Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Omnibus! Day of the Daleks featuring Gary Russell

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Omnibus! Day of the Daleks featuring Gary Russell · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

0:00
None. Hamster with a blunt pen knife.
0:35
We're doing quicker, quicker. Quicker so My name is Gary
0:41
Russell and this is Hamster with a Blunt Pen Knife, the podcast
0:46
in which we allegedly sit down and watch episodes of Doctor Who
0:52
and discuss them. And we don't get sidetracked and
0:54
we don't go off on tangents, do we, Joe, We're very, very good
0:57
about this. We are very strict and and
1:00
straight to the letter. No, not at all.
1:02
In fact, the last time we spoke it actually became more of an
1:06
interview. And I'm going to tell you
1:07
something, the numbers are scored for those episodes going
1:10
out. Absolutely phenomenal.
1:11
So thank you very much for that. I don't think people gave a shit
1:14
about the sensor rights by the end of that.
1:15
They just wanted about your career.
1:17
But. That was the whole point is we
1:18
wanted to, we wanted to to sort of convince people that the
1:21
sensor rights is good. So I'm just going to say now the
1:23
sensor rights is good and although we didn't talk about
1:26
it, you have to go and watch it again because it's brilliant.
1:29
And now we're going to do another one that I don't
1:32
understand why people don't think this is one of the
1:35
greatest stories in the history of Doctor Who, because it
1:38
absolutely is. What story is that then?
1:41
We're going to do Doctor Who in an exciting adventure with the
1:45
Day and the day of the Daleks from 1972.
1:48
Seventy. Yes. 72, isn't it?
1:49
Yes. Do you?
1:50
Know what? Before we even go in, did you
1:52
know? You were well into watching
1:54
Doctor Who at this point, weren't you?
1:55
Oh. Yeah, I've been watching it.
1:56
I've been watching it for 565 years at this point.
2:00
My first experience of this was the target novel.
2:03
Which is a very different beast, isn't it?
2:05
And it's fantastic as well. And then I've I've got back the
2:09
VHS, the compilation VHS. When I took out all the all the
2:13
cliffhangers, I was obsessed with it.
2:15
I can, honestly. I think I know every line of
2:17
dialogue from this story I've watched.
2:18
This, the novelisation of Dave the Dialects, was the first
2:21
target novelisation I ever bought.
2:23
I didn't even know novelisations existed and I walked into
2:27
Woolworths one day and there was Doctor Who and the Day of the
2:30
Dialects and Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon, and I could
2:32
only buy one. And I was so excited because you
2:34
just didn't find Doctor Who stuff back in those days.
2:38
And of course the day of the Dialects, I knew what it was.
2:40
There was a dialect, there was no ground, there was John
2:41
Pertwee. I know the doomsday weapon was
2:44
just a set of claws on the Master and I was like, that
2:47
isn't I don't remember that story so I don't know what that
2:50
is. And of course when I went back
2:52
the next week, having scrounge as much money off my dad as I
2:55
could and realise it was colony in space, I was also equally
2:58
excited. But dare the Daleks, first
3:00
Terence Dix book I ever read and it's very different from the TV
3:05
version. But he's just stupendous and and
3:09
you just think the amount of kids in the 70s who were
3:12
literally taught to read by Terence Dix and Malcolm Hulk
3:16
were those early target novels and they just elevated the art
3:20
of novelising things to such a high level.
3:23
Why do? You think he makes it look
3:24
effortless? Yeah.
3:27
How he can sort of start a scene, capture a location or a
3:30
character in a paragraph, so economically, a gift.
3:35
And I thought, have you written a book before he did that first
3:37
target Spearhead from space? I don't think he had, I think.
3:41
So I think he had because, well, he must have done because he
3:44
must have done had. You don't know.
3:46
It's Malcolm Holt did the Crossroads novelisation, isn't
3:49
he? I honestly don't know.
3:51
If Terence had, I think he'd probably written things that may
3:54
not have been published. But yeah, this might have been
3:56
his first published work. He tells that brilliant story.
4:00
There's a interview with him on YouTube where Justin Richards
4:04
got in touch about the quick reads and he was like, right,
4:06
Terence? We need this to be, you know,
4:08
unpretentious pose, simple, You know, to the point.
4:12
Because it's got to be for people that aren't used to
4:14
reading. He's like Justin, what are you
4:15
talking about? That's what I write all the time
4:17
anyway. And yeah, it makes it
4:20
spectacularly readable anyway. I can hear Terence's voice
4:25
saying that as well. What are we talking about?
4:27
Joshie? Wait, wait.
4:30
But as well do you? Do you ever fight with Terence?
4:33
He goes back and corrects what he might consider to be mistakes
4:39
that were made. Like he puts in the in the final
4:42
scene, doesn't he? That was edited out of.
4:45
The, the, the, the thing we're going to see in a minute, yes,
4:47
but that that's the joy of novelisation, since you always
4:50
do that. And I would imagine in all
4:52
honesty that at the time he would have novelised Day of the
4:57
Dialects, he was working from scripts, so he probably thought
5:01
that scene was there anyway. He'd actually probably forgotten
5:04
at that point that it wasn't even there because he would have
5:07
been working purely from scripts and no visuals.
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In those days you can just phone up the BB.
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Target couldn't phone up the BBC and say oh bung us over a VHS of
5:14
data at the Dialects. Because you know, in those days
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it would have appeared on a massive, great big one inch
5:19
machine that cost millions and millions of pounds to have.
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So you didn't have it. All Terrence would have had was
5:24
a handful of photos, and in those days we didn't have half
5:27
photos that we have today and those scripts and so yeah,
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that's what. He was looking from memory of.
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Being of memories, yes. I'm thinking, oh, I remember
5:37
when I was sitting in an office with doing Marks and we said we
5:39
should have a scene where this happens.
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Well, we couldn't do it, So we put it in the book on
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enormously. It's a very bad, very, very bad
5:47
toxic impersonation. I promised never to do that
5:50
again. Honestly, I was absolutely
5:52
compelled by that impression, and I think you'll promise you
5:55
we will start watching it. We've gone off a diversion
5:57
already. I'm.
5:59
So sorry, I'm just a bad influence on you, aren't I?
6:02
Terrible. Honestly, what everyone is that
6:04
last page of the Android invasion.
6:06
Do you remember that that novel where he's literally going?
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Oh no, I'm sorry, Bob. Bob, but you you haven't tied up
6:13
anything here. And the last paragraph is him
6:15
going right. We're going to have to get the
6:17
duplicates and take them all over there.
6:19
We're going to have to contact Unit and do this.
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And he basically ties up every plot point that's been left
6:24
dangling and then just writes the Android invasion was over.
6:29
Which you get a feeling, is a certain matter of joy in his
6:32
mind that he'd actually finished the novelisation of this really
6:36
quite blacklist of the first three episodes of Android
6:39
Invasion are brilliant, and the last episode completely and
6:43
utterly falls apart. And.
6:45
Still don't understand why they put an eye patch over Guy
6:48
Crawford's face. It still makes absolutely no
6:51
sense. His eye is there.
6:54
How many people live their entire life and never lift their
6:57
own eye pageant? My eyes.
7:00
Because it's not like he's he's come down in the last five
7:03
minutes. He's been there for months, if
7:05
not years at that point, and it never occurred to him whenever
7:08
he had a shower clean under the other.
7:12
Filthy underneath that WI pad. OK, OK, obviously there's lots
7:18
to our pick here. Not the Android invasion.
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They are the Daleks. Invasion.
7:22
But Day of the Daleks? Count us in.
7:25
Oh, skippers in your episode one.
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All right, 54321. Off we go.
7:35
I do have a question for you. Yes, I know you said off.
7:39
Mike, you're going to talk a little bit about being a wee
7:41
nipper. What was your first experience
7:45
of this and did you love it? Of this story?
7:47
God, yeah. So I'm sorry, I'm just going to
7:51
say that title sequence is the epitome of why I was in love for
7:55
Doctor Who. There has never been a better
7:58
title sequence than the first Purpley title sequence I.
8:01
Like the weirdest. Colour.
8:03
All of it. The the sound, the the the the
8:06
70s style shapes, the Purpley face in it.
8:09
That logo, the way it goes into episodes, the start of it.
8:13
Oh, it's just it just is Doctor Who's the people of my age I,
8:18
Dave the Daleks, was. I suppose I was just excited
8:22
that Doctor Who was back when we were all excited.
8:23
Everyone at school was excited. I lived in an era where the only
8:29
people that didn't Doctor Who want to say were a bit weird and
8:33
probably sat in the corner. Or like my friend friend Jane
8:37
Edwards, who didn't have ATV. Her parents didn't believe in
8:40
television so they wouldn't ever have one.
8:42
And she was living Doctor Who vicariously through the other
8:45
sort of 25 people in my school, in my class at school, because
8:49
she'd never seen it and we'd all talk about it and she'd get
8:52
excited and she'd be thrilled about Doctor Who.
8:54
She didn't know what it was because she couldn't see it.
8:55
She wasn't allowed to see it, but it was a big thing.
8:58
So. So Doctor Who coming back for a
9:01
new series, when you're sort of like 7-8 years old, you're kind
9:09
of, it's like 10 years since since the Demons finished, you
9:15
know, it can't only be a few months.
9:17
It it felt like 10 years, a whole school year virtually had
9:20
gone past, it seemed. So Doctor Who coming back at
9:23
Christmas was a was a big thrill and a big excitement and it was
9:27
trailed the week before in a little photograph of Jon Pertwee
9:31
and a Dalek against a red flash. And I was like, how is a Dalek
9:34
is? A.
9:38
Dalek It didn't occur to me that the Daleks had been away because
9:44
it's only about four years really between.
9:46
Was it 67? Isn't it?
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Is evil. Of the Daleks, it's four or five
9:51
years. 72. 72 So what it for me as a kid Daleks are still
9:59
everywhere. They were in they'd been in TV
10:02
comic they would probably that was only they'd been in
10:05
Countdown at this point. But they were in the annuals.
10:10
We all had our Doctor Who stuff and Daleks were everywhere.
10:14
So I remember years later reading articles in fans and
10:20
things about how important this was that the Dialects were back
10:22
in. It was a big launch and the
10:23
Dialects hadn't been in it for five years, and but as a kid in
10:27
1972, it actually didn't seem that the Dialects hadn't.
10:31
To me, the Dialects were always part of Doctor Who and it's only
10:35
when you sit down and think. Actually, of course, they hadn't
10:38
been on television for five years.
10:40
But I didn't think that, you know, something to do.
10:41
To me, it was just the Daleks are back.
10:43
Of course they're back, because that's what Doctor Who does.
10:46
Because you you equated Doctor Who and the Daleks, even if they
10:50
weren't on television with being one parcel, practice and parcel
10:54
the same thing. So it was very exciting they
10:57
were back. But I don't think it had quite
10:59
the thrill for me and my friends at school that Barry Letts
11:02
probably intended it to have. He liked opening, didn't he,
11:07
Every season with like a big. Gang.
11:10
And to be fair, the ratings were climbing throughout Hurley's
11:13
time. Suddenly there is like the Teds,
11:15
aren't they? They're very spectacularly well
11:17
now. Now we've got, we're just saying
11:19
we've just got to this sequence in Day of the Daleks that has
11:22
that. Obviously the kiss off at the
11:24
end, which got cut by Paul Bernard, which means that this
11:30
made no sense. I can't tell you.
11:31
In 1972 I didn't worry about, I'd forgotten about this scene.
11:35
So when it didn't happen at the end of episode 4, I don't think
11:39
anyone, any of us at school will go, what was that scene back in
11:42
episode one? Because you didn't think about
11:45
things particularly in those days.
11:46
There's a there's a comment by somebody on one of the special
11:50
features. I think it's on the day of the
11:51
Daleks thing, because I'm sure it's probably Barry saying it,
11:54
or maybe it's Terence saying, actually saying you shouldn't
11:57
put the explanations in episode 4.
11:59
You should always put them in episode two or three, because
12:02
all people want from episode 4. They've remembered all of that
12:04
story and all they want is bangs of flashes in the final episode.
12:08
And I completely disagree with that from the from the point of
12:11
view of a kid, you remember the big moments of an episode a week
12:17
apart, but you don't remember. Actually the blow by blows what
12:22
the story is about. I mean, it probably doesn't
12:24
matter a great deal. It's about Doctor Who and the
12:26
dialects and some gorillas, and it's in the future.
12:28
But the actual explanation stuff, it is actually quite good
12:32
to have it reiterated every week there.
12:35
There's a There's a policy in television for many, many years
12:39
called Show Don't Tell because everyone hates exposition.
12:42
And I actually think that's a really stupid rule.
12:45
To have exposition and reminding the audience what's going on in
12:49
a story is not a bad thing. Because kids, I mean, probably
12:55
today's kids are more sophisticated than we were.
12:57
But kids generally go, oh, it's excitement and television.
13:01
They don't necessarily sit down and and write down the plot
13:04
points every week. And because in those days you
13:07
had, no, I mean, I wasn't sitting there even with an audio
13:11
recorder at this point. So you had no way of referring
13:14
back to the previous episode. You just had your memories of
13:16
last Saturday and to an 8 year old kid, seven days Saturday to
13:21
sassay. Might as well be a month.
13:23
Well, it's what, 22 1/2 minutes of that Saturday as well, you
13:27
know? And you waited whole Saturday,
13:29
do you? And, you know, you're thinking,
13:30
I don't even remember what the climax.
13:32
I don't remember what the cliffhanger was to last week's
13:34
episode. But I know, I will remember when
13:35
it starts like, Oh yeah, of course that's how it ended.
13:38
Because you're you're not, you're not watching television
13:41
really. To remember that sort of stuff.
13:43
You're watching television to be loving it for the 22 minutes
13:47
that is on TV. It's happening now, sort of in
13:50
later years when we've gone back, watched this in, you know,
13:53
an in its entirety and we're, you know, critical about it and
13:57
we're studying it in all these ways.
13:59
I mean, this was being made pretty much on the fly back in
14:02
the 70s. More importantly, it was made to
14:05
be seen in 22 segments, 7 days apart.
14:08
It wasn't made to be sat down with two sad old men like us
14:12
watching and sitting again. Well, that's a continuity
14:16
mistake and all that doesn't make any sense.
14:18
And we're not going to. Be doing none of that, all
14:21
right? Didn't matter in those days
14:24
because it wasn't watched in one long ago.
14:28
Do you ever do that, though? Will you?
14:29
Will you ever watch a story you know, like a week apart, an
14:32
episode at a time? No Doctor.
14:34
Doctor Who for me these days, particularly pert week is is
14:37
comfort food. So you know, the slightest
14:41
moment where I'm thinking a bit, kind of, I'll slap a Purpley on,
14:45
and then I think it's. Exactly the same issue, exactly
14:48
the same. I go straight to Purpley if I'm
14:51
having a bad day. It's all about.
14:54
Because it's the best era of Doctor Who, full stop.
14:56
That is, It is just perfection. There is no such thing.
15:01
There's almost no such thing as a bad Purpley story clause of
15:04
access. But the rest of them are just,
15:07
you know, streets above anything else.
15:08
So for me, it's my Purpley is my automatic go to.
15:12
And this is a story I have seen a billion times because of that,
15:16
because it's so good. And then there's a second best.
15:18
I will probably go for a Davison but more.
15:21
Interesting. Do you know what your mind is?
15:23
My second would be Colin. Not enough of them.
15:29
I was an angry teenager. 40 Times Now there's a There's a
15:34
few more Davidsons than there are Collins.
15:37
Can I go drifting towards Tom or anything like that?
15:41
Can I draw your attention to she's not on the screen right
15:43
now, Miss Pageant? Who doesn't?
15:45
She's not in this story for very long.
15:46
She's obviously off smoking 20 Benson's or something like that,
15:49
because she's got that in all of Doctor Who.
15:52
I wish. She's fabulous.
15:52
I wish she was. In Eve McFarland.
15:54
Brilliant. She's didn't have a
15:55
fantastically long career after this, and if I remember rightly,
16:00
is actually ill and doesn't make the final studio recording.
16:05
So although credited for episode 4, is actually only seen as a
16:07
glorified extra on the film sequences outside Orderly House
16:11
and her lines are given to somebody else.
16:13
But she's brilliant, isn't she? She's very convincing the way
16:16
she she argues with his original styles.
16:19
The time paradox storyline and time travel in general, which is
16:23
obviously something that actually wasn't.
