Day 192 — July 11th 2021
Planet of the Spiders Parts Three and Four
Planet of the Spiders — Part Three
When I was younger, I was terrified of spiders. All of them. Didn’t matter if they were a tiny little money spider or a great big tarantula, they were scary in equal measure. I’ve loads of things which I could pinpoint as for where the fear came from — finding a big spider behind the door in the kitchen, my grandmother telling me she once turned on the shower and loads of spiders came flying out of it or the time my mother called me downstairs to look at something on the telly and it was the film Tarantula, which had terrible special effects but remains as clear in my memory as the moment it happened.
It was for that reason that I put off watching Planet of the Spiders for so long. It just wasn’t the sort of story I’d choose to watch. The fear was compounded by a behind-the-scenes image from this one, which showed (I think) an early version of the Spider Queen, and I can only describe it as the stuff of nightmares if you’re arachnophobic. I can’t remember where I saw the image, but for years afterwards it eluded me. I’d describe it to people and they’d tell me I was making it up, but a few years ago a friend found it and sent it my way — still terrifying!
Spiders don’t bother me now. I put myself through some aversion therapy by refusing to sleep in a room where I could see a big spider crawling around the ceiling… until I was too tired and just had to give up and go to sleep. I woke up the next day cured, which is a good job because my wife’s even more scared of them than I used to be, so I’m the one who has to catch them and put them out in the garden.
I wonder if it’s because I’m not bothered any more that the spiders are my favourite part of this story? I can’t remember if they scared me when I last watched (I’ve only seen it the once, as part of my last marathon), but I can appreciate how creepy they are this time. I’m sure I’ve seen people complain that they’re not great models, but I think they come across really well, and the movements are nicely authentic. There’s one spider who crawls across the floor and it looks good enough for me!
Equally, my interest in them could be simply because they’re the most interesting part of the story. I can’t get on board with all the Buddhist talk, and the Two Legs on Metebilis 3 are so bland as to give me nothing to talk about. The spiders at least are interesting to look at, and those voices continue to be brilliantly haunting. It’s also impressive how well a scene can hold together when it’s just Lupton talking to a model of a spider — the performances really sell it, and the spider looks great writhing in agony once Lupton has turned the tables;
Lupton: ‘Stop, I can’t bear it!’
Spider: ‘Say please.’
Lupton: ‘Please! Please!’
Spider: ‘You will go to see the Doctor and lull his suspicions. In future you will
do as I wish.’
Lupton: ‘What did you do to my mind? It felt like red-hot needles. Was it, was
it this that you did? Or no. No, was it… this!’
Spider: ‘Ah! No! No, stop!’
Lupton: ‘Say please.’
Spider: ‘…Please, Lupton! Please!’
I’ve rather lost track of who’s who among them — I’m sure the subtitles for Part Two called the spider on Lupton’s back ‘Spider Queen’, but here that’s a different arachnid entirely. Not that it matters, though. I love the ‘council’ of the spiders all sat around plotting together.
Unfortunately, that scene is also a good example of an era this episode really falls short — there’s some more dodgy CSO going on. I suppose I should call that another thing that’s being homaged from the Pertwee era; bad CSO has been a hallmark of the last four seasons. Here, Barry letts seems to be trying to replicate the ‘shifting head’ effect used so well in The Claws of Axos, but the yellow fringing around Lupton’s head really detracts from the effect.
And it’s not the only example. It’s a clever idea to show the change of location from Sarah’s point of view when she’s transported to Metebilis 3, but it’s not well achieved. The same is true for a later shot of the TARDIS arriving on the planet, CSO’d over a picture of the sky. This second example is especially boggling, as they then show us that the TARDIS prop has been erected on the set of the Two Legs’ colony, so there’s absolutely no need to have done an effect in the first place!
I’ve enjoyed this one much more — having an actual story to follow rather than a sequence of various vehicles chasing each other makes it all the more watchable…! 7/10.
Planet of the Spiders — Part Four
This is a typical middle episode, innit? It feels like the situation at the end of the episode is barely any different to that at the end of the last one. Part Three came to a close with Sarah Jane and Doctor Who about to be arrested. They manage to escape that fate (Sarah by hiding and Doctor Who being left for dead), but the situation at the end of this episode is… the two of them being placed in the same prison.
It feels like nothing very much happens on Metebilis 3 at all in this one, and I’m sorry to say that the Two Legs are still among the most boring guest characters the series has given us. I just don’t feel like I care about any of them, and I’m certainly not bothered about them being carted off to be eaten now and then.
The one thing which does come out of this one is an explanation for how the spiders came to be… and I really like it! There’s something brilliant about the idea that a spider might have ended up on a rocket to another world, and that the properties of that world have allowed them to grow in both size and knowledge to the point that they’ve taken control and seized power. I’m surprised we’ve never had a story in expanded media which explores the now giant spiders descending hungry from the mountains, because I reckon it’d be terrifying.
Sadly the spiders themselves don’t have much of a role to play in this one. Aside from a single scene of the Lupton spider standing up to the queen, they’re largely represented by human guards, and that’s just not as interesting to me. I also find myself annoyed by the design of Metebilis 3; what do they want it to be? There’s shades of India in there, especially in the guard costumes, but the landscape is presented as being like Utah, and the regular two-legs are given an almost Mexican feel. None of it feels like it fits together, and that’s spoiling things for me.
There’s also an odd lack of webs as part of the design in the spider’s palace — we get a single one in the prison cell (complete with a static spider prop which looks more like a Halloween decoration than anything else), and Sarah gets wrapped in a cocoon but that’s it. I’m assuming that the designer must have decided that covering everything in web would be a bit cliché, so has steered away from it… but I feel like it would have been better to play up to that.
But that’s enough moaning, because this episode also includes what might be my favourite part of the story so far — Tommy’s mind being opened up my the crystal, and allowing him to read. Tommy’s disability has been an ongoing subplot of the episode so far, and I appreciate that most of the characters are shown to be patient and understanding with him — there’s a bit in Part Three where Sarah goes off with him and seems to be genuinely enjoying the man’s company.
It’s been a brilliant performance by John Kane — a rare example of someone on the guest cast who hasn’t been in the show during the last few years, indeed this is his only appearance — and as such the resolution here, when he manages to read his Ladybird book for the first time is really powerful. They go on to show him heading into a full library and reading the opening lines of BOOK, and it continues to be just as emotional throughout.
I can’t remember Tommy’s role in the story going forward from here (indeed, I spent the first part of this episode wondering why we were bothering to check in with the people still on Earth) but I really hope he’s vital to the resolution because I think it would be really great to have the character everyone’s underestimated come through and save the day.
On the whole this story is proving a bit of a rollercoaster — I’m dropping back down to a 5/10 here, with the hope that we’ll get some more exciting spider action in the next instalment.
