Business Unusual

The Doctor arrives in Brighton in 1989 and discovers that Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart has disappeared - perhaps been abducted - while investigating the insanely low-priced video game console manufactured by a company called SeneNet. Knowing that the Brigadier would not go comparison shopping without very good reason, the Doctor begins a search and rescue mission for his friend, braving the dangers of SeneNet's security, and coming face to face with the person he has been desperately attempting to avoid for years now: a computer programmer called Melanie Bush.

The plot's pretty thin on the ground here, and SeneNet turns out to be the Nestenes again making another bid to conquer Earth for their own purposes. The hallmark of a Nestene invasion plot has never been complexity; find plastic, inhabit it, invade, kill. Oh yeah, defeated by the Doctor, forgot that part.

So here she is now. Mel. Last seen at the end of The Trial of a Time Lord, the Doctor returned her to the future point in time where she was pulled from and then went out of his way to stay away from her and delay the inevitible as long as possible. In this case the inevitible is progressing down the road to his possible future of becoming the Valeyard. Another inevitiblity might be going deaf from the screaming. The Doctor has hidden behind Grant, Frobisher and Evelyn to avoid this point in time, and his attempts to keep Mel from getting involved with him only serve to egg her on to do just the opposite.

Melanie Bush is, of course, one of the least favourite companions of all time; I'm sure a lot of fans rolled their eyes at the intro story before realizing that in print, no one can hear you scream. This is the sort of thing author Gary Russell likes to do when he writes a novel; take the unfinished plot threads and try to tie them back together, eben going as far as to make sure the sixth Doctor gets some time with the Brigadier, although the latter has now already done so in The Specrte of Lanyon Moor. The Brig's continuity with Brendan school is observed as well, although if memory serves (I haven't read this book since it was published in 1997) he has not gotten married to Doris yet, which would actually put Business Unusual before Spectre. Ah continuity. I would have to read it again to be totally sure. And draw myself a continuity map...

Mawdryn Undead
The Five Doctors
The King of Terror
Downtime
Business Unusual
The Spectre of Lanyon Moor
Battlefield

Yes I'm dipping into the future there.

Ah well. So the Doctor has met Melanie Bush at last and we start moving ahead back towards the televised series. It's been forever since Jay and I sat down and watched an episode together. Soon we shall... soon...

NEXT EPISODE : MILLENIAL RITES

Synthespians

In the 101st century, Reef Station exists to receive broadcasts from the 20th century and redistribute them to the audiences of the future. Such is the demand that 80's retro nostalgia is everything, and the society has become dependent on television for not just entertainment, but for its ways of life. The Doctor and Peri find it amusing and astounding at first, until the Doctor discovers that the business empire that controls virtually everything has been infiltrated by the Nestene Consciousness, and the plastic surgery of the rich and famous is taking on a whole new, and deadly, meaning.

Reef Station One comes off as more of a theme park than a broadcast centre; it's vast enough to encompass all sorts of environments such as Los Angeles of the 1980s as well as London of the 1960s to name just two, but the layout is never explained properly. Is this a round space station, almost a planet? Or is this a big sprawling disc? The zones are all sectioned off with massive concrete barriers as a means of keeping the people separated, and passage between zones is limited to a priveledged few - mostly soap stars. Mind you, everyone on Reef Station seems to have been a star at some point; Peri falls in with spoiled rich girl Claudia and her hunky soap star friend Marc and experiences the good life while the Doctor goes about things the usual way being pursued by police, shot at by Autons, confronted by megalomaniac businessmen... that stuff.

Do I buy the whole idea that society could start to function this way? That the 80s lifestyle could re-emerge? As someone who lived through that me-obsessed decade I really hope not. Author Craig Hinton must have enjoyed it, though; he's grabbed every bit of nostalgia he could remember right down to neon colours, big teased hair and reruns of Miami Vice. The parallels between what the people of the 101st century are watching and what the people of the 80s produced are unmistakeable, right down to a certain science fiction show called Professor X. And note there is an interesting comment about an actor who rightly refused to return to a series just so he could be killed off in the firet episode. Trust me, this will mean something soon.

