The Doctor Who Real Time Marathon: Planet Of The Spiders
Planet Of The Spiders: Part One (04/05/14)
SO much better this week! Mike Yates has gone to a meditational retreat in the West Country and stumbled across some fellow residents up to some funny business with a Mandala in the basement. So he's brought journalist Sarah Jane Smith in to investigate in the hope that she'll be able to bring in the Doctor and UNIT - something he wouldn't be able to do having helped out the bad guys of Operation Golden Age.
Meanwhile, the Doctor and Alistair (that's the Brigadier's first name!!!) have been to the theatre and invited the psychic Professor Clegg back to UNIT for some tests. After a quaint telekinetic sequence with some no-bad CSO, Benton turned up with a parcel from Jo (all the way in the Amazon) asking someone at UNIT to look after the Blue Metebilis crystal the Doctor gave her as a wedding present as the natives think it's bad magic!
However, whist the Doctor was reading her letter and Professor Clegg was examining the crystal, the rather unpleasant leader of the dodgy meditation group, Lupton, was starting another chanting session (in order to draw power of some kind to the basement, it seems), unaware that Mike and Sarah, who he thought he'd scared off, were down there watching. The chanting seemed to have an affect on Jo's crystal as it killed Professor Clegg and caused a storm in the Doctor's lab - then a spider appeared on the Mandala!
Really very good with some nice location work for Mike and Sarah, lots of information about Buddhism, some nice comedy business for the Doctor and the Brigadier (11 years ago, a mysterious girl called Doris gave him a watch in a Brighton hotel as gratitude for... something!) and it was really nice to have a reference back to Jo. I rather miss her. Sarah is okay, but just not a good enough replacement.
To be honest, there was lots going on this week which tied in with 'Invasion Of The Dinosaurs', 'The Green Death' and even 'Carnival Of Monsters' (at one point Professor Clegg saw Drashigs whilst holding the Sonic Screwdriver) making it feel rather epic and something like a proper Season Finale which, given Mr Pertwee's imminent departure, is quite appropriate. Back on track after ten weeks of tedium!
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Two (11/05/14)
A unique episode this week, more than anything. Clearly as a gift to the departing Mr Pertwee, half of this week's instalment was devoted to an 'exciting' chase sequence by land, air and water utilising more cool vehicles than you can shake a perigosto stick at!
However, before that the spider on the Mandala offered Lupton all the power he desired, then she jumped on his back, turned invisible and joined minds with him. Mike smuggled Sarah out of the Lamastery and told her to get the Doctor and the Brigadier, but Lupton (and Tommy the retarded handyman) prevented him from telling the Lama.
Meanwhile, the Doctor used his IRIS machine to see what had gone through Professor Clegg's mind just before he died (Spiders!), then looked into the crystal himself but only saw the face of his old hermit friend who lived up the mountain behind the house (on Gallifrey) where he grew up.
Next morning (presumably) Sarah went to tell the Doctor about events at the retreat (finally she's wearing something vaguely flattering and in a colour other than brown!) but only piqued his interest when she mentioned the spider. Then Lupton turned up with his spider-jockey because she's looking for the blue Metebilis crystal. Lupton can shoot people unconscious with electrical bolts from his hand now he has a spider-jockey and he nicked the crystal and legged it, first in the Doctor's Whomobile (chased by the Brig, Sarah and Benton in Bessie, and the Doctor in a mini helicopter) through country lanes (pursued by a comedy bobby), then in the mini helicopter (chased by the Doctor and Sarah in the Whomobile - which can fly!!!), then in a speed boat (chased by the Doctor in a mini hovercraft). Here the Doctor caught up with him (following a comedy routine driving over a sleeping tramp) at which point the spider-jockey teleported Lupton away (begging the question why she didn't do that to begin with!).
Great locations with drizzly, misty, early Spring countryside and entertaining enough, if a bit silly. Still, better to have padding like this than the dreary crap prevalent in the last couple of stories! Silly but fun.
