The Doctor Who Real Time Marathon: The Green Death
The Green Death: Episode One (19/05/13)
A massive improvement this week! In Llanfairfach, South Wales, something in a closed down mine is turning people green and killing them. Professor Clifford Jones, an Ecological Scientist (and Nobel Prize winner) who runs a local eco-research centre thinks the local oil refinery, Global Chemicals, is responsible but they claim to be producing oil with an almost negligible amount of waste.
It just so happens that Professor Jones is one of Jo's heroes and she's determined to go and join him at the Wholeweal Farm (or Nuthutch, to the locals). Luckily, the Brigadier is off to investigate the Green Death, so gives her a lift in his fancy cream Mercedes convertible! The Doctor, meanwhile, wold rather fanny about on Metebilis III collecting blue crystals.
Learning from Professor Jones that he thinks Global Chemicals are pumping toxic waste into the mines, Jo goes off to investigate while the Brigadier meets the man in charge at G.C., Stevens. Finally getting the Doctor to join him, the Brigadier and the Doctor go to the mine but Jo has got there first and found two miners waiting for a third who's gone down to investigate. He's been Greened and phones up for help, and Jo goes down with Miner Bert to give First Aid. However, Stevens' security guard, Hinks, has been sent to stop anyone going into the mine and now the brake won't work to stop the cage's descent!
So, great episode with nice characterisation (if somewhat stereotyped in places, isn't it) - despite the 'Welsh' the characters really come across as being part of a community. Some nice interplay between the regulars and some great scenes for Jo and Cliff (entirely absent from the proposed relationship 'developed' between Jo and Latep last week!) and the Brigadier in his Civvies! Nice cap and coat! And car!
There's something very dodgy about Stevens and his choice of headgear - massive headphones! Plus lots of discussion about alternative forms of energy, food and the process of oil refining. Smart, intelligent, fun and informative. In fact, everything the last story wasn't! And I've completely overlooked some bad CSO in places. Oh, and great location footage, too!
The Green Death: Episode Two (26/05/13)
Giant Maggots! A very engaging episode this week. The Doctor used a girder or something to slow the lift and Dave the Miner reversed the mechanism, stopping the lift but fusing the cable solid. Suggesting a donkey engine to attache to the second lift, the Brigadier visited Global Chemicals looking for cutting equipment but they denied having any. So he contacted the Nuthutch and Professor Jones hightailed it to the mine to help.
The Brig and Dave went off to Newport to get some cutting equipment while the Doctor and Professor Jones joined forces to infiltrate Global Chemicals. Jones got his hippies to demonstrate out front to distract the guards while the Doctor used a borrowed Cherry Picker from South Wales Electricity Board to scale the fence.
Meanwhile, Bert and Jo had found Dai Evans close to death, but decided to try and find another way out (Bert knowing one to the west). The Doctor tripped an alarm and was followed by CCTV, then had a fight with some guards which was brilliant, especially his line "Actually, I'm quite spry for my age!". They really need to get Pertwee's stuntman a new wig, though, 'cause some of the cuts were awful. Trapped by Stevens, the Doctor was shown the empty storage unit and sent packing. Luckily, the Brigadier had called at a garage for petrol and found an acetylene torch, so the second lift was jury-rigged and Dave, the Doctor and two miner extras went down to help Jo, Bert and Dai. Dai was dead but Jo had left a note so the Doctor and Dave went after them. Bert, however, had touched some green goo - no doubt Global Chemicals' toxic waste - and Jo was persuaded to go on alone. Dave and the Doctor found Bert and Dave took him back while the Doctor followed Jo who, by this point, had found a cave full of goo and giant maggots, and now they're both trapped by a cave-in!
Really cool, this week. One of the best individual episodes in a long time. Stevens has a boss who is controlling them all at Global Chemicals, 'processing' anyone who asks questions or doesn't conform. But so far he's just a voice pattern on a screen! Maybe it's the Macra? And there's a dissenter, Elgin, working there. Lots of fun, lots of adventure and moral high ground. So far, best story all series!
