Season 13 continued - Days 406 to 427

Broadcast Dates: 27th September 1975 - 6th March 1976

Relative Dates: 1st January 2013 - 22nd January 2013

After describing the debacle I had with the first story of this season (Terror Of The Zygons) it's time I moved on to talk about the rest. Only 3 more seasons till I've caught up with myself. This blog is so confusing but I suppose it's appropriate that it should jump about in time like it is.

Planet Of Evil

 

Talk about a melodramatic title! So poor Harry is left behind on Earth after the events of Terror Of The Zygons leaving the classic teaming of the fourth Doctor and Sarah Jane. 

This one was pretty dull but had a good central idea. A ship lands and attempts to take precious minerals from a planet but every time they try to leave with the minerals they are dragged back to the planet. It is as if the planet itself will not allow them to take part of it away with them.

There are some "invisible" monsters which I guess are cheap to create but in the moments when you do catch a glimpse of them they seem pretty crap looking so just as well that they are invisible for the vast majority of the story. The best part of the story however is the whole look of it, mainly the sets used for the jungle scenes. They are fantastic! It really does feel like they go on forever and are suitably alien looking with all their various shades of red and purple. I'm a man so I can't tell you exactly which shades. As far as I am concerned there are only about 10 different colours in the world!

One of the crew members becomes possessed by the planet and starts to kill off the crew as he goes all mental. Writing this now I think it sounds quite exciting but for some reason that excitement doesn't come across well on screen.

This story started off the various homages to classical horror stories with this one meant to be a type of "Jekyll and Hyde" story. I can sort of see what they are trying to do but it is no where near as successful as some of the later stories of this type that they would create.

Of course it goes without saying that Elizabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane is superb as ever. Knowing what an important character she is to the show I was enjoying watching her character develop through the series.

Pyramids Of Mars

From Jekyll and Hyde we now move on to the Egyptgian theme and robotic mummies that strangle people with their giant breasts! I'm not even joking.

This one is rated as one of the very best stories and as such it has always failed to live up to expectations in my eye, except this time. Maybe it was because I was coming to it from the rather dreary Planet Of Evil., but for some reason I just loved watching it this time.

The villain of this one, Sutekh, has to be one of the most creepy villains ever. The actor playing him has a very creepy voice and the scene near the end where Sutekh has captured the Doctor and is torturing him, the creepy voice combined with the screams of Tom Baker make for a very unnerving and dark scene to watch.

The basic premise is that Sutekh has been imprisioned beneath a pyramid in Egypt for thousands of years by a forcefield being projected from another pyramid on Mars. An archeologist, Marcus Scarman, discovers Sutekh and is taken under his spell in order that Lawrence can be used to create a rocket capable of destroying the pyramid on Mars and thus freeing Sutekh.

As well as the dark scene mentioned earlier where the Doctor is tortured by Sutekh we also have another very disturbing moment when a possessed Marcus Scarman murders his own brother! Now that is very dark!

Sarah Jane raises an issue that I can't believe it has taken this long to address. As this story is taking place in the past then why are they worried about Sutekh escaping and causing havoc on Earth as they know the future is fine. The Doctor goes on to explain that time is constantly in flux and can be rewritten. To prove his point he takes Sarah back to the present day to a world ravaged and destroyed by Sutekh. This scene is brilliant because now we are aware of what will happen should they fail and it's not pretty!

 

Loved this one!

 

The Android Invasion

 

 

I'm going to really struggle with this one. This was a fairly new purchase when I watched it and therefore I was watching it for the first time. I haven't watched it since and as such I can't really remember much that happens.

 

The Doctor and Sarah Jane arrive in a village where things are a little off. We soon discover that we are not on Earth as first believed but in a mock up of an Earth village where aliens are training up androids to take over the Earth...I think.

 

I remember the shocking moment shown above. Sarah Jane turns against the Doctor and as they struggle she falls down a hill and her face falls off revealing that she was an android!