16:24
Really. Here Now we're suddenly jumped
16:27
forward to the 22nd century. And there's Aubrey Morris making
16:31
his chair go round with his feet.
16:32
Very sorry. Aubrey Woods.
16:35
Not Aubrey Morris. Aubrey Woods.
16:36
I know what Louis Marks and Terrence Dicks between them
16:39
managed to do is break down the ideas very simply, but never
16:44
patronising me, and in a really interesting way, where the plot
16:47
develops in really interesting ways.
16:50
That's not an easy thing to do. It's it's science fiction for
16:54
kids. And basically, I think you sit
16:57
down and you say in exposition they've gone forward to the 22nd
17:02
century. That's all you need.
17:04
Someone tells 8 year old Gary Russell they're now in the 22nd
17:07
century. I don't need any other stuff
17:09
around it. I don't need to know how they
17:11
got there. I don't need to know why they
17:13
got there. I don't need to know the
17:15
scientific accuracy of time. It's just bollocks.
17:19
It just needs to be telling a good story, which Dave the
17:22
Daleks does brilliantly for this.
17:23
You know, the whole time travel thing, it's great fun and yes,
17:27
you can sit down at the end of it and go for me, I think the
17:29
paradox very, very cleverly. It is a good time paradox,
17:33
probably couldn't be done really, but it it really, really
17:36
works. But it doesn't matter.
17:38
It's a nice pay off at the end of episode 4, but again in 1972
17:42
I'm not convinced. I sat there going, oh that's
17:45
really clever because that relates back to what happened in
17:48
episode one where the blah blah blah.
17:50
I didn't care. It was just men with guns
17:52
shooting at Ogrons and Daleks and blowing up houses, and
17:55
that's what you want as a kid. And I do think that sadly, we
18:00
tend these days to forget that storytelling can afford to be
18:04
quite simplistic. People is good If it's a good
18:08
story well told, You don't need all the bollocks around it to to
18:13
justify what you're doing. The moment you have to justify
18:17
something in a story, your story is back because the audience
18:20
should be carried along and not have time to sit down and think.
18:23
That's actually doesn't work very well.
18:25
And it's the peculiar thing about us as Doctor Who fans in
18:29
that we do that, we we, we, we sort of commit autopsies on our
18:33
episodes of Doctor Who. And the worst thing, of course,
18:36
is we can do an autopsy on a 1972 story because we've got 50
18:40
years since it went out and lots of research and we know what how
18:44
it was made. The worst thing is when people
18:46
are doing autopsies of a modern episode of of Chris's or Stevens
18:50
or or Russell's 30 seconds after it's finished and think
18:54
automatically they're experts on television and they know what
18:57
went wrong and brother and no one sits down and goes.
18:59
You know what, Have a bit of patience, sit back and let it
19:02
percolate for a few weeks or a couple of years and then go
19:05
examine it and find out whether it works or not.
19:07
It's a peculiar thing. You know how people tend to
19:10
spoil their own enjoyment of something that's being delivered
19:13
to entertain them? It's baffling to me sometimes.
19:16
I was. I was trying to look for the
19:18
best. I am critical, but I always try
19:20
to look for the best. I think there's a degree of 1
19:23
upmanship as well with with fans and this has been going on since
19:27
the late 70s really when fandom really started being
19:30
hypercritical of of things. It's not a new thing to be hyper
19:33
critical but I think it comes down to a degree of 1 upmanship
19:36
that you never got at school but in in adult life and by adult I
19:41
mean sort of over 16. You kind of you want to be seen
19:47
to be critical you want to be seen to be clever.
19:50
Oh well obviously that's a shit episode.
19:52
The Doctor. That's a terrible episode, such
19:54
that's an awful episode of Casualty because they did this
19:56
and this and this and and you actually don't know what on
19:59
earth you're talking about, but you kind of want to seem amongst
20:03
your peers that you are clever and you are erudite and you you
20:06
can dissect television. That person comes across the
20:10
obnoxious person in the room, though, You know, usually the
20:12
loudest person saying that sort of thing, yes.
20:14
Yes, it's the old pub culture, and that's what social media
20:18
multiplies, because you can be the loudest person in the room
20:21
because you're actually the only person in the room typing.
20:24
So automatically you become the loudest person in the room.
20:27
I can't believe I'm I'm about to draw your attention because I
20:30
feel like I'm pointing out the most obscure details here, but
20:32
these fabulous women hovering their hands in the air well.
20:37
They are clearly predicting Apple technology 50 years early
20:41
because they're basically just swiping.
20:44
That's all they're doing. But it's kind of simple
20:46
shorthand for this is the the week, yeah.
20:50
There's no what I love about this.
20:52
There's a couple of things I really love about this that that
20:55
we should talk about the the, the future thing.
20:58
One, which is as you say is there's no controls on those
21:01
tables. We well, none that we can see
21:04
anyway, but they're just moving their hands over them and and
21:06
sort of doing what they do because it looks futuristic.
21:10
The other thing is you see it and a couple of episodes later
21:13
you'll see it. They don't have and they don't
21:16
read anything. They have to kind of like
21:18
Braille and and computer cut out stuff and they run their hands
21:22
along it while they're talking and that's how they read.
21:25
I've never. Noticed.
21:26
That. Oh you watch it later, Nobody
21:28
reads anything. They look at each other in the
21:30
eye and they're running their fingers along the top of this
21:32
Braille like paper and that's how they get their messages.
21:36
And I just thought again that's a simple way of going to kids.
21:40
This is the future. This is right.
21:42
And the other thing that's so lovely about it, which doesn't
21:45
happen in very many Doctor Who's is it's a joy for the make up
21:49
department because they very cleverly every single person
21:52
from the 22nd century gorillas. Has this kind of.
21:56
Scene on their face, which really makes everything reflect
22:00
in that set because the set is very silver and green.
22:03
So by having that silver make up and and you look at the look at
22:07
the next time he's on the air, look at Aubrey Woods's fingers.
22:10
He's wearing fingernails, he's wearing finger varnish, he's
22:12
wearing blue varnish on his fingernails.
22:15
And it just again adds to the sort of futuristic unworld news
22:20
of it. And I don't think until Robots
22:22
of death, anyone ever really sat down and used make up to very
22:27
subtly tell you that you're in a healing environment.
22:31
Yeah, but it makes the world come together that that the all
22:35
the the girls operating, the controller, all the security
22:38
guards, they all have that silver thing on their face.
22:41
It's just brilliant. And we talk about Perk, where
22:43
he's one Man. Food and Wine show here, please.
22:46
Yes, he's wine, which is a touchstardomic but not cynical.
22:51
Purwi at his best, isn't it? It's like everyone just loves
22:56
poet because he he's that perfect 70s renaissance man have
23:01
faith. With him, he's He's never going
23:04
to lose Poet. What is he?
23:06
Well, except Inferno. But you have to lose Inferno.
23:10
But that's a whole different thing to talk about one day.
23:13
He's loving this though. Look at him smelling that glass.
23:16
Or. And then you've got this
23:18
brilliant scene here with with the, the, the, the, the
23:23
connection between Yates and Benton's.
23:25
Benton's saying, you know, give us some food, darling, and Joe
23:28
gives him the food. And then Yates just comes up as
23:31
an. Absolute.
23:32
Oh, Joe, how thoughtful. Yeah, what a prick.
23:36
And it's the fact that he know, even when he's talking to Benton
23:40
about it. And he said tells him to go off
23:42
and and, you know, investigate those other troops.
23:46
There's a smile on Captain Yates's lips because he knows
23:49
he's he's such a shit to poor old Benton.
23:52
In all of those Unit stories, even, I don't really think
23:54
there's a poor one. I think there's a lot I love
23:56
about even the time on stuff. But there's all those lovely
23:59
little character moments with the Unit guys in all.
24:02
Like, even if it's a terrible scene or a bad episode or
24:05
whatever, there's cute stuff going on and it's absolutely
24:08
just rampant. With it, I do think that.
24:11
I mean, people always talk about the demons, and I think it's
24:13
because the cart stories talk about the demons.
24:15
People talk about the Demons as being sort of the epitome of the
24:17
UNIT family, but it isn't. I think this story has so many
24:21
little lovely moments between Benton and Yates and the
24:25
Brigadier and any combination of that.
24:27
That fantastic sequence where Yates and Benton later on go
24:31
back to the UNIT HQ and they talk to the Doctor on the flag
24:35
and the Doctor's not there and the Doctor is on the phone and
24:38
he does that. Don't forget to tell the marines
24:41
lies and Yates is. It just looks at the breeze
24:44
like, And I told you, is it? Listen to me.
24:46
I'm a captain. I know what I'm talking about.
24:49
The Brigadiers like, oh shit, well, they're obviously right.
24:52
And I can't possibly tell Benton and Yates they're right.
24:54
And there's a moment. The love is when the Doctor
24:58
where the Brigadier goes. Doctor come back at once.
25:00
When he goes on knowing full well he's never going to listen
25:03
to it, I'm going. To see him again, yeah.
25:05
Oh, they're great. But I have heard people say that
25:07
Purwi is a little sort of we're coming out of that kind of
25:11
overly arrogant period into where he's a bit gentler a lot
25:15
further down the line. I'd rather like him when he's a
25:17
bit of an asshole, you know. Yeah, well, I think he needs to
25:19
be a bit of an asshole. I mean, he never is that much.
25:22
He's very rude to Joe Grant in the Demons, I think, but then
25:26
he's rude to everyone in the Demons.
25:27
I think the Demons is an interesting bit of writing
25:29
because it's Barry Letts where he's writing Pertwee as William
25:33
Hartnell and all that. That all that stuff in the pub
25:36
and they're looking at Haunted Beasts and everything.
25:38
And Pertwee is quite rude and abrasive.
25:40
Other than that, like he's not terribly rude and abrasive.
25:42
He's very fond of Joe right back, sort of.
25:45
By the time you've got to mind of Evil, the relationship
25:49
between him and Joe and the relationship between him and the
25:51
Brigadier is a lot of fun and A and A and a lot of of goodness
25:55
you. Remember that?
25:56
Had a problem in cursive peloton where he's like, oh, don't you
26:00
like being a Princess, Princess and just a chemistry guy?
26:03
That point is on fire. You can tell that the the, the,
26:07
the, the, the two of them here are having a friendship off
26:12
screen that is very much like Diana Riggan and Patrick, Minnie
26:16
and The Avengers. You can just see the chemistry
26:18
on screen because they are clearly all good friends and and
26:22
when you add Courtney and and Naveen and and Franklin into the
26:26
mix, it's just wonderful. It's just really, really good.
26:29
And look, there's Jimmy Winston. People talk about J&T doing sort
26:33
of stunt casting in the in the late 80s with pop stars and
26:37
things. The cast Jimmy Winston in a
26:40
leading part in in Day of the Daleks and nobody sits down and
26:43
goes, oh that's that's Paul Bernard doing stunt casting, is
26:46
it? But when I talk about Paul
26:48
Bernard, thank you for bringing him up.
26:50
Anna Barry's there as well, and let's just have a moment.
26:53
Let's just worship at the feet of Anna Barry.
26:56
She is a goddess, as here is Gypsy Kent.
27:00
Sarah Kent as. As as the UNIT radio operator
27:05
who I just love because again, she just gives side eye to the
27:10
Brigadier all. Right at the end of the stage,
27:12
as one of Joe Anna Barry's on the commentary for this, right.
27:15
And I've heard, you know, one shot actors come on like the
27:18
woman who played Queen Phillera in Monster Peloton didn't have a
27:20
clue why she was there for the commentary.
27:22
She's sort of going along with it and she's like, I don't
27:24
really know why I'm here. Anna Barry comes onto the
27:26
commentary of Day of the Daleks and she is intelligently picking
27:31
apart this piece of television and praising it for what it is.
27:35
And I think she's she went on to direct, didn't she?
27:37
And. Just a lot of work, very smart,
27:40
very clever lady. Probably didn't get treated like
27:44
lots of people in the 70s. Probably wasn't treated as well
27:48
as she should have been. Because I suspect a lot of male
27:50
directors and actors are probably quite frightened of a
27:52
woman with with the guts and the the smarts that she had.
27:56
No hint of embarrassment though, of being in it.
27:59
She's she's in the targets. Why would you be embarrassed?
28:01
It's brilliant. Look, we've got trim phones.
28:05
We had a trim phone at home that was exactly the same colour as
28:09
that, the 2 tone green trim phone.
28:10
I remember watching this as a kid and kind of looking across
28:14
our phone and going Doctor Who has phones like ours.
28:18
It's little things like that that I used to love about it.
28:21
And you know, I feel like the and I don't always get this
28:23
right. The exterior and the interior
28:25
match. Yeah, although they do have a
28:31
pawn shunt in this big big house for massive sort of 60s wall
28:36
coverings and hangings in keeping with everything else
28:41
that that he has in this house. Although of course they do make
28:44
this thing at the beginning of how it isn't Reginald Stiles's
28:46
house. He's been put here for
28:48
safekeeping, but then everyone in the 22nd century assumes it
28:51
is his house and it sort of becomes his house after that.
28:55
But I like that because that's again is we can say with the
28:58
power of hindsight is a clever thing of history is being
29:03
written by the winners and therefore they would think that
29:06
was Reginald Styles House because why wouldn't they.
29:08
All they know is they got to go to a house where this man lives.
29:11
The whole thing about their immediate assumption, you know
29:15
old regional stars blew himself up with everyone else.
29:17
Nobody sits down and thinks, well, why did he do that?
29:19
They just go, well, that's what we're told in history happened.
29:22
Therefore he must be the bad guy.
29:24
And I love that fact that they get little things that that
29:28
wrong you. Know they do that whole mistake
29:29
identity thing with the Doctor. They think he's, I love to get
29:32
out. Also that where he goes, oh,
29:33
just read that paper down there and they read it and they're
29:35
like, right, OK, you're not a star.
29:38
Yeah. I love that.
29:40
Here are the. Darlings and Boas as well in
29:42
this because that's very convincing that she's in charge
29:47
sure is the hot head that's gone off and they think got killed.
29:52
And Boas is very sort of cynical and and angry with an act
29:57
because he's there. He's got a singular mission.
29:59
He's been sent on and. The dynamic.
30:03
The right thing pulled out from under his right feet all the
30:06
time. Sometimes you have these sort of
30:08
guest characters come in to Doctor Who stories, and I feel
30:11
like, yeah, they're not. They're specifically designed
30:12
for this story. And sometimes you have
30:13
characters come in like I believe they had history before
30:16
this story and they're going to go on and have an adventure
30:18
afters. And I believe the dynamic set
30:21
this ended The Dialects turned up and I just briefly want you
30:25
to talk about the voices, the staccato Dalek voices.
30:30
Again, one of those things that I never noticed until I'd been
30:34
in fandom for about 10 years and everyone goes, oh, the dollar
30:36
voices. Dialects are really shit, you
30:38
know, because they're not Peter Hawkins or Roy Skelton back in
30:42
1972. And you know, watching as a kid,
30:45
frontier in space and death to the dialects and Genesis and
30:48
everything, where they're all done by different voice artists,
30:51
You know, Michael Wisher comes in at one point to do them as
30:53
well, that it's a dialect. Voice.
30:55
It didn't matter. It was a dialect to my mind.
30:58
Yeah, of course that was a dialect.
30:59
That's what they sound like. Yes, I can look at it now and
31:01
go, yes, they are too slow and pronouncing it, but you know,
31:05
that was a decision that was made and who cares?
31:10
They're Daleks. Can I ask you a question about
31:12
dialect voices? You may not choose to answer
31:14
this, but it was in that big finished book, so I tend to
31:16
believe that it's true. Did you once play a Dalek in
31:19
that Big Finish story and then you yourself chose to take it
31:22
out? Yeah, absolutely.
31:23
It was. It must have been genocide
31:25
machine. And I was terrible.
31:28
I was the campus gayest Dalek you've ever heard.
31:31
And I was up against Alistair Locke, you know.
31:33
So that shows how Camp and Gay I must have sounded.
31:37
And we were up at Alistair Locke's house doing the, doing
31:40
the voices, because they were all done afterwards.
31:42
We didn't do them in studio and at the end of it, we went back.
31:48
Nick and I went home with the stuff and Nick played it back
31:51
and he just looked at me and I listened and I just went, yeah,
31:55
I'm shit, aren't I go and re record it.
31:57
And so he re recorded doing a different dialect, voice, all of
32:00
my stuff. Because yes, I was just the
32:03
gayest camping style you've ever heard.
