The Doctor Who Real Time Marathon: The Leisure Hive
The Leisure Hive: Part One (30/08/20)
Well, that was a bit unexpectedly lush! It's a new Production team, but I wasn't quite prepared for exactly how new it looks! Aside from the fact that the theme tune has had a reboot, all bursting electronica and Gary Numan synths, and the credits are a massive, fancy starfield using cool computer effects, the incidental music has also been overhauled. Bye bye Dudley Simpson and his predictable orchestrations; Hello Peter Howell and his lush, dramatic synths! It really does sound very modern and quite exciting, and if that wasn't enough, the Direction is superb! So, okay, the design isn't that far removed from the Disco feel of last series' opener but, damn! does it feel arty!
To be honest, not a great deal happened this week but it looked fantastic. Maybe I should elaborate on the plot.
The Doctor took Romana to Brighton but got the season and year wrong so she had a strop, tried to kill K9 (blaming the Doctor for getting his sea-water defences wrong, but she was clearly taking her frustrations out on the computer dog unnecessarily - oh, and he's got his original voice back, that's if he ever works again!), then opted to go the the leisure planet Argolis whose inhabitants are barren survivors of a nuclear war with the reptilian Foamasi, and who now promote interspecies tolerance and appear to be plant-based lifeforms like Zhaan from 'Farscape' given the berry-dropping way they die.
The Leisure Hive, however, is going bankrupt and the Argolins' Earth representative, Brock, is urging them to sell to the Foamasi (who, immune to the radiation of Argolis, can live on the planet's surface). Meanwhile, the spouse of the Chairman (parents of the youngest Argolin, Pangol) has been working with an Earth scientist to use Tachyonics - a science developed by Pangol - to manipulate time. However, it seems that Hardin, the Human working for her, is conning her since a video which the Doctor and Romana didn't see but talked about as if they had has been faked.
It all looks brilliant, and despite very little happening it was nonetheless intriguing. I'm not 100% sure about the Doctor's new get-up - it's very... enveloping... but it's a fresh, modern, fancy new start for the series and it's really nice to have Lalla stay on as Romana; part of me was worried that she'd change again and that would've been horrible and dull. What a great start to the new series!
The Leisure Hive: Part Two (06/09/20)
That was pretty good again but, as with last week, not a great deal happened. What appeared to be the Doctor being torn apart last week was just an image. Then he and Romana were arrested for not being Mena's scientist, Hardin. Hardin's associate, meanwhile, who had persuaded him to fake the time experiments, was killed by the Doctor's scarf ("Arrest the scarf!") and, while the Doctor was put on trial, Romana was set to help Hardin 'perfect' the Time Transfer - where he confessed to her it was faked. However, Romana's no fool and helped him sort out the issues (sort of).
The Doctor was found guilty just as Hardin burst in to say that the experiments worked, so they put the Doctor in the Recreation Generator to test it. It should have taken a decade or so off but, returning to the lab and seeing that (after she'd left) the experiment had failed, Romana tried to stop the experiment taking place only to find the Doctor had been aged into an old man! The makeup, from what we saw, is a very good version of an ancient Tom. Also, associate Stimson was murdered for discovering that Klout is a Foamasi in a Human skin suit (his death was quite well directed).
But still this seems to be more a case of style over substance. The episode only just passed the 20 minute mark and, as brilliantly designed and shot as it is, it just doesn't feel quite as exciting as most of last year's episodes (certain episodes of 'Shada' excepted). Nevertheless, it's still a pretty decent story so far.
Oh, and Mena is dying, which might lead to trouble since Pangol seems to be a bit of a psychopath. In which case, next week should be pretty good!
The Leisure Hive: Part Three (13/09/20)
A marked improvement on last week, but then (as I guessed) a number of questions were answered. The Doctor has aged 500 years and, frankly, the makeup is really good. He's now 1250 with white hair and a long beard, and wouldn't it be great if he stayed like that!?! He and Romana have been locked up and Hardin has been set to work to complete his experiments without Romana's crucial help after Pangol revealed to Mena that, having gone through Stimson's stuff, he learnt that the experiments had been faked.
Mena continues her slow death and Pangol is preparing to take over... and bring the Argolin a New Dawn through the use of the Recreation Generator. It all started to fall into place when Hardin, visiting the Doctor and Romana (and releasing them from their constraints) mentioned that the Argolin have nothing to show for their experiments with Tachyonics in the 40 years since the war which sterilised them. But Pangol is certainly only about half that age! That was soon followed by a scene where Pangol addressed this (much to Mena's horror) in a conversation with Brock (who's working for a breakaway group of Foamasi - the West Lodge; very 'Twin Peaks') and revealed he was created from Argolin DNA in the Generator - the only survivor of many experiments!
