Running Through Corridors: Rob and Toby's Marathon Watch of Doctor Who (Volume 1: The 60s)

by Robert Shearman

  Right, to punish you for this terrible, terrible affront to the truth that you’ve gone and done, I’m going to go first on the commentary with this episode, and mention all the really noticeable and interesting stuff while leaving you with only table-scraps. For a change, you’ll the one forced to resort to bitterness and trite wordplay – hah!

  I have to back up for a moment, though. Victor Pemberton was once asked at a convention what, as script editor, he’d contributed to The Tomb of the Cybermen – and he replied that he’d “added some atmosphere”. It had become a byword for that serial – Tomb was “atmospheric”, and I imagined that it entailed gloomy tunnels and Cybermen looming out of the shadows. So when that story was recovered, you can imagine my feeling cheated upon discovering that it contained cheesy characters in anoraks, and – apart from the weapons room – some brightly lit sets.

  That’s not the case here, though. The scenes with the Abbot talking to the monastery’s master, Padmasambhava, entail gloomy, shadowy lighting, with flickering flames dancing about – that’s atmosphere for you. It’s especially pleasing that the cave sequences were filmed on location and weren’t part of a studio set, and that the big stone sets and period feel of the monastery convey mood much better than a futuristic serial ever could. And it’s also clever how – now that the Yeti has been revealed to us – we’re given a new visual mystery, in that Padmasambhava is treated as an unseen, tantalising presence.

  Meanwhile, the regulars have really bedded in, haven’t they? Jamie gets to do the action stuff, Victoria guesses at things and is generally terrified, and the Doctor runs through the gamut of being scared, funny and grumpy – all within a second of each other. I especially love the way that Troughton has a serious discussion about capturing a Yeti, then nervously backs away because “Jamie’s had an idea” on how to go about it.

  Let me end by mentioning that the real David Baron is alive and well, still acting and very easy to track down. Even this, however, probably won’t quash the rumour that an internationally renowned playwright took a five-week sabbatical to do a bit part in a children’s TV series.

  R: Hey, hold on! I didn’t say Pinter was in the episode. It was just a greeting, apropos of nothing, really. Like, “Nice weather, isn’t it?” or, “How are you this morning?” or, “Harold Pinter’s very good, isn’t he?” Now, there was a playwright who could get under the skin of late-twentieth-century paranoia. Nothing at all about him appearing as Ralpachan in an adventure about robotic Yeti.

  ... although I can’t help wishing it were true. Because it’d just be perfect, wouldn’t it? Our most lauded man of letters, the pillar of the theatrical community, putting on a fake moustache in a bit part consigned mostly to telesnaps. I’m still holding out for Tom Stoppard revealing on The South Bank Show that he was Sapan, or Alan Ayckbourn admitting that he’s bumbling about in one of the Yeti costumes.

  The Abominable Snowmen episode three

  R: This episode is solid and well directed, but the lack of incidental music means that we get a few too many sequences of brooding silences – Pinteresque pauses, if you will. And the point about Pinter’s pauses is that they are heavy with menace and hidden meanings. I’ve no particular problem with the slow pace of this – but it’s about time some of those menacing pauses paid off with a bit of action.

  Nonetheless, in the monk Khrisong, writers Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln have created a soldier who’ll grimly devote himself to the protection of others, who’ll put himself in danger more willingly than his own men, and who regards the undisciplined Doctor with gruff suspicion before realising that it’s his imagination and genius that will save the day. Remind you of anyone? Norman Jones is quite excellent as this prototype Brigadier. He’s the most hostile figure within the story so far, and the clichés of a Doctor Who story would lead you to expect him to be an enemy, or a madman – early on in the episode Jamie considers him “daffy” – but it’s quite clear that he is a man of integrity. And his frustration at the passivity of the monks he’s sworn to defend gives an urgency to a drama which might perhaps be judged as a bit flaccid: his arguments for bold action rehearse once again a debate that’s old to Doctor Who – that of the dangers of pacifism – and anticipates the entire plotline of The Dominators. But it’s done far more subtly here, and to greater effect.