32:05
And it's interesting on the special edition, you know, I I'm
32:07
a massive fan of Nick Riggs's dialect voices, but it felt
32:11
fundamentally wrong to hear that dialect voice.
32:15
Coming out of these. Days.
32:16
This is so ingrained in my childhood.
32:19
Like that. It's like weird thing with this
32:22
story that I don't understand why it was done and why it was
32:27
done so badly in the episodes 2:00 and 3:00.
32:32
And they don't do it with episode 4.
32:34
But episodes two and three start with the recap going into the
32:38
theme music again, snatch. And then it's abruptly cut off.
32:43
And it's just a weird decision, a probably by Paul Bernard for
32:48
doing it. But also weird that Barry Letts,
32:52
who had done work experimentation in season seven
32:54
with new title sequences and trying to work out what worked
32:56
and what didn't, didn't sit down and go This Is Us a shit.
33:00
This simply doesn't work. It's it's just an odd thing to
33:06
have in these episodes. And it never happened.
33:08
And they did do some straight when they ambassador death
33:11
title. Sequence anyway.
33:12
Season seven stuff. Every title sequence is
33:14
different in some way or other. But they kind of all worked and
33:17
the best innovation he brought in the best and it goes all
33:21
throughout the well throughout the rest of Doctor Who's classic
33:24
run I think is bringing in that screen at the.
33:27
End of episode. So, yes, yes, I always thought
33:31
that what he did with Ambassadors of Death, which is
33:36
bit of title sequence recap, second bit of title sequence
33:40
with the Ambassador of Death, I would love them to have done
33:43
that forever. I I think that's a really clever
33:45
way of doing the recaps. But what they do here just is
33:50
jarring because you assume that it's a mistake when it happens
33:53
at the start of episode 2, you just go, oh, that's clearly a
33:55
mistake. When it happens again in the
33:56
episode 3, you go, Oh no, this is deliberate.
33:58
They've chosen to do this, and then it doesn't happen in
34:01
episode 4, and you're kind of like.
34:03
I think they've probably locked it in and then they've got, oh
34:06
man, that mistake's there. But that episode's done now.
34:08
It's ready to go. Probably Is it?
34:10
Oh, do it again Episode 4 to get round it.
34:12
They have a very, very you don't get for the first time in a
34:15
poetry story since Spearhead, you don't get the actual proper
34:21
recap from from the previous episode.
34:23
The Episode 3 ends with the Shouton and Hartnell on the
34:27
screen and the dance going blah blah blah.
34:28
You'll be exterminated. Episode 4 doesn't have it.
34:31
It has the beginning of it. And then the controller comes in
34:33
and you miss what you actually did the squeal out of at the end
34:37
of Episode 3. And I wonder if that was a case,
34:40
if they did do it. And Barry, let's finally went,
34:42
no, not doing this, cut it in. Because, you know, it's quite
34:45
hard to cut stuff on videotape in those days once it was
34:48
finished, but it just feels that they cut that out because it
34:52
would have just been awful. Paul Bernard is obviously new to
34:55
this, and I do want to talk about Paul Bernard a little
34:58
more. We should probably cut this here
35:02
and skip into Episode 2 if you're ready to go.
35:05
I'm halfway through episode 2 now.
35:07
Oh dear. I'm so sorry.
35:10
You've forgotten how we do this, haven't you?
35:11
I've forgotten. Oh fuck, it won't let me.
35:15
Oh, you stupid machine, Right? Hang on, I'm just going back to
35:18
episode selection and I'll start episode 2 again.
35:21
Yeah, no, I just left it running and just rambled.
35:25
OK, welcome back to Hamster with a Blunt Pen Life, the Doctor Who
35:29
commentary podcast. After our usual technical
35:33
inexperience at the end of episode one, of which Gary
35:37
watched the half of episode 2 already, here we are, The Day of
35:41
the Daleks, episode 2. I cannot be trusted with a with
35:45
a play button on a remote control.
35:47
Is basically what you're saying I.
35:49
Mean. This is when we get talking
35:50
which is the the actual what we're watching is relevant in
35:54
and I'll. Press.
35:56
Play in 54321 Let's go. Are you fond of a a camera?
36:08
Zoom or two, because I'll tell you what, there's a fair few in
36:11
this, you know. Well, you know, Paul Bernard's
36:15
an interesting director, isn't he?
36:17
I think there is a thing that happens a lot in 70s Doctor Who
36:21
and certainly some 80s Doctor Who, but mainly 70s Doctor Who
36:25
where you get directors who can either are really, really good
36:29
in the studio. I think Barry Lex is brilliant
36:32
director in the studio and Lenny Mayne's another fantastic
36:36
direction in the studio. And then you get other directors
36:38
that are fantastic film directors, but the moment
36:41
they've done the filming, they go into the four or five camera
36:44
studio setup, they get completely lost.
36:46
And I think Paul Bernard falls into that category.
36:49
His work on film, his, his, his cinematography on this story is
36:55
just absolutely brilliant. It's awesome angles and and
36:59
clever look, you know, lots of stuff with with full focusing
37:03
and things on the House. That brilliant sequence in
37:06
episode one and whether they're all going towards house and that
37:10
knockout scene in episode 4 where the injured surer is going
37:13
across the grounds to get into the house is is masterfully
37:17
done. But I do think in studio he gets
37:20
a little bit ham fisted and lost and I and I think and there's a
37:25
you're talking about pull pull out.
37:26
Well, there's a lovely one pulling out of the Dalek here, I
37:29
think he's. Trying to suggest movement where
37:31
he can't, where they can't move, those bulky cameras.
37:35
He's trying to suggest that there's movement going on, but
37:37
actually if you kind of tune into how many zooms there are,
37:41
you're just aware that you're zooming in and out all the time.
37:45
And then he's got this weird thing here where he does the,
37:47
the, the cross mixing for the obviously what was originally
37:50
the. End of and I suggest numbers.
37:53
Yeah, Or just trying to make it look more interesting because he
37:56
probably sits in one of those directors who's probably sat
37:59
there and thought, God Darl, it's a boring to look at because
38:03
you can do them and clearly the set they're in is actually very,
38:06
very small. I mean it gets miraculously
38:09
bigger in episode 3 where suddenly they've got a table and
38:11
a screen in there, but it probably is actually quite a
38:14
small part of the studio. So he's trying to make it look
38:16
as interesting again. There's some stuff there's a lot
38:19
of scenes with with Aubrey Woods here where he's talking to the
38:22
Daleks and he's always talking to the gold Daleks because it's
38:25
the leader and the gold Daleks is always off screen and you
38:28
only see the the the 2 Blue Daleks and the eye stalk of the
38:32
gold Dalek. And he's you know all we would
38:34
just giving his all in acting to this this lump of wooden and
38:38
plastic and it's off screen. And I just think yeah, that's
38:42
that's a sign of what, why didn't the director go.
38:45
Hang on a minute. Stop a minute.
38:47
John's got Martin. Can you roll 4, three inches
38:50
actually in view, please? And there's a lot of that that
38:54
goes. On I mean, let's let's get it.
38:58
Harry less isn't the commentary that he wouldn't take notes, he
39:01
said. I was always trying to give him
39:02
advice and I'm a director and he just wouldn't take notes, so.
39:07
Seen a lot of stuff where people who worked on this show, both
39:10
actors and people behind the scenes, generally seem to be
39:15
quite negative about Paul Bernard.
39:17
And yet bizarrely, they bring him back a couple more times.
39:21
It's not like they've sat down and gone.
39:23
This guy didn't listen to what we wanted on Day of the Daleks.
39:26
We won't use him again. It's not sort of like a love at
39:29
Bickford situation. They they then employ him again
39:31
because he comes back later this season, doesn't he?
39:33
And does. He's just time monsters, doesn't
39:34
he? I was running Frontier in space.
39:36
And then he's Frontier in space. He's Daleks again, which clearly
39:41
he doesn't like very much. And of course then he goes off
39:44
and does The Tomorrow People and again does this fantastic thing
39:48
where all the film work on The Tomorrow People is exceptional.
39:52
And that opening episode of The Tomorrow People is just some of
39:55
the best British TV film work you'll ever see in the studio.
40:01
He is completely screwed by the fact he's got five cameras
40:03
moving around the tin of the computer and that's all he's got
40:06
and and his studio work is done. So I think he's one of those
40:09
directors that really loved being out on location and
40:13
working with film and he's very easily lost in in studio.
40:17
The only time that's not true is this this stuff here that's in
40:21
Styles, his house. Where he's got a set that's big
40:24
enough for him to get the cameras moving where he wants
40:26
them. It's so interesting you say,
40:28
about being negative about him because Katie says in the
40:31
Frontier in Space commentary that she didn't really like
40:34
working with him, He wasn't really an actor's director.
40:36
And then she's watching Frontier in Space and somewhere in sort
40:40
of episodes 4-5 or six, she goes, do you know what I'm
40:42
actually seeing? What he was doing behind the
40:45
camera and sort of the visual flair that was there?
40:48
And because he was an artist at The Artist's Eye and things like
40:51
that and how he was using shadow and lighting and all this sort
40:54
of stuff. All the stuff on the South Bank
40:57
is beautiful, isn't it? Yeah, where we were very
41:01
recently. Yes.
41:03
Yes, it hasn't changed. I have to say every time.
41:07
I used to work up there because I worked at the National Theatre
41:09
for a couple of years when I back in the early 80s, and I
41:12
spent my entire life looking for ogrons and walking up and down
41:16
that spiral staircase, concrete spiral, that exterior staircase,
41:19
very excited and thinking. I remember when ogrons were here
41:23
years before. We knew what locations were and
41:25
no one went around trying to find locations.
41:27
But I always recognize that my Oh my God, this is where the
41:31
frontier. Is Spain.
41:32
I went to Leeds Castle the other week all right and stood on that
41:35
bridge and said next time I shall not be so lenient and
41:37
jumped in. Did you watch for canine going
41:41
round and round and round in a on a little?
41:44
Oh, I love that story. So do you know you said about
41:47
the Torah people there, This is a tangent now.
41:49
But someone suggested I watch the Tomorrow People.
41:51
The other. I've never seen an episode.
41:52
It's all down brick box now They said, Oh yeah, go stick on this
41:55
one. Starring Peter Davidson.
41:57
Oh. That's awful.
41:59
I've never seen anything quite like it in my life.
42:00
I don't. Know that's not a good episode
42:03
of The Tomorrow People to start with.
42:06
Now, the very first story of The Tomorrow People, the very first
42:09
five episode story is bloody brilliant.
42:12
Absolutely brilliant. And then the story that opens
42:14
Season 2, the blue and the green, which can I think might
42:17
be Paul Bernard, is also utterly fantastic.
42:20
There's more people. There's one of those series more
42:23
so than Doctor Who or anything else, that is utterly variable
42:28
and you can have a really, really good story followed by a
42:31
really terrible story. And sadly, as it goes on for
42:34
it's eight seasons, the tend to outweigh the good ones.
42:38
But there is always moments of the Tomorrow people which are
42:41
actually brilliant and most of that is because the people
42:44
playing the Tomorrow. People are good fun than all I I
42:47
had a massive hard on for Christian Schmidt in my teens.
42:50
Oh, in. The in the reboot, yeah.
42:52
In Noon tomorrow, Do you remember Jane Marsh as the Mad
42:55
Bug Lady? Yes.
42:57
Marvellous. Sorry, I'm back off there with
42:58
Alex again. I love tomorrow people in all
43:01
versions. I think is such a great concept
43:03
and done properly could be quite brilliant today.
43:06
I should probably do the run. Did they do another reboot of
43:09
that? Yeah, they did an American
43:10
reboot and and it starts really well and then very quickly you
43:14
can see they don't really know what they're doing with it.
43:16
They kind of thought this is a really great idea for a show and
43:20
then they kind of go she doesn't.
43:21
We're kind of lost here. There's nowhere to go with this
43:24
and it's a shame. Whereas actually I think down in
43:27
Britain, it's one of those shows that needs to be terribly
43:30
British and a bit gritty and a bit sort of good for kids and
43:34
not made in the studio but made on film.
43:38
It needs the Doctor Who treatment because the concept of
43:42
this could be you. You could wake up one morning
43:45
and break out and have all these superpowers as a kid again.
43:48
And this is around the same time as Dad the Dallas because
43:50
Tomorrow People was around this time.
43:52
It was a very exciting thing to watch the Tomorrow People and
43:55
realize that that could be you and and that you you are of an
43:58
age and you're growing up and you could actually, you could
44:01
break out and you could be the next and they made this whole
44:03
thing. Everything in all the publicity
44:05
was always about, you know, it could be you, you could be a
44:09
Tomorrow person one day. That was a very exciting thing
44:12
for kids. So you have that lovely thing of
44:15
very domestic it could be me tomorrow, people on ITV.
44:20
And then on the other side you had Day of the Daleks and the
44:23
Sea Devils and the Time Monster and everything, which is the
44:27
pure fantasy of Doctor Who, which is just so wonderful.
44:30
I suppose the equivalent there is You could be the companion,
44:32
you know he could choose you. You could skip into this artist.
44:35
You know, I'm sure I know that's exactly the reason for Doctor
44:39
Who companions. It's meant to be audience
44:41
identification and the person you talk to.
44:44
And then? As a.
44:46
Kid I never. I once ever thought, oh, I could
44:49
be a Doctor Who companion. I don't think I ever thought I'd
44:52
like to be a Doctor Who companion.
44:54
I just liked the companions. But I never thought I could get
44:57
in the TARDIS and go off and have adventures with the Doctor.
45:00
Whereas the Tomorrow People. I firmly believed that one day I
45:03
was going to wake up and I was going to be able to read
45:05
people's minds and move things, move objects around.
45:08
Doctor Who never had me thinking, and I don't remember
45:11
it ever been a thing at school that we ever thought we would be
45:15
the Companions. Do you know, for Doctor Who, I
45:18
always thought they were a bit too squeaky clean for me to sort
45:21
of buy in, so that could be me. Until Rose Tyler came along and
45:25
she was all catty and jealous. And I was like, Oh yes, it could
45:27
be me. It could be me.
45:29
But I think that's because you have you.
45:32
You're a child of the 80s, so you had your Teagans and your
45:36
turtles and your nieces and Perrys and everything.
45:38
Oh, you're right. I'm squeaky clean and and and
45:41
quite pure. Even even Turlow, who tries to
45:43
be a villain for four episodes and then forgets about it.
45:46
But back in the 70s, and I'm not saying that they weren't squeaky
45:50
clean, but you didn't look at Liz or Joe or or particularly
45:54
Sarah Jane in that sort of light.
45:57
You just they're the Doctor's friends and I think, I just
46:03
don't think that we thought we wanted to be companions when we
46:06
we were playing Doctor and Day. The Daleks is a is a story that
46:10
particularly had kids in the playground at school playing
46:12
Doctor Who because it was Daleks.
46:14
Everyone wanted to be in UNIT and everyone wanted to be a
46:17
Dalek. Nobody ever wanted to play Joe
46:20
Grant, and nobody ever wanted to play the Doctor.
46:22
Did everybody watched it? Was everybody watching?
46:25
That's what I mean. It was the weird kids were the
46:28
ones that didn't watch it. Generally in 1/2 of 25 kids, 20
46:33
of them would watch Doctor Who and Monday mornings was, you
46:36
know, too much to the annoyance of the teachers was all talk
46:40
about Doctor Who and Sugar Smacks when they brought their
46:43
badges out. You know, that was a huge thing.
46:45
At school we were all swapping badges to make sure we all got a
46:48
complete set of badges. And my experience in the 80s was
46:52
the other way round. It was all the weird outcasts
46:55
that did. Watch it.
46:56
There was a point in Doctor Who where I I think the seismic
46:59
shift happens with the Graham Williams era, not because of
47:03
him, but it's that time. It's Star Wars.
47:07
And suddenly people who weren't into sci-fi went and watched
47:11
Star Wars. I mean, I was actually quite
47:13
good. Then they found themselves
47:15
watching the invisible enemy and or Underworld how bad it was or
47:19
Underworld and just going you guys and of course a lot of
47:22
people will automatically grow out of Doctor Who by that point.
47:25
So suddenly the people who are still interested in Doctor Who,
47:28
which is looking really quite crap because it's now got
47:32
something to compare to Dave the Dallas didn't have anything to
47:34
compare to. You know, he had Soylent Green
47:37
and Fantastic Voyage if you were lucky to compare to.
47:40
But unfortunately for the Graham Williams era, it had Star Wars
47:43
and and eventually close Encounters came along.