The Green Death: Episode Three (02/06/13)
Another really good episode. The Doctor and Jo used a mining cart to get past the Giant Maggots to the shaft out of the mine that Bert was heading for. Climbing the shaft, they encountered a waste pipe from Global Chemicals along with a clutch of Giant Maggot eggs, so they took one and started to climb the pipe.
Meanwhile, GC employee Elgin was quizzing brainwashed GC employee Fell who was about to vent the waste pipe into the mine. Alerted to intruders in the pipe, Elgin eventually got Fell to tell him how to open the access door and saved the Doctor and Jo just in time, but Fell's conditioning had failed and Stevens' Boss ordered Fell to commit suicide.
The Brigadier, by this point. had tried and failed to get GC closed down till the investigation was over, after Stevens called the Minister of Ecology and, along with the Prime Minister, ordered the Brigadier to leave GC alone.
The Brigadier, the Doctor and Jo had dinner at Professor Jones' which was a nice touch, expanding on the Wholeweal commune by showing the people there to be intelligent professional scientists, mathematicians and engineers interested in a more ecological way of life. Then there was a bit where we learned that Bert had died in hospital. Really well dealt with! Jo was really upset, and she and Cliff had a conversation about death and grief. Likewise, when the 'Boss' ordered Fell to 'self destruct', Stevens had a sequence where he questioned the necessity of the action.
All the characters in this, from Jo to Stevens to Cliff and even Dave the Miner have very well written, thought out, fully- fleshed personalities; even the villains have a conscience! Speaking of Stevens, his henchman, Hinks, had apparently been having a drink after work at the Local and heard that the Doctor had found a Giant Maggot egg and was keeping it at the Nuthutch, so Hinks has been sent to fetch it. However, it's hatched and the maggot is making its way toward an oblivious Jo (reading about a high protein fungus Cliff plans to locate in the Amazon) left alone in the Nuthutch living room!
This has possibly been the most grown up and interesting episode I've seen, dealing with serious topics in a mature manner. More please!
The Green Death: Episode Four (09/06/13)
So, the maggot didn't get Jo, as Hinks arrived and it attacked him instead. The maggot escaped and Hinks was probably taken to hospital (to die) but the Doctor and Cliff had the maggot's slime trail to experiment on.
Next day, the Brigadier blew up the mine, but they got Mike Yates posing as a man from the Ministry to spy on Stevens. Jo knocked Cliff's Grade A Fungus onto the slime samples ruining his experiment and, while he was concentrating on his work, she went off with a cat basket to bag herself a maggot (hundreds of which have burrowed to the surface of the mine in order to spawn or something).
The Doctor dressed as a milkman to infiltrate Global Chemicals, then when the alarm was raised he dragged up as a cleaning lady and made contact with Yates. Mike told him that he'd not learnt much, but Stevens' Boss seemed to run things from the top floor only accessible by a lift. I had started to wonder if Stevens' Boss was the Master, even though the voice was different and this doesn't seem quite his thing. It isn't. The Boss is the company computer and the Doctor's stepped right into him/it!
Meanwhile, Jo's off searching for maggots (by now, Cliff has found her note having learnt that his super-fungus is fatal to maggots - nicely allegorical, there; natural stuff beats synthetic crap - and gone after her) but the area she's in is about to be bombed by H E grenades (I can only assume that's High Explosive)! So, really good again. The real cleaning lady showed the maggots in the pipe to Elgin who reported it to Stevens and threatened to go public and has now been brainwashed, so that was cool characterisation.
All in all, this is shaping up to be a pretty good story. We need more stories like this, and fewer like that awful Dalek story that we had last month!
The Green Death: Episode Five (16/06/13)
So Cliff caught up with Jo and they took shelter in a mine entrance while the air force bombed all the maggots on the slag heap.
Meanwhile, the BOSS was explaining stuff to the Doctor - namely that it's the first computer to be connected to a Human brain (Stevens') and that BOSS programmed Stevens to programme it for maximum efficiency since Humans are the most inefficient and illogical of creatures and yet are profoundly efficient as a labour force (or something). The Doctor had some fun setting the BOSS some unsolvable riddles and doing sums while it tried to brainwash him, so they locked him up, only for him to be rescued by Mike Yates. They tried to escape, but Mike was caught and brainwashed.
