Hello everyone, the Historian here, welcoming you to the end of season five! Joining me tonight are Ketina, Ronelyn, Schmallturm, Spoo, MiniSpoo, Photobug, Altair, Mister Mother and Cz. Tonight, we have a fully existing episode so, let’s find out, after this last episode, if we can finally figure out the full plot of the Wheel in Space! Let’s get to the discussion! This episode first aired on 1 June, 1968.
H = Historian
K = Ketina
R = Ronelyn
Sp = Spoo
MS = MiniSpoo
P = Photobug
A = Altair
M = Mister Mother
Cz = Cz
H: So, that’s it for season five
R: <Cyberman voice> “No, little were you aware that… um… this was just phase twelve of our… um… still going perfectly smooth plan.”
H: We finally got the reveal of what the ultimate plan was, but it was very hard to catch. Did everybody get it?
P: Nope.
R: <Cyberman voice> “No. Not yet. Seriously… there’s still more plan. And it’s going… fine!”
Sp: I caught it.
K: I think I caught it, but it didn’t make much sense.
Sp: The cybermen, apparently, in order to invade the Earth, need to have some rocking tunes and would only invade the Earth if they were playing a Roger Waters song. That’s… that’s what they meant when they were talking about being guided by radio waves, yes?
P: So they would be defeated by NPR?
H: Other than the silliness about Roger Waters, you did basically get it, yes.
R: Here’s the problem – So the Cybermen knocked out only the transmitting faculties of the stations radio system.
H: Wanted to knock out. The guy who they hypnotized did a little better of a job of it then they planned.
R: But to reiterate, the plan was he was only supposed to knock out the transmitter. Because that way the Earthlings couldn’t call for help. But, the Cybermen could send a signal to their… oh?
H: No, there’s an easy answer to that. I hate to say it, in this fashion, but phase six involved them taking over the Wheel. Then they could fix the transmitter.
Sp: <Cybermen voice> “You do not know our ways. Anything that can be knocked out can be knocked in again.”
R: <Cybermen voice> “That is why we captured the Irish Engineer. He told us it would only take about six hours.”
Sp: So, in this prequel to “Gravity”, which one was George Clooney, and which one was Sandra Bullock?
R: We talked before about which one’s wearing the skirt.
P: It’s a kilt.
H: I want to make a point – on TV screens in the 1960’s, that wire towards the beginning was not visible.
Sp: Just like the boom mic two scenes later.
H: That’s just part of the show’s charm.
R: Yeah. The show has a LOT of charm.
Sp: Jamie does… look dashing in a space suit. Or maybe it’s just unusual to see him in clothing with legs.
H: Zoe looks ADORABLE in the space suit!
Sp: Also, wanna get this out of the way early, because this bugged me slightly. The Cyberman puts his thrall in front of the supreme leader, and tells him to think of people and describe them as he goes. I didn’t realize that his mental images would be transmitted over the security cam footage that the Rocket seemed to have broken in on… or?
H: They broke in on the Cybermen’s signal. I don’t know.
R: Cybermen have 4G, man.
K: Easy to hack?
H: Just one of those things that you hand wave I guess. I’m not saying that this is the greatest story. In fact, I’m definitely not saying this is the greatest story. I mean, you know, it’s fun. But it’s definitely not the greatest story.
Sp: You mean, parade of line dancing Cyberman on a black catwalk in space doesn’t do it for you? You’re dead inside man, you’re dead inside!
H: <Historian mimics Cybermen prancy floaty effect space walk> I’m sure there’s a reason the director had the Cybermen walk that way, but I’m damned if I know what it is.
A: Also, I was particularly fond of their little mirror effect that magically turns three Cybermen into six!
H: We call that the Dalek effect around here.
Sp: We call that presaging an ABBA video by about 10 years.
<brief discussion of ABBA and clocks or something. I have no idea>
Sp: They really blew the special effects budget for this one.
R: On what?
H: The Wheel model was actually really nice.
K: But they built that five episodes ago.
H: They do all of the miniature filming all at once.
Sp: The space porcupine that was holding the invading Cybermen fleet was adorable.
R: I actually thought that was a decent piece of mechanical design.
H: So here’s how I saw the Cybermen space ship. It had all the little… the beehive kind of things on the side of it. It’s supposed to have all kinds of small Cyber invasion ships inside. Looking at it, my theory was the little beehive things were all doors and ships and things would fly out. Does that make sense?
R: That’s reasonable.
