The Ark

The TARDIS materializes in a lush jungle and Dodo emerges with a cold. She think she is somewhere on Earth and shows Steven her proof: reptiles and trees surround her that could only come from her home planet. The Doctor cannot tell exactly where they have arrived but realizes that the wildlife around them is from many different areas of Earth, there is a faint regular trembling to the ground beneath them, and there is a steel roof overhead. No, this is not Earth, but a spaceship carrying the last refugees from the planet Earth as it is millions of years in the future and the planet is about to burn up in the sun. The majority of the human race has been miniaturized for the journey to their new home on the planet Refusis, which will take 700 years, and only a handful of humans staff the vast ship along with members of another race, the Monoids. The Monoids are speechless creatures with lizard-like skin, mops of hair, and one singulat eye, and after making a partnership with the humans to join them on their voyage they have become a servant class of species. The playing field is levelled, though, when Dodo's cold infects the humans and the Monoids indiscriminately; it appears that at this point in time the common cold has been cured for so long that no-one has any resistance to it - even Steven. The Doctor works under the suspicion of some of the humans and finally cures the cold, saving the inhabitants of the Ark, and the time travellers leave. The TARDIS performs something of a miracle, though, and returns in episode 3 some 700 years later when the Ark's voyage has been
completed and Refusis is in sight. This time, though, there has been a secondary outbreak of the common cold, and the Monoids have emerged stronger, and having made voice boxes for themselves and devised weapons, they are now in charge and the humans serve them. Not only that, but the Monoids intend to take Refusis for themselves and blow up the Ark with all the human race on board. Obviously the Doctor and copany cannot stand by and let this happen, and it is up to them to save the day.

I quite like The Ark. It's a simple story really but the production values are very high with no seams showing in the Monoid costumes, vast sets for the Ark control centres, and some great location work for the initial few moments of the show (unless you're going to tell me they got an Indian elephant into the BBC studios just for that scene). The costumes on the humans are a bit sily though; it seems in the far future we'll all be well-toned men and women wearing speedos and shredded tunics and flip-flops. There are also some good effects shots of the landing craft from the spaceship as they head for Refusis, even if the strings on the landers show a bit. A bit of a cop-out with the Refusians though; they're invisible like the Visians on the panet Mira in The Dalek Master Plan. All four episodes of the story exist in full and they're good quality copies, so when this story is considered for DVD release there will be great results with what I assume will be minimal effort.

Up next, the Doctor himself starts to fade from view for the next adventure, a twisted classic I enjoy despite only 1 episode existing to watch...

NEXT EPISODE : THE CELESTIAL TOYMAKER