Hannah: Well, like I said before: yes, but not much actually changes with the turn of one decade to another, except perhaps a mindset. Especially if it's the first story to be broadcast since the moon landing.
Me: Let's see.
Episode 1
Some of the differences are more immediately obvious than others. During the new title sequence, Hannah makes a brilliant observation.
Hannah: It's in colour!
Me: Well spotted.
Hannah: Nice title sequence. Psychedelic. Oh, they've put Pertwee's face right up there, before you get to actually see him. That's a bit of a spoiler. And they've changed the font again! It's more stylish now.
Me: Look, it's written by your friend Robert Holmes.
Hannah: Which ones did he write?
Me: The Krotons and The Space Pirates.
Hannah: Oh, excellent. They chose him to do the first one?!
But even with this track record, she's cautiously optimistic.
Hannah: I'm going to really savour this.
Me: Why?
Hannah: Because it's colour.
Me: You don't need to savour it that much. We're going to be seeing a lot more colour from now on.
Hannah: I know, but it's a novelty for me now; I'm really excited to see how everything looks. I want to see the proper colour of the TARDIS for the first time.
Me: A little while ago, you said it would feel weird when we finally went into colour...
Hannah: It is! Why is everyone so sweaty?
Me: Some people would argue that it looks a lot more atmospheric in monochrome.
Hannah: Whereas now the background is grey, the uniforms are brown and their ties are khaki. What was the point of having colour if they're not going to make the most of it?
Me: Most viewers would have been watching in black and white at the time, anyway. Colour television sets won't outnumber black and white ones in the UK for another six years.
Hannah: Would there have been any point in us watching the Blu-ray version of this? You can only upscale it so much.
Me: It's not an upscale; the reason this story has its own Blu-ray release is because it's the only one from the original series to be shot entirely on film.
Hannah: Why is it all on film? It would have been a lot more expensive than videotape.
Me: The studios were unavailable due to strike action, so the producer decided that the only way to get it made on time was to go out and shoot it all on location.
Hannah: That would explain why all the sets are echoing so much.
Me: Speaking of the producer, do you remember I told you that the last story was Derrick Sherwin's first one as producer?
Hannah: Was it his only one?
Me: No. This is his second story as producer.
Hannah: Makes sense.
Me: And the last. He left to join his predecessor Peter Bryant on Paul Temple after this.
Hannah: Oh. People don't seem to last very long sometimes.
Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart asks scientist Liz Shaw to join UNIT, the paramilitary organisation last seen facing off against the Cybermen in The Invasion.
Hannah: It's the Brig! Her face looks really familiar.
Me: Well, she was in Love Actually, but that was over thirty years later so it's probably not where you recognise her from. She played the grandmother of Liam Neeson's stepson.
Hannah: I've only seen Love Actually once.
Me: It's the most high-profile thing she's been in; I can't think of anywhere else you might have seen her.
Hannah: Maybe it's just once of those faces.
The TARDIS ("It's a bit rickety") materialises in the local woods, where the newly-regenerated Doctor is discovered unconscious in the heather and brought to the local hospital.
Hannah: They're going to find some unusual things if they decide to examine him! Whenever he gets checked by a human doctor they always say he's fine, even though it's now been established that he has two hearts and his entire body doesn't work quite the same way as them because he needs less oxygen.
Me: The second heart still hasn't been established yet.
Hannah: Hasn't it?
Me: No, it's never mentioned during the Hartnell or Troughton years.
An x-ray reveals that the patient has a second heart.
Hannah: Yay, finally! Do they think he's a really strange human who was born with two hearts, like conjoined twins? People are sometimes born with their heart outside their chest, you know.
Me: With inhuman blood?
Hannah: He's human-shaped, with veins. Why would they assume he's an alien?
Hannah doesn't manage to identify Talfryn Thomas straight away, but the penny drops as soon as he opens his mouth.
Hannah: (laughing) I didn't recognise him! He's so distinctive when he talks. It's the Welsh one from Dad's Army!
For Hannah, the highlight of the episode - probably the entire story - occurs when the Doctor is abducted from the hospital, and eludes his captors by rolling downhill in a wheelchair. The fun and games are abruptly halted when he runs through the woods to the guarded TARDIS, only to get shot down by a UNIT soldier.
