Carnival of Monsters
Story 66, Episodes 335-338, Season 10 Episodes 5-8
Doctor: The Third Doctor
Companions: Jo Grant
It turns out that the Doctor still cannot control the TARDIS, as he winds up inside of a tiny miniscope.
The Review
For a time, there are two stories: the Doctor and Jo trapped in some sort of miniature device dealing with a set of humans on a 20s steamship that repeat the same hour over and over, and two carnival barkers desperately trying to get business from an array of gray aliens. The latter story is completely uninteresting, including the whole plot to overthrow the too ‘liberal’ President Zarb who we never even meet. The steamship is a good setting, but then we move to meeting the Drashigs, giant predators of the plains. Turns out the TARDIS somehow landed in a miniscope, a machine that holds and parades around miniaturized intelligent life. The Doctor apparently raised such a fuss about them that the Time Lords banned them from the universe. Jo and the Doctor eventually escape, Drashigs and bad guys defeated, and everybody including the humans on that ship for Bombay are returned to their times.
This story suffers from the same malaise that a lot of classic stories suffer, there’s so little to discuss I don’t even have another paragraph worth of thoughts. It’s a miracle the Doctor is able to get Jo back to Earth, maybe he installed some sort of boomerang device on the TARDIS. Vorg and his assistant get off way too easily for owning the miniscope, even with Vorg admitting that he’d won it. It was almost time for the Doctor to lay a smackdown on Vorg, but Vorg generally gets away with it. Also, seriously, I know that it is cheaper, but there are only so many ‘alien races that look exactly like humans’ I can take. At least the carnival people got dressed in outrageous getups for everyone to tell they’re alien, and the story had the gray aliens which at least were a little different. You guys just need some variety, alrighT?
Actually an inventive idea, but a lot left to be desired on execution.
7/10 That’s it?
Reviewing Doctor Who from Start to Finish 