K: Wasn’t a honeycomb-ish design consistent with the Tombs of the Cybermen?
H: You’re absolutely right… My god, the Cybermen have rocket sounds!
Sp: <Cyberman voice> “There are no rocket sounds in space. We know science and stuff. Cut it out!”
R: So while we’re on the subject of lamentable special effects, at the very end, watching all the Cybermen go “weeeeee” off into the void. <Scottish accent> “Flush the neutron space toilet, that’ll get them.”
H: It was kind of hard to hear that line, to have any idea of what the heck happened. It helps that I’d seen this before. Were you guys able to understand what Flannigan mumbled inside his space helmet?
K: Yep. Use the neutron field.
P: Use Jimmy Neutron.
Sp: Oh, the plot! <head smack> I remember. There was one. This is another one of those episodes that had a very “new Who” sort of feel and pace to it. Lots of mooks dying. The Doctor feeling bad about it. Plans and counter plans.
H: Not very well plotted.
Sp: Heroic companions.
R: Nothing for the female companions to do. Speaking of mooks dying – that’s got to be the worst crazy base commander death I’ve ever scene. “I’m going out for a walk. I might be some time.”
E: Someone’s not genre savvy.
R: Yeah. Most of the crazy base commanders either die because “I’m staying at the wheel” or die because “jeeze, I’ve been being stupid this whole time. I should sacrifice my life so that someone better than me can live.”
Sp: The fact that he went out to die doesn’t stand out. The fact that he died by apparently rolling on the floor to death, slightly more standout-y.
R: “Thwow him to the fwoah”
H: That’s was a classic negative effect, rolling on the floor death. Again, the Dalek factor.
K: Yeah. That did feel like a Dalek death. I didn’t think that the Daleks, who are very much known for it, and the Cybermen both did the negative death effect thing.
H: It was the death of the one person on the Wheel that Jarvis really felt the closest to that made him feel like nothing was really worth it. But I don’t know. It wasn’t clear. He just stared at Gemma dead on the screen for a while and then left.
R: “Oh well, time to kill myself.”
H: Which leads me to something really, really odd about this episode, and I’ll have to go look into it. Actors, at this point, weren’t paid by the story, they were paid by the episode. So Gemma’s actor got paid to lie there dead for an episode.
Sp & R & K: NOPE!!
Sp: It’s better. She got paid to have a still of her from the previous episode to look like her, and it stuck out like a thumb.
K: And that explains why when Jamie and Zoe walk by the body you only see her legs sticking out.
R: I actually noted at that point that still photos are cheaper than recalling a live actress.
P: Trust me, if you have a dead actress laying around it gets really expensive… oh, never mind.
R: One last piece for the special effects. So they fire the laser at the meteorites…
H: FIRE!
R: Thank you. And immediately Zoe and Jamie are overcome by a wave of “space turbulence.” Whoaaa!
H: Ah huh.
R: So… there’s air in Doctor Who space?
Sp: They reference it in dialog later.
H: They actually say there’s a radiation wave. It’s scientifically crap, but it’s lamp shaded.
Sc: Shock wave in space? If you exploded something there’s be an expansion of gas and a shock wave of that.
Sp: The dialog I was actually thinking of was when either Jamie or Zoe comment on feeling like they had been pummeled by lots of tiny little hammers. So it wasn’t just space turbulence, it was rocks! Lots of little rocks.
<Mister Mother walks in. Just throwing that in there.>
Sp: So Minispoo, what’d you think?
MS: It was pretty cool. It was actually moving without pictures. And they actually talked without the dialog thing at the bottom. Overall it was just good.
K: I didn’t know we were going into final thoughts.
Sp: Consider it more of a penultimate thought.
<silence>
K: Are we at final thoughts?
H: We could be.
E: I’m being looked at. So, I guess I should probably give me final thought. Um… this was a pretty good episode. A nice end of the story. And some pretty hilarious special effects.
R: Weeeee!
E: Nothing to make your day quite like a bunch of floaty Cybermen dancing in space.
<various singing and whistling, and more Historian dancing>
H: Do you have anything to say Altair?
A: <says nothing>
Sp: <Cyberman voice> “Hold an image of the episode in your mind. Describe it for us.”
A: <says nothing>
R: I don’t know! I don’t know! I don’t know!
A: Doctor…. something…
<laughter>
Sp: <Cyberman voice> “We don’t know either. We were hoping you’d tell us.”
H: <Cyberman sad voice> “What’s our plan again?”