Hannah: Well, that was quick.
Me: Yep. Time for Tom Baker next.
Hannah: No, I mean they don't linger on the cliffhanger long; it's very abrupt. Bang, he falls to the ground, straight to the credits. And they've got wibbly stuff in the background of the credits.
Me: Yes, from now on, the credits always use the same background graphics as the title sequence.
Hannah: I'm enjoying this. The music is really good, and everything feels completely and utterly different in every way, being in colour and on film.
Me: And also the fact that you've changed the entire regular cast.
Hannah: The Brig's still there. If the Brig hadn't been in it, it would have been weird; they needed to have something consistent, like how they carried the companions over from Hartnell through to Troughton, so they carried over the TARDIS and the Brig. They needed to have him so that it would feel like the same programme, even though everything else is different.
Me: Including the whole premise of the show.
Hannah: Well, you don't know that yet.
Me: Of course we do! We already saw him getting exiled to Earth.
Hannah: Yeah, but we don't really know the ins and outs of it yet. He still seems to have his TARDIS. They've just sent him to... what, 1970? Is this supposed to be real time?
Me: Ah. I was wondering when that was going to come up.
I try to give Hannah some background on the UNIT dating controversy (the ongoing fan debate over whether the UNIT stories take place in the present or the near-future), but she's happy to accept it as "vague-ish seventies" and leave it at that. Probably for the best.
Episode 2
With the Doctor back in hospital, Dr Henderson admits to the Brigadier that he's dealing with a completely alien physiology.
Hannah: Oh, so he's accepted that the Doctor is an alien? And he's happy with that?
Me: You don't think perhaps the extra heart and the alien blood sample has given him a clue?
Hannah: So why hasn't he set up a quarantine, or even just started freaking out? He's way too calm for someone who's just found out that their patient's cardiovascular system is completely weird; it doesn't have to be a big panicky reaction, but you'd expect some kind of response. The nurse is calm, too. Maybe they've both experienced some really strange things in their medical career, and two hearts is nothing to them.
Elsewhere, in the local plastics factory, baby doll heads are being manufactured against a soundtrack of "Oh Well (Part 1)" by Fleetwood Mac. I had hoped that hearing one of Hannah's favourite bands might distract from her pediophobia, but the sequence clearly touches a nerve.
Hannah: Oh, why?! That's just not necessary. They can fuck right off with this nonsense.
The next three episodes could be a bit of a bumpy ride.
Out in the woods, a figure dressed in a boiler suit turns to reveal the head of a plastic dummy. Hannah lets out a heavy sigh.
Me: What's wrong?
Hannah: Plastic people. They look suspiciously like Autons.
Me: Are you okay with Autons?
Hannah: No! Smooth, faceless plastic mannequins are fine, but ones with faces like this are horrible. As soon as you give them eyes and they start moving around, I don't like it!
Me: So you didn't like Christopher Eccleston's first episode?
Hannah: No! I especially didn't like plastic Mickey, but at least that was out of the uncanny valley because he looked like a real human, just covered in plastic. I hate this kind of thing.
Me: Isn't that good, though, if you're finding it scary?
Hannah: It's not scary, it's disgusting and disturbing. I'm not scared by their abilities, I just feel icky and creeped out.
A poacher named Sam Seeley has brought home a mysterious glowing meteorite he found in the woods. While Hannah is pleased to see the programme finally putting our colour TV licence to good use ("That's a very cool prop; very pretty"), she doesn't think much of the way Sam talks to his long-suffering wife Meg.
Hannah: Slap him! Slap him one with your slipper! Go all Nora Batty on him!
Meanwhile, the TARDIS has been delivered to UNIT.
Hannah: It's always been strange that people can just take the TARDIS. It's supposed to be a sophisticated space-and-time machine, with a special lock and all the other gubbins that writers invent later, but it can be picked up and moved by humans. You'd think it would have an alarm, or some kind of immobiliser or anti-theft device.
The Doctor takes a shower in the hospital, thus giving us the programme's first ever nude scene.
Hannah: Very weird bathroom; there's no privacy, and the shower looks like a torture device. And the Doctor is perfectly happy to shower naked in front of other people.