The Doctor made it to the slag heap in Bessie in time to receive a distress call from Jo: Cliff was unconscious - concussed in an explosion - and they were surrounded by maggots. The Doctor and Benton rescued them, and they all went back to Wholeweal to figure out how to kill the maggots and stop BOSS.
While there, Mike turned up to kill the Doctor but the Doctor used the crystal he got from Metebilis III to undo the brainwashing. Cliff came to, said "Serendipity" then conked out again, then Jo noticed he been infected by maggots! Then they sent Mike back to Global Chemicals to pretend the Doctor was dead and un-brainwash some employees with the crystal, but he fucked up and got caught (again).
Another great episode! Jo's affection for Cliff is being developed well and the idea of a computer with an illogical, Human personality is a really good one. There were some odd scenes at the slag heap, though. Largely, it's been all location footage, but there were a couple of glaringly obvious scenes against Bluescreen with still landscapes as backdrops - I imagine the film was unusable and the scenes needed remounting in studio! Really enjoyable and clever. Looking forward to next week's conclusion!
The Green Death: Episode Six (23/06/13)
What a great story! Mike escaped Global Chemicals having learnt that BOSS's plan was going ahead at 4pm. Meanwhile, Benton found the empty carapace of a maggot and returned to Wholeweal to warn the Doctor and the Brigadier. Nancy had made a roast of protein-fungus and set it on the windowsill to cool, then a maggot came along, chowed down on it and died, so the Doctor and Benton took the Wholeweal supply of fungus and drove Bessie around the slag pit till all the maggots had tried some and died (!). They were briefly watched by a dodgy puppet giant-mutant-fly which then attacked them as a much better stop-motion giant-mutant-fly, but the Doctor killed it with his cloak (!?!).
Mike turned up with his news and everyone went to Global Chemicals so the Doctor could have a showdown with Stevens and BOSS. He de-conditioned Stevens with his Metebilis crystal and Stevens blew the plant up.
Later, the Doctor explained what 'serendipity' was to Jo (or was this earlier?) and she told him about spilling fungus on Cliff's samples, leading to the Doctor and Nancy making a cure for Cliff. Then there was the finale, and that's pretty much what this story's been all about; after three years, Jo has left the series, and left to marry Cliff and journey up the Amazon in search of a super-fungus. These last scenes where Jo said her goodbyes and everyone held an engagement party for Jo and Cliff were some of the best written and acted scenes the series has ever had! From Mike's slightly awkward reaction, to Jo and the Doctor's final chat, to Benton and Nancy dancing, to the Doctor leaving during the toast to the happy couple (having downed his champagne), to the sad look on Jo's face, and the final shot of the Doctor driving Bessie against a silhouetted skyline and a stark sun with the theme music fading in. Considering how annoying I originally found her, coming in after Liz and Zoe, it's sad to see her go and her character has developed considerably! No doubt she'll be replaced next year and the series will go on, but it somehow feels like the end of an era, akin to Susan leaving or the last episode of 'The War Games'. Only much, much better!
A massive improvement this week! In Llanfairfach, South Wales, something in a closed down mine is turning people green and killing them. Professor Clifford Jones, an Ecological Scientist (and Nobel Prize winner) who runs a local eco-research centre thinks the local oil refinery, Global Chemicals, is responsible but they claim to be producing oil with an almost negligible amount of waste.
It just so happens that Professor Jones is one of Jo's heroes and she's determined to go and join him at the Wholeweal Farm (or Nuthutch, to the locals). Luckily, the Brigadier is off to investigate the Green Death, so gives her a lift in his fancy cream Mercedes convertible! The Doctor, meanwhile, wold rather fanny about on Metebilis III collecting blue crystals.
