Revenge of the Cybermen
The Doctor, Sarah and Harry finally return to Nerva via a Time Ring given to them at the start of their adventure on Skaro only to discover that things have changed there. They have returned to the beacon at a time thousands of years before the solar flares devastated Earth and now just have to wait for the TARDIS to drift back to them. But there is a problem on Nerva: put into service to guide space traffic around a new planet around Jupiter, the beacon has been ravaged by a plague that has left all but four members of the crew dead. The Doctor does not believe that it is actually a plague and his suspicions are confirmed when Sarah is attacked by a Cybermat and injected with poison. Crewman Kellman has apparantly been working with the Cybermen, and the new planet is of interest to them: it is Voga, the planet of gold. Gold, it is revealed, is the one substance to which Cybertechnology is vulnerable as it is non-corrodable and destroys a Cyberman's inner workings. The Cybermen plan to destroy Voga with a series of bombs but all the while they are victims of a double-cross; Kellman has planned with the Vogans to lure the Cybermen onto the beacon and blow it up with a rocket.
Um. Right from one of the best Dalek stories ever we go into what is one of the weakest Cybermen adventures ever made. Not seen since The Invasion in 1969, the Cybermen are slightly redesigned for their first colour appearance, but unlike previous adventures where there were armies of them on screen, here we only have four of them including their Cyberleader - the last of the species apparantly. The Cyberleader is done all wrong by the actor playing him, he sounds too emotional and actually shouts and gloats, and even makes the odd ironic quip, which is something that has never happened before. Until 1992 this was the earliest Cyberman adventure that existed intact, so it was actually the introduction story for an entire generation of fans who had never seen a Cyberman on screen before. The new Cybermat design is a lot bigger and more sinister than the previous ones, though; it has no eyes and flows across the floor more like a silverfish. And it jumps. Okay it's a CSO jump but a jump nonetheless.
The production values of the adventure are very good despite the bad presentation of the key villans; extensive location work was done in some caves for the Vogan planet sequences, including Sarah and Harry arriving via transmat and many many chases down corridors. Again there is the problem of going from the filmed locations to the studio sets built to represent the caves, but one gets used to that sort of thing with Doctor Who. Eventually.
Revenge of the Cybermen was actually the first VHS Doctor Who adventure I ever bought, sometime back in the summer of 1989. I remember hauling it around downtown Toronto all day with me and after a Blue Jays game at the SkyDome coming home very late and sitting up for another 90 minutes to enjoy it. It still hasn't hit DVD release status yet and my copy has held up very well over the years, but it would make a good addition to the DVD library I think. Well, they all will in time, but some would just be more fun. The only sticking point is the special effects again; as the adventure is set of Nerva just as with The Ark in Space the new CGI effects would be a nice touch but it might prove more challenging this time around as the beacon does not just sit still the whole time; it is actually set on a collision course with Voga by the Cybermen. The entire sequence of the collision course uses a lot of CSO already and some astonishingly well timed performances by Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.
The TARDIS turns up just in time and the three travellers leave for Earth, having received a summons from the Brigadier to help him with some mystery. The next televised adventure was made for this season but for some reason it was put off to serve as the season premiere, so viewers were left with a bit of a gap before the adventures of the Doctor and company resumed. As a result there is a gap perfect for some additonal adventures, so let's look at two of them before resuming.
NEXT EPISODE : WOLFSBANE
Um. Right from one of the best Dalek stories ever we go into what is one of the weakest Cybermen adventures ever made. Not seen since The Invasion in 1969, the Cybermen are slightly redesigned for their first colour appearance, but unlike previous adventures where there were armies of them on screen, here we only have four of them including their Cyberleader - the last of the species apparantly. The Cyberleader is done all wrong by the actor playing him, he sounds too emotional and actually shouts and gloats, and even makes the odd ironic quip, which is something that has never happened before. Until 1992 this was the earliest Cyberman adventure that existed intact, so it was actually the introduction story for an entire generation of fans who had never seen a Cyberman on screen before. The new Cybermat design is a lot bigger and more sinister than the previous ones, though; it has no eyes and flows across the floor more like a silverfish. And it jumps. Okay it's a CSO jump but a jump nonetheless.
The production values of the adventure are very good despite the bad presentation of the key villans; extensive location work was done in some caves for the Vogan planet sequences, including Sarah and Harry arriving via transmat and many many chases down corridors. Again there is the problem of going from the filmed locations to the studio sets built to represent the caves, but one gets used to that sort of thing with Doctor Who. Eventually.
Revenge of the Cybermen was actually the first VHS Doctor Who adventure I ever bought, sometime back in the summer of 1989. I remember hauling it around downtown Toronto all day with me and after a Blue Jays game at the SkyDome coming home very late and sitting up for another 90 minutes to enjoy it. It still hasn't hit DVD release status yet and my copy has held up very well over the years, but it would make a good addition to the DVD library I think. Well, they all will in time, but some would just be more fun. The only sticking point is the special effects again; as the adventure is set of Nerva just as with The Ark in Space the new CGI effects would be a nice touch but it might prove more challenging this time around as the beacon does not just sit still the whole time; it is actually set on a collision course with Voga by the Cybermen. The entire sequence of the collision course uses a lot of CSO already and some astonishingly well timed performances by Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.
The TARDIS turns up just in time and the three travellers leave for Earth, having received a summons from the Brigadier to help him with some mystery. The next televised adventure was made for this season but for some reason it was put off to serve as the season premiere, so viewers were left with a bit of a gap before the adventures of the Doctor and company resumed. As a result there is a gap perfect for some additonal adventures, so let's look at two of them before resuming.
NEXT EPISODE : WOLFSBANE
Labels: Cybermen, Harry Sullivan, Sarah Jane Smith, The 4th Doctor
posted by Sean Hoover @ 2:27 AM
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