 

I think this is also the last time that we get to see Harry and Seargent Benton. Having pretty much said goodbye to the Brigadier in Terror Of The Zygons (for now at least) it was sad that I was finally leaving the UNIT stories behind.

 

The Brain Of Morbius

 

 

From Jekyll and Hyde to Egyptian mummies, we now move on to Frankenstien's monster!

 

Another cracking story. This one is about an evil Time Lord, Morbius whose body has been destroyed when his ship crash landed on the planet Karn. The only part of him that survives intact is his brain which is supported in a load of green goo in a jar. Fortunately a fanatical supporter of his is also a brilliant surgeon and is therefore harvesting body parts from the other creatures who crash land on the planet in order to build Morbius a new body.

 

The body is ready and whilst it may not look all too pleasant it is a least functional. All Doctor Solon is missing is the perfect head to house the brain of Morbius. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on your point of view) this is when the Doctor and Sarah Jane turn up and Solon therefore sets his sights on obtaining the Doctor's head!

 

Very atmospheric with all the usual Hammer Horror style tropes of old castles and lightening storms, this story is just brilliant. Having failed to obtain the Doctor's head Solon is forced to take up plan B which is to house the brain of Morbius in an artifical casing as shown in the picture above.

 

It's also another strong story for Sarah Jane as she goes through the terror of being blinded halfway through the story. Solon examines Sarah Jane and tells her that her eye sight will return but with a slow shake of the head to the Doctor we are made aware that he is lying purely to comfort her.

 

Philip Madoc who plays Solon in this story has been in many Doctor Who stories in his time but I think it is for this one that he is most well known and he gives an excellent performance as the passionate surgeon with his horrific creation.

Another moment to talk about is when the Doctor and Morbius take part in a mental duel. We see various faces on a screen as they battle one another. We see the third Doctor, then the second, then the first and then...more faces! Much talk has been had since about who these faces are supposed to be. I believe at the time that these were meant to be further incarnations of the Doctor and therefore the Doctor as we knew him then was not the fourth but maybe a much later version! Of course this now completely screws up some of the continuity in the show so I guess you could think of them as maybe being earlier incarnations of Morbius? At the end of the day it is a television show written by many different people for 50 years and therefore there are always going to be contradictary moments like this. It's not worth worrying about. But some people really do.

 

The Seeds Of Doom

 

Not to be confused with the second Doctor story The Seeds Of Death...which in turn is not to be confused with the fourth Doctor story City Of Death. This story is another gem of the Tom Baker era!

 

Six part stories such as this one can sometimes drag a little as they are spread a little thin to fulfil the epsiode count. Here is a perfect example of how to do one right. I think it helps that we effectively have a 2 part story and a 4 part story tagged togther. The first two episodes deal with the recovery of some mysterious seed pods in Antartica and then the remaining four episodes deal with the aftermath of the seeds recovery as the wealthy plant enthusisat Harrison Chase takes illegal possession of the alien pod that then starts wreaking havoc on his estate.

 

The idea that the Krynoid that emerges from the pod can make plants turn violent and attack people is a terrifying one. Plants are everywhere and just imagine if they started attacking people! It reminds me a little of Hitchcock's The Birds, with the idea of just what would happen if something that is familiar and around us every day suddenly turned on us.

 

Harrison Chase is a fantastic villain. His obesession with his plants is superbly creepy!

 

We also get to see a young John Challis (aka Boycie from Only Fools and Horses) as one of Chases's henchmen! It's amazing how many people have been in Doctor Who over it's 50 year history!

 

So that was season 13. I started my blog up again this year when I had just started season 16 which has led to this unfortunate necessity of jumping backwards and forwards along the timeline of my quest. But I'm very close to catching up with myself now and hopefully by the end of September I'll be up to date. God knows how I'm going to cope with the new series when there will probably be an entry required every day!