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Three (18/05/14)
After a fun but largely pointless chase around the Home Counties last week, this week has been positively packed with plot! Returning to the Lamastery via teleportation, Lupton had a rest after making contact with the Queen Spider on Metebilis 3 and her Spider Court. His arrival was seen by retarded handyman Tommy who clocked the blue crystal and nicked it off Lupton's windowsill. Lupton explained his backstory to his mate (nice that he gets some motivation) - basically he's a salesman who got made redundant after a corporate takeover and now he wants revenge.
The Doctor, Sarah and Mike spoke to Cho-je (the monk) at the retreat and Tommy took Sarah off to his cupboard under the stairs where he keeps all his 'pretties' in a shoebox. His intention was to give Sarah the blue crystal in return for the crappy brooch she gave him, but she got distracted by Lupton when she heard him tell his mate he was off down to the cellar with the Mandala. She headed him off, telling Tommy to tell the Doctor, watched Lupton teleport off to Metebilis 3, then stepped onto the Mandala and got teleported there herself, where she was caught by sexy local Tuar who took her to his village, thinking she was a spy.
Well written scene here, info-dumping the history of the Humans on Metebilis 3 - basically a load of Earth colonists in the future (from the West Country) one of whom (Arak) struck a guard who'd struck his mother, Neska (and to be fair I can understand why - I don't think there has ever been such an awful actor on the show! It's almost as if she doesn't know how Human beings act!).
Anyway, they all hid from the Queen Spider when she arrived to arrest Arak, but Arak's dad went out to take his place (as lunch for the spiders). However, Sarah was seen and went out rather than let Arak be found hiding her. Then the Doctor turned up (having seen Sarah disappear) and had a fight with all the Queen's guards which resulted in one of them zapping him!
Really enjoyed this episode, and Metebilis 3 is well realised and contrasted with grey, late-Spring England being all blue skies and Arizona! And Lupton and his spider-jockey plan on taking over their respective planets and bluffing the Queen about the crystal now Tommy has it. Great episode! If only the last two stories had been this good, Pertwee would've had a pretty flawless final series.
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Four (25/05/14)
Not too bad, this week, if a bit slow. The Queen Spider, Huath, took Arak's dad, Sabor, to be eaten and left the Doctor for dead. Reaching her throne room, she found Lupton and his spider-jockey sat on her dais claiming they wanted rewarding for their trouble or the Great One wouldn't get her crystal.
Sarah and Tuar argued about whether the Doctor was dead, then took him into their hut when it was clear he was alive. Sarah went to get a machine to help cure the Doctor but was caught returning from the TARDIS and taken to the Spiders' larder to be bound up with Sabor who gave her a potted history of Metebilis 3. Likewise, having used the machine Sarah had left behind to help the Doctor, Arak gave the Doctor the same tale (400 years ago, an Earth colony ship full of Humans, sheep and at least one spider crashed after coming out of warp orbiting Metebilis 3. A spider ended up on the mountain and was made more intelligent by the crystals there until their descendants became powerful enough to rule the simple farming communities of Humans). The spiders are pretty ruthless, killing whole village communities when they disobey.
Meanwhile on Earth, Mike Yates listened in to Lupton's mates chatting, confronted them and got knocked out and tied up, and Tommy looked into the crystal while reading a 'How To Read' book and had his mind defragmented. Next morning, the Doctor went to rescue Sarah but got caught by the guards. The cliffhanger was weird - the Doctor being led into the larder and Sarah realising he'd been caught.
On the whole, though, not a bad episode. We are midway through, so I imagine it'll pick up a bit next week.
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Five (01/06/14)
Lots happened this week. Sarah got taken away for a meeting with the Queen Spider who brokered a deal to set all the Humans on Metebilis 3 free in return for Sarah fetching the crystal from Earth - she thinks the Spider Council are misguided in their plan to attack Earth.