Learning from Professor Jones that he thinks Global Chemicals are pumping toxic waste into the mines, Jo goes off to investigate while the Brigadier meets the man in charge at G.C., Stevens. Finally getting the Doctor to join him, the Brigadier and the Doctor go to the mine but Jo has got there first and found two miners waiting for a third who's gone down to investigate. He's been Greened and phones up for help, and Jo goes down with Miner Bert to give First Aid. However, Stevens' security guard, Hinks, has been sent to stop anyone going into the mine and now the brake won't work to stop the cage's descent!
So, great episode with nice characterisation (if somewhat stereotyped in places, isn't it) - despite the 'Welsh' the characters really come across as being part of a community. Some nice interplay between the regulars and some great scenes for Jo and Cliff (entirely absent from the proposed relationship 'developed' between Jo and Latep last week!) and the Brigadier in his Civvies! Nice cap and coat! And car!
There's something very dodgy about Stevens and his choice of headgear - massive headphones! Plus lots of discussion about alternative forms of energy, food and the process of oil refining. Smart, intelligent, fun and informative. In fact, everything the last story wasn't! And I've completely overlooked some bad CSO in places. Oh, and great location footage, too!
The Green Death: Episode Two (26/05/13)
Giant Maggots! A very engaging episode this week. The Doctor used a girder or something to slow the lift and Dave the Miner reversed the mechanism, stopping the lift but fusing the cable solid. Suggesting a donkey engine to attache to the second lift, the Brigadier visited Global Chemicals looking for cutting equipment but they denied having any. So he contacted the Nuthutch and Professor Jones hightailed it to the mine to help.
The Brig and Dave went off to Newport to get some cutting equipment while the Doctor and Professor Jones joined forces to infiltrate Global Chemicals. Jones got his hippies to demonstrate out front to distract the guards while the Doctor used a borrowed Cherry Picker from South Wales Electricity Board to scale the fence.
Meanwhile, Bert and Jo had found Dai Evans close to death, but decided to try and find another way out (Bert knowing one to the west). The Doctor tripped an alarm and was followed by CCTV, then had a fight with some guards which was brilliant, especially his line "Actually, I'm quite spry for my age!". They really need to get Pertwee's stuntman a new wig, though, 'cause some of the cuts were awful. Trapped by Stevens, the Doctor was shown the empty storage unit and sent packing. Luckily, the Brigadier had called at a garage for petrol and found an acetylene torch, so the second lift was jury-rigged and Dave, the Doctor and two miner extras went down to help Jo, Bert and Dai. Dai was dead but Jo had left a note so the Doctor and Dave went after them. Bert, however, had touched some green goo - no doubt Global Chemicals' toxic waste - and Jo was persuaded to go on alone. Dave and the Doctor found Bert and Dave took him back while the Doctor followed Jo who, by this point, had found a cave full of goo and giant maggots, and now they're both trapped by a cave-in!
Really cool, this week. One of the best individual episodes in a long time. Stevens has a boss who is controlling them all at Global Chemicals, 'processing' anyone who asks questions or doesn't conform. But so far he's just a voice pattern on a screen! Maybe it's the Macra? And there's a dissenter, Elgin, working there. Lots of fun, lots of adventure and moral high ground. So far, best story all series!
The Green Death: Episode Three (02/06/13)
Another really good episode. The Doctor and Jo used a mining cart to get past the Giant Maggots to the shaft out of the mine that Bert was heading for. Climbing the shaft, they encountered a waste pipe from Global Chemicals along with a clutch of Giant Maggot eggs, so they took one and started to climb the pipe.
Meanwhile, GC employee Elgin was quizzing brainwashed GC employee Fell who was about to vent the waste pipe into the mine. Alerted to intruders in the pipe, Elgin eventually got Fell to tell him how to open the access door and saved the Doctor and Jo just in time, but Fell's conditioning had failed and Stevens' Boss ordered Fell to commit suicide.
The Brigadier, by this point. had tried and failed to get GC closed down till the investigation was over, after Stevens called the Minister of Ecology and, along with the Prime Minister, ordered the Brigadier to leave GC alone.