  Indeed, it’s a thoughtful script all round. I can’t help but feel that Victoria’s constant insistence on seeing a private sanctum is a bit crass. But when she mocks the young monk Thonmi for being in thrall to a master he has never seen, and cannot understand his own curiosity, it’s surely a debate about faith itself: how can a monk devote himself to a lifetime of worship, when you can never look on the face of your god? At best, Doctor Who has taken a rather agnostic stance towards religious belief – you’ve either got your Aztecs who are gullible savages, and any number of cults worshipping Amdo or Demnos who’ll sacrifice your average assistant as soon as look at her; or you’ve got your corrupt or hypocritical churchwardens and vicars, who’ll either be ex-pirates or genocidal Time Lords in disguise. When Haisman and Lincoln set their story on a planet called Dulkis, and debate (endlessly) about a society’s disinclination to defend itself, it’s all rather too pat and twee. But when they depict a band of monks whose entire point is peaceful contemplation, something much more interesting is being asked when they’re required to take up arms, or demand evidence of their faith. There are no easy answers here – as there shouldn’t be – and whilst it’s true within this story that Victoria has every reason to suspect Padmasambhava, the dignity with which David Spenser portrays Thonmi and his unwillingness to challenge his own religious doctrine is still very persuasive.

  And Wolfe Morris’ turn as Padmasambhava reflects both sides of that debate. At one moment his voice is genial and warm, and then in a moment it’ll become hissing and waspish. The schizophrenia of it is genuinely unnerving. But it also ensures that there’s some respect given to these Tibetan monks; if we kept cutting to sequences where the man they regard as master kept on performing like a melodramatic villain, then they’d look no more than stupid stooges. The ambiguity of Morris’ performance is the ambiguity of the way faith is handled in the story.

  T: Norman Jones is magnificent as Khrisong, isn’t he? Especially considering that he’s undoubtedly the same Norman Jones who played football for Gillingham in the 1920s. Why, the man must be older than he looks – common sense might dictate that we’re dealing with different Norman Joneses, but hey... the names match, so they must be one and the same. And it’s not as if Norman and Jones are particularly common names is it? Off to Wikipedia again...

  R: Dear God, Toby. Let it go.

  T: All right, fair enough, I’ll stop now. However, if the words “Bush” or “Kate” feature in your Kinda appraisal regarding who actually wrote that story, I’m going to write a bad review of one of your Big Finish audios – Scherzo, I think – and post it on Eye of Horus. I’ll need to adopt their house style – something like “It sucked, were wuz the monstas?” – to get it past their rigorous editorial control, but I’m sure I can cope.

  R: I’ll bear that in mind. Even though that sounds to me less a threat than a challenge.

  T: Back in Tibet, Professor Travers still has “bad guy” written all over him, hasn’t he? He has a line where he seems to give himself away (“Now I must make a... find out for sure”); we’re in a period of Doctor Who where this could be either a simple fluff or a character-almost-giving-himself-away-by-blurting-out-the-wrong-thing moment – and on this occasion it feels like the latter. We’re never allowed to shake that feeling that Travers is hiding something, and it’s part and parcel of the way that Haisman and Lincoln have steeped the adventure in mystery, making it (oddly enough) much closer to the Universal horror movies than the tomb-of-the-mummy-flavoured story preceding it.

  So many different elements, in fact, combine to make this story drip with a sense of unease. The scale of the location shooting is impressive, as
is the fact that some of it is at night; it’s very eerie, the bewitching blackness of the mountain’s inky cloak. The board with the model Yeti effectively depicts – both in terms of visuals and storytelling – how a powerful, outside force is manipulating these events. And it’s great that Wolfe Morris refuses to be hamstrung by his character’s protracted invisibility, and gives a terrific vocal presence. In his “normal” state, he’s both spiritual and chilling – but then he assumes the rasping, evil tones of the Great Intelligence, which is a smart way of suggesting that Padmasambhava is not necessarily a willing host to this baleful force.