Meanwhile, the Doctor escaped from the larder and was lured into a cavern where the Great One (a fucking ma-hoo-ssive spider) made him walk around in a circle against his will and act like Derek Acorah pretending to be possessed! Mike teamed up with Barnes and went down to the cellar with the rest of Lupton's followers to carry out a ceremony to try and get Lupton and Sarah back, but were overheard by Tommy who told Cho-je. By the time Cho-je got down there, they'd unknowingly transported a load of spiders to Earth who KO'd Cho-je and Mike with psychic bolts and possessed Barnes et al.
The Doctor bumped into Sarah in the larder just as Arak and Tuar (the fit one) mounted an attack on the Spiders' palace but Sarah teleported them back to the TARDIS at the village. Apparently, the Queen showed her how to do it but I don't believe a word of it.
Arriving back in the cellar they were attacked by the Spider-controlled Barnes et al. but rescued by Tommy. Great line from Tommy when Sarah gasped (a bit rudely, in my opinion) "Tommy! You're normal... you're just like everybody else!"; his response being "I sincerely hope not!". Tommy took them to see the Abbot, who the Doctor thinks he's met before. The Abbot pointed out that the Doctor 'stole' the blue crystal from Metebilis 3 and, while they had a little chat, Tommy waited outside holding off Barnes et al.
Rather good, all said, although the actress playing Neska is still absolutely awful, not helped by the hammy and melodramatic lines she's been given. And there wasn't enough Ralph Arliss (Tuar) in my opinion. He should've joined the Doctor and Sarah. We need a Hippy in the TARDIS since Jo left!
Next week is the last episode, and also the last for Jon Pertwee. Don't know how I feel about that. On the whole I've really enjoyed his tenure; so much better than Pat Troughton! However, I'll consider that next week. This week: exciting and fun!
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Six (08/06/14)
So that's it then.
After talking to Ch-je Rinpoche, the Doctor realised he had to take the Metebilis crystal back to the Great One, despite the fact that the radiation in the cavern would kill him. Yates saved Tommy from the attack by Barnes and the spider-jockeys by standing in the way of their electrical blasts, but survived due to his compassion.
The Queen Spider on Sarah's back was killed by the crystal and Cho-je was revealed to be a Time Lord and K'anpo a projection of his future self. The Doctor returned to Metebilis 3 to find Arak and Tuar's uprising had failed and ended up taking the crystal to the great one who planned to use it to multiply her mind to infinity and rule the universe. However, instead it killed her and vicariously all the other Spiders, thus freeing the Humans.
Three weeks later, Sarah visited UNIT to see if the Doctor had returned and the TARDIS landed. K'anpo turned up to help the regeneration as the Doctor had got lost in the vortex and the TARDIS had brought him home to die. And after a really sad death scene, the credits came crashing in as he regenerated into someone remarkably similar-looking, but with brown hair!
Pleasingly absent were any sickly sweet bits and the regeneration was nicely abrupt. I'm definitely going to miss this Doctor. Very different to his predecessors, being dashing, active, snobbish; very much an action hero. I wouldn't say I liked him more than the First Doctor, but he was much better than the Second!
Whilst I'm not warming to Sarah, the Third Doctor had some great companions in Liz, Jo, the Brigadier, Benton, and Yates; and Yates and Jo in particular had some great character development! Whilst this season, especially the preceding two stories, hasn't been great, it has emphasised the change coming and mirrored how society changes. The UNIT era was great, but Doctor Who is about a man with a Time and Space Machine. It's time to get back to that, and the Third Doctor was very much an action hero with his army back up and his glamorous assistant. Maybe the new Doctor will be more suited to adventures in time and space. Pertwee was a hero and a protector of Earth... well, the Home Counties, at least! He'll be very much missed.
SO much better this week! Mike Yates has gone to a meditational retreat in the West Country and stumbled across some fellow residents up to some funny business with a Mandala in the basement. So he's brought journalist Sarah Jane Smith in to investigate in the hope that she'll be able to bring in the Doctor and UNIT - something he wouldn't be able to do having helped out the bad guys of Operation Golden Age.