Me: What do you think of Jon Pertwee's cobra tattoo?
Hannah: I wouldn't expect the Doctor to have a tattoo; he regrows his skin, so it's a very specific thing for the Time Lords to change his face and randomly assign him a tattoo. Is it just that Jon Pertwee's going to be wearing his costume the rest of the time, and they forgot about covering it up for that scene? Or is the Doctor genuinely going to have that tattoo?
Me: Most fans tend to rationalise it as a Time Lord criminal branding.
Hannah: (after considering this for a moment) Yeah, it's just a snake tattoo.
Not for the last time, the new Doctor helps himself to some clothes he finds in the hospital...
Hannah: I like it when the Doctor finds clothes; it helps to establish his new personality. There are so many other things he could have picked, but instead he chooses a frilly shirt and a bright red-lined velvet cloak.
...and then steals a vintage car while he's at it.
Hannah: Oh, that's where he gets the car from? He never gives it back? He just steals that car and keeps it? How does he know how to drive?
Me: I don't know. Maybe Hartnell took lessons when he was living on Earth with Susan?
Liz isn't afraid to make snarky remarks to the Brigadier when he tries telling her that the police box is actually an alien spaceship.
Hannah: I like her, she's fun. I've been wondering who's going to be Pertwee's first companion, and whether it's going to be multiple companions or just one person, and the only possible candidate at the moment is Liz. She's a good character; intelligent, but not naïve like Zoe. She doesn't take any nonsense, but she's also happy to just get on with things. I hope she's a companion.
The Doctor examines his new face, throwing in a remark about the planet Delphon as he does so.
Hannah: He doesn't often talk about other alien species, does he? It's something that I recognise from modern episodes, those random throwaway lines, but I don't think he's done it very much so far.
Me: He didn't in the sixties, but from now on he's suddenly going to have an extensive knowledge of other planets and galaxies.
Hannah: Yes; things that he obviously saw when he was Hartnell, but didn't think were important enough to share with people.
The episode ends with Hannah's worst nightmare, as one of the mannequins at the plastics factory comes to life and starts terrorising a former employee.
Me: What do you think of it so far?
Hannah: I'm glad the show is using the level of humour that I enjoy, like having the Doctor escape in a wheelchair. The pacing here is great, and so is the balance of danger and humour. It's just a shame it had to be plastic people.
Episode 3
Me: I really like the blue boiler suits on the Autons, it's a good look for them. I'm not so sure about the cravat, though.
Hannah: Are they wearing scarves so that you can't see the join where the mask meets the actor's head?
Me: Actually, I hadn't thought about that. You're probably right.
Hannah: Oh, they've got the hands that come open, with little guns in! The modern Autons have those as well, don't they? It's cool to see things that they didn't just make up later and had actually been established already.
After chasing Ransome through the factory, the Auton takes aim at the top of a fire escape, craning its head to get a better view.
Hannah: That's far too lifelike. They look too human.
Me: Make your mind up.
The Doctor tries to take the TARDIS for a trip but the Time Lords have already clipped his wings, and he's forced to evacuate the ship when it grinds to a halt and fills up with smoke.
Hannah: Has he forgotten that he's not allowed to go anywhere?
Me: Worth a try.
The mysterious glowing orb is an energy unit that allows the Nestene Consciousness - another disembodied alien intelligence - to possess the plastic, controlling the Autons as a hive mind.
Hannah: Telepathic plastic. It's just so much creepier.
One of the Autons is ordered to carry out "total destruction"; its victim is completely obliterated, without a trace remaining.
Hannah: That was neat and tidy. They've just run an explosion in reverse. Stargate does that; it's just like a Zat'nik'tel gun. They're really good weapons.
The cliffhanger involves General Scobie answering the door to a shiny-faced Auton replica of himself, which advances on him threateningly.
Hannah: That's horrible. All of this is horrible.
Episode 4
The plastics factory has been supplying Madame Tussaud's with replicas of government officials.
Hannah: That's ridiculous. Madame Tussaud's is wax, not plastic. It's completely different.
But there's a twist...
Hannah: They're the real ones! They've replaced all of these people with plastic lookalikes.
