The TARDIS Project

Hello everyone, the Historian here, welcoming you to the beginning of Season Six, the TARDIS Project’s final season! No, I never thought we’d make it either! This is going to be an interesting year, as almost all of this season exists in full episodes, so it’s the Troughton season several of us have seen almost all of before. It’ll be fun to see whether our views of the stories or the individual episodes change as we go.

Anyway, joining me tonight are Ketina (as always!), Ronelyn, Spoo, MiniSpoo, Schmallturm (silent, as usual), Cz, Photobug, Altair,   and Ezio. Now, let’s get to the discussion!

This episode first aired 10 August, 1968.

H = Historian
K = Ketina
R = Ronelyn
Sp = Spoo
MS = MiniSpoo
Cz = Cz
E = Ezio
A = Altair
P = Photobug

—————-

R: Historian??

H: Yeeees?

R: Is this gonna be one of those movies where the men wear shorter skirts than the women?

P: And lower blouses?

H: “Well, little buddy, I’ve written a song called… pants!” No, not really.

Sp: Oh, Loose Cannon, why have you forsaken us? What in the name of unholy Ra happened to the set design?

H: I have an answer for that.

R: Yes, we’re out of recon hell, but now we’re into quarry hell.

H: So, you know this thing called a series budget? It got radically slashed for season six?

Sp: Is that why they’re wearing the curtains? And how did they not have the budget to go… on location… and yet the could afford those… were those foam rubber post-it-notes they were wearing?

R: And shoulder pads that would make a War Hammer 40K character blush.

P: And a bigger target.

K: I remember… okay, the Historian and I have opinions about this story. And if you read previous comments we’ve made during the project since we’ve started with Troughton… “it’s not worse than the Dominators.” This is it, folks. And I must say… the main issue… the costumes. And the set… the effects… Okay, and the acting…

Sp: So, what you’re saying is… earlier in the Project you lamp shaded this moment. And they overheard you and said “lamp shades? Great idea! Put some on!” This is bloody awful, Historian, what have you done?

H: I’ve done NOTHING! Noooothing!

P: You’ve brought this into our house.

H: It’s not your house.

P: My point is still made.

K: I brought it into my house, okay. I own this on DVD.

R: Speaking of doing nothing…

P: How about that acting, huh?

R: I was going to talk about the special effects. The “fly by wire” space ship. You’re not supposed to see the wire.

H: I’m going to make the point that the televisions of 1968 had a very different quality than the TVs of today.

R: The special effects of 1968 had a very different quality than the special effects of today.

H: What I was going to say, is that being said, and given this is a DVD, that was… a horrible quality picture. They must have a terrible source for this episode.

Sp: They have a terrible source for this episode. It was called the writer.

K: Honestly, I can’t even tell if the writing is bad yet. I can’t get over the costumes, and the effects, and the set, and the acting…

P: What if it’s just the actors are just that bad. Like straight out of high school auditions?

Sp: I will counter that! I love the teacher.

K: The teacher’s not bad. And Cully is okay, if a bit dramatic.

H: Well, he just saw a bunch of people get shot down in front of him.

R & P: And they hadn’t paid him yet!

Sp: But yeah. The scene with the teacher deferring to his student the back story – plot. It was well written and well acted.

R: Really?

K & H & Sp: Yeah!

Sp: That bit specifically was.

K: I liked that bit.

H: It sounded like what it was supposed to sound like – a student who has learned something by rote attempting to regurgitate the information.

R: That was my point. I thought she was a college student.

H: She was.

R: And that’s my point. “I memorize and recite by rote at a college leeval. I mean level.” I pity the British school system.

E: Is anyone else amused by the fact that one of the villains was telling the other one “would you stop destroying things.” It’s basically like a little kid… “Can I destroy it now? Can I?”

R: “Aw, you never let me destroy anything nice!”

<Discussion of the Dominator’s being the first Troughton story available in the US in the 80’s, and who has seen it. Historian and Ketina have seen it. Altair has seen some of it, and maybe Ronelyn, who can’t recall.>

H: So, the epic of how this story was written and presented is slightly long and complex, and I’m not going to start talking about it here. But let’s just say, for now, that only some of the intent of the authors over the next few weeks will be what actually made it to the screen. This story was written by the same men who wrote The Abominable Snowman and The Web of Fear. You’ll note that Haisman and Lincoln did not have their names at the beginning of the episode as the story’s writers.

Sp: Alan Smithee is a time traveler?

H: Something like that. Apparently “Norman Ashby” is taken from the names of their two fathers.

K: Well. That’s…. a bummer. So we can’t just blame the budget on this one.

P: So what you’re saying is they wrote out the Yetis.

R: No, they just shaved them.

H: There weren’t Yetis in this one, but they did make an attempt, in conjunction with the production team, to create a new creature that could be as popular with merchandise with the Daleks.

MS: No!

K: Yeah, and if they made them about 2 feet taller they might have had a chance.

MS: They will never be better than the Daleks. Nothing! Daleks will rule the world. Because they’re awesome. And yes, I am here.

