Authors: Robert Shearman,Toby Hadoke
Tags: #Doctor Who, #BBC
So I’ve moaned a few times in this diary about having to find my way through episodes that don’t exist as they were meant to be seen. Listening to soundtracks, following online transcripts, watching the reconstructions. But it must be said now, before we move on forever, that the reason that I’m able to enjoy them in any form whatsoever is down to the efforts of a few fans. As early as 1964, a mere 14 weeks into the run, there were already those as dedicated to preserving Doctor Who as I would be in my bedroom, 20 years later – and doing something rather more practical about it than praying to God.
It’s worth repeating, and worth reminding ourselves about over again. Doctor Who fans are extraordinarily lucky. We have each and every episode of the series to enjoy again, even if in a compromised form. When sense would suggest that our tally of episodes should be riddled with holes well into Tom Baker’s tenure, and that a substantial part of the 1960s offerings should be completely without shape or form. Here we are, Toby and I, and we’re going through all the 700-plus instalments of Doctor Who in order. And we
can.
It’s amazing.
... And, yeah, this essay is here in part because I can’t be bothered to talk about Milo Clancey any more. So sue me.
T:
Just a minute... does that mean that
I
have to talk about Milo Clancey? Dammit, you’ve played the Missing Episodes Joker when I had planned to! Suffice to say, if God knocks on my door with “the three Ms” (Marco Polo, Myth Makers and Massacre), and guiltily says he won’t give them back because of some deal with you that he feels is a bit of a high price to pay for some archival ephemera... well, I’m afraid I’ll have to snatch them off him, and just see you in the next life, matey.
But, all right, I’ll write about the episode in question. History tells us that the regulars only appeared in pre-filmed sequences in episode six, as they were off fulfilling their massive obligations to the next story, so I’d expected their participation would be minimal. To my pleasant surprise, though, they feature heavily in this last instalment, and interact with many of the guest characters. And I can credit Dudley Foster for doing what he can with Caven, switching from no-nonsense, clinical villainy to snarling anger in a successfully brutal way. It’s brilliant (and pretty hardcore) that he’d rather blow himself up and kill his opponents than be taken alive.
Two other characters, however, fail to live up to their potential. There’s Dervish, who showed signs of breaking out and having some impact on the drama, but ends up as a Private Pike to Caven’s Mainwaring – he snivels away, complains, and is told to shut up and do as he’s told. Worse, poor old Esmond Knight, as Dom Issigri, spends the whole episode collapsing and being disorientated. Has an illustrious guest actor
ever
been so shabbily used by the series?
Oh, what’s the use? I can’t even pretend to muster any enthusiasm for this story. Do you know, it is my son’s ninth birthday today – I thought
that
would make me feel old, and it might have done, had I not already been watching The Space Pirates. I feel like I’ve aged decades watching this... just look at how the V-Ship hurtles towards the climax by telling us it’ll be there in 55 minutes, which makes The Invasion’s 12 seem like the click of a finger. And
every
process that
everyone
engages in is complicated – the landing procedure for the V-Ship is slow, laborious and complicated; a lock is complicated; and there are complicated explosives which will be complicated to diffuse. Here in episode six, all these manoeuvres serve to slow everything down, as if Robert Holmes is wilfully refusing to be dramatic. He might as well have been more explicit about it, and just started the countdown at T-minus three and a half months.
But no, wait, I can be upbeat in one regard, even though you’ve somewhat paved this ground. The Space Pirates episode six is the final missing episode, which means that things will be very different from now on, because obviously I am – as with everyone reading this, I presume – more familiar with the stuff that exists on video. Sure, I’ve listened to the soundtracks of some absent stories many times, but usually while I’ve been pottering about doing other stuff, and not with the concentration that I’ve had this time around. That means that, whatever my reservations about a particular story, I’ve unearthed a few little nuggets that were surprising or mysterious or beguiling. The fact that so much is missing from this era, while deeply regrettable, does give it a magic that will be difficult to recapture with the more familiar and available. And let’s face it: even if an episode as mundane as this one turned up, it would be
so
exciting! We’d discover what Dom Issigri looks like, how the other rooms and caves are designed, what sort of physical presence Dudley Foster brings to Caven, and so much more.