Me: Why else would you have a civil servants exhibition at Madame Tussaud's? Who would care?
Hannah: Well, if they've all made important decisions of recent times... you know, a minister who helped to push a particularly important bill, or something like that.
Me: Yes, they've probably got him between Marilyn Monroe and the Pope.
Hannah: I know it's not as exciting as kings and queens and things like that, but... I don't know, everyone's got a niche.
Me: Maybe if the museum hadn't bothered with them, they could have put more work into these American presidents and ended up with something that actually looks like Richard Nixon.
To be fair, some of the sculptures are a lot more recognisable.
Hannah: The aliens haven't replaced Mahatma Gandhi, have they?!
Me: Seems unlikely, considering he died in 1948.
On the high street, shop window dummies start coming to life and begin slaughtering innocent bystanders and passing cyclists.
Hannah: Are you about to tell me where these shops are?
Me: What? No.
Hannah: Because it looks like Southampton.
Me: Does it?
Hannah: Yeah, it looks like our Debenhams. And that shop across the road would be what's now the British Heart Foundation.
It's actually Ealing, but never mind.
Me: Do you remember the scene in Christopher Eccleston's first episode, where the shop window dummies come to life?
Hannah: Sort of.
Me: This is where they got the idea. It's one of the most memorable sequences from the entire series.
Hannah: It's horrible.
Me: But what's really interesting is that most people remember seeing the Autons smashing through the glass window, but actually the BBC didn't have the budget to do that, so they just played the sound effect as they cut to the faces of the witnesses. They got the exact same special effect without even having to film it!
Hannah: Oh look, there's a Currys!
The Doctor has thrown together a hastily-constructed machine that will (hopefully) immobilise the Autons, so the Brigadier organises an impromptu raid on the factory.
Hannah: They've only got, what, ten minutes left of the episode? The big threat has only just happened, and this is the first time the Doctor's even mentioned trying to find a way to fight it! Usually it takes them a whole episode to figure out what they're going to do, but they've spent all of their time so far trying to work out what's going on and now they've only got ten minutes to save the world, and no time at all to actually come up with a plan. He just comes up with a plan off-camera and says "I've built a thing. Shall we go and see if it works?"
Me: That's because they spent the first episode and a half establishing the new Doctor.
Hannah: Yeah. It's just annoying because the Autons are such a good story, but there's only four episodes and they need to have all these other bits wedged in. Maybe they could have made it longer.
Me: Well, the good news is that the other stories in this season are going to be a bit longer.
Hannah: That's not necessarily a good thing.
Some green liquid spurts from a hole in the Nestene incubator ("Ewww!"), and the Nestene Consciousness manifests itself as a giant green octopus.
Hannah: Well, this seems a bit out of place! There's a really weird feeling here. Up until now, everything's been creepy and manipulative; we've had faceless plastic robots, and others that look human, and now they've suddenly thrown in a giant monster to make it traditionally scary because they think that's what everyone really wants. Tentacles coming out of a box.
Me: I guess the climax needed some dramatic tension.
Hannah: I know they said it was the ultimate life form, but it doesn't look very... ultimate. It doesn't have any kind of rigid structure; it's perfectly adapted to a water environment, but it wouldn't be very good with gravity.
When the monster attacks, Jon Pertwee goes into gurning mode and Liz defeats the Nestene Consciousness by... plugging a cable into their machine and switching it on. Later, back at UNIT HQ, the Doctor agrees to stay on and help UNIT during his exile. When the Brigadier agrees to find him another vintage car, similar to the one he stole from the hospital, the Doctor can't wait to go out and choose it.
Hannah: He wants to go car shopping with the Brig! It's a very different ending to usual, because they're setting up interesting things for the future. Obviously it can't end in the same way, running away into the TARDIS and disappearing somewhere.
The Brigadier asks for his name for the paperwork, and is unimpressed when the Doctor supplies his favourite thinly-disguised pseudonym: Doctor John Smith.
Hannah: Okay.
Me: Okay?
Hannah: It makes it easier. If he's going to spend time on Earth, he needs to have an Earth name.
Me: And a steady job?
Hannah: That's just to stop him being bored. But the Doctor still hasn't actually explained anything to the Brig; he's told him that he's still the Doctor and that his TARDIS won't go anywhere, but he hasn't explained how his face has changed, .