47:46
And so that reflection of the audience was, yeah, Doctor Who
47:50
really is cheap and nasty because it it couldn't keep up,
47:53
whereas. You said as well, haven't you,
47:55
that fandom? Fandom then suddenly got a big
47:59
voice, didn't they, at that time as well?
48:01
It's. A shame that fandom got the big
48:02
voice at the point when the show really wasn't very good, you
48:07
know? And and there's a lot of, again,
48:08
there's a lot of modern day people reclaiming season 17 and
48:13
going, Oh no, it's really clever and Ryan, brilliant and superb
48:16
and witty and Gina, it's not, it's still rubbish.
48:23
But you know, look, all right, so there's a shot there, that
48:28
bogrom just being obliterated by by Shura and the whole camera
48:32
moves like 3 inches to the left, making the effect look really
48:36
quite terrible. But it didn't matter in 1972.
48:40
When you do a bad effect in 1977 or 78 and you see how good
48:46
everything could be in Star Wars, suddenly that comparison,
48:49
that is an unfair comparison, but it's there and you can't
48:52
avoid it. And that's the seismic shift
48:54
where Doctor Who suddenly became something that was only liked by
48:57
weirdos and geeks, whereas previously the weirdos and the
49:00
geeks were the ones that didn't watch Doctor Who.
49:02
Matt Irvins is like very interesting in the Warriors and
49:05
deep special features where he goes, look, we can use the same
49:08
techniques they're using with those, you know, films that
49:11
they're doing, but we need the time and we need the money.
49:13
You know, you're right, it's an unfair compassion.
49:16
But let's talk about the Oprah Mass for a second, because this
49:18
will absolutely is the, I think, the period of fantastic aliens.
49:24
Well, this is John Friedler's Friedlander's first Doctor Who
49:27
gig, which he got by accident, I think.
49:30
Did you do brilliant? Did he do that one I?
49:35
Think he might have done? And the draconians.
49:37
I'm not. I'm not an expert on on
49:39
Friedlander's work. I know he did the Draconians,
49:43
but I know, yeah, he started with the Ogrons and they're
49:48
brilliant. They look fantastic, so.
49:50
Memorable. And those guys are so tall.
49:54
I mean, they're all about 6-7. I know a lot of people take the
49:57
Mickey, but you love that fella who's, you know, the one of them
50:00
is talking very slow. You know, I found the people and
50:03
then the other one's like, I ain't doing that, I'm sorry.
50:05
And just says no complications. I love it.
50:10
Well, that isn't what happens. Oh, go on.
50:12
There's no complications. Is the same one that's just been
50:16
talking slowly. It's the same Ogron, he goes.
50:22
And were there any complications?
50:23
No complications. And it's just like that's the
50:26
same Ogron and everyone talks about it being two separate
50:28
ones. It's very funny.
50:30
Same guy. Because the other ogrons just
50:32
stand there and kind of going. Is it time for a cup of tea yet,
50:36
you know? Can I ask you a question about
50:39
the Daleks invading the Earth? Is this the same Dalek invasion
50:43
of Earth from the Dalek Invasion of Earth?
50:46
No. OK.
50:49
Actually the the rare moment of Doctor Who continuity in here is
50:53
the dialects refer to it that they are invading Earth.
50:56
Again the the gold Dalek actually says in episode three
51:00
or four we have invaded Earth again.
51:03
It is, it is clearly not. I mean it's blatantly not
51:06
because you know when the Dialects invaded Earth in 2150
51:09
AD or whatever it was it still looked like 1960s Earth and and
51:15
this is a very very different earth of of you know to knock
51:19
down bricks and some silver paint on your face.
51:21
So it's it clearly can't be. And I don't think in 1972 or 71
51:26
when they were putting this story together, they remotely
51:28
sat down and thought this is going to contradict.
51:31
And then I probably Terrence at some point went oh shit, they
51:34
did do a starlet story didn't they set with the dialects of
51:37
any of oh just add the word again in solves all the.
51:40
Problems. It's quite a funny joke, he
51:42
says. Actually, I think he says like,
51:44
don't make it for the fans. Right.
51:46
Let's just put out a piece of good television and they'll
51:49
watch you. Know because generally that's
51:52
how all Doctor Who should be made.
51:53
Because generally Doctor Who fans love knitting it all
51:58
together or saying it can't be knitted together.
52:03
But there was another one. There's awful crash rooms, but
52:07
that's what Doctor Who fans do and I'd I think it is the the
52:11
duty of the people making the show not to give 2 Monkeys about
52:16
what the fans will think continuity wise and let the fans
52:18
have their fun trying to work it all out.
52:20
And it's it's the the duty of the person making the show.
52:23
I think this is true of all television, not just Doctor Who.
52:26
The duty is to make something that's entertaining for four
52:29
episodes in 1992 or 50 minutes in in 2022.
52:33
You know that's that's your duty is to be interesting for 52
52:37
minutes. It's not your duty to sit down
52:39
and go. What will they say about this?
52:41
Will it tie into an obscure reference in the in the 1990s
52:45
novelisation or something? But.
52:47
You know, I mean, let's be honest though, with each other.
52:50
There are times when the show was being made a bit like that,
52:54
where the, you know, continuity was.
52:57
Particularly in the 80s. Given some focus, you know when
53:00
you had a continuity advisor that was taking a look over the
53:02
script and saying, well, that doesn't make sense, that is,
53:04
that contradicts that you know and.
53:06
That's why it's a terrible idea to have a continuity and a
53:10
person, you know. It's the script editor's job,
53:12
really, if he wants to, to look up and go, Have we ever done a
53:15
story with the Loch Ness Monster before?
53:17
Oh, we have. Oh well, probably time now
53:20
shouldn't have a reference to the Loch Ness Monster, but the
53:22
script doesn't do that. It's up to us to then piece it
53:26
together and go, wow, well, the Scarrison and and the Borad
53:29
share the Loch Ness at the same time.
53:32
You know, it's not the duty of the program to worry about
53:34
continuity, because their duty is to make a good, damn good
53:38
story. My favorite is all the
53:40
Atlantis's the mention in the demons.
53:42
Obviously the underwater menace, it's high monster and.
53:45
Each one of those is only like two or three years apart.
53:48
Nobody cared. And quite right.
53:51
They shouldn't care. They absolutely shouldn't care.
53:54
It's it's our job to work out the discrepancies.
53:57
It's not the producers job to worry about that.
54:00
Do you know, I think? This is an enormously clever
54:04
scene, beautifully written with Aubrey Woods tricking Joe Grant
54:10
and and making out that, you know, they're all the the
54:13
gorillas are terrible people and he's just playing on on what
54:17
she's done and everything. And it's a lot.
54:19
And this is beautifully directed because somehow he, Paul
54:23
Bernard, has managed to get to those huge big cameras right up
54:27
close on both those actors and cutting across them, and it's
54:30
wonderful. And then you cut to this wide
54:32
shot. There's no sign of them at all.
54:33
And the focus on those cameras wasn't brilliant in those days.
54:37
It's lovely sequence. All these sequences in the
54:40
controllers control room I think look absolutely amazing.
54:44
It's only when you go into the Dalek side of it that it all
54:46
looks a bit. I you know Aubrey, Aubrey Woods
54:50
is. He's given a really interesting
54:52
performance here and Barry Letts and Terrace Dicks disagree.
54:56
Yeah, they don't like it, do they?
54:58
They Well. No, no, Barry doesn't, he says.
54:59
It's a theatrical performance and he's sort of playing it very
55:02
grand. And Terrace Dicks just goes.
55:04
And he should be as grand as possible.
55:06
He's the villain, you know, like.
55:08
I think he's brilliant and he's great, I think.
55:11
And he is no more theatrical than Roger Delgado.
55:14
He even delivers a lot of the same lines as Roger Delgado and
55:17
delivers them the same way. I don't think he's theatrical.
55:20
I don't think he's over the top. He's also an utterly brilliant
55:22
actor. I mean, he's.
55:24
Seen in Charlie, the Chop factory is one of my favourites.
55:27
Oh, do you remember him in Blake 7?
55:29
He's brilliant in Blake 7. Oh God, he's terrible Supreme
55:34
Commander. But he's lovely in this what?
55:39
So years, Years and years and years and years and years.
55:42
I in 1972, when this finished, Ask Aspel started.
55:47
It was the first year of Ask Aspel.
55:50
OK. And John Poe was going to be
55:51
they announced the Poe was going to be a guest.
55:54
So me and my friend Jonathan wrote to ask Aspel and said, you
56:01
know, because they said write in and tell us what clips and
56:03
Doctor Who you'd like to see. So we wrote in to ask Aspel and
56:07
we said the clip we most want to see is the controller being
56:10
exterminated at the end of Day of the Daleks.
56:13
And they didn't show it. Instead they just showed the
56:14
Daleks attacking Orderly House because I think his death is one
56:19
of the best Doctor Who deaths. Ever.
56:22
But he's got layers, doesn't he? There's a sequence where he lets
56:25
them go and then the camera zooms in on him and gives him a
56:28
moment where he's like, fuck, what do I do now?
56:31
The other thing to do is is watch his body language in all
56:33
his scenes where he is confronting the dialects and say
56:36
even if the dialect is off screen when he's talking to him,
56:38
watch his body language. He does things with his hands
56:42
and he does things with his shoulders that make you go.
56:44
He is terrified of the dialects. He's absolutely better.
56:47
He's sweaty, He's probably got sweaty palms.
56:50
He's brilliant. He just gives 110% in.
56:53
This What about that restrained anger as well when the Doctors
56:56
condemning him in episode 3? Those scenes are brilliant.
56:59
And that expression on his face when the Doctor saves him from
57:02
the terror from from the gorillas and and he just, you
57:05
just feel him go, I've just been saved and so much changes in him
57:10
at that point. And then you've got that lovely
57:12
scene in episode 4 in the In the Tunnel, where he's just
57:15
absolutely magnificent. I mean, I don't think anyone can
57:17
do, you know, moral outrage better than Pearl.
57:20
We you know. Now I will agree with with
57:24
terrorist Dicks and Barry, let's hear that this whole sequence
57:28
it's fine with with Annette and Bowie's shooting and somehow
57:31
missing it's. The odd choice, isn't it?
57:34
But then Perry comes out and just stands and shoots that over
57:37
on for no reason. And even as a kid, I remember
57:40
thinking that's that's not something we'd seen Doctor Who
57:43
do before did. They take it out of the other
57:48
version, I can't remember. No, no, I don't think so.
57:51
In fact, they had a special effect where the death looks
57:53
even more horrific. Yes.
57:55
Paper. Fuck off.
57:57
You don't need that. They're disintegrated.
58:00
End of. I'm sorry, I do.
58:01
I love Dave the Daleks so much and I utterly despise.
58:05
I'm afraid and I'm sorry to everybody that worked on it
58:07
because I'm sure there's a lot of hard work into it.
58:09
But I really don't like the special edition because I don't
58:12
think, with the exception of Nick's voice, I don't think any
58:15
of the things they've added enhance it, particularly at all.
58:18
And one of the things that is most upsetting is that
58:22
disintegrated ray gun effect where people just sort of
58:24
disperse. And that's not the point of a
58:27
descendant. They haven't been blown up.
58:29
They've just been disappeared, vaporized.
58:32
It's such. AI always assumed they were sort
58:34
of sucked into the vortex or something like that, you know?
58:36
They just cease to exist, which is a horrible way to die.
58:39
You cease to. There's nothing left of you for
58:41
anyone to find. This is again great episode
58:44
ending another crash dude in a row to to to say it's the Daleks
58:48
but now it's the Doctor seeing the the audience saw the Daleks
58:51
first episode and now the Doctor's seeing the Daleks and
58:55
it it's just it's clever build up because it's not done that
58:59
Terry Nation thing. I hate to say but Terry Nation
59:02
in episode one would have kept the reveal of the dialects to
59:05
that very last scene and you got what's called dead the dialects.
59:08
I know the dialects in it and Paul Bernard doesn't.
59:10
He gives you a glimpse of the dialects quite.
59:12
Early on in the end, doesn't it? It just goes rapport.
59:18
That's right. And then you get them all again
59:20
at the end of the episode as an as an 8 year old that is.
59:22
That's exciting. That's how you want Doctor Who
59:25
to be. I think that's.
59:28
An absolute choice to do that tiny two second.
59:30
Shot I do as well. I'm sure it probably wasn't in
59:33
the script. In the script it was probably an
59:34
off screen voice saying report and he makes the decision to go.
59:38
We know it's a dialect story so let's see a glimpse of them and
59:41
then snatch it away again and not give you anything to the end
59:44
of the episode. It's very clever and a distinct
59:46
reverse of what happens in things like Planet of the
59:49
Dialects and death to the Dialects where a get in Genesis,
59:52
even where the word is in the title but you still don't see
59:54
them until the last second. I've paused.
59:57
Now we've got to the end of the two and I've actually remembered
59:59
to pause. I'm a good boy.
1:00:01
I think you know in Episode 3 we ditch.
1:00:04
We can like contempt the 70s now, don't we?
1:00:07
We're entirely in the. Whole episode, other than a
1:00:10
quick shot of the brigade at the beginning if I remember rightly.
1:00:13
I think everything then is set in the future for that one
1:00:15
episode. And aside from, you know,
1:00:17
perhaps a little overuse of a car park that they found
1:00:20
somewhere, it is spectacularly grim though, isn't it?
1:00:23
It's a really dark episode. What to Who, actually the the
1:00:27
grimmest it's it's ever been, as we'll see when we get there.
1:00:30
Just how really dark and negative and and but I'll talk
1:00:36
about how how terribly typical for the 70s that that dystopia
1:00:41
actually is. I can't wait, Bosch,
1:01:18
a hamster with a blunt penknife for doing quicker.
1:01:24
Quicker, quicker. Hello there.
1:01:25
My name is Gary Russell and I'm here with Joe and we are here
1:01:29
doing Hamster with a Blunt Penknife, the podcast that
1:01:33
reviews episodes of Doctor Who in a madcap, zany and sometimes
1:01:38
sophisticated and usually quite ill informed if I'm on it kind
1:01:41
of way. And today we're doing Episode 3
1:01:46
of Day of the Daleks. I'm very excited to watch
1:01:50
Episode 3 of Day of the Daleks. We're skipping into war-torn
1:01:53
Daleks future we are. What could not be exciting about
1:01:57
that? Absolutely nothing.
1:01:59
It's. Just perfection.
1:02:01
Here we go. Oh, let's do it.
1:02:03
Drive it straight to the point. Straight to the point.
1:02:06
How's it then? Go on.
1:02:07
Off you go. Do the clams in this.
1:02:08
All right then, 54321 and we're off.
1:02:18
We are. Oh, no, we're not.
1:02:20
Oh, I'm just about off. Are you off?
1:02:23
I'm, I'm it's it's going now it's it's time for secrets to
1:02:26
started. Mine took a couple of seconds as
1:02:28
well, so. Pressed completely the wrong
1:02:30
button because at 59 years old I still can't work out how to
1:02:34
press the button on a Blu-ray player because you ancient
1:02:39
technology. They didn't understand
1:02:41
technology. Anyone who listens to this knows
1:02:44
how good I am with technology. My side quality is terrible when
1:02:47
I say. Ah, the Daleks.
1:02:48
It's just those words are just so beautiful to see on the
1:02:52
screen. And that swirly green pattern of
1:02:54
that beautiful title sequence, so wonderful in those days,
1:02:59
still is now. But I was about to ask a very
1:03:01
silly question. I was about to say, Gary, you
1:03:03
know, four episodes of Doctor Who, four part stories.
1:03:06
Yeah. I think very often there isn't
1:03:09
quite enough plot for four episodes in a four part Doctor
1:03:13
Who story. But I think this is one of those
1:03:16
stories where it absolutely fits that timely perfectly.
1:03:22
I think there's enough going on. The narrative's always moving,
1:03:25
There's twists and turns happening.
1:03:27
There's great character stuff right up until the last episode.
1:03:31
I don't think there's a second wasted really in this.
1:03:34
I totally agree with you about Dave the Dogs.
1:03:36
I'm actually trying to think generally.
1:03:38
I think 4 parts is actually, on the whole are pretty damn good
1:03:42
in Doctor. I think 4 parts is the perfect
1:03:44
length for Doctor Who. It's those threes.
1:03:46
I think the threes lag a bit sometimes.
1:03:48
I don't know the threes. Three seem to always feel like
1:03:52
they've got stuff cut out in two-part Doctor Who stories.