The Autons of Hinton's novel are pretty much on par with the ones who menaced Earth during Jon Pertwee's days, expanding their influence farther and inhabiting all manner of plastic items so when the day comes to slaughter the human population they can attack from all sides. When that day does come, though, the sequences that describe the attacks are somewhat vague and fall a bit flat, almost as if Hinton got a bit too carried away throwing scene after scene after scene onto the page and meaning to come back and work on them, but never finding the time. The Autons do not just manifest as shop window dummies this time; in the TV studios sit the inactive forms of Sythespians - synthetic thespains - who are used in crowd scenes. And then there's the interesting take on plastic surgery; that bit's clever, even calling the process Skin Deep. You can guess the results.

I have maybe one big issue with this book. It comes at the very end. A Time Lord named Vansell (his name will matter more in the future) watches the Doctor's activities on Reef Station One and gives the order for the Doctor to be brought in and put on trial. Utter crap. Yes, there is an episode called Trial of a Time Lord coming - it would be a massive tale taking up all of season 23 - but Craig Hinton has decided that his story will be the last one before that episode by creating a continuity lead in. I really hate it when authors get above themselves and do this sort of thing.; it shows a total lack of respect for anyone else who might be coming along later with a story to tell. Of course it's easy to ignore what is written and plunge ahead and make all sorts of continuity arguments. It's even easier to just tear out pages or use White-Out.

NEXT EPISODE : I, DAVROS - PURITY

Terror of the Autons

With Liz Shaw having gone back to Cambridge, the Doctor is short of help. The Brigadier has a replacement in mind: agent Josephine Grant; mind you, she's not a scientist, she's barely trained in any other aspect of UNIT operations aside from using the phone and fluttering her eyelids at Captain Mike Yates, but she'll do. And her first introduction to life with UNIT is going to be a doozy: the Master, another renegade Time Lord who has so far escaped the same justice that saw the Doctor put on trial, has come to earth, and he's brought the Nestenes back with him. Once again the plastic killer Autons are stalking the cities, although with the Master's help they have branched out from store mannequins and are now manifesting themselves as killer toys, plastic household goods, and masked replicas of human beings. With the aid of a brilliant Time Lord they are intent to conquer the Earth this time - unless the Doctor can stop them again.

This is the good meat of the UNIT years; alien menace comes to Earth and spreads unseen, aided by the Master in his quest to simply destroy and to humiliate the Doctor. The Master is on a higher more dangerous tier than the Meddling Monk; collaborating with aliens so long as he gets power. Only his obsession with destroying the Doctor is what causes him to fail. I'm sure there is somewhere out there a paper on the Master, written by someone in fandom, labelling him as an absolute psychotic sociopath. It's far easier to accept someone who is evil when they are out and out evil and consumed with rage and fury, though; and the Master is calm and polite, meticulous and scheming. And he's going to be a thorn in the Doctor's, the Brigadier's, Jo's, UNIT's, the world's side for a while.

Terror of the Autons is another of the colourized adventures, the results being pretty iffy, and made worse by the fact that it's on VHS tape. Of course technology has changed and there is probably a better way to make this kind of thing work, so when a DVD release comes along it'll be better. I hope.

And now we have a new companion. Jo Grant. She's a bit of a ditz, perhaps a product of her era if her wardrobe is anything to go by. But where she is the antithesis to the brainy Liz (who was just a less abrasive Zoe) she is still a very new kind of companion; someone from a modern age who might have a few more brains going for her than Polly, whose days were spent toiling for Professor Brett and then idling the nights away flirting with sailors at the Inferno Club with Kitty. Jo's got the ambition to be a UNIT operative but she's not experienced enough of the realities of the job yet, although when job description is "assistant to scientific advisor" things are bound to get a bit dodgy for her...

