going to be another
• 23:31
  week when they. Come though, we know.
• 23:33
  Oh yeah, got it. Worth the wait.
• 23:35
  Look at his face. So now Vaughan is cross and for
• 23:38
  the and it's episode 3 we've we've held off him actually
• 23:43
  showing anger until this point. I don't take all as Packer.
• 23:47
  I give them. He's great.
• 23:50
  Did you hear Packer? There he goes.
• 23:51
  Our allies know him. Yes.
• 23:54
  If I was Vaughan, I'd say, excuse me, my allies, you're
• 24:00
  just the hired end. Do you know whenever I whenever
• 24:07
  I watched Trouten 1, I think about how lucky we are to watch
• 24:13
  those two stories that came back, what, 10 years ago now?
• 24:16
  Two. I just lament all those stories
• 24:20
  we still can't watch. We.
• 24:21
  Lose so much with the visual, don't we with with Trouten?
• 24:26
  I mean, it may be even the Space Pirates, you know, was an
• 24:29
  absolute masterpiece. Wonder because we thought the
• 24:31
  enemy of the world was going to be even a dull 1.
• 24:33
  Until it turned out, didn't we? Did you see the way he glided
• 24:37
  into the? Room before it's it's great.
• 24:40
  Very ingenious a simple. Magnet, I congratulate you.
• 24:47
  They're so great together, aren't they?
• 24:50
  Other methods, again these thinly veiled.
• 24:53
  Threats. And they pepper the scenes
• 24:56
  between the Doctor and Vaughan. It's like every other episode
• 24:59
  they get a scene together. I love that he calls Jamie
• 25:03
  adolescent. Maybe adolescents enough to make
• 25:07
  idle threats, young man. Oh, cards are on the table now.
• 25:12
  I shall hand Zoe over to Packer. He's really he's.
• 25:17
  A bit of a sadist himself, isn't he?
• 25:21
  I'm not sure about the the helmets and glasses of his gun.
• 25:24
  I'm not sure about the helmets, but it's it's fine.
• 25:27
  Isn't it? I went to a party once, you
• 25:29
  know. Actually, no, I'll stop that
• 25:30
  there. And even then, look, the end of
• 25:34
  that scene there swung round to the professor.
• 25:39
  I don't. I think he just knows his way in
• 25:40
  and out of scenes. He he really does, yeah.
• 25:43
  In in a time when TV is just being made, it's a bit of
• 25:46
  ephemera that they throw on on a Saturday night.
• 25:48
  It doesn't have to be this thoughtfully directed and yet.
• 25:54
  I So here we get the tricks to Doctor and he knows that Packer
• 25:59
  is so thick that this will work. He just shoves him rub.
• 26:04
  Jamie I. Love it.
• 26:06
  Your knife. Give me your knife.
• 26:08
  Oh, I am just quoting. That's OK, we're getting great.
• 26:11
  So a great physical performance. Now look at them and look at the
• 26:14
  way I love that Fraser Hines kind of clutches, clutches at
• 26:18
  Troughton as well. There was just hold on to each
• 26:21
  other. There was just something about
• 26:24
  like, like we said earlier, about coming in via the railway
• 26:27
  tracks, going up in the lift shaft in a way that I just
• 26:32
  didn't see in any other Doctor Who I, I can't explain it.
• 26:35
  Like obviously we go up and down and lift up, but there's just
• 26:38
  like a a realism, a grit. It does have a grit to it when
• 26:43
  slightly heightened. It's like, yeah.
• 26:45
  You have that sequence in the fucking Daleks where they're
• 26:47
  going up and down in lift shafts, but it just feels like
• 26:49
  it. Doesn't feel.
• 26:50
  Science fiction here. When you see those chains moving
• 26:53
  and you know they're going to get splattered, I don't know,
• 26:57
  there's some real suspense to it.
• 26:59
  Yes Packer, our clever doctor has outwitted you.
• 27:02
  Oh, then that wouldn't be too difficult, would.
• 27:05
  So this is where I think that the the comedy in Holiday's
• 27:08
  performance just slightly oversteps the mark.
• 27:11
  Is he got a lazy eye or is he just doing that deliberately?