1:03:54
No, that just that should never happen.
1:03:57
No, I I think for four works. I can't think of many Duff four
1:04:01
parties that don't sustain themselves.
1:04:04
They all have that one is set up, two is action, three is
1:04:08
explanation and and running around putting everything
1:04:11
together and then 4 is big bangs.
1:04:14
But I think that works for Doctor Who.
1:04:15
I think that's what Doctor Who is all about and and it clearly
1:04:19
in this episode it's also all about 1970s nightclub sound
1:04:24
visual effects. Because I remember as a kid
1:04:27
watching this and thinking that was from Top of the Pops, all
1:04:29
that's that sort of effects as people go through the time
1:04:32
travel and everything is pure Top of the Pops backgrounds, The
1:04:35
Suite and T Rex and everyone would have those effects played
1:04:37
over their faces every week. If you hang around long enough,
1:04:40
you're going to end up in the top of the pop set in the 80s,
1:04:42
you know? Yes.
1:04:45
Well, we get there in in, in. I think Haunted Norman is the
1:04:48
first one to use the top of the pop set.
1:04:51
We were talking earlier about the dynamic between Boaz and
1:04:55
that. And it's really good in this
1:04:57
little scene with the doctor where you get, you know, and
1:05:01
that's the hard leader, but at the same time, she has a
1:05:04
conscience. She has a an understanding of
1:05:06
what's going on. I don't understand, sorry, I
1:05:08
don't understand the ogrons having this strange 1970s cop
1:05:14
car noise effect every time they turn up.
1:05:17
If I was an ogron trying to capture people, the last thing
1:05:21
I'd do is announce my presence by having what appears to be AZ
1:05:25
car siren going on in the background behind.
1:05:28
I mean, I think in terms of the story, yes, but in terms of the
1:05:31
TV experience, I think it's just there for the kids to go, the
1:05:34
over ones to come in, you know? But it's it's an odd, it's an
1:05:38
odd noise to have because it's such a 20th century noise.
1:05:42
It doesn't sound 22nd century. It sounds like something you,
1:05:46
you know, if like me, you're a kid of this era, it's Ed Cars
1:05:50
and you're just thinking, why is why is there a Ed Cars police
1:05:52
car going on in the background? And I remember actually, I don't
1:05:56
think I did think this when I was 8, but I certainly when I
1:05:59
was an adult watching this, it took me a couple of times to
1:06:02
realize it's a deliberate effect.
1:06:04
And not just I thought when it because it happens in episode
1:06:06
one and when they kill the OR they they knock out the
1:06:11
original, the Tim Condron gorilla.
1:06:15
And I've been thinking, oh, that's just a police zone in the
1:06:17
back and they, they couldn't not record it when they were filming
1:06:21
and then realise I know it's, it's there or something.
1:06:24
Oh, I was talking earlier about that photograph in the Radio
1:06:26
Times before the episode or the week before the episode went
1:06:28
out. And that photograph is this
1:06:30
thing here of Pearly hiding behind this broken wall.
1:06:33
And that's such a powerful. With all the reeds as well, all
1:06:36
the all the plants in front of the camera, it's a.
1:06:39
Really powerful image because the expectation that one
1:06:42
photograph it's just a picture of Pearly hiding behind a wall
1:06:45
and yet it promised. Much of what?
1:06:47
But you love the fact that a tower block was enough to you
1:06:50
know, that's a scary vision of the future.
1:06:52
This is this is 19727172. And yeah, those three, the
1:06:57
Brentford tower blocks when they went up were a massive thing.
1:07:01
I remember my mum and dad talking about them because they
1:07:04
were on the the you could see them from the Chiswick fly over
1:07:06
on the M4 and that was new. You didn't see tower blocks like
1:07:11
that they that hadn't happened. Good office blocks.
1:07:14
But this was three in a row major tower blocks built in the
1:07:18
late 60s and so the use of them in this I think is really
1:07:22
clever. This is this is one of these
1:07:25
scenes I was talking about where his body language when he's so
1:07:28
frightened of the Daleks and he and he's trying not to be but he
1:07:32
is terrified of them. When you see his hands in a
1:07:34
minute he's he's kind of rubbing his fingers together and looking
1:07:37
upset. But he's also, unfortunately,
1:07:40
spending an inordinate amount of time having to talk to a dialect
1:07:42
that's barely in the scene. I mean, that's a a meteoric,
1:07:46
it's a when. It's a profile.
1:07:49
Then Aaronovic says, you know about the hierarchy of power in
1:07:52
the story and how interesting that is.
1:07:54
You've got the Dialects, then the Controller, then there's the
1:07:57
people he's threatening, and it sort of filters down.
1:08:01
Yes, it's all about power struggle, isn't it?
1:08:03
But that's that's what good drama is built on.
1:08:05
Is is. If it was all just the Daleks
1:08:09
and then everyone else it would be nonsense.
1:08:12
But the fact there are all these layers of society that we're
1:08:15
we're learning through through throwaway 1 liners and things
1:08:18
like that, it's fantastic. Very well story I I, I'm never
1:08:22
quite sure how much is Louis Marx and how much is Terence
1:08:26
Dicks. I was black.
1:08:28
That's a lot of Weira for me, though I'm never quite sure
1:08:31
because I often think that Terence Dicks is doing a Rusty
1:08:34
Davis style. I think he is.
1:08:36
I I think, and Terence is very good at it.
1:08:38
He's very clever at making everybody's stories work.
1:08:41
The other thing I love about Poe.
1:08:43
Poe, see, we're seeing this thing here.
1:08:45
There's a symbol on that door that Poe is about to open.
1:08:49
Yeah, and the Poe era is full of little symbols like that that
1:08:55
the design department have done. There's no explanation for it.
1:08:57
It looks vague like a Dalek ice stick I think.
1:09:00
But it's just they always do that in frontier in space and
1:09:04
and and colony in space and all these.
1:09:06
There's always labels and stickers and and symbols to
1:09:11
suggest the future. I think it's a really
1:09:14
interesting thing that the poet we ever did that doesn't carry
1:09:17
on past Genesis, the Daleks. Genesis is the last time that we
1:09:21
really have interesting stickers.
1:09:24
Interesting stickers transfers for Doctor Who Magazine.
1:09:28
This is what I mean about his hands.
1:09:29
He's, he's, he's clenching his fists and everything here.
1:09:32
Lesson is, given it, it's always in front of these immobile
1:09:35
Daleks. So is it.
1:09:36
And one thing. Aubrey Woods is not a small man.
1:09:40
They cast a very, very, very tall actor against Daleks, which
1:09:45
in some respects you might think is a stupid thing to do.
1:09:48
But it isn't. It's an incredibly clever thing
1:09:50
to do. You don't think they look quite
1:09:52
small Next how terrifying they are.
1:09:54
That they're tiny, he's really tall and he's still frightened
1:09:58
of them. And as a 8 year old kid, that
1:10:00
was a really good way to constantly make me think the
1:10:04
dialects are frightening. Because if that man's frightened
1:10:06
of them, and we've seen how powerful he's in all the other
1:10:08
scenes and he's frightened of them, the dialects must be
1:10:11
really, really scary. I've always thought that's the
1:10:13
power of those who though, isn't it?
1:10:14
It's like, you know, the dialects are absurd looking if
1:10:16
you break them down, but how people react to them, those
1:10:19
performances, is what sells it half the time.
1:10:23
When I was when I was watching this, I watched this earlier
1:10:26
today in preparation for this. And one thing I found really
1:10:30
interesting was how I was reacting to this as an adult
1:10:32
compared to how I used to react to this as a child and this
1:10:36
depiction of the future as a child.
1:10:38
I remember, you know, the bit where the guards were like
1:10:40
whipping the slaves. That sort of visceral imagery
1:10:44
that really scared me as a child doesn't really affect me now.
1:10:47
Maybe, although I'm not even going to go into that.
1:10:53
But what really? I think that says more about you
1:10:55
than it does about Day of the Dialects.
1:10:57
Quite a bit, you know. But what affects me now is an
1:10:59
adult sequence is coming up in a bit where the controller
1:11:02
threatens the section leader and says about his family and his
1:11:06
children and all the sort of inference rather than the actual
1:11:09
imagery itself. It's like it is interesting how
1:11:12
you view this differently as a child and as an adult.
1:11:16
A lot of you have. Lots of Doctor Who, but it's
1:11:18
good Doctor Who that makes you still be able to appreciate it
1:11:22
from both points of view. Now here we've got Valentine
1:11:26
Palmer's coming to the series and I remember the first time I
1:11:30
saw this went on video naughty illegal video would have been
1:11:34
sort of early 80s. I'm being shocked at how late on
1:11:37
in the story this is episode 3 and money has just arrived
1:11:41
because in the Terrorist 6 novelisation he's the lead
1:11:44
character. He's on page one and all the
1:11:47
future stuff is told from his point of view and we meet all
1:11:51
the other. We meet Job and and Marek and
1:11:53
all the other rebels that we don't get to see here, although
1:11:57
one of them is actually named when he gets killed.
1:11:59
And it's like Terrence really was clever but I was gobsmacked
1:12:03
when I first saw this again and went, oh, he's not actually the
1:12:06
main character, he's not in it for the first two episodes.
1:12:10
Valentine Palmer, very interesting man.
1:12:13
He's a painter and a sculptor I think.
1:12:16
But more importantly, his grandfather, or great
1:12:20
grandfather was the last person aboard Titanic who survived.
1:12:26
Really. And he made quite a he wrote
1:12:30
books and things about this. He's a fascinating man, a little
1:12:34
bit of a conspiracy theorist as well about Titanic, which is a
1:12:37
bit odd but fascinating man. Didn't stay in there very long.
1:12:42
Brilliant actor, very, very good guy to look up and and and read
1:12:48
some of his books and things about the Titanic.
1:12:51
The height of sophistication. In the future there is a platter
1:12:54
of grapes and beaks. Yeah, I love that we were.
1:12:58
You were talking about the scene with the the whips and the the
1:13:02
kids. Well, actually he talked about
1:13:04
children. I think we did actually see any
1:13:05
children, but we certainly saw old people lurking around.
1:13:08
This is a very unusual thing for Doctor Who, this story and that
1:13:12
particular part of it when Perry sees the slaves.
1:13:15
Because if you think about most Doctor Who up to this point, the
1:13:22
future of Earth is pretty much portrayed in a very glossy,
1:13:27
sci-fi pulpy kind of way. Even Dalic Invasion of Earth.
1:13:34
Everyone's in modern day clothes.
1:13:35
Everyone, you know? Oh yeah, we've been dominated by
1:13:38
the dots, but actually could still be set in 1965 with no
1:13:40
problem. This is the first time there's a
1:13:43
little bit of it in Colony in Space and a lot more of it in
1:13:45
the novelization of Colony in Space.
1:13:47
Yeah, Angry. First time we've seen a
1:13:50
dystopian future for Doctor Who that is deeply unpleasant that
1:13:55
that people have as you say whips and they're they're
1:13:57
lugging things around and obviously that would go on a lot
1:13:59
more in later Doctor Who's but dare the Dialects is kind of all
1:14:04
the way through the 60s. The future of Earth you look at
1:14:07
you look at seeds of death and stories like that and Earth is
1:14:12
always seen as shiny silver space suits and and you know
1:14:15
you've got the eyes for ears and all these things.
1:14:17
It's all terribly nice space. Aren't they?
1:14:19
They're all in cocktail dresses and yeah.
1:14:22
Whereas here, because it has to be.
1:14:25
But this is the first time Doctors actually dared to show
1:14:28
an alternative, that which is quite an adult thing and a very
1:14:31
70s thing. The dystopian futures that we
1:14:34
saw on television in the 70s were almost uniformly portrayed
1:14:38
as negative. That kind of George Orwell thing
1:14:42
had finally come to television and we were going right.
1:14:45
Well, we've done 1984 a couple of times, but now we can put it
1:14:48
in other shows. And you know, shortly after
1:14:51
this, you get survivors, you get Blake 7, you get 1990, and
1:14:56
they're all showing dystopian futures that are desperately
1:15:00
unpleasant. And is this.
1:15:02
Sort. Of attorney in Doctor Who
1:15:04
before. As I said, there's a hint of it
1:15:06
in colony in Space, but it is only a hint, and that's not set
1:15:09
on Earth anyway, so it's kind of one step removed.
1:15:13
This is the first time we see a really brutalized version of
1:15:16
Earth in the future. And we're seeing it absolute
1:15:21
worst, aren't we? Because this isn't how it's
1:15:23
supposed to be. Well that's the point is it's it
1:15:25
makes you sit and watch this and go.
1:15:29
I don't want the future to look like this.
1:15:32
I'm fed up with seeing Chinese silver spacesuits from From
1:15:35
Seeds of Death. Now I'm seeing a future that I
1:15:37
don't want to see. And I think that again is a very
1:15:40
telling parts of Barry Letts's approach to Doctor Who.
1:15:46
His whole ecology thing, his whole we're fucking up the world
1:15:49
thing, which is runs all the way through his five years on Doctor
1:15:51
Who and even it's even here because it's going World Peace.
1:15:57
It's all going to go wrong. There's going to be a third
1:15:59
World War and look, this is what it leads to.
1:16:02
We talk about a third World War, but we actually need that scene
1:16:06
of the controller talking about the survivors living in holes in
1:16:10
the ground and then we need to see people with being whipped
1:16:13
and and having to carry heavy loads.
1:16:15
And that's never been seen properly in Doctor Who before.
1:16:18
And I think it's fascinating that they do this in Day of the
1:16:20
Daleks and within 6 to 8 months every other TV show that's got a
1:16:25
slight fantasy bent in it, exactly the same thing.
1:16:29
This character, here he is in one seat, OK?
1:16:32
He comes in, he's so interesting, this guy, he comes
1:16:36
in and he's quite threatening with the guard, isn't he?
1:16:38
And he's like, get out, you know, I'm in charge the 2nd,
1:16:41
that doors down, he's like, which rebel base are you with?
1:16:44
So suddenly you realise actually he's working with them.
1:16:47
Then the controller comes in and he starts threatening him and
1:16:50
it's just so interesting. He's in one bloody scene.
1:16:54
And it's it's Peter Hill. I think he's the actor who you
1:17:00
won't remember years later, not that many years later.
1:17:05
But shortly after this he went into Crossroads.
1:17:08
And he and he, he's Arthur Brownlow in Crossroads for quite
1:17:11
a few years, who has one of the most memorable deaths in
1:17:15
Crossroads ever. Because he plays this guy who is
1:17:19
a complete loser in everything in his life and his kids are
1:17:22
bored of him and his wife's a bit fed up with him and he's
1:17:25
always fighting to to win and he's always fighting to to get
1:17:28
better and things like that. And he's only accuses him of
1:17:32
sexually assaulting him which never happened and and he has
1:17:35
his and then finally he wins a bowling trophy something as
1:17:39
simple as a bowling trophy and it's like his whole life has
1:17:42
been made-up and he's walking home with the bowling trophy and
1:17:46
gets hit from behind by a car and he's killed his last shot is
1:17:49
the bowling trophy rolling through the the rain and his
1:17:52
hand landing beside it and it's. Dark.
1:17:55
And he's such a good actor because.
1:17:57
And it's a shame that this is his only Doctor Who role,
1:17:59
because he is. It's a great moment, but he's a
1:18:02
little bit wasting it because he should have had a much bigger
1:18:05
role. He's a brilliant, brilliant
1:18:07
actor. I just think there's a lot of
1:18:09
complexity there for A1 character, one scene character,
1:18:13
you know, is that Dick's. I'm wondering if that's Dick.
1:18:16
Oh, I'm. Sure it is.
1:18:17
I'm sure it's Terrence Dick's. I mean not take anything away
1:18:19
from Louis Marx because I think the whole the whole plot and the
1:18:23
and the the the story is very much Louis Marx.
1:18:27
But there are moments like this sequence as you're talking about
1:18:30
where he's telling him about his kids.
1:18:32
I think to me that feels like this that I can hear Terrence's
1:18:35
voice in that I can hear. I can imagine Louis doing that
1:18:39
scene and that those dialogue lines are probably there, but
1:18:42
Terrence will have just gone through and made the menacing
1:18:46
and then Paul Bernard again does very successfully with his
1:18:50
studio cameras, he. I think.
1:18:52
In his mouth, there's no, no, sort of, yeah, I mean that's
1:18:55
extreme close up and it works. It really works because that's
1:18:59
that tells you menace. I love it.