We can all lament at how much is missing from the archives, it’s true. But there are times when the absence of video makes even the
potential
of something like The Space Pirates seem so much more alluring! You can bet that I’d be the first in line, cash in hand, if ever it was recovered and released on those shiny disc things – what a wonderfully joyful and giddy time that would be.
The War Games episode one
R:
And to think – the Doctor and his companions begin the episode laughing. The very first spoken line is of disgust, the music is immediately doomy, the opening landscape of mud and puddles as immediately depressing as it sounds. And yet the regular cast, almost against the grain of the script, emerge from the TARDIS as happy as we’ve ever heard them. They’ve no idea what’s in store for them. Nor has the viewer.
Because at first this feels very much like a return to the historical adventure. About eight minutes in, we’re given our first anachronism – but it’s subtly done, and we’re left in doubt whether or not we’re understanding what we’re looking at. General Smythe opens a cabinet behind a picture and we see a little video screen. But we don’t yet
know
it’s a video screen; no-one’s face appears on it; it all looks so decidedly lo-tech that it could just be the lens of an Edwardian camera. Smythe refers to the 1917 zone, and that of course sounds off-kilter – but we’re given no further explanation of why he seems to be historicising the present, and it
could
at a pinch just be very awkward exposition. When Zoe asks the Doctor whether they’re on Earth, the script (very cleverly) only says that they would
appear
to be – and the irony is that this very bogus World War I setting looks as credible a historical backdrop as we’ve seen Doctor Who do for years.
Film the Great War nowadays, and we’d be given sequences of soldiers being gunned down by machine gun fire in the trenches. (David Maloney will get his chance to do this, of course, and the imagery will be pure 1917 – but the action will be on Skaro, and by then Tom Baker will be the Doctor.) Instead, what we get to sum up the brutality is barbed wire and bureaucracy. The speed with which the Doctor and his friends are found, imprisoned, then sentenced, is almost surreal, and very dizzying – but that’s precisely the idea. We’re not seeing the ordinary Tommy killed without thought on the front line; he’s being symbolised by what happens to our heroes, caught up in a piece of madness they can’t reason their way out of, and then led off to execution. All of Troughton’s wit and cleverness can’t do a thing to stop it. The moment when he kisses Wendy Padbury goodbye has a despairing finality about it that is beautifully done – and very frightening, because we’ve never seen the Doctor so easily defeated. That final scene, in which he stands before the firing squad, and sighs with unhappy acceptance of his fate, is extraordinary. This is what the Great War did. It made death abrupt and commonplace.
What’s horrifying is that the soldiers who sentence the Doctor do so very amiably. After Smythe appears, they all seem tragically human in comparison. The sergeant major who looks on sympathetically as he marches the trio to interrogation; the major who tries to comfort Zoe by chucking her under the chin as her best friend is led off to die. They aren’t monsters. That’s what’s so terrifying. They’re ordinary, even kindly people, who’ve got so used to institutionalised murder that in response to our regulars’ cries for justice, they just exchange glances in bemusement. It’s almost cruel, the way that the story gives the viewer hope this might be like an ordinary Doctor Who adventure – Zoe finds the key for the Doctor’s cell, and goes to rescue him. (And after all the locking up and escaping we’ve just seen in The Space Pirates, this almost looks like a deliberate comment upon the series’ clichés.) It’s to no avail. He’s taken outside and shot forthwith... or so it appears, in one of the most honestly shocking cliffhangers the series has ever done. It really doesn’t matter that the way out of it will be a mite contrived. On its own terms, this episode appears to have taken children’s hero Doctor Who out of his fantasy, stuck him in a very real and very grimy war, and, with undue haste and with awful credibility, killed him. If next week The War Games becomes a weird sci-fi adventure with ray guns and monsters, that’s okay – this week, standing alone, it’s played the Great War straight, and in the process has been one of the most remarkable episodes we’ve yet seen.