P: <Cyberman voice> “We are in phase number… what?”
R: <Cyberman voice> “Now we spring into action!”
H: So, I guess we’re at Photobug.
P: The complete lack of Newtonian physics way bothers me.
Sp: No, they responded to that fishing line exactly as you’d expect.
H: An, inertia shminertia.
P: Also, the helmets they were using were fighter pilot helmets from the 60’s. Because I used to go sledding in one as a child. For reals.
H: Same helmets and space suits from Star Wars. So next time you watch A New Hope and Empire Strikes Back, keep a look out for your sledding helmet.
R: <old man voice> “Martha, where’s my sledding helmet.”
<Mister Mother develops backstory for Martha and her husband, and various leaky helmets>
Sp: I’m sure that back story makes more sense than most of the Cybermen plots. <Cyberman voice> “Disable the radio. Dear Liza, Dear Liza.”
M: There’s a hole in our premise.
Sp: Kit Pedler, Kit Pedler. A hole in our premise, Kit Pedler, you’re fired.
H: So, Photobug. Do you have any more final thoughts.
P: No, that’s it.
Cz: The one scene I looked up for, I think people were… floating in space?
H: <dances again>
Cz: They were just like… trying to grab each other. They were kicking… I don’t know how people fake it now, but that was horrible.
<discussion of actually how they bounced around in space, just encouraging the Historian to do his silly dance some more>
H: Schmallturm, final thoughts?
Sc: <shakes head>
H: Alright then. Spoo?
Sp: <thinks> Alright. The story as a whole was fun to mock for how convoluted it was. And since the point of watching television is to be entertained, and all that mockery was entertaining, mission accomplished. That said, yet another story that was probably about an episode and a half too long.
H: I was waiting until my final thought to say something about that, but I’ll just say it now. Something that I thought was a bit flaw of this story was a whole heck of a lot happened in this final episode, and it felt very very full, and previous episodes felt kind of empty. And I thought they were trying to rush to push a bunch of stuff in the final episode. Now that I’ve read something about the production, I have an understanding why, which I will talk about in the story wrap up.
Sp: So, character wise, for introducing Zoe, as well as just the Doctor and Jamie and Zoe doing their thing, and some of the minor characters and NPCs…
H: She has a nose for trouble, you know!
Sp: No that one. But some of the others. All fine, all part of a good story. And, plot wise, even theme wise, the first episode and the last episode, right there with it. Something needed to get hammered out a little bit better plot wise, plot mechanics I guess you could say, for all of those middle bits, to really make it a solid story. The TL;DR of this is – this was probably one or two thorough rewrites away from really being up there amongst the good Troughton stories. So, it takes a project like this to really kind of pick apart the good bits and appreciate them. But we came out of the story with a Zoe and I’m fine with that.
H: So, Ronelyn?
R: I don’t have my trademark sting this week. I guess I vented most of by venty bits earlier. I should have saved my “Weeeee.”
H: You can talk about how you liked the story as a whole, or what you did or didn’t like about the episode…
R: Okay, I do need to vent two more things. First, regarding the newly updated Cybermen outfits, two words: Cyber-Cameltoe.
A: Yes, I did notice that.
K: We didn’t need to know what religion the Cybermen were.
Sp: <Cyberman voice> “Alright, put an image of everyone on this station in your mind. Oh, god! Oh god! Not that one! Cannot unsee!”
M: Can’t be any worse than going to Comic Con.
H: Not, it was not.
Sp: <Cyberman voice> “Hey pal, my eyes are up here.”
R: Yeah. And, second, normally I can excuse when people don’t recognize when people are being mind controlled…
H: But Flannigan talk… like… this.
R: Yeah, exactly. The worlds calmest Irishman. “There… is… an… emergency… down… here. I recommend… you send someone… immediately… before they… break through.”
A: Yeah. During that scene I was thinking, I don’t even know the guy and I could tell that wasn’t right. If they can’t tell, they’re clueless.
M: If they can’t tell, they’re secondary characters on a Doctor Who episode.
R: As for the overall thing, honestly if the Cybermen had just been attacking the station it would have been a better episode.
P: <Cyberman voice> “Not in the plan.”
<laughter>
R: Yeah, seriously it was worthy of the writers of Lost. This hugely complex thing that comes around to the end, and then they say “and therefore…” and you turn around and just say, wait, what?
M: What are they going to introduce next, time travel?