H: I’m talking, of course, about the Quarks. In fact, it was the merchandising of the Quarks that killed the potential third Yeti story that the writers were going to work on.

Sp: They couldn’t just sell Yetis?

H: They didn’t think the Yetis were as marketable as the Daleks.

K: They weren’t as marketable as the Daleks, but the Yetis were a hell of a lot more marketable than the Quarks.

H: I don’t know. I think if there hadn’t been the fights over ownership, we could have seen a bunch of Quark toys. Because they are designed exactly perfectly for toys. You’ll see more of that in weeks to come.

<Discussion of Quarks as toys… lots of sharp edges… snap off arms to choke on… perfect toys, yeah.>

H: Anyway, are we at final thoughts?

P: No!

R: Oh no, we have a lot more bitching to do.

A: I feel like this is not Jamie’s introduction to inflatables.

H: “Here Jamie, blow this up!”

<jokes about inflatables. I cannot repeat them here. Thankfully they all went above Minispoo’s head. We hope.>

R: This is the busiest “island of death” outside of a Roger Corman film I’ve seen.

<laughter>

P: They actually do have some decent sets here. One is the very tiny pod. And the second is the space ship interior that we’ve seen so far.

K: The bottom floor.

Sp: I also liked their gesture based keyboards.

Cz: I loved those.

R: Although if my keyboard made modem noises all the time I would chuck it through the window.

Cz: Was the first introduction of the motion keyboards them trying to stop the ship? So she just goes over to the panel and does this <sticks her arms out>. And I was thinking that wasn’t going to do a damn thing if they weren’t going to touch the keys on the keyboard to stop the ship. And then later they show that’s how you normally use that type of control. There’s a Kinect in there somewhere.

R: That explains why it crashed!

P: Hey!

<laughter>

K: I want ice cream! Final thoughts!

P: No, we gotta drag this out for hours.

Cz: I’ll give you my final thought.

H: Yes?

Cz: I really liked this episode.

K: <laughs>

H: WHAT?

Sp: I move to rename “Cz” to “The Contrarian.”

Cz: Well, I mean this is the first episode I actually sad down and watched for a very long while. This is the first time I’ve seen Patrick Troughton.

Sp: To be fair, that’s something more about your attention span.

Cz: I usually just look up every once in a while during an episode and watch a scene or two. This time I sat down and looked at it all.

K: Are you actually going to really join this TARDIS Project now?

Cz: I mean… if there are going to be real episodes. This is the promised land I was told about. I really did like it. I thought it was ridiculous. Entertainingly horrible.

K: Moving on?

A: The Quarks were cute. I would buy one.

R: You’re the only one.

H: No, I don’t think she is. I think they would have been really popular. They were kind of popular at the time.

Sp: I liked them better when we were just looking through their eye site… gun sight… whatever.

R: Until they opened their cutesy little mouths. “Deedeedeedeedeedestroy!”

H: That was actually intended to be kinda creepy, for these things with cute little voices to be incredibly destructive.

Sp: <gestures meaningfully to Mini-Spoo>

MS: I’m cute. Wait until I destroy you.

Sp: Ten years of that.

E: “Would you like me to destroy them for you?” They were pretty disturbing. Not extremely, but noticeably.

H: It’s your go for final thoughts.

E: Alright. I’ve got two things. One, that dramatic sound track.

P: Damn it!

H: That was going to be Photobug’s thought.

E: I’m sorry. And two, they are never going to get a proper vacation, are they?

K: Not until Doctor’s Who’s 20^th Anniversary.

P: Actually, I really did like the spaceship, although it looked nothing like what was in space. The vanguard in space was made of a bunch of triangles, or shapes with edges. And what landed was round.

Sp: <frog voice> “Budget cuts.”

P: <laughs>

R: They couldn’t afford sides?

Sp: <frog voice> “Budget cuts.” I think I found my hook for the story.

H: I think you found your hook for the season.

P: Alright. Secondly, I know we covered the costumes, but what the hell.

<general laughter>

P: Seriously. It looked like gender reversal on purpose.

E: And poorly done.

P: Which… I’m fine with. It’s just very not 1960’s.

K: The women were wearing dresses. It’s just the men were wearing dresses too.

Cz: I was concerned when that one guy fell over that we were going to see something.

<discussion of “panty shot” verses “buffalo shot”>

P: Second of all.

K: Third of all.

P: Third of all, music was awesome. I really could not tell if it was just horrible acting, or they’re pretending to be emotionless when the two Dominators were discussing plans. He was like “order received”.

Sp: Seriously, the second guy “Probationary Navigator Controller” dude, his actor could not keep a straight face for the entire first scene he was in. And for an instant I felt really bad. Because this was the most genuine emotion that the actors were showing for most of the episode. With the exception of the teacher and our heros. But anyway, he knew what a steaming pile he had to work with, and he was just shoveling away.

K: I liked Cully too.

H: I think Pat did a really great job with what he had. He still leapt off the screen. He’s still a lot of fun to watch.

P: The Doctor wasn’t in much.

