Companions: The Brigadier, Nyssa, Tegan Jovanka, Visor Turlough, Kamelion
Season 20 is where we fully settle into the Fifth Doctor era, and celebrate 20 years of the show with The Five Doctors
The Review
Here’s the scores for the stories
The Five Doctors: 9.25/10
Enlightenment: 9/10
Mawdryn Undead: 8.9/10
The King’s Demons: 8.25/10
Snakedance: 8.25/10
Terminus: 8/10
Arc of Infinity: 7.9/10
The best story wasn’t technically part of the season, but The Five Doctors is the class of this group of stories, a delightful anniversary special. Behind that, most stories were good but not great, though avoiding any complete disasters. The best story from the season proper was the moody and inspired Enlightenment, while the biggest miss was Arc of Infinity because of its over-reliance on Gallifrey and lore, something that The Five Doctors deftly avoided despite it’s characters.
8.543/10 Season 20 celebrates 20 years of Doctor Who with a classically good season
A quick two-part story wraps up Season 20 with some good location filming and Master shenanigans.
The Review
The King and his subjects
The past two seasons have done a historical two-parter to reach 22 episodes, and I will say I find them more agreeable than messing around with a padded out six part story. There’s fun to be had in this tale of a 13th century castle, complete with excellent on location shooting. A highlight is Gerald Flood’s performance as King John, perfectly dripping with over the top relish. The TARDIS is dropped into 1215, a few months before the signing of the Magna Carta, and are befuddled when King John isn’t too unnerved by three people appearing out of thin air. There is little for Tegan and Turlough in this story, Tegan is just following around the Doctor while Turlough is always on the edge of being executed. The Doctor is the first to suspect that King John might not really be King John at all, and decides to sword-fight the weird French guy that serves as the King’s champion. Naturally: he’s the Master in disguise.
The Master and Doctor sword fight for the second time in the show
The Master is here to put an end to parliamentary democracy, showing that he has changed his usual methods of partner with an alien race to take over the planet and see it blow up in his face. By never having King John sign the Magna Carta, it would created devastating ripple effects. I think the weakest part of this story is how easily he is outwitted. King John is revealed to be an incredible facsimile, Kamelion, that the Master has picked up and plans to use to dominate worlds. Kamelion is a complex prop which just looks kind of weird, but is invited to the TARDIS team. The Doctor simply breaks Kamelion out of the Master’s spell and whisks away. Overall, not too many complaints, but the story is pretty disposable, and compared to Black Orchid does not have a seen where Tegan does the Charleston.
Highlighted by Gerald Flood and Anthony Ainley’s performances, The King’s Demons is a breezy way to wrap Season 20.
8.25/10 Makes me remember that The Witchfinders is probably a highlight of the 13th Doctor era
Story 127, Episodes 596-599, Season 20 Episodes 17-20
Doctor: The Fifth Doctor
Companions: Tegan Jovanka, Vislor Turlough
One of the best ideas for a setting in show history gives us a memorable tale with a pitch-perfect ending.
The Review
A boat race through the solar system
The TARDIS gets a faint message from the White Guardian, and coordinates to land on an Edwardian sailing ship. Only, it turns out to not be a ship sailing through the solar system with ‘boats’ from other times in human history. The setting is rendered well, especially when Turlough jumps overboard and is chillingly falling in the void of space. It is a competition between Eternals, immortal beings who nevertheless are quite boring: they have no ideas of their own and need ‘Ephermals’ for entertainment. The crew of the first ship, Striker and Marriner, are creepily stoic and unsettling. The evil captain of a pirate ship, Wrax, is over-the-top evil, a perfect contrast of styles. The race is for Enlightenment, which will supposedly open the minds of the Eternals. As the ships sail, propelled by solar winds, the Doctor knows he has to stop someone from winning the race, but who? The whole time, Tegan is pursued by Marriner, who can’t get enough of her mind, a very creepy thing indeed.
The Guardians meet at last
Turlough goes through the most in this story, and it ultimately turns out to be about him. The Black Guardian curses him to ‘never leave the Eternal ship’ saying he’s failed to kill the Doctor, and with the revelation that the Guardians created the race it seems his whole motivation was to ensure that evil Wrax would win. Turlough pretends to be on Wrax’s side, but she sees ‘only greed’ in his mind. Still, when asked to choose her or the Doctor, it’s Wrax who is sent tumbling into space. As he and the Doctor technically win, they both are offered ‘enlightenment’. The Doctor quickly turns it down, but Turlough is tempted one last time by the Black Guardian.