• 27:14
  I think he's just doing weird eye stuff.
• 27:16
  How how do you do that? He makes some quite weird
• 27:19
  physical choices. Mavic Chen, doesn't he?
• 27:21
  Do you say that close up there though, where he's like, Oh
• 27:23
  yeah, I say up the lift shaft? Perfect.
• 27:29
  This is great. This is great.
• 27:30
  Exciting writing. It is and.
• 27:33
  And it's, it just keeps going. They're in the lift shot, then
• 27:36
  they're on the roof, you know, and he's doing these high angle
• 27:39
  shots of them silhouetted on this on the roof of the
• 27:41
  building. Oh, look at the backer.
• 27:44
  He's getting. Well, we're starting to sweat a
• 27:46
  bit, isn't it his hair? Isn't Packer our birds can't fly
• 27:49
  away? This is a well designed set as I
• 27:53
  mean there must be very little of it to be honest.
• 27:56
  The light helps with the light coming up through the lift.
• 27:59
  Yeah, and, and, and Camfield managed to get the camera in
• 28:03
  several different angles to sell the idea that there's a lift
• 28:06
  shaft. James that Kilroy was here as
• 28:09
  well. I believe that Fraser Hines was
• 28:12
  there, in fact. He definitely was.
• 28:15
  But that was that was his idea to write it, wasn't it?
• 28:17
  If Fraser Hynes is going up a ladder, now you know I'm going
• 28:20
  to pay close attention. He's only wearing a skirt.
• 28:25
  I'm not sure that's true. But he's not wearing a skirt.
• 28:30
  I think that the the story is that he he was wearing something
• 28:34
  underneath his kilt, but he asked can feel to stop the
• 28:39
  camera down a couple of. Is that right?
• 28:42
  So that no one will be able to tell.
• 28:44
  And yet I bet he was the one there when Isabel's being
• 28:47
  shotgun. A bit lower.
• 28:48
  A bit lower. Yeah, look at this with the
• 28:51
  chains. With the chains going, yeah.
• 28:53
  Brilliant. And the music really rises here
• 28:55
  and. The noise of the, you know the
• 28:57
  the the radiophonic workshop have have made a lift noise
• 29:01
  that's slightly bigger than it would be as well.
• 29:05
  I'll tell you what it is. It's it seems that you would
• 29:08
  have in normal dramas. That's what it is.
• 29:11
  That's what I didn't see in other Doctor Who stories.
• 29:13
  Yeah. It is like proper Spyfi stuff,
• 29:18
  you know? Has has Doctor Who done anything
• 29:22
  like this up until this point? No, it will certainly go on to
• 29:27
  do a lot more afterwards. Yeah, no, I don't think so.
• 29:30
  This is, it's a. It's a real change of direction.
• 29:32
  I don't know, but I just think this one captures the tone of
• 29:35
  something that we never quite. Yeah, I agree.
• 29:38
  I agree. I'll be in my office and don't
• 29:43
  fail me this time. There's a good fellow.
• 29:46
  Oh. His face.
• 29:50
  You do feel sorry for him a bit. I know he's a sadist.
• 29:53
  He's been threatening women, but but God bless him.
• 29:56
  Oh, here's when he does the squeaky voice.
• 30:00
  Yeah, well here we get the the. Overtly comic though, isn't it?
• 30:04
  Tell them to take it right to the top.
• 30:09
  Now, given that Vaughan has told him to recapture them, it's not
• 30:12
  the smartest idea really, is it? Was that a gun or is
• 30:16
  walkie-talkie? Walkie-talkie.
• 30:18
  Or maybe it's a gun. No, he's a gun because he talks
• 30:21
  to his watch. Doctor Jamie, you better get a
• 30:23
  shift on. All right?
• 30:24
  That lift is coming. That's that's one short ladder
• 30:29
  doing a lot of work for like then just.
• 30:31
  Straight out the door bursting open then coming out is.
• 30:34
  That the railway line you can see in the background there.
• 30:36
  He just doesn't let up the pace, does he?
• 30:39
  Great locations. But this shot in a minute.
• 30:43
  I'll never forget the shot where the the camera, it sort of
• 30:46
  tracks along the roof. Looking at there, it's just
• 30:50
  gorgeous. I can't remember.
