by Ken Parker
I still can't believe that I finally
saw this Doctor Who episode. In the early 70's the BBC
destroyed most of their video archive and while film copies were
returned hundreds were not and believed gone for good. Over the
years Doctor Who's missing count dropped with finds of an
episode here and a couple there. Earlier this year the count was
table at 106 but is now 97 thanks to the efforts of Phillip Morris
and his team of archivists searching the globe for missing episodes.
“The Enemy of the World” is a six
part story that aired between December 23 1967 to January 27 1968 and
starred Patrick Troughton as the Doctor. After the junking in the
70's, the serial could only be experienced by viewing fan made
reconstructions (using telesnaps and the original audio recording) or
reading the Target novelization. Episode 3 did exist in the archive
and was released on home video with many other incomplete stories.
For the first time in 45 years, this
story is complete and watching it for the first time was certainly an
emotional event.
The story follows the Doctor, Jamie
(Fraser Hines) and Victoria (Deborah Watling) as they land on Earth
in 2017 (50 years away from 1967 but only 4 from us now). They get
caught up in a political and ecological thriller mostly because the
Doctor resembles an evil leader, Salamander. Different sides are out
to reveal Salamander's plot to destroy his enemies while most people
view him as Earth's savior. The Doctor is hesitant in helping one of
the sides until he learns more about what is going on. We soon learn
that Salamander has double agendas and secrets beyond even his most
trusted aides and the Doctor must impersonate Salamander to learn
more and to save many lives.
This story has the distinction of being
the only story of that season 5 without a featured monster in the
mix. Instead we have people fighting people in a very thrilling and
complex story with so many twists and turns that M. Night Shyamalan
would salivate. One has to expect the usual trapping of having look
a like characters pretending to be one another and having everyone be
tricked or trying to guess which one was which. I was surprised how
subtle these were done and in most cases, the viewer was not aware of
the switch. The writing and director allowed for off screen moments
to deliver times when we weren't sure who was who and credit goes to
Patrick Troughton in playing the two parts perfectly. This has got
to be one of his best acted Doctor Who stories.
Episode 1 starts off with some silly
Doctor action as he delights in taking a dip in the ocean to the
bemusement of his companions. Things get crazy with a non stop chase
as assassins try to kill the Doctor, thinking he is Salamader. The
location shooting is very well and you can see that this an few
previous ones like “The War Machines” are starting utilize more
and more location shooting that would become commonplace during the
UNIT years.
The plot settles down after that and
becomes a intrigue tale of chess as each side moves and learns more
about each other. Jamie and Victoria manage to bluff their way into
Salamander's complex in an attempt to learn more about his true
intentions but are soon found out and locked up for almost two
episodes (both Fraser and Deborah were on vacation during the filming
of this serial). It is a shame not to see them fully integrated into
the story as they seem to never do much after their initial couple of
episodes. In the end they are shuffled off to the TARDIS before the
end of episode 6.
This does give more of the guest cast
time to shine with Mary Peach as Astrid taking the most advantage of
this and the excellent writing to really deliver an excellent part
that is full of action and emotion. She is one of the tougher female
characters, a trend that had been going on for a while, perhaps
influenced by The Avengers and Emma Peel. Others in the cast such as
Colin Douglas (Bruce), Milton Johns (Benik) and Carmen Monroe
(Fariah) also bring some great moments to this story.
The story was probably a bore to many
children who were hoping to see monsters. The story is serious and at
times dry but with the performances and story, at least the adults
should have appreciated it.
From a personal perspective, I never
was that interested in this story for the same reasons, because there
were no Cybermen, Yeti or Ice Warriors and when I heard about the
find I right away loved the idea that "The Web of Fear" was back. But
my choice of first download was “The Enemy of the World” and I
was so excited to see this, I broke out in tears a couple of times.
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| Costumes are WOW! |
I loved watching this story. So much
of it was good as I mentioned above. I won't go as far as say this
is better than my previous top Second Doctor story, “The Tomb of
the Cybermen” but it is excellent and makes me like Patrick
Troughton even more and he is already one of my favorite Doctors.
It is just great to see more of Watling
and Hines, especially Watling as so little of her time in Doctor
Who is missing. My picture of that era of Doctor Who is
just a little clearer now with one more story to compare. It was
refreshing to see this and the
If you are debating on whether to
purchase on Itunes or DVD, it is worth it just to see more Doctor
Who. As of right now there is no US DVD info other than rumors
that it will be out in early 2014. The UK DVD is out on November 25
and the DVD is not listed with any extras so beyond the vidfire
process and better quality, the DVD is the same as the Itunes
release.
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