[W]e had another nice Doctor Who night last night at our place, watching several classic Who DVDs. Again, like last time out, they\’re all Tom Baker stories, two from the Philip Hinchcliffe era and the third from the Graham Williams era.
We started off with The Seeds of Doom, one of my favourite stories from the Philip Hinchcliffe \”Gothic Horror\” era of the classic series, a four-year period that remains, to this day, my favourite-ever era in the history of Doctor Who, either Classic or New series. This is quite a scary one, with the Krynoid very reminiscent of the plant creature in the first 1953 Quatermass serial. Doctor Who, especially the classic series, was very heavily influenced by Quatermass. Always copy the best, that\’s what I say! 🙂
This was followed by The Deadly Assassin, the rather controversial story which showcased the \”reinvention\” of the Time Lords. This one got some of the more purist fans of the original, near-omnipotent Time Lords in a bit of a tizzy, and I have to admit that I found myself sometimes wondering how this bunch of incompetent bureaucrats could ever have been the lords of time and space. The story also featured the first reappearance of The Master since the Pertwee era, a welcome return. The Deadly Assassin is an excellent tale, always rated among one of the greatest of the classic series, although I wouldn\’t rate it as one of my own personal biggest favourites (I do like it, however).
To wrap up the evening, we finished off with another highly-rated classic, City of Death, which I also quite like, although, again, I wouldn\’t rate it in my own personal Top Ten Classic Who stories. I was never as fond of the Graham Williams era as I was of the Hinchcliffe era. Tom Baker was allowed to do his own thing far too much, and often hammed it up a lot, with the humour getting a bit silly and slapstick at times. I much preferred the more scary and serious feel of the Hinchcliffe era, when Baker\’s humour was much more subdued and subtle, and he played the role totally straight. That said, City of Death was definitely one of the best stories of the Williams era. Scaroth was one of the better villains that the fourth Doctor faced, and I\’ve always found the concept of the Jagaroth, a ruthless alien race which terrorized the galaxy half a billion years ago, to be something that I\’d love to see revisited again. Maybe in the new series. The TARDIS can go anywhere, after all.
Anyway, that was another really enjoyable evening. Here\’s looking forward to watching some more Doctor Who soon.