Who Watch Part 15: Screw you, John Nathan Turner

Story 127 Enlightenment

Ham! Ham! Ham everywhere! Ham on pirate ships! Ham on yachts! Not so much with the guardians. They held back as much as the script allowed. How, I do not know. If I saw the White Guardian's headpiece, I'd either turn into a Vriginia Backed Ham to pretend it was okay or die laughing. Fun story about him... there's a fanclub out this way called Knights of the White Guardian. It's happened on multiple ocassions that outsider think "white dragon" and thus mistake a Doctor Who fanclub for a KKK orginization.

Story 128 The King's Demons
If I was into drugs, I'd do some research as to what John Nathan Turner was on when he decided that Kamelion would be a good idea. Okay maybe for one episode but a barely mobile mess joining the TARDIS crew? And The Master wanting to stop the Magna Carta? What's next? The Master steals sugar from a supermarket on Christmas Eve? Shit. It just keeps getting worse.

Story 131 The Awakening
Crap. Just crap. I mean... crap. At least the lovable little urchin you want to strangle didn't get to ride along.

Story 132 Frontios
Not a bad oncept I guess. Execution though. Yeah. Production value cesspool. I am apparently reviewing drunk and angry or something. Everything is pissing me off.

Story 133 Resurrection of the Daleks
Now this I can get behind. The Daleks, even riddled by disease, are a viable threat. Davros is a suitably evil scumbag. There's the right amount of inexcusable wholesale slaughter. Plus Teagan goes away. Great story!

Story 134 Planet of Fire
JNT-era Master + Kamelion in a single story? Yeah. This hurts. Oh and Peri makes me miss Teagan. The voice. The senseless T&A. The complete and utter uselessness and reliance upon The Doctor. She needs to be drowned or something. Hey at least no one would be stupid enough to keep her around for more than a couple episodes, right?

Story 135 The Caves of Androzani
I dig Davison as The Doctor. Just wish he got some better material to work with. More time passes, more shitty ideas, awful companions, bad scripts. I get that there was a whole lot of pressure and very little money. However, I don't get why funds can be sunk into crap like Kamelion and not walking more than five feet to find a companion superior to Peri. At least she's useless against an interesting baddie this time. Ah well. GO JNT GO! KILL THE SHOW SLOWLY! Also, not so sure about Colin Baker he looked a bit ... arch for the role. 

Who Watch Part 14: Davison Davison everywhere! And a bit of Baker I, too

Story 80 Terror of the Zygons

The costumes look pretty cool. However, it's pretty clear the actors can't move in them. Nice to see the Brig again. Much prefer his interactions with Troughton and Pertwee. Of course, I prefer them to Tom Baker in some ways. The others are aware that they're superior but not so bloody nasty about it. Interesting explanation of Loch Ness, though.

Story 121 Earthshock

Dear Cybermen,

As you seem to be granting my fondest wishes, do you think maybe you could release Teagan into space and persuade Sarah Jane to return to the TARDIS for a couple weeks while someone other than John Nathan Turner picks a companion? He did a great job with Nyssa and Teagan does have some moments here and there. However, I don't trust him. 

Thankfully yours,

-G-

Story 122 Time-Flight

Yeah. The more Ainley-as-Master I see, the less I like it. Delgado was ultimately inept and I'm hard pressed to think of a plan that didn't bite him in the ass. However, the way this regeneration is written The Master comes across as a bloody idiot. He throws on a crappy mask, tosses it off to gloat over the easily tricked fool of a Doctor, then is seemingly killed or stranded. I think it's less Ainley and more the writers not having a clue how to handle more than one developed character at a time. Oh and this episode... it's a bit shit.

Story 123 Arc of Infinity

Omega was a great, effective villain in The Three Doctors. Here, he's far from terrible and written far more effectively than The Master of this period. Actually quite liked the story. Made me a bit excited for the rest of the season.

Story 124 Snakedance

Ah. The Kinda. They are an argument for going against JNT's trend of senselessly recycling old favorites. Legitimately frightening in concept and execution. Don't have a physical form to explode and must be defeated in new ways. So naturally, they were utterly destroyed on their second outing. I mean this is Doctor Who. The Cybermen are defeated forever on every outing. Same with the Daleks. Part of me just vomitted a bit when I pictured Moffat's regime bringing back The Kinda. The trvilization of history into harmless myth that society partakes in within the episode? Yeah. The show would do the same. I mean come on... the new avacado Silurians. Anyhow, it was nice to see them have a real use for Teagan other than shouting a lot and stressing that the episode was made in  the 80's. 

Story 125 Mawdryn Undead

Interesting afaptation of the ole Flying Dutchman myth to a sci-fi context. Nice to see the Brig again. Less than nice to see Nyssa be a dumbass and mistake Mawdryn for a regeneration. Teagan looking stupid at this point in JNT's quest for T&A is inevitable. Nyssa though... they almost write for her! Oh great. They can't leave things trimmed for any length of time! A new third wheel! Doesn't JNT ever learn? Oh man and that headdress on the Black Guardian! IT'S THE EVIL LIBERACE!

Story 126 Terminus
This one ruined Black Metal for me. Garm of Ulver was named after the same Norse pantheon member as the large scottie dog thing. That aside, I miss Nyssa already but it all seemed okay. Except the young male space pirate. Dear lord. Scream overly much? Ouch. 

Who Watch Pt. 13: Davison ist... not that bad really.