Meanwhile, the Doctor and Alistair (that's the Brigadier's first name!!!) have been to the theatre and invited the psychic Professor Clegg back to UNIT for some tests. After a quaint telekinetic sequence with some no-bad CSO, Benton turned up with a parcel from Jo (all the way in the Amazon) asking someone at UNIT to look after the Blue Metebilis crystal the Doctor gave her as a wedding present as the natives think it's bad magic!
However, whist the Doctor was reading her letter and Professor Clegg was examining the crystal, the rather unpleasant leader of the dodgy meditation group, Lupton, was starting another chanting session (in order to draw power of some kind to the basement, it seems), unaware that Mike and Sarah, who he thought he'd scared off, were down there watching. The chanting seemed to have an affect on Jo's crystal as it killed Professor Clegg and caused a storm in the Doctor's lab - then a spider appeared on the Mandala!
Really very good with some nice location work for Mike and Sarah, lots of information about Buddhism, some nice comedy business for the Doctor and the Brigadier (11 years ago, a mysterious girl called Doris gave him a watch in a Brighton hotel as gratitude for... something!) and it was really nice to have a reference back to Jo. I rather miss her. Sarah is okay, but just not a good enough replacement.
To be honest, there was lots going on this week which tied in with 'Invasion Of The Dinosaurs', 'The Green Death' and even 'Carnival Of Monsters' (at one point Professor Clegg saw Drashigs whilst holding the Sonic Screwdriver) making it feel rather epic and something like a proper Season Finale which, given Mr Pertwee's imminent departure, is quite appropriate. Back on track after ten weeks of tedium!
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Two (11/05/14)
A unique episode this week, more than anything. Clearly as a gift to the departing Mr Pertwee, half of this week's instalment was devoted to an 'exciting' chase sequence by land, air and water utilising more cool vehicles than you can shake a perigosto stick at!
However, before that the spider on the Mandala offered Lupton all the power he desired, then she jumped on his back, turned invisible and joined minds with him. Mike smuggled Sarah out of the Lamastery and told her to get the Doctor and the Brigadier, but Lupton (and Tommy the retarded handyman) prevented him from telling the Lama.
Meanwhile, the Doctor used his IRIS machine to see what had gone through Professor Clegg's mind just before he died (Spiders!), then looked into the crystal himself but only saw the face of his old hermit friend who lived up the mountain behind the house (on Gallifrey) where he grew up.
Next morning (presumably) Sarah went to tell the Doctor about events at the retreat (finally she's wearing something vaguely flattering and in a colour other than brown!) but only piqued his interest when she mentioned the spider. Then Lupton turned up with his spider-jockey because she's looking for the blue Metebilis crystal. Lupton can shoot people unconscious with electrical bolts from his hand now he has a spider-jockey and he nicked the crystal and legged it, first in the Doctor's Whomobile (chased by the Brig, Sarah and Benton in Bessie, and the Doctor in a mini helicopter) through country lanes (pursued by a comedy bobby), then in the mini helicopter (chased by the Doctor and Sarah in the Whomobile - which can fly!!!), then in a speed boat (chased by the Doctor in a mini hovercraft). Here the Doctor caught up with him (following a comedy routine driving over a sleeping tramp) at which point the spider-jockey teleported Lupton away (begging the question why she didn't do that to begin with!).
Great locations with drizzly, misty, early Spring countryside and entertaining enough, if a bit silly. Still, better to have padding like this than the dreary crap prevalent in the last couple of stories! Silly but fun.
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Three (18/05/14)
After a fun but largely pointless chase around the Home Counties last week, this week has been positively packed with plot! Returning to the Lamastery via teleportation, Lupton had a rest after making contact with the Queen Spider on Metebilis 3 and her Spider Court. His arrival was seen by retarded handyman Tommy who clocked the blue crystal and nicked it off Lupton's windowsill. Lupton explained his backstory to his mate (nice that he gets some motivation) - basically he's a salesman who got made redundant after a corporate takeover and now he wants revenge.