K: He didn’t show up until about halfway into the episode.

P: About that. What’s up with the change in the TARDIS not making sounds.

K: What’s up with the change in the TARDIS falling to pieces.

H: That’s still the original prop. It hasn’t been painted since the Smugglers.

Sp: <frog voice> “Budget cuts.”

<discussion of the condition of the TARDIS prop>

Sp: It was the same size on the inside as it was on the outside! Whaa.. It was so sad.

H: I have only one thing to say to you Spoo. <frog voice> “Budget cuts.”

<laughter>

P: I totally liked the exploding tent ship. That was so cool.

H: Minispoo?

MS: My last thought was my final one. And that was like 3 minutes ago.

H: Nothing else to say?

MS: Not really.

H: Did you like the episode?

MS: Yes. <dramatic pause> It was awesome.

H: Spoo?

MS: <mini frog voice> “Budget cuts!”

Sp: <thinks> So the teacher was really good. And I see what they were trying to do story-wise for drawing parallels between the teacher – student relationship in the study center thingy. And the mentor young dude relationship between “The Dominators.” And, of course what we see every week with the Doctor and his companions. But I think I only see it because the sets are so flimsy, and the acting so all over the place, that I can see straight through to the scaffolding, and really the frame of the plot is all I’ve got to work with. So, I’ll go with that.

H: Is that it?

Sp: <big sigh> I had more…

Random folks: <frog voice> “Budget cuts?”

Sp: Yeah.

H: Alright. Ronelyn?

R: “It’s the Island of Death!” “Is it?” “We could be in mortal peril!” “Are we?” “Am they?” “Does we?” “Is them?” “Duzzums?”

<laughter>

Sp: Oh dear. I think Ronelyn is stuck in a perpetual Improv warm up sketch. One of those things were you can only answer questions with questions things.

R: “It’s not just a small amount of sar… it’s a whole chasm of sar!”

P: You made a pun! And I didn’t get it.

A: That’s because it was good.

<burn>

H: Is that it?

R: I think that’s the note to go out on, yeah.

K: <laughter> My turn? What that everybody except me and the boss?

H: Stop calling me the boss. If I was really the boss I should have a lot more power than I do.

K: Okay, true. I’m probably the boss. 😛

<distracted briefly by boss discussion>

K: So, anyway. As I mentioned earlier, this story is a testament of bad early Doctor Who, as I recall. But, nevertheless, it’s still lots of fun. Just fun to laugh at it. Alas, I can’t really remember the details of the story itself, which is probably a good thing… so I’ll be kinda surprised.

R: If there is one, you mean.

K: I remind you Ronelyn, this is a five parter.

P: So we’re 20% done.

Sp: There were six parts, but the second in command destroyed one.

K: <laughs> Anyway. Despite his overacting and scenery chewing, I am finding Cully quite entertaining. I felt kinda bad when his girlfriend died.

R: That was his girlfriend?

H: More a friend who was a girl.

K: Well, she was the only one he wasn’t snarky to. I’m waiting for Dominator #2 to get so frustrated with Dominator #1 that he just destroys EVERYTHING. I hope that wasn’t me actually remembering that happening. Anyway, point is, I remember this one being terrible, but entertaining. So I am looking forward to seeing it with you guys, which should be a relatively terrible story a lot more fun.

H: Alright. So, first of all, as Ketina’s pointed out, this is a five episode story…

R: God help us all.

H: It was originally planned as a six episode story, but…

Sp: <glares at the Historian>

H: But it was decided by the script editor that the story couldn’t sustain the full six episodes. This is a test of our “six episode stories would have been much tighter if they had cut an episode or so” theory. So I want you to keep that in mind as you watch.

Sp: That’s not fair! This is hash! This is absolute hash!

R: At six episodes this story would have become weaponized.

H: To be fair, we’re not seeing the author’s original intent here. A lot got changed, and I’ll go over that later.

Sp: “I’ll explain later.”

H: Alright, I haven’t seen this story in quite a number of years. Unlike Ketina, I remember this story as being not only terrible but incredibly boring. I’ve actually been looking forward to watching it again, to see how I feel about it all these years later, and whether my feelings will change because of the one episode a week thing. Thus far, it’s not… looking… promising. <pathetic voice> But we’ll see.

Sp: It’s okay, Historian. We’re here. We will fill in the gaps, and be entertaining where this show was not. In fact, we may even go a step further, and fill in other things. Like… sets. Or music. Or… costumes. In fact… I would wager, even in this economy, we could pull together the money and expertise…

R: And shoulder pads.

Sp: And shoulder pads, to make this episode.

K: We’d just have to splice in the Patrick Troughton parts.

Sp: No. We’ll do like they did, and go out on location, and use body doubles to fill in for Troughton and Jamie from behind for no damn reason!

H: Great story, isn’t this?

Sp: I just may challenge myself to make a better version of this story with Legos.

H: I assure you, the season gets better.

R: I assure you, it’s impossible that it does not.

NEXT WEEK: THE DOMINATORS EPISODE 2