Another one I'd never seen before, and I know very little about.
Fascinating re-cap for those who might have just joined us, with the rather po-mo self-reference to how much they've changed as people.
Dead people, and yet no panic, just acceptance. Then the mystery begins!
The script is oddly quite stilted, and the brave attempt at talking over themselves when the Doctor declares hilariously that he's not at all curious doesn't quite work. The incidental music seems to cut-off all the time, too, which is really disconcerting. But, the sound effects aren't bad in that they're barely noticeable. Whoops in ep 6 though when the bubbly noises keep going after we've left the aqueduct.
Is this the first time the Doctor wears glasses?
The missing crew member - John - who the other two stoically won't talk about is marvelously creepy. But the acting is so stylised and of another time it always takes a bit of time to get used to. In this ep (1) it's all very melodramatic.
Carole is yet another good, strong, equal-opps woman, though the attitudes still have - unsurprisingly - that early 1960s feel. Nice to have big beefy blokes crying, too.
Chestan! But, then, almost everyone has fluffed lines. It's actually a bit endearing and a bit more realistic... which means the theatrical style scripting jars. Then again, Susan has the lion's share of the Billy-fluffs in this story.
Ooh. The Sensorite at the window at the end of the first ep is terrific.
Interesting stuff about fear allowing for the Sensorites to take over their minds.
Susan's idea about using their brains was hilarious... until she explained about thought transfer. Then why does Susan collapse but not Barbara? Ah, it seems it's because she was open to their thoughts.
The Sensorites are pretty cool, really, given the time, though everyone has zips up the back (even the human astronauts.)
Susan is more like what she was back in An Unearthly Child and surprisingly deep - better to travel with hope than just arrive. Lovely stuff. It seems as though each writer hadn't really quite grasped her character and therefore it vacillates... of course Ford's acting doesn't help.
Ah, the politics comes through in ep 2: the 'bad guys' being 'bad' because of bad stuff the 'good' guys had done in the past. Colonialism, really, and fighting back. A recurring theme of Doctor Who and fascinating it appeared so soon in the series. "It's suspicion that's making them enemies," says Susan in Ep3, and the Doctor can't see beyond their fear and his grandfatherly concern and anger. Then there's the family stuff, and growing up/old, and his intense paternalism. Not only to Susan, as the episodes continue he is really rather dreadful to the poor old Sensorites, too.
There is so much clumsy science lesson stuff. The stuff about trust is great, though, and the stuff about seeing people/creatures through their own eyes is laborious but pertinent. The politics is interesting but doesn't really make for scintillating television. Though, it is nice to see a thorough attempt at making sense (ho ho) of an alien society - though why are they all weirdo socialist types? A utopia? But yet there is dissent... in fact, the old Animal Farm saying of some being more equal than others. Actually, no, it's more like Stalinist (or any other despot) paranoia that leads to fear and thence evil. While it's refreshing to have the attempts to make the Sensorites more complex than normal, it's ponderous for an adventure. While it's a nice attempt, it's still a little sloppy. Like, for example, why, if they're such a perfect society and everyone's 'content', do they have a prison?!
So obvious with the water, and yet the obvious takes a bit of time for them to realise. Oh boy. And my huge question is to do with human/alien physiology... how can it act the same way? Especially odd when there's such attention to detail about their eyes and sensitivity to sound.
Oh, no. Beginning of ep 5 and the Doctor's jacket has suffered what always used to befall victims of clawed monsters in the Avengers... such neat and tidy ripping...
Susan is awful with her teasing about how the Sensorites must look when they run... though it is a funny thought.
Oh, no. The Doctor has such a lot to learn about trust and cynicism. Giving their enemy the position of 2iC. But there are some nice touches about the Doctor and Susan's true origins.
I wonder what Barbara and the astronaut chappie had been up to in all the time the others were in the Sense-Sphere. And where the hell has that chappie disappeared to? And why doesn't anyone remember him? Oh, no. Right at the end they mention Maitland. It's like they forgot about him completely, but then remembered and inserted these odd mentions and a strange shot of the space ship.
It's not a bad story, really, but a bit sloppy. It tries to be very clever, but it's not. The plotting was very contrived, but the execution okay. Nice ideas, but not my favourite so far.
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