The Doctor, Sarah and Mike spoke to Cho-je (the monk) at the retreat and Tommy took Sarah off to his cupboard under the stairs where he keeps all his 'pretties' in a shoebox. His intention was to give Sarah the blue crystal in return for the crappy brooch she gave him, but she got distracted by Lupton when she heard him tell his mate he was off down to the cellar with the Mandala. She headed him off, telling Tommy to tell the Doctor, watched Lupton teleport off to Metebilis 3, then stepped onto the Mandala and got teleported there herself, where she was caught by sexy local Tuar who took her to his village, thinking she was a spy.
Well written scene here, info-dumping the history of the Humans on Metebilis 3 - basically a load of Earth colonists in the future (from the West Country) one of whom (Arak) struck a guard who'd struck his mother, Neska (and to be fair I can understand why - I don't think there has ever been such an awful actor on the show! It's almost as if she doesn't know how Human beings act!).
Anyway, they all hid from the Queen Spider when she arrived to arrest Arak, but Arak's dad went out to take his place (as lunch for the spiders). However, Sarah was seen and went out rather than let Arak be found hiding her. Then the Doctor turned up (having seen Sarah disappear) and had a fight with all the Queen's guards which resulted in one of them zapping him!
Really enjoyed this episode, and Metebilis 3 is well realised and contrasted with grey, late-Spring England being all blue skies and Arizona! And Lupton and his spider-jockey plan on taking over their respective planets and bluffing the Queen about the crystal now Tommy has it. Great episode! If only the last two stories had been this good, Pertwee would've had a pretty flawless final series.
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Four (25/05/14)
Not too bad, this week, if a bit slow. The Queen Spider, Huath, took Arak's dad, Sabor, to be eaten and left the Doctor for dead. Reaching her throne room, she found Lupton and his spider-jockey sat on her dais claiming they wanted rewarding for their trouble or the Great One wouldn't get her crystal.
Sarah and Tuar argued about whether the Doctor was dead, then took him into their hut when it was clear he was alive. Sarah went to get a machine to help cure the Doctor but was caught returning from the TARDIS and taken to the Spiders' larder to be bound up with Sabor who gave her a potted history of Metebilis 3. Likewise, having used the machine Sarah had left behind to help the Doctor, Arak gave the Doctor the same tale (400 years ago, an Earth colony ship full of Humans, sheep and at least one spider crashed after coming out of warp orbiting Metebilis 3. A spider ended up on the mountain and was made more intelligent by the crystals there until their descendants became powerful enough to rule the simple farming communities of Humans). The spiders are pretty ruthless, killing whole village communities when they disobey.
Meanwhile on Earth, Mike Yates listened in to Lupton's mates chatting, confronted them and got knocked out and tied up, and Tommy looked into the crystal while reading a 'How To Read' book and had his mind defragmented. Next morning, the Doctor went to rescue Sarah but got caught by the guards. The cliffhanger was weird - the Doctor being led into the larder and Sarah realising he'd been caught.
On the whole, though, not a bad episode. We are midway through, so I imagine it'll pick up a bit next week.
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Five (01/06/14)
Lots happened this week. Sarah got taken away for a meeting with the Queen Spider who brokered a deal to set all the Humans on Metebilis 3 free in return for Sarah fetching the crystal from Earth - she thinks the Spider Council are misguided in their plan to attack Earth.
Meanwhile, the Doctor escaped from the larder and was lured into a cavern where the Great One (a fucking ma-hoo-ssive spider) made him walk around in a circle against his will and act like Derek Acorah pretending to be possessed! Mike teamed up with Barnes and went down to the cellar with the rest of Lupton's followers to carry out a ceremony to try and get Lupton and Sarah back, but were overheard by Tommy who told Cho-je. By the time Cho-je got down there, they'd unknowingly transported a load of spiders to Earth who KO'd Cho-je and Mike with psychic bolts and possessed Barnes et al.
The Doctor bumped into Sarah in the larder just as Arak and Tuar (the fit one) mounted an attack on the Spiders' palace but Sarah teleported them back to the TARDIS at the village. Apparently, the Queen showed her how to do it but I don't believe a word of it.