  And did you notice? Poor old Ralpachan gets hypnotised, which means he doesn’t say much this week. He has to put up with plenty of pauses.

  March 31st

  The Abominable Snowmen episode four

  R: There are definitely pay-offs to this deliberately slow pace. The last few minutes of the episode have a tremendous tension to them, as we realise at last that the claustrophobic menace is soon to break into violence, as the Yeti move to attack the monastery. And it’s a great cliffhanger too – the grotesque smiling face of the ancient Padmasambhava urging Victoria deeper into the sanctum, and his lines genuinely scary because (guess what?) he makes them even slower than we’re used to. And there are pay offs to the lack of music as well, the beeping of the Yeti spheres reminding us (and the Doctor and Jamie) that they’re about to be set on by robots. Simple things, like fetching equipment from the TARDIS, the sort of stuff you wouldn’t give more than a few scenes to in an ordinary story, become major endeavours; Travers is away from the monastery for an episode and a half, which lends his experiences in the cave far greater emphasis.

  But I must admit, I wouldn’t want all Doctor Who to be quite this minimalist. I think it’s striking, and undoubtedly very good – but it requires an effort of patience I’m not used to giving the series. (And it’s hardly the production team’s fault, but struggling through it on soundtrack and telesnaps alone doesn’t make it any easier.)

  The highlight for me, though, is the scene in which Victoria tries to explain the workings of the TARDIS to the monk Thonmi. The way in which his Buddhism can accept a box travelling through time and space is actually quite touching – and even a little profound.

  T: It’s a bit slow, but it doesn’t half build to a massive climax. The monastery’s echoey, stony environs help to stoke the tension, the end of this episode sees the Doctor and Jamie imprisoned, the Yeti models moved into attack position and Victoria ordered to enter a creepy inner sanctum as Padmasambhava is finally revealed. Generally speaking, six-part Doctor Who stories tend to be marbled with padding, but this is a rollicking old adventure yarn, and it’s coping well with the added time allotted to it.

  I stumbled a bit concerning the dormant Yeti by the TARDIS – it makes the Great Intelligence look a bit foolish, as if it’s gone to all the trouble of dressing up a robot to serve as a sentinel and lookout, but evidently hasn’t bothered to keep it switched on. But conversely, I did like Thonmi’s blithe acceptance that the Doctor can travel through time and space, as it’s not such a huge leap from the notion that Padmasambhava can astral travel. I don’t normally hold much truck with religion (I’m areligious rather than anti-religious, though – whatever one’s opinions on the topic, they should be couched in good manners) and certainly don’t want mysticism and magic in my Doctor Who. For that matter, I can much more easily accept a nonsensical attempt at rationalising something with science mumbo-jumbo (i.e. “refract the core of the plasma relay”) than I can with mystical mumbo-jumbo (i.e. “summon the spirits of Isis to give us their spiritual power”). However, I can make an exception with this story, as the whole Buddhisty element contextualises the Intelligence’s malignancy. and so gives this adventure its own unique flavour.

  Anyway... Buddhists are just, well, nice, aren’t they?

  The Abominable Snowmen episode five

  R: This is one of the most chilling episodes of Doctor Who we’ve seen yet, and it achieves those chills by dwelling upon human possession by alien intelligence with a directness rarely seen in the programme again. When Padmasambhava speaks through Victoria’s mouth, it’s truly disturbing – all the more so since the aftereffects reduce the girl to a puppet, only speaking when she hears the Doctor’s voice, and only then with a frightened insistence that they should all leave. The Doctor breaks her hypnosis with such trepidation, and by stressing too that should her possession go unchecked it’ll ultimately drive her out of her mind – it’s a far cry, say, from the gentleness with which Hartnell helped the WOTAN-controlled Dodo, Troughton making the concept of Victoria’s mind being so abused much more unsettling and real. When you bear in mind that a companion being taken over by aliens is already beginning to look like something of a cliché – since Innes Lloyd has become producer, they’ve all been at it – that Haisman and Lincoln are able to make it feel so invasive is truly impressive.