The Brigadier, the Doctor and Jo had dinner at Professor Jones' which was a nice touch, expanding on the Wholeweal commune by showing the people there to be intelligent professional scientists, mathematicians and engineers interested in a more ecological way of life. Then there was a bit where we learned that Bert had died in hospital. Really well dealt with! Jo was really upset, and she and Cliff had a conversation about death and grief. Likewise, when the 'Boss' ordered Fell to 'self destruct', Stevens had a sequence where he questioned the necessity of the action.
All the characters in this, from Jo to Stevens to Cliff and even Dave the Miner have very well written, thought out, fully- fleshed personalities; even the villains have a conscience! Speaking of Stevens, his henchman, Hinks, had apparently been having a drink after work at the Local and heard that the Doctor had found a Giant Maggot egg and was keeping it at the Nuthutch, so Hinks has been sent to fetch it. However, it's hatched and the maggot is making its way toward an oblivious Jo (reading about a high protein fungus Cliff plans to locate in the Amazon) left alone in the Nuthutch living room!
This has possibly been the most grown up and interesting episode I've seen, dealing with serious topics in a mature manner. More please!
The Green Death: Episode Four (09/06/13)
So, the maggot didn't get Jo, as Hinks arrived and it attacked him instead. The maggot escaped and Hinks was probably taken to hospital (to die) but the Doctor and Cliff had the maggot's slime trail to experiment on.
Next day, the Brigadier blew up the mine, but they got Mike Yates posing as a man from the Ministry to spy on Stevens. Jo knocked Cliff's Grade A Fungus onto the slime samples ruining his experiment and, while he was concentrating on his work, she went off with a cat basket to bag herself a maggot (hundreds of which have burrowed to the surface of the mine in order to spawn or something).
The Doctor dressed as a milkman to infiltrate Global Chemicals, then when the alarm was raised he dragged up as a cleaning lady and made contact with Yates. Mike told him that he'd not learnt much, but Stevens' Boss seemed to run things from the top floor only accessible by a lift. I had started to wonder if Stevens' Boss was the Master, even though the voice was different and this doesn't seem quite his thing. It isn't. The Boss is the company computer and the Doctor's stepped right into him/it!
Meanwhile, Jo's off searching for maggots (by now, Cliff has found her note having learnt that his super-fungus is fatal to maggots - nicely allegorical, there; natural stuff beats synthetic crap - and gone after her) but the area she's in is about to be bombed by H E grenades (I can only assume that's High Explosive)! So, really good again. The real cleaning lady showed the maggots in the pipe to Elgin who reported it to Stevens and threatened to go public and has now been brainwashed, so that was cool characterisation.
All in all, this is shaping up to be a pretty good story. We need more stories like this, and fewer like that awful Dalek story that we had last month!
The Green Death: Episode Five (16/06/13)
So Cliff caught up with Jo and they took shelter in a mine entrance while the air force bombed all the maggots on the slag heap.
Meanwhile, the BOSS was explaining stuff to the Doctor - namely that it's the first computer to be connected to a Human brain (Stevens') and that BOSS programmed Stevens to programme it for maximum efficiency since Humans are the most inefficient and illogical of creatures and yet are profoundly efficient as a labour force (or something). The Doctor had some fun setting the BOSS some unsolvable riddles and doing sums while it tried to brainwash him, so they locked him up, only for him to be rescued by Mike Yates. They tried to escape, but Mike was caught and brainwashed.
The Doctor made it to the slag heap in Bessie in time to receive a distress call from Jo: Cliff was unconscious - concussed in an explosion - and they were surrounded by maggots. The Doctor and Benton rescued them, and they all went back to Wholeweal to figure out how to kill the maggots and stop BOSS.
While there, Mike turned up to kill the Doctor but the Doctor used the crystal he got from Metebilis III to undo the brainwashing. Cliff came to, said "Serendipity" then conked out again, then Jo noticed he been infected by maggots! Then they sent Mike back to Global Chemicals to pretend the Doctor was dead and un-brainwash some employees with the crystal, but he fucked up and got caught (again).
Another great episode! Jo's affection for Cliff is being developed well and the idea of a computer with an illogical, Human personality is a really good one. There were some odd scenes at the slag heap, though. Largely, it's been all location footage, but there were a couple of glaringly obvious scenes against Bluescreen with still landscapes as backdrops - I imagine the film was unusable and the scenes needed remounting in studio! Really enjoyable and clever. Looking forward to next week's conclusion!