Enlightenment like the story beforehand succeeds in atmosphere, but to an even greater extent. The depravity of the Eternals is unnerving, and a race on boats through space to reach a magical power? Now you’re speaking my language.
Story 126, Episodes 592-595, Season 20 Episodes 13-16
Doctor: The Fifth Doctor
Companions: Nyssa, Tegan Jovanka, Vislor Turlough
In an atmospheric story, we encounter space lepers and unexpectedly find ourselves facing the highest stakes in show history.
The Review
Armor from the local Spirit Halloween
The vibe of Terminus is quite spooky, even Halloween-y one might say. The armor used by the Terminus staff is this absurd clearly plastic Halloween-costume like stuff, which is pretty silly but honestly it works. Terminus is a crappy space hospital that promises a cure for ‘Lazar’s Disease’, whatever that is, basically space leprosy. The people working there have the disease too, but only survive with medicine from a company controlling the station. The Lazar’s are supposedly cured by the Garm, a hulking dog-creature thing. The TARDIS crew meets two raiders that went to rob the Lazar ship, but end up getting stuck on Terminus. Then, the stakes get really high as it apparently Terminus the ship used to time-travel, and apparently the pilot jettisoned fuel mid-flight that caused the Big Bang. And now, it might happen again, destroying the universe. I didn’t expect this story to reveal the origins of the universe, but it does, and it fits with the creepy vibe. The hulking Garm uses his strength to prevent it, saving the day.
The Garm himself
The companions have varied storylines. Tegan and Turlough ended up together for most of the story, with Tegan not doing too much despite being suspicious of Turlough. The Black Guardian is now threatening Turlough with death, making his actions to kill the Doctor at least logical. I think Mark Strickson is actually putting in a good performance, all four of the main cast has some excellent acting. Some of the best is Sarah Sutton as Nyssa, who sadly leaves in this story but gets a dignified exit. Rather then falling in love with someone, Nyssa finds herself in a situation where her excellent chemistry skills can be put to good use, to improve the cure for Lazar’s and save the Terminus workers from dependence on the company. In fact I think it might be one of the best companion exits for that reason that she gets to use her expertise in a meaningful way. I will certainly miss Nyssa.
Terminus isn’t a classic, but it’s got great spooky sci-fi B-movie vibes, right down to the comically insane oxygen helmets worn by the scavengers. More of these vibes please.
8/10 It’s a solid entry in what’s shaping up as yet another great season. Or do I just love this show?
Story 125, Episodes 588-591, Season 20 Episodes 9-12
Doctor: The Fifth Doctor
Companions: The Brigadier, Nyssa, Tegan Jovanka, Vislor Turlough
Things get self-referential in Mawdryn Undead, but a timey-wimey plot with a genuine moral dilemma at the center keep it succeeding.
The Review
Turlough gets an offer he can’t refuse
The main storyline in Mawdryn Undead is the introduction of a new companion: Turlough, a troublemaking boarding school student implied not to be from Earth. The early reveal that he causes a car crash with none other than the Brigadier himself is fantastically pulled off. Speaking of old friends: the Black Guardian is back, and tasks Turlough with destroying the Doctor, saying he’ll let him leave Earth. Turlough accepts like an idiot and immediately regrets it, his heart’s never really in trying to kill the Doctor, and all in all it was a bad plan by the Black Guardian. Tegan and Nyssa are good presences but not the focus, Nyssa finally gets a good outfit and Tegan gets the Doctor to say ‘zap’ at the end of the story which I enjoyed. Neither of them really trust Turlough, with good reason, so I’m interested to see where this goes, especially with the Black Guardian’s link with Turlough apparently cut off.
1977 Brigadier meets the Mawdryn gang
The main story revolves around a group of scientists led by Mawdryn that tried to get the Time Lords’ regeneration powers and now lead horrific endless lives. They want the Doctor’s regeneration energy to finally die, and he doesn’t give it to them: until Tegan and Nyssa are in danger. Now, for the Brigadier. Nicholas Courtney is just a cheat code, and they decide to double him up by having both an aged 1983 Brigadier, and a fresh out of unit still with mustache 1977 Brigadier which is really quite fun and portrayed with great style by Courtney. The story’s only problems are a lack of action, there’s more roundabout movement with characters nearly missing each other, and too many references: there’s a gratuitous Brigadier montage, we get a reference to the regeneration limit, and even ‘reverse the polarity of the neutron flow’. When you have a cheat code like Courtney, no need to lay it on so thick.
Mawdryn Undead is a fun story with good music, great characters, and a lot of twists.