  But the greatest example of alien possession in the episode is Padmasambhava, finally visible as a man rotting in his chair, who would have rather been left to die centuries ago. Wolfe Morris gives an extraordinary performance, inspiring both sympathy and revulsion. The scene in which the Doctor confronts his old friend, only to witness his apparent death, is very moving. That Padmas recovers as soon as the Doctor has left is genuinely unnerving, and makes us feel thrillingly that our sympathy has been abused.

  And the imagery is great too. The lack of incidental music, again, makes the atmosphere truly oppressive, and lets the more disturbing moments speak for themselves. Travers moaning in fear at something that has been ripped from his memory, the Great Intelligence spewing out of a cave... and Rinchen, crushed to death by the statue to whom he is so desperately praying amidst all the chaos.

  T: After all the build-up last week, this all kicks off as the Yeti break in and wreak havoc. Many of the Troughton stories are referred to by shorthand as being “base under siege”, but this really does feel like a siege. Rinchen’s death, which you’ve mentioned, is particularly gruesome, with him screeching as the statue is pushed on top of him, and he’s horribly crushed. And it adheres to an odd dramatic device that’s frequently used in a wide span of drama – from The Poseidon Adventure to Die Hard – which involves an annoying character who is just begging to get killed, even though their eventual death is in no way comic. In this case, Rinchen’s intransigent insistence that Victoria is the baddie makes him slappably one-track minded, and you almost get the impression that the main motive behind Padmasambhava’s orchestrated attack is nothing more than a petty desire to kill this moaning fruitloop.

  Much of what else occurs, though, is entirely serious. Khrisong remains very honourable – he constantly berates himself whilst being brave and forthright, and Norman Jones oozes dignity and strength in the role. Wolfe Morris too gives a terribly multi-layered and impressive performance (even if the make-up he wears as Padmasambhava looks a bit stuck-on and latex), and adds an almost tearful shudder to his utterances. And Deborah Watling deserves a lot of credit for that really disturbing sequence where Victoria keeps speaking like a broken record. She pitches it in exactly the same way each time, and it’s horrible – it’s as if her personality has been scooped out, and she’s now a brainless automaton.

  So, we have here a great amount of action and discovery, and a despair-laden episode ending that 24 would be proud of – the monastery is evacuated while the Yeti are waiting outside, Khrisong unknowingly runs into danger as he charges out to save the Abbot, and the cave is so filled with the goo produced by the Great Intelligence that it starts to flow out onto the mountain.

  April 1st

  The Abominable Snowmen episode six

  R: You remember that concern I had a little while aback, that Troughton never emerged with any clear authority at the climax of his adventures? Well, this more than makes up for it. In fact, it’s probably the best stand-off with a villain Doctor Who has yet given us, the Doctor’s battle with Padmasambhava com
ing off as a mental duel that uses all his reserves of power and concentration. The build-up to his entry into the sanctum, his trying to reassure his companions before going in to face battle, is exceptionally tense; that from Jamie and Victoria’s point of view we only hear that battle commence with a scream of fearful agony from the Doctor hardly helps us. (And is this the first time the Doctor has been made to seem so vulnerable and pained? I think it might be.) That the production team raise the stakes so high that we really feel he might lose only makes the Doctor all the more impressive for winning through. On paper, it seems to be a similar conclusion to The Power of the Daleks, where the Doctor succeeds only by the skin of his teeth – but in realisation it’s very different, Troughton in this story presenting a Doctor who’s far less a bumbling clown than a man of enormous intelligence and mental strength.