Story 118 Kinda

Nice to see them going scary after years of overly goofy repetition. There was some actual malevolence. Slight bonus over the earlier Davison episodes I've seen of late wherein higher concept stuff is actually pulled off. Not really sure WTF they were doing with the companions though. It was as though the producers felt this immense sense of relief at having an actor who could work well with others and just piled them into the TARDIS. Then for this episode someone realized there were too many around, had one go off camera for a flimsy reason, another pass out, and the last of them get trapped. Rather than go the logical route and have The Doctor strike out on his own a 4th companion- who only sticks around for this story- comes in. Otherwise, far fewer glaring issues than the rest. Hoping they kill off or otherwise remove a companion soon. They clearly overstuffed the TARDIS and need to resolve it. Really awesome supporting cast here. Managed to portray madness convincingly instead of just chewing scenery loudly. Already don't miss Baker!

Story 120 Black Orchid

Nice to see a historically set story that doesn't need an alien to maintain interest. Got a fairly simple but engaging murder mystery/mistaken identity thing going on. Very refreshing after seeing Bidmead's overly convoluted messes recently.

Story 56 The Mind of Evil
I'm sort of glad that the BBC lost the color version of this episode. Somehow, a machine with a blinky light on top seems much more effective in black and white. I mean the idea of something storing then releasing ultimate evil and subsequent anarchy is scary. However, it looks to be housed in a rather tacky 70's lamp. Ah well. If one wants high production values, seeking them on Classic Who is beyond stupid. Loved the story but that's a given when Delgado is involved.

Story 59 The Dæmons

Dig the concept, daddio. Mankind is an experiment run by what we came to call demons, who have given us sporadic assistance to progress the species. The Master calls them back to demand power as the clearly superior being. Lucifer is a lie. The priest is fake. The Witch has it wrong too. Religion is stupid! SCIENCE SCIENCE SCIENCE. Sorry, the story is honestly a bit more subtle than all that.  I just woke up. This is one of the goodies.

Story 61 The Curse of Peladon

Interesting to see The Doctor be an idiot. Ice Warriors cannot change! They are remorseless warriors! They... just saved his ass. Nice story, deftly told and well acted.

Story ??? Shada

I got my hands on the VHS edition with linking narraration by Tom Baker. What's left is pretty middle of the road. There's an egomanical genius seeking ultimate power. He does so in a convoluted, mildly confusing way. It's got some nice bits. Particularly dug the ship that fell in love with The Doctor. Also nice to see someone else who went on to be a part of Waiting for God. Sadly, he's no Saldeen and just flounces around being confused. 

Story 117  Four to Doomsday

The Doctor saves the day from a megalomaniac who wishes to do us all the favor of ending our lives since flesh is ever so flawed by TOSSING A CRICKET BALL! Yeah. I get that Davison's Doctor wore a stylized cricket outfit but Black Orchid had enough of the game to convince me I can't care about the sport. No fault of their's really. Now Adric being an annoying brat... that I can blame them for. Sure the kid is an idealist but nearly getting Nyssa killed because he can't see through an extremely transparent villain? I HEREBY SENTENCE ADRIC TO DEATH!

Who Watch Pt 7: Tonsillectomies Suck

Story 055 Terror of the Autons
Ah sweet, sweet, Delgado. I enjoyed The Sound of Drums and End of Time version of The Master well enough. However, this one just has so much more class. He comes across as a Moriarty instead of a spoiled sadistic club kid. Autons also worked well in the classic episodes because they were supposed to be made of plastic. So a few unclean edges or blatantly fake facial appliances make perfect sense. Such well executed villains + Pertwee + Brigadier = awesomesauce.


Story 057 The Claws of Axos
Creepy statuesque angelic beings offer man a quick way to attain ultimate power which turns out to be a deadly world-eating poison. This one made me consider getting Amazon Prime to reliably stream classic episodes. The library's copy was covered in oil and scratched to hell. By the time I got it working, I was too tired to watch the special features that make the DVDs so worthwhile. Probably need to rewatch this sans technical glitches to fully appreciate.

Story 072 Death to the Daleks
Interesting to see the Daleks unarmed and outmatched. Didn't lead to character development persay. Just revealed they were the same old arrogant killing machines. Cool serial all told.

Story 129 The Five Doctors
Sometimes, I want to punch Tom Baker. Richard Hurndall did a decent Hartnell impression. However, stepping up his role when Tom bailed served to drive home everything he got wrong. Ainley wasn't bad as The Master but did make me miss Delgado. All in all, the whole thing felt insanely clumsy and made me miss The Three Doctors.

Story 045 The Mind Robber
Not really sure how I feel about this serial. Whenever Jamie and Zoe went missing, Troughton became a whiny little emo bitch. The first couple episodes were kinda crap then the plot took a nice little twist. By the end, it was a joyous romp. Right up until the robots got a "destructa-beam." Then it got cringeworthy.

Story 046 The Invasion
Well done. Troughton is quirky and awesome. Despite having eight parts, there's minimal drag to the story. The animation is remarkably effective for recreation of lost episodes. Hell, even the features were informative and watchable. Plus this may be the first Cyberman story to make me understand why they recur so much. Only had one "heeey it's silver Doc Martens" moment. Otherwise, I was on the edge of my seat hoping Jamie would make it. Nice up-the-kilt-shot obscuring on the ladder too.

Story 044 The Dominators
There are times where the depth of storytelling, characterization, performances, etc. obscure the fact Doctor Who began geared towards children. Then there are things like the Quarks. Holy attempt at a second Dalek Mania, Batman! Thing is Quarks manage to be even less frightening than when Daleks couldn't leave specially charged panels in one location. They're so grade-school arts and crafts in design and their voices are "aww lookit the little mechanized bear" Sci-Fi pap. Plus, Quarks only kill if guys wearing mudflap shirts and sea shell shoulder pads look at the camera and scream "DESTROY" while doing a gleeful little jig. I guess The Doctor helping people who wouldn't help themselves aspect of the story was nice for the character but everything else hurt. Maybe four parts worth of material here, but barely.