R: But there was a lot of solid acting. Some really fun characters I wish we could have seen more of instead of Cybermen droning on and on about sub section 3 of the PIMBOK manual, or whatever.
M: Did they really show the Cybermen planning their plan.
H: Almost. We actually got to plan three of phase six, and I’m not making that up.
M: Wow.
Sp: It did have that kind of Monday morning Standup meeting feel to it.
R: Including the droning voice you can barely understand. “Mewrag mewraa Milestone mewrag raum Burndown…”
Sp: I think you just invented two new Pokemon spelling those words, Ketina.
MS: I’d actually play the game with those.
M: I wonder what their attacks would be?
MS: Mewraa!!
<Discussion of new Pokemon>
R: So yeah. I will have some fond memories of this, but a lot of them were unintentional. And I close with a final… Weeeeeeee!
H: Ketina?
K: Before I go, Mister Mother? Anything?
M: No. <goes back to Minecraft. Seriously, how does Doctor Who even happen with all of the distractions?>
K: Okay.
Sp: So you’ve been talking a whole bunch about how everyone gets to say things before you. When do you get to start the final thoughts?
K: The problem with me going first, is that you all have to wait for me to type and finish talking to myself, basically. And that’s kinda… I’d think boring. So I wait until people are kind of wandering off at the end anyway.
Sp: We have been watching your blossoming career as a stenographer for 3-5 years. It’s not boring.
K: Only because, unlike our readers, you see all of my spelling corrections in real time.
A: Your typoetry.
K: Yes, readers do not get to see my typoetry. Anyway, my final bits. No one talked about the snuggle couple there…
H: You mean Leo and Na-nee-na? She was Tanya in this story, but I can’t help but to think of her forever as Naneena.
K: Anyway. I was I little “ugh” in that final caress, hand hold bit at the end there. But it was still nice to see NPCs get together. I’m not sure what the point was, though.
H: They’d been kind of flirting and whatnot throughout the story. It was a nice closure to the story.
A: Did you see the way Jamie and Zoe shook hands in the very next scene.
H: Yup. That was a nice transition.
Sp: There were a couple of directorial flourishes like that.
H: You mean besides the boom mic?
Sp: Yes, yes. The director did a couple of nice little fades and very deliberate blocking sorts of things. Which actually, probably, subtly, contributed to the brisk pace and just how well put together this episode felt.
H: Well, he never worked on the show again. So I hope you enjoyed it. The producers decided he went too far over budget and never hired him again.
A: Six lava lamps?!
K: Anyway. And, I guess to wrap up my final thoughts for this story, this one story I’m not super jonesing to have found. Not saying I’d be disappointed if it was found, but given how bad the effects were for this last episode, I don’t feel like we missed too much by seeing the rest as recons. Anyway, as Spoo said. Good start, good (if silly) end. Meh middle.
H: Okay. I actually thought the effects were okay given the budget and studio limitations.
K: It wasn’t the effects themselves that bothered me.. I didn’t care if I saw wires. It was how the actors handled the effects. Dancing Cybermen, Jamie and Zoe wobbling around, and all that.
H: Something no one else had mentioned, that I’m going to mention, talking about the story as a whole and not just this episode, is that I think this was one of the best recons we’ve seen.
Everyone: Agreed.
H: The animation, the use of stills, and the animation within the stills…
R: The special effects for the recon were better than the special effects.
H: To be fair, the big special effect for the recon was in episode one with the servo robot, and it does look a lot like the telesnaps. So I just don’t know if the animation would look better than what we would really see. It’s certainly possible given that animation can make something look more alien and fluid than a guy in a suit might, but I don’t know. What I do know is tremendous kudos to Loose Cannon. As for the episode, and the story as a whole, I’ve kind of said was I was going to say earlier in the discussion. I may add more in the wrapup.
P: Is it just me, or does telesnaps sound like a breakfast cereal?
——————————————————
And there we have it, the end of “The Wheel in Space,” and the end of season five! I say this every year, but I’m always pleasantly surprised that my little idea has actually made it this far. We only have one season to go, and we’ve made it through Recon Hell! Be on the lookout for a story wrapup and, a little while later, a season wrapup! Although the latter will probably be a bit of a placeholder until I catch up with story wrapups. Speaking of which, I just finished and posted a wrapup for “The War Machines”–take a look! As for us, we’ll be taking a week or two off, but the TARDIS Project will return with the beginning of season six! Until then, I remain
THE HISTORIAN
NEXT TIME: THE DOMINATORS EPISODE 1