1:19:01
You need actors there that aren't afraid of the camera,
1:19:03
aren't there? We need to go for it.
1:19:06
Louis Marks is an interesting one, isn't he?
1:19:07
Because he strided so many production teams from Planet of
1:19:12
the Giants. What else did you do?
1:19:14
Planet of Evil? Master Van Dragon.
1:19:18
In this and of course in BBC terms he's a hugely successful
1:19:22
and important producer. What did he what he's worth in
1:19:26
the 70s and 80s? He is one of the BB CS biggest
1:19:31
ever producers of drama, which is why I think a lot.
1:19:36
You know, I I don't take anything away from him for this
1:19:39
because I do think story wise and dialogue wise for the most
1:19:42
part this is him. It's just that the Terence
1:19:45
Polish is so clever. That's what you can guarantee in
1:19:49
the Hurley era, isn't it? Is that Terence Dick's Polish?
1:19:51
There's there's a competency to all of it.
1:19:54
There's a through line with with Terence and Barry's work that
1:19:57
that you never felt. And I think this is possibly
1:20:02
true of most good where you have a good dynamic between a
1:20:05
producer and script editor and it certainly doesn't happen in
1:20:09
the mid 60s stuff and it doesn't really happen in the mid J&T
1:20:13
stuff. But when you have a a good
1:20:15
rapport between the script editor and the producer and
1:20:17
they're both their visions are informing the program.
1:20:21
Hinch, Kef and Holmes are another good set for that.
1:20:23
Yeah. That impression that the show is
1:20:26
always consistent. You always know you're watching
1:20:28
Doctor Who. You never sit down and go, oh,
1:20:31
suddenly you didn't feel like Doctor Who.
1:20:33
And I think you know that the sort of J&T Eric Saywood era you
1:20:38
frequently from story to story could go well that it's just
1:20:41
Doctor Who because it doesn't feel related to last week's
1:20:43
Doctor. They're.
1:20:44
Pulling in opposite directions, isn't it?
1:20:46
And interestingly, Eric's Ward says he was looking over his
1:20:49
shoulder. Could see that relationship
1:20:51
between parasites and Barry Letts and what they produced and
1:20:54
how it could go. So, right.
1:20:56
And then he was kind of seeing what they would do.
1:20:58
And it could go right, but it could go.
1:21:00
Wrong and and clearly clearly did and I think you know there's
1:21:05
a there's a real the Pearl we era has a has a solidity to it
1:21:11
that is like no other five year period in Doctor Who.
1:21:15
Where from from Silurians. Well, I suppose it really is
1:21:19
Silurians, the root of giant robot.
1:21:22
It just feels like the same program.
1:21:25
There is no getting away from it.
1:21:27
The the influence of Barry, Letts and Terence can never be
1:21:31
underestimated or or undersold because the the two of them were
1:21:35
geniuses at the show. They understood the show and
1:21:38
they understood I think more than any other produced or
1:21:42
director run, they understood their audience really, really
1:21:45
well. They understood children, they
1:21:47
understood what they could do and what the what the kids
1:21:50
needed to do, and occasionally they got their hands slapped for
1:21:52
it. But you know what kids weren't
1:21:55
complaining about autumn policemen.
1:21:57
Kids weren't complaining about things being.
1:21:59
Terrified. It's always the adults isn't.
1:22:01
It always the adults and I think Gary and Terence really
1:22:05
understood this show and and the season nine I think is is the
1:22:09
point where everything flows beautifully They they they've
1:22:13
kind of gone right with with bored of the Master so he'll
1:22:16
make a couple of brief appearances but we're relatively
1:22:19
bored of him but this is about the Doctor and Joe and a series
1:22:23
of monsters and a series of adventures and season 9 just and
1:22:28
10 as well. They just work they just they
1:22:31
they that that is the central core of of this era of Doctor
1:22:35
Who. And although I will tell you
1:22:37
that season 7 is my all time favorite season, Doctor Who by a
1:22:39
long way and I think a lot of season 8 is brilliant, 9 and 10
1:22:44
I think is is the point where you can see why this show became
1:22:49
the huge success that it was during the Perot era that but
1:22:53
the however good the heart and Trout eras were the Perot era
1:22:57
put Doctor Who on the map and put it into the public
1:22:59
consciousness. Suddenly everyone knew what a
1:23:02
dialect was and what a TARDIS was and who Doctor Who was.
1:23:04
They knew the word Time Lord even, you know, at this point.
1:23:07
And it's like, yeah, it needed that.
1:23:10
And that is solely down to to Barry and Terrence and how they
1:23:13
made the show. And an awful lot to do with with
1:23:16
Perry and Katie Manning and Nick Courtney as well-being,
1:23:20
completely accessible to the audience to watch them.
1:23:23
One of the smartest things I think Barry let's did was when
1:23:26
he did that survey as to what the contingent of the audience
1:23:30
was and they realised they had as many adults as children
1:23:33
watching and they said right, we would just make great telly.
1:23:36
We won't take our eye off the kids, but we won't write it
1:23:39
specifically for the. Kids, we'll make it.
1:23:41
It works on all those levels, yeah.
1:23:43
And I think, I do think the next person who got that right was
1:23:46
Russell. I don't think between Harry and
1:23:49
Terrence, however good Hinchcliffe and Holmes were, and
1:23:53
however good J&T and Carmel were, I still think that Russell
1:23:57
is the first person that came in and went.
1:23:59
This is a family show, and I've got to make sure that every
1:24:02
episode is watched by at least two generations of a family and
1:24:06
enjoyed by them. I know plenty of fanboys that
1:24:09
wept into their points about that burping bin, but I sat
1:24:13
there watching it with my nephew and he was laughing.
1:24:15
He's absolutely, absolutely. Party Aliens is brilliant.
1:24:20
We sit there and go, oh for God's sake, but the rest of the
1:24:22
story love it Great. The kids.
1:24:24
That's just a brilliant thing. Absolutely brilliant.
1:24:28
And do you know what? Gassy politicians, I mean,
1:24:30
honestly, gasbag politicians, That's the one of the best jokes
1:24:33
he ever did. There was a sequence a minute
1:24:35
ago which I think there's a line in it.
1:24:37
The whole sequence is great. It's the bit between the doctor
1:24:40
and the controller where he's kind of condemning him for being
1:24:42
a quisling. And there's a line that's so
1:24:45
angry it could come from the pen of Malcolm Hulk.
1:24:48
And I don't think he's touched this at all.
1:24:49
Where the doctor goes, Don't they like being happy?
1:24:53
I love that line. I bet that's a Terrance line.
1:24:57
I bet that's a. Terrance, it's so dark.
1:25:00
I love it. But obviously it's it's so dark
1:25:04
that we have to change this. Like, you know, yes.
1:25:07
And then we have to have a little silly run about on on a
1:25:10
oh look, here's a trike to make Jumper be happy.
1:25:14
And of course, at the time this went, now that I never sat down
1:25:17
and thought, oh, that's a trike, I sat down when that's a
1:25:20
fantastic bit of yeah, that's been built for Doctor Who
1:25:22
because you've never seen them before and then.
1:25:24
I did not see those ogrons trying to catch up with him.
1:25:27
I just saw an exciting. Track which as a kid, I can tell
1:25:31
you, was the most exciting thing in the world, because it's
1:25:34
Patrick Trouton and William Hartnell on the title sequence
1:25:38
behind The Dialects and an Ogron and Jon Pertwee, and it's like,
1:25:41
Oh my God, everything I've ever wanted as a kid in that one tiny
1:25:46
sequence. What the hell is that?
1:25:48
His name appearing over the action.
1:25:52
Somebody pressed the wrong button a little bit too.
1:25:54
Peter Hill. It was Peter, yeah.
1:25:57
Oh, but I was just making it up, I tell you.
1:26:00
Honestly. Oh, it's just it's this story is
1:26:02
so good and that is an absolute classic episode climax.
1:26:08
You know, I'm going to get to mention this in episode 4, so
1:26:11
I'm going to mention it now very quickly because one of my
1:26:13
absolute loves in life is I'm a someone who studies a narrative
1:26:17
quite a lot when I'm watching TV and reading a book and things
1:26:20
like that. And when a plot locks together
1:26:23
perfectly in the climax and delivers a punch, it's that's
1:26:28
one of my love it. And the bit where purple, the
1:26:31
massive zoom on his face where he says Starz isn't the one that
1:26:35
did it all. You did it yourself.
1:26:36
I can remember as a child just getting chilled watching that
1:26:40
scene and I was like, yeah, as an adult I just think it's
1:26:43
brilliant and Pearly sells that moment, that everything that
1:26:47
it's worth. It's an actor, isn't he?
1:26:49
He just he he again, he understood.
1:26:52
Doctor Who. He understood how to play it.
1:26:53
This is man that everyone thought would be terrible
1:26:55
because he's from a comedy and Variety background.
1:26:58
But he isn't. He's a brilliant, brilliant
1:27:01
actor who understood how to create the character of Doctor
1:27:05
Who, and I suspect it's the only time in Purley's life he ever
1:27:08
played a character pretty similar to himself.
1:27:13
He was. He allowed himself to be Jon
1:27:15
Pertwee underneath it all, but he's the man.
1:27:18
He he he is. He's the cool man.
1:27:20
He is the Doctor. He'll always be for me.
1:27:24
He will always be Doctor Who, that every other actor who's
1:27:27
ever played the Doctor. They're all brilliant.
1:27:29
There's no never been a bad one, but Purtly is is still at the
1:27:34
top of that that hill and everyone in my eyes is
1:27:37
constantly trying to to reach him.
1:27:39
I suppose we've we've complimented Barry Letts, we've
1:27:41
complimented tear and sticks and you know Louis Marks directs to
1:27:45
everybody, but throughout this era, who's the through line,
1:27:48
Who's the hero? It's, it's, it's, it's the man.
1:27:52
He's just, he's a hero to kids, you know, He was the reason, and
1:27:57
we watched Doctor Who. He was the reason that we cut
1:27:59
out pictures of him and stuck him in our school books and
1:28:02
everything. He was a hero.
1:28:04
He was, he was just he never let us down.
1:28:06
As kids you knew he he, his presence, his screen presence
1:28:14
exuded confidence. And I suppose it's a bit of a
1:28:20
cliche to say, but I think it's true.
1:28:21
Looking back, you felt safe with him.
1:28:23
You never really thought the Doctor was ever going to die.
1:28:26
You were never convinced that Joe Grant or or Sarah or Liz
1:28:28
Shaw were going to survive. But you always knew the Doctor
1:28:32
was getting hit. You, you trusted that he would
1:28:35
find a way out of it, which you didn't have.
1:28:38
I can't say Hartnell because I didn't see enough of him as a
1:28:40
kid. But Trouton, obviously, I I, I
1:28:42
watched The Trout in years as a kid and brilliantly was, I never
1:28:48
felt that I was watching the show because of the Doctor.
1:28:53
I was watching the show because of everything else in it, and
1:28:55
the Doctor was just part of it. With Purtway.
1:28:58
By the time you get to this point in Purtway, we're watching
1:29:02
the show because the Doctor is the man we're watching and we're
1:29:05
we're gunning for him. And we've not gunning for us the
1:29:07
wrong phrase entirely. We're we're supporting him.
1:29:10
We're we're going. You know, we want you to
1:29:12
succeed, Doctor, because you're just a genius and we love you.
1:29:16
And that thing that Barry Letts says, and I know Barry Letts
1:29:18
didn't cast John Pertway, but he took it with him.
1:29:21
I think Pertwee was, you know, the the person that made him
1:29:24
realise that this is how I needed to be.
1:29:26
But you know, no matter how dreary what is on the screen,
1:29:30
that the actors are charismatic enough that you always want to
1:29:34
watch them despite anything. Or whatever happens in the John
1:29:37
Pertwee era in my element watching John.
1:29:41
Pertwee and Katie as well, I I think that is a perfect, as I
1:29:45
said earlier, that because they had such a good friendship off
1:29:48
screen, that dynamic and that charisma makes them both
1:29:52
incredibly watchable and believable.
1:29:55
You don't ever think you're watching actors.
1:29:58
You think you're watching a Time Lord and and his and his human
1:30:01
friend and that's that's a skill, that's that's something
1:30:04
to be admired. Hamster with a blunt penlight
1:30:40
for doing. Quicker, quicker, quicker.
1:30:44
Welcome back to Hamster with a Blunt Penknife, The Doctor Who
1:30:48
Commentary Podcast, Mr. Gary Russell.
1:30:51
Hello. Hello.
1:30:52
There, I'm going to ask you a question now.
1:30:55
You did this to me last time in the last episode.
1:30:57
Go on. Why is it called hamster with
1:30:59
the blunt penknife? I'm sure that's a quote from
1:31:01
Doctor Who, isn't it? And my brain, I mean, I don't
1:31:04
know it. Because I have some with a blood
1:31:05
penknife to do it quicker. Right.
1:31:08
Oh, it's benign, isn't it? Yes.
1:31:10
Yeah, yeah. Do you know what I Because
1:31:11
there's, you know what have you seen that we've got two podcasts
1:31:13
that are out there and some of them have got some bloody dreary
1:31:16
titles. I tell you, I said I want
1:31:18
something that people are going to remember and the genius of
1:31:20
this, it ain't the title, it's the hamster emoji, which is now
1:31:25
used across social media all the time to identify the podcast.
1:31:29
So it works. Right, it was.
1:31:31
Quirky and it worked. My other one's called the Nyman
1:31:34
be praised and that worked for similar reasons.
1:31:39
Well, thank you for the question.
1:31:41
We are about to head into Date of the Daleks episode four.
1:31:46
I've only got one question for you before we go in, and that is
1:31:49
this a satisfying conclusion to the story we have so far
1:31:51
watched? Yes.
1:31:53
Without a shadow of a doubt. That's a 16th answer.
1:31:56
Thank you. Everything you want, I think
1:31:59
it's a shame. I mean clearly we know that
1:32:01
there was material that had to be cut at the end the the, the
1:32:05
unit scene that referred back to episode one.
1:32:07
And you do rather feel that the final stuff on film between
1:32:12
Pertwee and Sir Regional Styles just feels very rushed and and
1:32:18
it kind of the he talks to Sir Regional Styles.
1:32:22
Oh, we've seen it, haven't we Joe?
1:32:23
Yes, she said. Boom, we're into the title
1:32:25
because you kind of go, oh oh, that was a bit abrupt, because
1:32:29
there's obviously a lot to pack into this episode, and it uses
1:32:33
up its its 22 1/2 minutes very, very, very quickly, but there
1:32:38
isn't a wasted second in it. It's a glorious episode of
1:32:41
Doctor Who. Well, shall we head in?
1:32:43
I think we should. You're going to count us in?
1:32:46
I will in 54321. Do you know you asked it to you
1:32:53
earlier about watching this as a child, I've had a lot of people,
1:32:58
a lot of websites, a lot of books, and a lot of magazines
1:33:01
criticize the finale of this by saying there's only there's only
1:33:06
like two or three dialects. I'm telling you, as a child I
1:33:10
was utterly convinced there were 100 dialects attack in that.
1:33:14
House with you completely. Because that criticism is such
1:33:18
an adult criticism. And when you're a kid, you're
1:33:22
sitting there, you go, it's Daleks and Ogrons attacking a
1:33:24
house and unit soldiers. You don't notice there's only
1:33:27
three Daleks and and six Ogrons. You just go, oh, it's attacking
1:33:32
the house. It's exciting.
1:33:33
We're on the brink of war, and someone's going to blow it up.
1:33:35
And there's it's all gone. Just utterly brilliant.
1:33:39
Utterly brilliant. It's the first time this
1:33:41
happened. All the doctors on screen, I
1:33:43
know it. Will happen.
1:33:45
Yeah. Yeah, it is.
1:33:47
This is why it was so exciting. It was like we'd seen Troughton
1:33:50
and Hartnell on screen for the first time since they both left
1:33:52
the show. It was wonderful.
1:33:56
You know, I think Katie Money's got a point.
1:33:57
You know the the way that shot was framed there with Pearly in
1:34:00
the front looking out, you had the two overruns on either side,
1:34:02
the Daleks inside. There was a lot going on there.
1:34:06
Yeah, in a tiny set that's clearly far too small for it.
1:34:11
I love it. I this is this is so clever.
1:34:14
And God again, Aubrey Woods is just brilliant with it.
1:34:20
This is there's. No grounds, isn't he?
1:34:22
That's quite terrifying. Now it all he is.
1:34:25
He has his best. He's even.