8.9/10 Only reason it doesn’t get a 9 is that eye-roll worth reverse the polarity line
Story 124, Episodes 584-587, Season 20 Episodes 5-8
Doctor: The Fifth Doctor
Companions: Nyssa, Tegan Jovanka
Snakedance levels up the weirdness from Kinda and takes us to the origin of the Mara, in a story that really goes for it.
The Review
Hanging out outside of the Mara cave
The best part of Kinda was the super weirdness of the Mara, the worst part being the human guy who lost his mind. I think then my disappointment of Snakedance is that we did not get more time in the weird-ass shadow world of the Mara. It turns out that the Mara are the creation of the people of Manussa, who accidentally created the Mara through their own inner evil. The Mara still lies within Tegan, and takes her to Manussa to return 500 years after the Mara were banished. Tegan spends a lot of the story doing a lot of evil laughter and having a fondness with snakes. The Doctor spends a lot more time with Nyssa who has finally dropped the pantsuit (though the replacement isn’t great) and shows a lot more personality that really has me liking her. Davison is on fine form, not always in charge of the situation but doing the best he can.
Martin Clunes is on fine form
The other plot involves Lon, the son of the lord of the planet visiting the Mara caves for the ceremony. He starts off very lazy until he is summoned by Mara/Tegan and becomes part of the Mara consciousness himself. Lon and the Doctor terrorize the Director of the research into the past Manussan civilizations, the highlight getting him to wear a headdress of the six heads of delusion that only had five heads, exposing the sixth is the wearer himself. The Doctor has to visit the silent sage Dojjen to gain the power of the mental crystals to have the energy to defeat and reject the Mara, which gains power through fear. By rejecting it, the Mara dies, and all Tegan can do is cry and remark that fear and hatred of the Mara was just so horrible. Much smarter writers than I (such as Steven Moffat) love this story, I think there’s too much running around and not enough actual action, but I see why: this story just goes for it. What else could you want?
The defeat of the Mara is one of the more unique stories in show history. You have to appreciate it.
Story 123, Episodes 580-581, Season 20 Episodes 1-4
Doctor: The Fifth Doctor
Companions: Nyssa, Tegan Jovanka
We head back to Gallifrey to kick off the twentieth season of Doctor Who, and it turns out to be more of the same.
The Review
Gallifreyan diversity: a council member is a woman now
Arc of Infinity doesn’t do anything other Gallifrey stories haven’t done before, or really that The Invasion of Time didn’t do, but better. There’s a dastardly plot and the Doctor and Nyssa are recalled to Gallifrey, some antimatter creature has attached itself to the Doctor and the only way out is the Doctor must die. This creature turns out to be Omega, last glimpsed yelling and screaming at everything in sight in The Three Doctors. Now he looks really weird and still just wants to come back to reality. The Doctor is seemingly killed, but not really, and he returns from the Matrix in order to track down Omega and stop him. There’s some nice references, we’re told Leela is doing well on Gallifrey and the Time Lords are upset Romana never returned from E-Space. Borusa is President now, but the shared history between him and the Doctor is irrelevant. The exceedingly serious Commander Maxil is played by Colin Baker, who will succeed Davison as the Doctor next season, but there’s no glimpses of a future Doctor with his good but extremely serious approach. All in all, we have nothing new from Gallifrey.
The day is saved in Amsterdam
The first episode starts with two young men sleeping in a crypt in Amsterdam, which seemingly has nothing to do with the story. There’s one hell of a twist when one of their cousins turns out to be Tegan, sporting a new short haircut. It’s fun to see Tegan again, though I’m surprised she offers no ill-will to the Doctor. The location shooting in Amsterdam is a huge plus, an upgrade from chroma-key and quarries and the usual fare for the show. Davison briefly plays Omega in the finale once Omega steals his body, but once it becomes corrupted he hilariously is swapped out by some actor who looks a lot closer to Javier Bardem. Still, Davison does a good job as the creepy Omega moping around the city. I think a bit too long is spent on the Amsterdam plot before the trick with Tegan is revealed. Recently it has been ‘canonized’ that Nyssa and Tegan were a thing, something I didn’t see any hint of until this episode. Seems to be more on Nyssa’s side so far with her quiet joy at hearing she’s going to see Tegan again on her face. Don’t get me wrong, I’m here for it, but I’m searching to see if there’s any there there.
The Gallifrey parts don’t add anything, and I really don’t care about Omega returning, especially when he’s never even really explained again that well. Still, solid location work.
Reviewing Doctor Who from Start to Finish 