Me: I think we can assume that it happens off-camera at some point.
Hannah: Maybe, but it would have been nice to have a summary for everybody who hasn't watched it in six months.
Me: So what do you think of the new style of the show, compared to the old one?
Hannah: Well, it's the first one. So far, it just feels like a normal Earth-based episode so it doesn't feel out of place yet. If we're going to have a couple in a row where he has to wait for trouble to come to him, it's actually going to start feeling weird. I'm sure it will soon stop feeling plausible, especially when the humans never seem to remember what's going on.
Me: Yes, but you liked Torchwood; it's basically the same premise. We're just moving from Cardiff to the home counties.
Hannah: Well, exactly. Lots and lots of alien invasions, happening in the same place over a relatively short space of time.
Me: What are your first impressions of Jon Pertwee?
Hannah: I like him, but he doesn't seem very... "established" yet. It still feels like there's space in the mold. He feels a bit like Troughton, but with all the characteristics turned down.
Me: He made a very deliberate decision to play it straight.
Hannah: Yeah, he just seems slightly more boring at the moment. He's not all over the place, he's just intelligent and he's not really talking down to anyone...
Me: Just you wait.
Hannah: I'm not saying he's bland, but he doesn't seem very much of anything yet. He's not a grumpy old fart who's incredibly clever, he's not a silly old fool who's incredibly clever, he just seems clever. I suppose he's still trying to get used to the fact that he's stuck here and can't go anywhere, so he's probably a little distracted. I'm sure his personality will start to assert itself soon. Is there anything else you want to tell me about him?
Me: Ron Moody was the first choice to play this Doctor, following his success as Fagin in Oliver!, but he turned it down.
Hannah: The only version of Oliver Twist I've ever seen is the Disney version, Oliver & Company. I haven't even read the book.
Fair enough, I suppose. If you can't have Ron Moody on the soundtrack, Billy Joel is probably the next best thing.
The Score
Hannah: A bit of a slow start, but then the ending felt rushed. The Doctor suddenly discovers a way to defeat the aliens, and it works; all he has to do is shoot the main one and it deactivates all the others. Which is fine; it's a collective mind, so it's plausible and the story works, but they've jumped over too many things, like the Doctor making the weapon and how the aliens establish themselves on Earth in the first place. And we haven't been shown the TARDIS interior yet; I want to see it. Oh, and they haven't established an actual companion other than Liz, but Liz belongs with UNIT; she already has a job. Even if he could go travelling around, and he invited her to come with him, he wouldn't be able to control the TARDIS and get her back exactly where he wanted; Ian and Barbara were very lucky. And if someone does become his companion on Earth, are they technically called a companion if they don't travel in the TARDIS anymore?
Me: That's a very good point.
Hannah: So, to summarise: it's a great story, but they skipped out a few things. It feels like a film, not just because of the way it was recorded but also because you can tell they're not in a studio; it's shot inside proper buildings, real locations with ceilings and things. The Autons are terrifying creatures... really terrifying, and very effective, especially for someone like me who can't stand that kind of thing. I liked the old man, and the glowy orbs are very pretty. And I'm glad the lady didn't die.
Me: She could have died from internal injuries later.
Hannah: The Autons really should have shot her anyway. And does UNIT never think about finding the missing man, the one who got disintegrated? They just think he ran off? They could have done a lot more with this story, so I'm going to give it...
7/10
Hannah: It's an excellent concept, but an anti-climactic ending.
Me: What do you think of Robert Holmes now?
Hannah: Okay, he can write... that story, at least. His other two stories were awful, but he's redeemed himself with this one.
Me: So you like him now?
Hannah: No! Anyone who can come up with that other drivel is just very lucky that they've been able to produce something else. He was probably helped a lot by the fact that the budget was a bit better and it was in colour.
Later that night, we watch the DVD's making-of documentary and something completely unexpected happens.
Hannah: How much Quatermass is there?
Me: Four series. Five if you count the remake with Jason Flemyng and David Tennant.
Hannah: Can we watch it? It sounds interesting.
Me: I'll put the Blu-ray on my Christmas list.
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