Arriving back in the cellar they were attacked by the Spider-controlled Barnes et al. but rescued by Tommy. Great line from Tommy when Sarah gasped (a bit rudely, in my opinion) "Tommy! You're normal... you're just like everybody else!"; his response being "I sincerely hope not!". Tommy took them to see the Abbot, who the Doctor thinks he's met before. The Abbot pointed out that the Doctor 'stole' the blue crystal from Metebilis 3 and, while they had a little chat, Tommy waited outside holding off Barnes et al.
Rather good, all said, although the actress playing Neska is still absolutely awful, not helped by the hammy and melodramatic lines she's been given. And there wasn't enough Ralph Arliss (Tuar) in my opinion. He should've joined the Doctor and Sarah. We need a Hippy in the TARDIS since Jo left!
Next week is the last episode, and also the last for Jon Pertwee. Don't know how I feel about that. On the whole I've really enjoyed his tenure; so much better than Pat Troughton! However, I'll consider that next week. This week: exciting and fun!
Planet Of The Spiders: Part Six (08/06/14)
So that's it then.
After talking to Ch-je Rinpoche, the Doctor realised he had to take the Metebilis crystal back to the Great One, despite the fact that the radiation in the cavern would kill him. Yates saved Tommy from the attack by Barnes and the spider-jockeys by standing in the way of their electrical blasts, but survived due to his compassion.
The Queen Spider on Sarah's back was killed by the crystal and Cho-je was revealed to be a Time Lord and K'anpo a projection of his future self. The Doctor returned to Metebilis 3 to find Arak and Tuar's uprising had failed and ended up taking the crystal to the great one who planned to use it to multiply her mind to infinity and rule the universe. However, instead it killed her and vicariously all the other Spiders, thus freeing the Humans.
Three weeks later, Sarah visited UNIT to see if the Doctor had returned and the TARDIS landed. K'anpo turned up to help the regeneration as the Doctor had got lost in the vortex and the TARDIS had brought him home to die. And after a really sad death scene, the credits came crashing in as he regenerated into someone remarkably similar-looking, but with brown hair!
Pleasingly absent were any sickly sweet bits and the regeneration was nicely abrupt. I'm definitely going to miss this Doctor. Very different to his predecessors, being dashing, active, snobbish; very much an action hero. I wouldn't say I liked him more than the First Doctor, but he was much better than the Second!
Whilst I'm not warming to Sarah, the Third Doctor had some great companions in Liz, Jo, the Brigadier, Benton, and Yates; and Yates and Jo in particular had some great character development! Whilst this season, especially the preceding two stories, hasn't been great, it has emphasised the change coming and mirrored how society changes. The UNIT era was great, but Doctor Who is about a man with a Time and Space Machine. It's time to get back to that, and the Third Doctor was very much an action hero with his army back up and his glamorous assistant. Maybe the new Doctor will be more suited to adventures in time and space. Pertwee was a hero and a protector of Earth... well, the Home Counties, at least! He'll be very much missed.
Another thoughtful story from the Letts school, and a nice (if again at times rather indulgent) send-off for Pertwee. It's interesting that by this point you hadn't taken to Sarah, but also understandable really, since with the 3rd Doctor she's a lot more prickly and pushy and uppity than she'd go on to be with the 4th Doctor.
ReplyDeleteI wonder, within the fiction of the series, whatever happened to the Whomobile.
I reckon the Brig used it as a replacement for his Merc lol. I think this is a great send off for Pertwee, though. It nicely winds up the Mike Yates arc, references Jo, has flashbacks and copious vehicles for Jon to play with, and the ultimate in heroic acts - the Doctor doing 'the right thing' regardless of the cost, which is VERY Pertwee era. I think his regeneration is one of the most touching there's been! It was a clear influence on RTD when he wrote The End Of Time - throw everything in for the lead actor and make it exciting and balls to everything else. It's almost a Pertwee's Greatest Hits, and so it should be. An enjoyable end to a fantastic era.
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