NEXT EPISODE : THE MIND OF EVIL

Spearhead from Space

An odd shower of meteorites lands in England, drawing the attention of UNIT and their newly drafted scientific advisor Liz Shaw. Liz is skeptical of UNIT's mission to deal with the unknown and unusual, but it told by Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart of past attempts to invade Earth by alien races, and how each time those forces were repelled thanks to special "help" UNIT received. The Doctor returns to Earth in the TARDIS, having been regenerated by the Time Lords and now serving his sentence of exile. The Brigadier has a hard time swallowing the Doctor's new appearance but had no choice but to ask him for his help with the meteorite mystery, as none of the objects are actually ever found. The Doctor and Liz realize that the meteorites are not what they seem and are made of a form of plastic, and at one point contained something. The reality of the situation is the first attempt by the Nestenes to invade and colonize Earth; creatures with no physical form as such they can manufacture bodies made of plastic and animate them with their own energy, and thus they create an army of Autons, which are no more than shop window dummies awaiting orders to attack. The Nestenes also create facsimilies of important people to use in their invasion to hamper the government's efforts to stop them, but the Doctor comes through by determining that the Autons' major weakness is to destroy the controlling Nestene creature itself. With UNIT's latest crisis solved, the Doctor strikes a deal with the Brigadier to offer his help in exchange for facilities to attempt to repair the TARDIS, and for the help of Liz in his work. The Brigadier agrees, and the Doctor begins his life on Earth.

First thing that strikes one watching this one: IT'S IN COLOUR!!!!!!! Yes, it's 1970 and the BBC have finally made the leap to colour television in their programming, and it adds and entire new level to Doctor Who. Stylistically the entire 4 part serial is shot on location, not in a studio, which gives it an even more impressive look after the black and white finale of The War Games. And then there's the scary faceless Autons, the creepy character Channing, and the Nestene tentacles attacking the Doctor... all impressive and a far cry from the previous days of the show.

When Patrick Troughton took the role of the Doctor the production team knew they were gambling with the future of Doctor Who, but he was well received and when it was time to introduce Jon Pertwee the fans were asked once again to accept a stranger in the guise of their favourite Saturday hero. And it worked. Pertwee's protrayal of the Doctor loaned him a certain element of elegance, making him more of a gentleman than Troughton's hobo-esque version, but bringing with him his own sense of humour and even a slight mischievous edge. The Doctor bridles at the Brigadier's sense of order and control; he wants to be free but is stuck on Earth without the ability to leave. The Doctor also gels immediately with Liz; as they are both scientists he recognizes her intellect and finds he can work well with her. Comparitively, Liz is the female Ian Chesterton when it comes to brains, but whereas the first Doctor enjoyed playing cat and mouse with Chesterton's limited scientific knowledge, the new Doctor takes the time to share his knowledge with Liz and add to her own capabilities as his assistant.

The Auton element of this adventure was borrowed heavily for the 2005 season premiere, recreating the infamous shop-window dummy rampage that was a lot scarier in 1970. My 7 year old nephew found the original version to be far more alarming, but he first saw it spliced with some specially shot footage recreating the scene for the commemorative More Than 30 Years In The TARDIS documentary. Still, though; faceless mannequins busting out of shop windows and striding through the streets shooting people down... yes. There is also an interesting moment of continuity in this episode which may or may not have been intentional; a certain General Scobie is part of the cast, and he was originally seen in the background behind William Hartnell's Doctor back in The War Machines. Nice to see Scobie is still an important figure in the UK military.

Jon Pertwee always said that he found it more frightening to have alien meances come to Earth rather than go off into space to find them, reasoning that the alien meance set against something familiar like, say, Daleks on Westminster Bridge (or as he was oft quoted: "Finding a Yeti sitting on your loo in Tooting Bec,") was a lot more effective. Exiled to Earth, the Doctor would find a lot of new menaces heading his way, most from outer space, but some from Earth itself...

NEXT EPISODE : DOCTOR WHO AND THE SILURIANS