• 30:54
  They get down now. Does the helicopter swoop in?
• 30:56
  I think there might be another. Oh, well, there's a there's a
• 30:59
  rescue in the next episode, isn't there?
• 31:01
  Do they? There's a fire escape?
• 31:03
  There's a fire escape even. Even the doctor's quite calm.
• 31:06
  I mean, we're, yeah, we can't go back that way, can we, Jimmy
• 31:09
  now? I think this is where Fraser
• 31:10
  Hines has said yeah, we, we. Oh, it's so dark, we can't see
• 31:14
  anything. Anyway, but it is true I feel.
• 31:18
  Oh my God. Actually.
• 31:20
  It did sort of flower out his skirt then did you notice?
• 31:23
  Are we really resorted to this? You say resorted like hamster
• 31:28
  has never gone there before and. Oh yeah, I forget you've
• 31:32
  listened. Sorry.
• 31:34
  Oh, now no. We do.
• 31:36
  We do. The line go on.
• 31:38
  You're a stupid incompetent. I'm every available kind on him.
• 31:43
  Mind him and look how cross he is.
• 31:47
  Angriest, Tobias. I knew there'd be a little bit
• 31:52
  of porn quoted, but I didn't think I was going to have this
• 31:55
  much fun doing it. Yeah, now they're under the
• 31:58
  train. It's.
• 31:59
  Great and and and a railway siding is just a such a great
• 32:03
  place for any kind of action. See, Doctor Who just isn't like
• 32:07
  this normally. I love it.
• 32:10
  They slapped on the nail in A4. Done.
• 32:13
  With like we could have done with bits.
• 32:15
  Bits like this Inferno really it just growl, it makes it it's a
• 32:19
  real location it. Yeah, I mean, God, I I won't
• 32:22
  complain about the action in Inferno.
• 32:23
  It's industrial and creepy and. I, I love it, but I but a
• 32:28
  railway sighting goes a lot. I mean, what do I like to do on
• 32:32
  a day out? I really like to visit heritage
• 32:34
  railway. So when Doctor Who gets a bit
• 32:36
  heritage railway, I'm I'm there for it.
• 32:39
  Anytime it's on a train, I don't even care if it's a space train,
• 32:43
  I just love. Trains.
• 32:44
  Yeah, trains this. Is such a great cliffhanger.
• 32:47
  It is. It is.
• 32:49
  It's. Just how it's lit and shot, with
• 32:51
  the thing breathing and the light on Jamie's face.
• 32:58
  Why do the Cybermen? Is it a Cyberman in there?
• 33:03
  I think it must be. Well, it's not.
• 33:05
  It's not Zoe, is it? No.
• 33:07
  How many other girls have they put in those boxes?
• 33:11
  She's breathing very heavily and she's plus no sign of the Bower
• 33:14
  as well. That was a fabulous episode.
• 33:18
  Really good. Absolutely.
• 33:22
  The best part of it was Vaughn's interaction with everybody.
• 33:25
  Absolutely that. And it's really raised the ante.
• 33:28
  We went into that episode and Vaughn was still being terribly
• 33:31
  polite. Now that it's all out in the
• 33:33
  open and they're being pursued and there's just a hint that
• 33:38
  there's something else going on because what on earth is in
• 33:41
  these crates? We're just starting to see
• 33:44
  Vaughan's resolve crack as well, aren't we?
• 33:48
  And the more that happens, the better it gets.
• 33:50
  Well, I mean, that's sort of the conclusion we're drawing as we
• 33:53
  head into Episode 4 is the more Kevin Stoney.
• 33:56
  The better, the better and and the more mentions of Packer the
• 33:59
  better because we're now up to 28.
• 34:04
  Well, alas, we're no longer going to be watching Douglas
• 34:06
  Canfield direction, which has been incredibly good and stylish
• 34:11
  in the last couple of episodes. We're heading back to Cosgrove
• 34:14
  Hall Animation. Yeah, I'm going to miss
• 34:17
  Canfield, but I'm also really excited about going back to the
• 34:20
  animation. I mean, you've got four top dog
• 34:24
  episodes of Canfield to come after that, don't you worry.