The Green Death: Episode Six (23/06/13)
What a great story! Mike escaped Global Chemicals having learnt that BOSS's plan was going ahead at 4pm. Meanwhile, Benton found the empty carapace of a maggot and returned to Wholeweal to warn the Doctor and the Brigadier. Nancy had made a roast of protein-fungus and set it on the windowsill to cool, then a maggot came along, chowed down on it and died, so the Doctor and Benton took the Wholeweal supply of fungus and drove Bessie around the slag pit till all the maggots had tried some and died (!). They were briefly watched by a dodgy puppet giant-mutant-fly which then attacked them as a much better stop-motion giant-mutant-fly, but the Doctor killed it with his cloak (!?!).
Mike turned up with his news and everyone went to Global Chemicals so the Doctor could have a showdown with Stevens and BOSS. He de-conditioned Stevens with his Metebilis crystal and Stevens blew the plant up.
Later, the Doctor explained what 'serendipity' was to Jo (or was this earlier?) and she told him about spilling fungus on Cliff's samples, leading to the Doctor and Nancy making a cure for Cliff. Then there was the finale, and that's pretty much what this story's been all about; after three years, Jo has left the series, and left to marry Cliff and journey up the Amazon in search of a super-fungus. These last scenes where Jo said her goodbyes and everyone held an engagement party for Jo and Cliff were some of the best written and acted scenes the series has ever had! From Mike's slightly awkward reaction, to Jo and the Doctor's final chat, to Benton and Nancy dancing, to the Doctor leaving during the toast to the happy couple (having downed his champagne), to the sad look on Jo's face, and the final shot of the Doctor driving Bessie against a silhouetted skyline and a stark sun with the theme music fading in. Considering how annoying I originally found her, coming in after Liz and Zoe, it's sad to see her go and her character has developed considerably! No doubt she'll be replaced next year and the series will go on, but it somehow feels like the end of an era, akin to Susan leaving or the last episode of 'The War Games'. Only much, much better!
Rather like The Talons of Weng-Chiang and The Caves of Androzani, this is a story that transcends its production limitations (the dodgy blue/yellow/whatever colour screen and the fly) to cement itself as a classic. The sense of something coming to an end is beautifully built up until the last five minutes of the final episode, which - as you point out - are among the most moving and well played the series has ever given us. My eyes are pricking slightly just thinking about it (seriously!), which is testament to how much of an emotional hit it still has all these years later, after seeing it a hundred times. It's arguably the best Pertwee story, certainly among the very best of the classic series and probably remains one of the 10 best overall.
ReplyDeleteI was pretty much an emotional wreck writing that last paragraph. When I first saw the story as a BBC2 repeat in the early 90s (back when I didn't much like the Pertwee era) I thought it was good but the ending had little effect on me. Watching it in context I was a mess. It's certainly one of the very best Pertwees and definitely one of the best stories there's been. Jo's departure has a similar impact and is given as much time as Victoria but because Jo was so much better developed, had been around longer, and the story of her relationship with Cliff was given more time it pays off and is far more heart wrenching. It also helps that the story is so well written and has themes and moral messages which are so adult and well presented.
DeleteThe issues 'The Green Death' deals with are sadly still as prevalent today as they were in 1973, and I doubt the story will ever be irrelevant in my lifetime. It encompasses all the important themes and ideas of the Letts era and it's galling that almost 50 years later we still face the same problems.
In the space of 3 years, Jo Grant went from being a companion I didn't particularly rate to being one of my favourites. Katy did a remarkable job of making what was essentially a step backwards in terms of character after Zoe and Liz into anything but - resourceful, smart, funny and a perfect foil for Pertwee's Doctor (their clear affection for one another literally shines in every scene they share) and it's no surprise that the show soared in popularity during the early 70s. In 1974, the Doctor would tell Mike Yates "There never was a Golden Age", but in this case I think he might have been wrong.