1:34:26
Dressed like the I was saying earlier, you know, he's got
1:34:28
dialogue like the Master. He's even dressed like the
1:34:29
Master. He's got the Neru collar and
1:34:31
everything on there. I think Barry Letts is wrong
1:34:34
when he talks about him being theatrical and over the top.
1:34:37
He isn't he? He's just superb well.
1:34:42
You know, he was a very smart man, but.
1:34:45
He's allowed to be wrong occasionally.
1:34:48
It is only occasionally. This is what Katie Malik also
1:34:51
Doris Day outfit, isn't it? She really didn't like what she
1:34:53
was wearing. It'd be interesting as well.
1:34:57
There's there's, oh, what's his name?
1:34:59
I want to say Andrew Carr. It probably isn't Andrew Carr,
1:35:01
the guy playing the guard anyway, who becomes the new
1:35:04
controller at the end. Then his future is going to be
1:35:06
wiped out and his victory is only going to last a few seconds
1:35:09
anyway. But he again, it's a tiny little
1:35:13
thankless part and he but he's been in it for three episodes
1:35:16
and he's really mesmerizing. He's very good at his camp.
1:35:21
Isn't it fantastic look and he's wearing a mask and he's got a
1:35:24
beard. There's not much of it.
1:35:25
He might as well be wearing an Ogron mask for for, you know,
1:35:28
the expression he's able to give.
1:35:30
But he does he he has a very expressive face and plays
1:35:34
cynicism and snarkiness. I think really, really well it.
1:35:38
Reminds me of one of those very short men with restrained anger
1:35:41
that is allowed to let it out every now and again.
1:35:43
He's a little bit scary. Bit like some of those people
1:35:46
that if you've ever been to sort of the Excel or Olympia when
1:35:50
they have those big events on where the guests are sort of
1:35:53
signing autographs and he's a bit like the kind of people they
1:35:57
employ there to walk around and be stewards.
1:36:00
It's that same kind of sneery. I'm more important than you and
1:36:04
you're having to queue up and do things.
1:36:06
And if I had a whip in my hand, I would absolutely use it.
1:36:11
And then I go to one of those events.
1:36:12
Now I'm going to be murdered by every one of those.
1:36:17
Again, I'm just going to point out very simple tricks to
1:36:21
suggest a few cushions on the floor, all the sort of wines
1:36:25
that set out on the floor. Again, it's that thing of trying
1:36:29
to imply that in this sterile cold, everything is metallic,
1:36:33
Everything is grey and green, which is automatically sickly
1:36:38
putting cushions down. That's the height of luxury post
1:36:43
war kind of thing. Oh, this is the spit where he
1:36:46
talks about the the holes in the ground, isn't it?
1:36:49
This is such. This is pure exposition, but it
1:36:52
adds a lot of detail. Yeah, you see, they, I know that
1:36:56
people talk about, and I think Barry and Terence have both
1:36:59
talked about this as well, that this, this episode has too much
1:37:02
exposition. It it doesn't for a kid at 8
1:37:05
years old watching this. This is the information you
1:37:07
needed. This is, this is beautifully
1:37:10
done. Both this and the bit later on
1:37:12
where they talk about the time paradox.
1:37:14
Very clever writing because it just gets the the message across
1:37:18
and and that whole. That's why I say this.
1:37:21
The show don't tell thing is a load of old bollocks half the
1:37:24
time because you do need to tell.
1:37:26
It is a very good thing. If you've got good actors and
1:37:28
good dialogue, you can get an awful lot of story across in a
1:37:31
couple of lines, and it's better to do that that that telling the
1:37:35
audience and reminding them what they've been watching is worth
1:37:38
any number of fancy show Don't tell shots.
1:37:42
But it's only that in classic who they They often had to use
1:37:44
exposition because they didn't have the budget to show all of
1:37:47
this exactly. And you know what?
1:37:49
Sometimes my imagination could be a lot more disturbing than
1:37:51
what I'll ever see on the screen.
1:37:52
So they give me enough information, I'll fill in the
1:37:55
blanks. So that was, that was a really
1:37:58
lovely bit of cruel, The doctor there on my he says.
1:38:02
My family with controllers for three generations and the doctor
1:38:05
says, oh, a whole family of Quislings just on the nose, you
1:38:10
know, he doesn't care. He doesn't think about being
1:38:13
rude to anybody. And it's lovely.
1:38:15
Have I missed the bit where Joe Brant stands there screaming the
1:38:17
head off? Yes, I was.
1:38:22
We were probably waffling on about that, but yeah.
1:38:25
And this is great, the very the very people that were trying to
1:38:29
kill him in episode 2 and now trying to rescue him.
1:38:31
Yeah. And I again, this is what I was
1:38:33
saying earlier about how good I think Paul Bernard is as the
1:38:38
film director because his use of under low shots and his and that
1:38:43
is one of the goriest deaths you've ever seen in Doctor Who
1:38:46
that. I mean you don't see Boaz die,
1:38:48
but his his body when it's lying on the floor covered in blood
1:38:52
with what looks like his leg blown off is really quite
1:38:56
unpleasant for Doctor Who. I remember as a kid watching
1:38:58
that and just thinking, oh he is, he's definitely dead.
1:39:02
It's a shame you have to have the cutaway in studio which they
1:39:05
obviously forgot to shoot on location of him shouting and
1:39:08
that. Doesn't equate the future with
1:39:11
just a lot of concrete though, doesn't it?
1:39:13
The sand frontier in. Space.
1:39:15
But you know, I'm sorry, in the 90s, growing up in the 1970s,
1:39:20
the future was concrete. We we had the, we had the, the,
1:39:24
we'd gone through Art Deco. And with the 60s and 70s, we had
1:39:27
Brutalism, which I absolutely love.
1:39:30
That's why I love the South Bank, because it's it's
1:39:32
Brutalism writ large. But you know, this is what we
1:39:36
saw as a kids growing up. This is what we had around us.
1:39:39
We grew up in the 60s and 70s where it was concrete,
1:39:43
everything. Concrete was the great answer to
1:39:45
everything. Everything was square, harsh
1:39:50
angles. There was no attempt at beauty
1:39:56
and then that trans, you know, you just know that 200 years in
1:39:58
the future that will still be there.
1:40:01
Everything else has been wiped out, but concrete tower blocks
1:40:03
will have survived because that's what we were taught to
1:40:06
believe. And and I think it's true, I
1:40:08
think it works. I think it sells the whole
1:40:11
dystopian thing very, very well. It's depressing as hell as well,
1:40:15
I say. Did you see how the cameras
1:40:17
swung around then when they got away?
1:40:20
Not a lot of villains get those quiet moments of, oh shit, you
1:40:25
know, like. Also, it hadn't occurred to me
1:40:29
till we're watching it now. This must be one of the very
1:40:32
last stories. I'm sure a moment I've said that
1:40:34
10,000 people will point out loads of others, but a very 60s
1:40:38
thing is fade to black rather than crossfade.
1:40:42
And Paul Bernard uses a lot of fade to blacks all the way
1:40:44
through this story, rather than doing crossfades between scenes
1:40:47
and and and things like that. It's quite dramatic.
1:40:51
And I can't think there's many more Perkins after this where we
1:40:54
use fade to blacks rather than than dissolves.
1:40:58
It's a very handsome looking man at the back of that shop there.
1:41:01
Can you see? Just peering out of the shine.
1:41:03
I'm sorry, my eyes are firmly fixed on Valentine Palmer, who I
1:41:06
think it's a very handsome man. Oh, Gary, there are beautiful
1:41:09
men throughout this story, aren't they?
1:41:10
Yeah, this is it. This is the same, isn't it?
1:41:15
When this? Is the big exposition as we work
1:41:19
out, and therefore as a kid watching this, we're working it
1:41:23
out with them and seeing what they were talking about.
1:41:25
It's so important to have exposition scenes like this.
1:41:28
It's it's really wrong when people say you shouldn't have
1:41:31
exposition. I just.
1:41:32
You're right. It is this story.
1:41:34
Thinking about your audience, you're thinking about
1:41:36
yourselves. It is a story where they
1:41:38
criticize. Make this stuff.
1:41:40
They know the story, they forget that the audience don't.
1:41:43
And this kind of scene is is really vital, I have to say.
1:41:47
I want to say that this episode is very powerful for me memory
1:41:52
wise. So I watched this at my friend
1:41:56
Paul Trotman's house. It was his birthday party.
1:42:00
So this is one of the first episodes of Doctor Who I ever
1:42:03
saw in colour. Because we had a black and white
1:42:05
TV right through to the late 70s and I've seen one episode of the
1:42:09
Demons in colour. And then I saw this episode,
1:42:11
Episode 4 in Colour, and it was doubly exciting to see Daleks
1:42:18
fighting people in color. I hadn't realized that there was
1:42:21
a gold Dalek and and and two blue dialects.
1:42:24
I just they were just Daleks in black and white.
1:42:26
But suddenly seeing Doctor Who in color for the first time what
1:42:30
second time but with Daleks for the first time in color was a
1:42:33
brilliant thing for me. And I just sat there and I think
1:42:37
it was the regular times that referred to it rather than day
1:42:40
of the Dialects. They referred to it, I think on
1:42:42
a caption on the pages and his end of the Dialects, and I
1:42:47
remember being quite disappointed that the episode
1:42:49
title was still Day of the Daleks.
1:42:50
I thought three episodes, The Day of the Darks and the final
1:42:52
episode should have been End of the Dialects, which somehow the
1:42:56
day thing. So this is, you know, so early,
1:42:58
beautifully shot. He shoots the whole thing
1:43:00
through foliage, what is really just a boring shot of a man
1:43:05
running from one end of a park to the other.
1:43:08
Very. Clever.
1:43:09
I'm still coming to terms with the fact that you watched the
1:43:11
whole of the poetry and most of the Tom Baker's area in black
1:43:13
and white. The first time, first time we
1:43:15
got a colour telly was Face of Evil Episode one.
1:43:19
Which? We were revisiting all of those
1:43:21
when they came out on or well, however you saw.
1:43:24
Them when I first started seeing pirate Doctor Who videos of of
1:43:28
Purtree and Tom Baker stories. For the most part they were the
1:43:31
first time I was seeing them fully in colour.
1:43:33
I but in the mid 70s sort of, I think from I think from
1:43:38
Mastermind Dragger onwards. Do I think Maskman Dragger?
1:43:43
No earlier than that, early in that.
1:43:45
So it would have been probably Android Invasion.
1:43:47
I think I came back. I've been on tour and I came
1:43:51
back so it'd be Android Invasion or possibly Brendan Mobius.
1:43:54
I used to go to my friend Tim Farman's house and he had a
1:43:57
color telly. So every Saturday I would always
1:43:59
say to my mom, I'm going to Tim's for the afternoon.
1:44:01
And it was certainly because we wanted to watch, talk to and I
1:44:03
wanted to see it in color. But personally we didn't get a
1:44:06
color TV until Facebook episode one.
1:44:09
So all of partly I said the only episodes I ever saw in color of.
1:44:13
Partly was episode four of The Demons.
1:44:15
Episode 4 of Day of the Daleks and episode 2 of Curse of
1:44:19
Peloton were the only part with stories I ever saw in colour on
1:44:22
transmission. Everything else was black and
1:44:25
white. It didn't worry me.
1:44:27
I Doctor Who television was black and white to me, you know,
1:44:31
see it in colour was exciting to go to a friend's house and they
1:44:34
could afford to have a colour TV.
1:44:35
We couldn't afford that. Do you know in some ways, in
1:44:40
some ways are very envious and you saw this consecutively as it
1:44:43
was going out or I didn't. I watched I basically all of
1:44:47
classic who I saw as the VHSS were released.
1:44:50
But do you know what it was like putting together a massive,
1:44:52
exciting jigsaw puzzle? Because they just came out all
1:44:55
over the place, Didn't. They.
1:44:56
It felt no. Transcendence or rhythm to it at
1:44:58
all? No, it was wonderful.
1:45:03
Yeah, it was. It was.
1:45:06
It's just for me, it's just nostalgia.
1:45:10
It's just my childhood and the fact I'm lucky enough that so
1:45:14
much of my childhood I can sit down and revisit on television
1:45:18
and watch these things can watch Doctor, you can watch to.
1:45:22
I mean, I'm, I'm so disappointed that Ace of Wands, the first two
1:45:25
years of Ace of Wands and it's just 'cause that was a very
1:45:27
important show in my childhood. But pretty much most of the
1:45:31
other kids TV that ITV and BBC have that I watched, I've got
1:45:36
sitting on shiny disk out in the corridor there.
1:45:39
So I'm very, very lucky that we've got access to this stuff
1:45:42
and we're very lucky that all of purwee exists.
1:45:45
I think like, you know, the the act of making television has
1:45:48
obviously come on in leaps and bounds since this came out.
1:45:52
But this is still great telly. Like this can still be watched.
1:45:55
That's great telly. It's just exciting and it's, you
1:45:58
know, it's what we were saying earlier.
1:46:00
It's really well paced. There's nothing wasted other
1:46:04
than possibly the little trike scene.
1:46:06
There's no wastage in this story at all.
1:46:08
It just bounces along similar to what I was saying when we were
1:46:12
at the BFI the other week about Bond or Snowman, which I still
1:46:15
maintain is the one of the most perfect six part Doctor Who
1:46:20
stories and certainly of the 60s stuff, only that and Enemy the
1:46:23
World. I think Justified 6 episodes
1:46:26
because there is no padding. There's no running around.
1:46:28
There's no repetition at all in those two stories And why I
1:46:32
think 4 parts generally works really well but this is this is
1:46:35
great. Oh there look that guy's giving
1:46:37
him that side eye look again he's great actor that bloke,
1:46:39
whoever he is, it just works. There's there's just there's no
1:46:44
wastage and you come away at the end of these kind of stories
1:46:47
just go. I've watched really good
1:46:49
exciting television. I love Dave the Dialects.
1:46:53
I just don't understand why people could have anything bad
1:46:58
to say about it. It's it's it's beyond me but I'm
1:47:01
biased it's beyond me that people can have anything bad say
1:47:04
about any pert we apart from Clause Paxos which I'm the first
1:47:06
person to have lots of bad things to say about the rest of
1:47:10
Purt we stuff is just to me is flawless.
1:47:14
Whereas I can point you at 100 other Doctor Who fans of similar
1:47:20
age to me who will tell you that everything from Robot through to
1:47:23
Lagopoulos is the best doctor whoever is.
1:47:27
And I would sit there and argue that and go, it's bloody.
1:47:29
No, it's, it's, you know, there was a great moment in seasons 12
1:47:33
and 13 and one or two highlights after that.
1:47:37
But frankly, once Leela's gone, Doctor Who for me in the 70s is
1:47:42
pretty dire until Pete Davidson comes along and then it lifts
1:47:49
again. And as I said, they're great.
1:47:51
They're in the middle of all of those, you know, Stones of
1:47:53
Bloods and your Andrew's Attire and Leisure Hive and Warriors
1:47:56
Gate and things like that. There's always a.
1:47:59
Chair Brilliant Tom Baker stories.
1:48:02
But overall, I always come away from those last three years of
1:48:05
Tom Baker with the kind of. Whereas I'm sure you know, I've
1:48:09
had people on here that are entirely in the opposite
1:48:12
direction. And all of the.
1:48:13
Graham Williams Era You know, find all this a bit dreary.
1:48:17
Beyond me how they do, but I'm very glad that such strange and
1:48:22
weirdly created people exactly. I love them all.
1:48:26
They're all welcome here, I'll tell you.
1:48:29
But you know, go back to what we're saying about how this is
1:48:31
structured. Obviously you've got all the
1:48:32
mystery in episode one. There's a load of explanation in
1:48:35
episode 2 about what's going on. I think we've spent just enough
1:48:38
time in episode 3 in that future to see how shocking it is.
1:48:42
Yeah, and now peaks in episode 4.
1:48:45
So when we head back into contemporary times, we've got to
1:48:48
sort this. Out and we've earned it that's
1:48:50
the point is is we've earned their victory.
1:48:54
We've earned them going back to to the the future, to the past
1:48:57
rather to do this and. Making that choice to controller
1:49:01
there, saying go on, go now and see what you can do.
1:49:06
Fabulous. Beautifully written.
1:49:10
Probably he's going to try and pretend you see this is the.
1:49:13
Scene I wanted to ask Aspel to show this is, this is, this is
1:49:16
when I wrote them and said, you know, I want this scene.