T:
I’d like, if I may, to focus on the flipside of the casualness to murder that you’ve been writing about. There’s an extraordinary (but quick) moment here when Major Barrington gets news over the phone that his men are to charge over the top of the trench in the morning – right into the waiting German guns, presumably – and notes the order with grim acceptance before he puts on a brave face to Carstairs, and cheerily informs him about tomorrow’s big push. Then later on, after a kangaroo court has sentenced the Doctor to death, Barrington stoically gives Zoe some words of encouragement before returning to his command post...
... and we never see him again. Chances are, having told Zoe to keep her chin up, Barrington will have to be doing the same in a few hours. The Doctor’s not the only one who’s been sent to his death at dawn.
This isn’t a production that shirks away from the horrors of the time – as is highlighted in the Doctor’s lines, and the swift brutality of our heroes’ condemnation – but what comes across even more strongly is everyone’s ability to keep their basic decency in the midst of bloody madness. Yes, Rob, it’s right and proper of you to point out the disconnect between the military personnel acting warm and personable while being callous where murder is concerned, which only goes to emphasise the sheer horror of war and what it makes people do. Apart from the gruesome, leering General Smythe (Noel Coleman has an air of superior military bearing, whilst being terrifyingly repugnant at the same time – he’s terrific), everyone here is inherently a good egg. Lady Jennifer offers to look after Zoe rather than subject her to a night in the cells, and the barking sergeant-major offers the condemned Doctor some food. Even the northern sergeant who chastises the Doctor’s party in the trenches issues a courteous, “You too M’am, if you don’t mind...” to Zoe as needed. War will
always
be hell, and sometimes, the best that those involved can do is guarantee that chivalry and compassion have a place there also.
As this is Doctor Who’s first venture into one of the two World Wars, it’s perhaps not surprising that the morality on display here is trickier than on other occasions, when there are Daleks or Cybermen that need killing. In fact, so far, The War Games is notable because there isn’t really much action either – the sequence of events that ultimately put the Doctor in front of a firing squad isn’t an exercise in dodging bullets so much as it’s about the TARDIS crew finding themselves (as was the case for a lot of real-life people in wartime, I’m sure) in a degenerating situation that they can’t control. Moreover, it’s a condemnation of the depressing reliance on military protocol – as if doing everything “properly” somehow excuses the destruction and butchery that abound – as is emphasised during the sham trial when the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe are made to march less than ten feet away, wait a couple of minutes, then turn around and march back. It illustrates a lunatic adherence to procedure, even when justice has just gone out the window.
I can’t quite believe that I’m saying this, but after The Space Pirates, we’ve been thrust into an episode which is damn-near perfect. The script gives us jeopardy, character and mystery, and rollocks along from one interesting set-piece to another. The realisation of the period and ad-hoc dwelling places is effectively rendered in Roger Cheveley’s excellent design work, and even the grainy location photography is stark and terribly atmospheric. If this is Doctor Who’s last black-and-white adventure, it should be celebrated as such – there’s a certain breed of fan who thinks that the 60s stories would improve if they were colourised, but The War Games, and the grim period of history that it depicts, is manifestly at home in all its black and white majesty.
May 4th
The War Games episode two
R:
A round of applause for Hubert Rees. His performance as the amiable Captain Ransom is an absolute joy – a pipe-smoking pencil pusher whose method of chatting up an attractive woman is to tell her all about his admin duties. The look of relieved delight whenever General Smythe hypnotises away any of his doubts is like a puppy dog being given a bone; here is a man who doesn’t want to think for himself, and takes comfort in following orders. And that’s what makes Ransom such a terrific comic character, but so sad and dangerous a figure as well – he’s the exact epitome of conformity, of the plucky Tommy who’ll die for his country without question. He’s Hugh Laurie from Blackadder. The awful tragedy of it is that when he dies, it won’t be for his country at all – it won’t even be for his planet. This is a man who’ll only moan about the cost of the Great War in terms of the number of shovels he has lost – he won’t (or can’t) bring himself to think about the loss of human life. Thoroughly likeable, and thoroughly dismaying, Rees gives the most interesting comic performance in the series since Barrie Ingham came over all Wodehouse back in The Myth Makers.