The Doctor and Hardin distracted the guards around the Recreation Generator while Romana went in to have a shufty and was grabbed by a Foamasi in a great scene where it suddenly appeared over her shoulder. It appears to be on their side, though, and likely holds the secret to what the hell's going on - if only it could talk instead of chirrup. The costume is actually quite good; very chameleon-like with pivoting eyes and not half as bad as I expected. They burst into the Council Chamber as Pangol was revealing his plans to create a new race of Argolin via the Recreation Generator, and the Foamasi (who has a mate) went up to Brock and ripped his face off - revealing him to be another Foamasi like Klout!
The series is looking and sounding very stylish - Peter Howell's score is fresh and dynamic, a wonderful work of electronica. The glossy, vac-formed sets look great, too, and the hair and costume design is all very striking. Looking forward to next week's conclusion. It should be good!
The Leisure Hive: Part Four (20/09/20)
Well, that was pretty good, all said. Brock and Klout were both disguised West Lodge Foamasi who were trying to run down the Hive so they could buy it and have the planet for themselves, or something. Since the Foamasi are a lot bulkier than Humans I imagine they must have been using some form of compression suit as part of their disguise. The real Brock never left Earth, the Foamasi representative revealed having taken 'Brock's voice synthesiser, and he restrained the imposters to take them home for trial.
Pangol had other ideas and started to build his army for the Dawn of the New Argolis, leaving Mena in the boardroom to die. Hardin went to help her by placing her in the Generator while Romana went to stop the Doctor who'd gone into the Generator to fit the Randomiser from the TARDIS.
I have to say that David Haig is absolutely brilliant as Pangol, a young, driven psychopath who sees war as the only future for his species. His scenes as he demanded the Foamasi remain on Argolis to witness the New Dawn and his screams for Romana to be thrown outside the Hive to die were chilling and very convincing. He comes across as a very charismatic monster in the vein of Hitler and Mussolini.
Anyway, Pangol went into the Generator and his army came out, but something sciencey had happened and they were all the Doctor in Pangol's clothes and war helmet. They were also unstable and all faded away but the original, who's been rejuvenated - shame, as I quite liked the Old Man look! Then Hardin turned up and put Mena in the Generator and Pangol went in to get her out. As a result, they both got rejuvenated like the Doctor, Mena much younger and Pangol to a baby. It also looked like Pangol had started a war by blowing up the Foamasi shuttle as it took off, but only the West Lodge criminals had been on board.
It all looked very lush, very stylishly Directed, and with a great score to match, a big difference from the often rather stale orchestrations of Dudley Simpson over the last few years. I do wonder, though, if all this gloss is covering up something lacking. There was a lot of technobabble, and Douglas Adams' wit has been replaced with a rather dry quality which feels considerably less fun. It's all being overseen by Barry Letts, who's responsible for the most enjoyable and successful era of the show, but I feel that the new Script Editor lacks the talent and flair of his predecessor. It's all very well making things serious and sciencey but it needs to be balanced with humour. I'm sure things will improve as time goes on and, regardless of my criticisms, this was still a brilliant start to the season and a great way to showcase the new House Style.
The science [of the entire season] is a bit of a misfire from the start but I don't mind the more serious and sombre tone, and the switch from The Horns of Nimon to this is one of the most stark and successful in the series' history. That said, I wish JNT had had less time to prep the series and had been forced to hold off on the sweeping changes until Peter Davison's first season, as it always seems the more natural starting point for a new take on the show.
ReplyDeleteAs for The Leisure Hive itself, I agree that it's a triumph of style over substance - and what style! - but there's enough of a story there to keep you interested even when not a lot's happening, and the cast are uniformly good and really throw themselves at it. On the whole I think it makes for a promising start to the season and an effective introduction to JNT's take on the show.
It's definitely a very promising start to the season, and the glossiest and most stylish the show's ever been (or would be - it's downhill from here, I seem to recall, at least for Season 18. Maybe I'm wrong...). There *is* enough story to keep you interested - just - but the script doesn't really reflect the shift in, well, everything else. It's still slow and, rather than being padded, the first two episodes feel drawn out. That said, it's not as bad as 'Shada' which spends the best part of three episodes in Cronotis' study! And as for the science, as great as it is that CHB pushed for a more 'real' science basis for the stories, the inverted commas are a permanent feature of his era, and a particularly dull one. I'm sure the computer geeks loved all the talk about Tachyonics and the like, but I can't say I found it very stimulating. Fortunately, the season opener has some great performances and real emotional drama - Adrienne Corri plays the quick aging incredibly well and her prolonged death scenes, coupled with David Haig's chillingly cold dismissal of his 'mother', are quite shocking in their way. It's these scenes as Pangol is slowly revealed to be a warmongering psychopath and Mena sees her hopes crumble into faked experiments and unlearned lessons that make the final two instalments so compelling. It's just a shame that the end seems to rushed with Mena stepping out the Generator and basically saying "I'd better try harder next time" before everything's wrapped up in a few sentences. The first half sets the scene for the society on Argolis, but could have done in in half the time which is the only major downfall I can find, which isn't anything to sniff at!
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