1:49:19
I still think this is an absolutely masterful scene of
1:49:23
Doctor Who, 70s Doctor Who. It's it's the first time the
1:49:29
Daleks have really behaved like Daleks actually in this story as
1:49:31
well, because first time we've seen them exterminate anyone.
1:49:35
But he's just, it's everything you've waited four weeks to
1:49:39
watch. And then this guy comes out and
1:49:43
it's just like, yeah, the ultimate portrayal and he's so
1:49:45
smug as he walks away with his little grin.
1:49:47
It's sort of like ha ha. Ducks down the door, doesn't he
1:49:50
like? Yeah.
1:49:51
He has no idea that he's about to just wink out of existence in
1:49:55
about 20 minutes time. It kind of shows you the poor
1:49:58
controller, that kind of what circumstance, because I've just
1:50:00
chosen the next guy along, right.
1:50:02
You're in charge now. Don't let us down.
1:50:03
Well, it's the guy that betrayed him, isn't it?
1:50:05
That's it's that typical dialect thing.
1:50:07
Someone comes on and goes, that guy's betraying you and the
1:50:10
dialects go, Oh well, we'll believe you and we'll
1:50:12
exterminate him and you've automatically become the new
1:50:14
leader. It's a great way if you if you
1:50:16
understand dialects, it's a great way to always stay in
1:50:18
charge. I never realized as a child I'd
1:50:21
never clicked in my head that they actually don't leave that
1:50:23
room until now, when they go back to the future.
1:50:26
Back to the Future. We've just seen them from 2
1:50:29
camera angles for 3 1/2 episodes.
1:50:32
Davis was paying attention here with the newscaster.
1:50:35
Well, this is a fairly standard drama thing in the 70s actually,
1:50:40
to have real newscasters. I mean, I think Alex McIntosh
1:50:43
was, I think he's a regional reporter.
1:50:48
I don't think he was. He was mainstream.
1:50:49
It's like we'd had Kenneth Kendall in In War Machines and
1:50:55
every other show always used Corbett Woodhall.
1:50:58
And I think Alex McIntosh is it was was a local news and he was
1:51:03
an actor as well, but he was a local news reporter.
1:51:05
I think they they got in for this.
1:51:07
Now I get Paul Bernard with. Ragic.
1:51:09
And that's Ragic, because she was ill.
1:51:13
That is shot exactly how it would be shot on the news with
1:51:16
an establishing stock, the cars coming in, then some handheld
1:51:19
work as they're going into the building.
1:51:21
This, I always think, is a bit iffy.
1:51:24
Why are these people letting the?
1:51:25
They kind of salute the doctor and you think, I'm sorry, but
1:51:28
you're not UNIT, You're the regular army.
1:51:30
You wouldn't have a clue who he was.
1:51:33
But don't you love Nick? Courtney's delivering this line
1:51:35
in a minute. Now be quiet, Sir.
1:51:36
It's great. This is very clever, this, this
1:51:41
whole sort of realizing the whole thing with Shura and the
1:51:45
bomb is just clever. That that lovely scene coming
1:51:48
up, which we'll talk about in a minute with Shura.
1:51:50
And here we have, here's why do people complain about this?
1:51:54
Yes, I mean. Don't worry, sorry, it looks
1:51:56
like there's loads coming out. Just shoots it over and over
1:51:59
again. And so there are more Daleks and
1:52:01
more Ogrons and it just works. And yes, you don't he he
1:52:05
probably makes a mistake on the actual attack on the House by
1:52:09
not doing the same kind of cheating and seeing different
1:52:13
groups of dialects coming from different angles.
1:52:15
But who cares? I.
1:52:16
Wasn't putting a party me as a child, though, I was just swept
1:52:21
up in this. Yeah, absolutely.
1:52:23
So was I. It was just brilliant.
1:52:25
It was like, Oh my God, the dialects are attacking.
1:52:28
Not quite sure how they get around that bit of water, but we
1:52:31
won't ask about that. I have it as they sort of glide
1:52:34
across just the French windows, you know, like a very graceful
1:52:38
entrance into the building. And I have in my head, which I
1:52:43
know doesn't exist, but I had in my head for many, many years
1:52:47
that they did smash through the the glass windows.
1:52:50
But of course that's the Ogron in in episode one that does
1:52:53
that. But in my head I remember Daleks
1:52:56
swarming it and I'm sure there's Terence's novelisation is to
1:52:59
blame for this. The Daleks swarming in and
1:53:01
coming through those glass windows.
1:53:03
And as it is, it's two Daleks in a corridor.
1:53:07
But I remember it as a kid convincing myself that actually
1:53:11
we'd seen 20 dilates coming in through every possible angle
1:53:14
into the house and it was a complete sort of routing of the
1:53:17
house. And this is what you do as a
1:53:19
kid. Your your mind.
1:53:21
You get so caught up in the story when you're 8 years old
1:53:24
that you fill in the bits that even they they couldn't shoot
1:53:27
and you've convinced yourself within 10 minutes of the program
1:53:29
ending that's actually what you saw.
1:53:31
It's a shame we. Grow up, isn't it?
1:53:34
It's a growing up so overrated and and a waste of time.
1:53:38
Isn't this great? How?
1:53:39
The plot again, this ending where he sets off the bomb, he
1:53:43
takes out the Daleks, they've got out the politicians.
1:53:46
It's so neat. It's so Terrence Dicks.
1:53:48
It's clever. It's.
1:53:49
Well, I think that's, I have to say, I think that's probably
1:53:52
Louis Marks because I think that's in his original Ghost
1:53:56
Hunters or whatever it was called idea of these people with
1:53:59
the time paradox coming back and and creating it themselves.
1:54:02
I I think Terrence is saying it's just the cleverness of of
1:54:05
putting Daleks and giving them a reason to do it.
1:54:08
But I think we'll never really know that we should have the.
1:54:11
Race failure. With her one, her one scene,
1:54:13
because she wasn't I'll at this point.
1:54:16
I love all the different cars and the different cultures and
1:54:19
you know, there's people from different countries in this
1:54:22
sequence. It's very adventurous.
1:54:23
There's a obviously a lot of money spent on extras in this
1:54:26
story because apart from UNIT soldiers, there's a hell of a
1:54:29
lot of diplomats and things. Here they go inside the windows
1:54:34
and. I this is the point where I was.
1:54:36
You know, this is Ricky Newby, isn't it going, Not Ricky Newby.
1:54:40
Oh God, what's the name of the dialect operator?
1:54:42
I can't remember going through that window, but I was convinced
1:54:45
you saw him go all the way through the window and and go
1:54:47
through the the big room that we've seen before.
1:54:51
Jimmy Winston is amazing in here.
1:54:53
I think he's great actor. But isn't it great they they
1:54:56
took him out of the action early enough?
1:54:58
You've completely forgotten. About it, Absolutely.
1:55:00
But as a kid, I didn't. I have to say that never
1:55:03
confused me as a kid because I think in the back of my head
1:55:06
because we knew he hadn't been killed by no Gron.
1:55:08
Watching this as a kid, I was always thinking, well, hang on,
1:55:11
Shuras. They left Shura behind.
1:55:12
Someone needs to go back and get him.
1:55:14
That poor bloke stuck in the 20th century and he should be
1:55:17
home with all his friends in the 22nd.
1:55:19
Oh, wait a minute. He's actually got something to
1:55:21
do here. And then when and directly is
1:55:23
that thing? Hang on, Shura.
1:55:25
We thought he was dead. Maybe he's still alive.
1:55:26
I'm like going as a kid. I was going, yes, yes, go get
1:55:31
him. Whereas I've forgotten
1:55:33
completely. And I went, of course, you know,
1:55:36
like he's still there. I don't You love Daleks and
1:55:40
incongruous settings, I think. Yes.
1:55:43
Yeah. Oh no, not this time.
1:55:46
Brilliant. Oh, I just remember this as a
1:55:48
kid and being so excited and that big explosion that he's
1:55:52
ever done with very, very quickly and suddenly, yes, this
1:55:55
is, this is the only down point of the whole thing, is it?
1:55:58
It just ends and it just ends. And you know, with hindsight we
1:56:03
now know this wasn't meant to be the ending at all.
1:56:06
And it is a little bit disappointing that after all
1:56:09
that excitement and all that adventure, there's there's no
1:56:12
real, all the dogs just been blown up.
1:56:16
There's no no one talks about it, no one says the dialects are
1:56:19
gone and blah blah blah, and there's no unit.
1:56:21
There's no Brigadier at the end, which I think is a shame, you
1:56:24
think? Back to something like
1:56:26
Ambassadors of Death where you spent 5 minutes of him going,
1:56:28
right? Joe, you can stay.
1:56:29
I'm sorry. Liz, you can stay here and sort
1:56:31
this out. Right.
1:56:32
I'm off. See you.
1:56:33
You know, now we just cut. We got next story.
1:56:36
But I think that's just, you know, they just haven't sleep.
1:56:39
Just ran out of time on the episode, but it doesn't matter
1:56:41
because it's just so brilliant And so, look, it was Ricky
1:56:46
Newbie. I was right.
1:56:48
On the subject of this being brilliant, would you then
1:56:52
indulge me to give three reasons as to why three only.
1:56:56
I'm afraid we'll do three, each one back and forth as to why
1:56:59
people should go and watch this immediately. 3 Great reads,
1:57:05
right? Brilliant actors.
1:57:08
Not just the main cast, not just elite regulars, but people like
1:57:12
Aubrey Woods and all the Anna, Barry and and Valentine Palmer
1:57:17
and Scott Frederick's and Jimmy wins and all of her.
1:57:20
So there's there isn't a Duff performance in the entire story.
1:57:24
So that's important. The the special effects that the
1:57:27
the time tunnel effects and everything like that.
1:57:29
It's so 70s. It just screams 70s at you
1:57:32
without being the over the top colourful Blair that that clause
1:57:37
of Axis did. It just holds on.
1:57:40
And then the most important thing I think for this story
1:57:42
that makes it so watchable is it's just a damn good story with
1:57:46
a very clever beginning, a very clever middle and a very clever
1:57:49
end. It just works.
1:57:51
It just sings along and it's got Daleks and it's got the Doctor
1:57:56
tied to a mind analysis machine. And all these moments that make
1:58:01
Daleks so exciting, when actually they're barely in it
1:58:06
and yet you still come away thinking I've just seen a
1:58:09
brilliant dialect story. God damn it.
1:58:12
I've got to do 3 now I'm going to do on the back of that.
1:58:15
OK, all right. I've got.
1:58:16
I'll be very quick. I'm going to say the character
1:58:18
of the controller, who I think is given like magnificent depth
1:58:22
by Aubrey Woods and has very surprising moments throughout.
1:58:27
I would say Dudley Simpson. I think this is the point where
1:58:30
he's but allowed to not to stop doing all electronic music,
1:58:34
which he did in Season 8 and as ever is on form and is you know,
1:58:41
creating the language of drama for Doctor Who throughout the
1:58:44
70s. Marvellous.
1:58:45
And three, I'm going to say me and my ability as a child to
1:58:53
skip over any deficiencies in the production that they might
1:58:56
have been and fill in the blanks and convince myself that that
1:59:00
climax was every bit as you know what, on that special edition
1:59:04
version. I think it's improved for seeing
1:59:06
all those, no. It's not.
1:59:08
It's not improved at all because it's as obvious.
1:59:11
It's it makes it obvious. Whereas here you're using your
1:59:15
imagination and here you're just going this is thrilling this
1:59:18
this was you know and also the special edition isn't directed
1:59:23
by for Bernard and and his film work is so bloody good in this
1:59:28
serial that the moment you try and drop shots in that have been
1:59:31
shot by the people, however good they are it it doesn't mesh very
1:59:36
well. It it sort of jolts and that's
1:59:38
I'm never a big fan of of special edition Doctor Who
1:59:41
stories anyway with extra scenes and things.
1:59:43
I don't really like them when they put new special effects in.
1:59:46
But do you remember Peter Moffett's marvellous reaction to
1:59:48
the Five Doctors? And he went, did you see that
1:59:50
special edition version of the Five Doctors they put out?
1:59:53
I took out those things for a reason.
1:59:54
You know, and then there's that, that very bizarre Planet of
1:59:59
Fire, one with new stuff. And it's just like that, Doctor,
2:00:03
I want people to leave Doctor Who as it was.
2:00:06
I just don't think you need to keep farting around and
2:00:10
tweaking, partly because, as I said to you before.
2:00:13
It also it dates far more than the original 60s and 70s and
2:00:18
80s. That sort of CGI.
2:00:20
Fire, isn't it that looks. And it just looks terrible now.
2:00:22
It looks worse than anything they did back in the 70s.
2:00:25
Well, do you know what? I think it's the bizarreest
2:00:27
choice ever. There was the Enlightenment one
2:00:29
where they decided to cut it down and make it as pacey as
2:00:33
like a new series. And I'm like, but it just wasn't
2:00:37
being made that way and I bless them, they got Fiona coming in
2:00:40
and and she had her input into how she would make it now but
2:00:45
but they lost 20 minutes like. How can you lose 20?
2:00:49
I mean, I'm not saying, but how can you lose 20 minutes from
2:00:51
enlightenment? It's it's another it's of almost
2:00:54
perfect Doctor Who four parts story.
2:00:56
You don't want to lose 20 minutes from it.
2:00:58
You want to actually add a bit more in I think for
2:00:59
enlightenment. I love enlightenment.
2:01:01
It's a brilliant story. It's fantastic.
2:01:04
Gary well then that does lead me to ask you a question because
2:01:08
Enlightenment is one of my five 80s Doctor Who stories I haven't
2:01:11
done a commentary on yet. And we've done the 60s and we've
2:01:15
done the 70s. I can't get out of that now, can
2:01:19
I happily love to do enlightenment?
2:01:23
Definitely. I love it.
2:01:25
Corker. Brilliant.
2:01:27
And in another era, you said that is like comfort Hootie you.
2:01:30
And it's an era I have a bit of difficulty with, actually, So I
2:01:33
like to. Oh, really?
2:01:34
And again, since for me is is just just, yeah, it's it's a
2:01:38
different form. It's nostalgia again, like
2:01:40
Pertwee is, but it's a different form of nostalgia because it's
2:01:43
my early years in Doctor Who found him.
2:01:46
It's when I was doing my fanzine.
2:01:48
It's when I was beginning to sort of make slightly more
2:01:52
valued judgements on things. So I have AI have an enormous
2:01:55
passion for those 3 Davidson years.
2:01:58
I I think, you know, and again it's it's that middle year is
2:02:02
just really, really good for me because lots of people diss it
2:02:05
and I think no, I I love season 20.
2:02:07
I think it's wonderful. I had a wonderful American come
2:02:11
on and and claim that the King's demons one of his favorite
2:02:14
stories. Honestly, it was a 2 hour
2:02:16
conversation I'll never forget. It was marvelous.
2:02:20
Well, good luck to them. I'm I'm glad they were able to
2:02:23
see that in in in the King's demons.
2:02:25
Yeah, two. Yeah.
2:02:26
I will say Davison 2 parters are not though the highlight and if
2:02:31
you were the Awakening is infinitely better than the
2:02:33
King's demons. I always feel like with
2:02:35
Davidson, when it's good, it's really good and when I good it's
2:02:41
ready to. Arkham Infinity I see.
2:02:45
No see. I like I've got I've I've got a
2:02:48
soft spot for Arkham Infinity, partly because it's Gallifrey
2:02:51
and Time Lords and that's always going to open doors for me
2:02:54
anyway. I at the moment I see a time
2:02:56
world caller. I'm like yeah this story is
2:02:58
brilliant Infinity like lots of people do because there's
2:03:03
something desperately again, there's something quite clever
2:03:06
about story. It's a very good idea behind it.
2:03:09
It's Johnny Byrne who I do think is a very, very good writer and
2:03:13
it's just fun. I I think it's a fun story.
2:03:16
It has some terrible moments. It has the space chicken, which,
2:03:20
yeah, no one in their right mind should ever have allowed that to
2:03:24
go on screen. Let it.
2:03:27
Let it. Slack strips over a few lies.
2:03:30
Yeah, I I I have a a simplistic love for Arkham Infinity.
2:03:34
But then, as I say, it's season 20 and and I have a hard job not
2:03:38
liking season 20 apart from our famous demons.
2:03:43
Enlightenment. Here we come.
2:03:45
All right. Leaves me to say thank you very
2:03:47
much for your time. It's been an utter pleasure once
2:03:50
again. Thank you for hosting us.
2:03:53
Until next time. All right.
2:03:55
Take care.