There’s so much to enjoy here. The way that Jamie the Highlander is able to form a brief friendship with the Redcoat soldier is really rather touching – the two enemies coming together because they have more in common with each other than anyone else they could meet. That the Redcoat is so abruptly shot (albeit in the leg) takes the fantasy that two foes can find peace so easily and gives it a harsh twist – the reality of the war we see here is a lot grimmer than that. And I love the way that Troughton has the audacity to infiltrate the prison so bombastically and bully the staff. When he says that he is the examiner, his lie throws us right back to his very first story – and reminds us that this is what the second Doctor
used
to be like, the sly chameleon who’ll take on any persona at will. In barking orders at the military and making them run around in small circles for him, it’s as if, in his final adventure, Troughton is getting the chance to revisit the glory moments that established him. I’m just grateful he doesn’t start admiring everybody’s hats.
And for a truly magical moment – how about that sequence where the ambulance suddenly fades into thin air? At this stage we’ve no idea what that can mean. When it reappears before a set of Roman soldiers, it’s as if Doctor Who has abandoned its police box, and replaced it with a time-travelling ambulance. It’s as bizarre an image as – say – a London bus in a desert, and I think it’s quite wonderful.
T:
Troughton’s turn as the barking prison-inspector while he and Zoe try to rescue Jamie is brilliant – just look at how he bristles with indignation and gets testy at the impertinence of someone having the audacity to query him. It’s an act of desperation, of course – blustering chutzpah to cover the most fragile of disguises. Troughton emphasises this with a tremor in his voice that flits between quivering rage and desperate improvisation, and the way he storms about frustrating Richard Steele’s delightfully stuffy Commandant is a joy. Steele first makes us laugh at him for being such a pompous twit, but ultimately engenders our grudging admiration as he snaps and refuses to be brow-beaten any further (even if this threatens to undo the Doctor’s plan!). And then Zoe hits him over the head with a vase. You could argue that much of this is filler, but it’s filler of the highest order. (Is it just me, though, or does Steele remind you of Richard Mathews’ turn as Rassilon in The Five Doctors? Listen to his line about the inspector having to wait while he has his tea – the delivery is identical.)
So far, this has been a pretty sumptuous production, with plenty of location filming and impressive-looking sets. There’s attention to visual detail – they’ve gone to the trouble of including broken glass in the windows of the chateau. And let me add that Pat Gorman – one of the unsung stalwarts of Doctor Who, a perennial extra who was stuffed into all manner of monster outfits – finally gets a line, and a credit, and we actually see his face and everything! He sometimes gets one of those, but he’s not yet had all three at once. It’s all justly deserved, as he’s logged so many hours with Doctor Who but so rarely gets any notice.
And let me not only echo your praise for Hubert Rees, but also use him to echo some of the points I made about episode one. Smythe orders the “creeping barrage” (two words that Coleman positively devours), and it’s Ransom who reminds him that his target is, in fact, an ambulance with two women on board. Even in war, there are rules. In the mouth of madness, we still create a structure, a moral framework, which under actual scrutiny makes no real sense. That’s the madness of human conflict – we allow ourselves to commit the foulest of crimes so long as we follow protocol, and obey the rules. War
games
indeed.
The War Games episode three
R:
You could argue, I suppose, that the bit with the Doctor being interrogated by the German lieutenant as a spy is a bit repetitive. But of course it is. That’s the nature of this war game – that for all their different accents, the soldiers on the front line are exactly the same stooges as each other, and will respond to the same events accordingly. The joke of it is made all the clearer when Smythe’s counterpart, Captain von Weich, turns up and takes his lieutenant outside for a spot of hypnotism. Very rarely for the series, the whole sequence plays out in German, without subtitles – and we know
exactly
what’s being said, the way that the naïve young soldier is being turned back into a simple automaton, because we’ve heard it so often already. The fact that David Garfield wears a monocle, rather than Noel Coleman’s pebble glasses, feels like rather a witty difference – as if he’s chosen another form of eyewear simply so he can show off his natty scar.