Day 209 — July 28th 2021
Pyramids of Mars Parts Three and Four
Pyramids of Mars — Part Three
When people discuss Tom Baker’s incarnation of Doctor Who, something which comes up often is talk of his ‘Olympian Detachment’. I think Philip Hinchcliffe himself has even talked about it in these terms, and Pyramids of Mars is the first story which really takes that idea and runs with it. Obviously, we get the scene in Part One where he talks about his role as a Time Lord, but this episode has something a bit more obvious, when he brushes over the death of Laurence;
Doctor Who: ‘His late brother must have called.’
Sarah: ‘That’s horrible! He was so concerned about his brother.’
Doctor Who: ‘I told him not to be. I told him it was too late.’
Sarah: ‘Oh! Sometimes you don’t seem…’
Doctor Who: ‘Human?’
Sarah: ‘A man has just been murdered!’
While it’s something that people seem to really like about this incarnation, I don’t think I’m a fan. It feels at odds with the version of the character I’ve been watching since Robot, and especially with the man who eulogised about the virtues of humanity aboard the Ark. Maybe he’s just having a bit of an off day, but I don’t think it suits the character, and I’m much keener on this Doctor Who when he’s being a bit less sombre.
It also means that he’s not treating Sarah Jane quite as well as I’ve grown to expect — indeed he’s as downright rude to her in this episode especially as the Third Doctor Who often was to Jo. I didn’t like it then and I don’t like it now. I’ve spent a lot of time praising the way that these two feel like genuine best friends having a good time together, but I don’t get any sense of that in this episode at all, and it makes me realise how you might end up with a relationship like the one the Sixth Doctor Who has with Peri, where you start to wonder why these people stay in each other’s company.
On the bright side, this story sees the culmination of Doctor Who’s evolving costume, into something which feels like a fairly iconic look for this incarnation. The outfit has been changing across this entire season — we get the introduction of the waistcoat in Terror of the Zygons (replacing the cardigan he wore in his first five adventures), the orange cravat replaced the green tie in Planet of Evil, and now we’ve dropped the short red corduroy jacket in favour of a longer velvet frock coat. Baker goes through a number of different outfits during his seven seasons (indeed, they’ll introduce a new one in tomorrow’s episodes!), but I think this might be my favourite one. There’s just something about it which feels totally right for him.
Right then, I’ve had my moan about Doctor Who feeling oddly out of character in this story, and now it’s time to say the same for Sarah Jane. I think readers will know by now that I’ve really taken to Lis Sladen and her character, and I’ve realised just why so many people consider her to be the best companion of them all. But while this story is great from the point of view of giving her things to do I’m not sure that I believe in a lot of what she’s up to.
Specifically it’s the skills and knowledge she displays in this story which feels oddly out of place. In this episode she’s forced to make a very important shot using a vintage rifle. Doctor Who spells out to her the importance of her getting it right, and she tells him that he needn’t worry because she knows exactly what she’s doing. Naturally, she makes the shot on her first try. Well done, Sarah Jane, but… where has she picked up these skills? We’ve not had any indication in the last two and a half seasons that Sarah has any experience with a gun. I feel like I just needed a line here to suggest that her Aunt Levinia used to take her clay pigeon shooting or similar; just something that explains her sudden crack shot ability.
The same goes for her knowledge of Egyptian mythology, which she’s proving to be fairly all encompassing in this one;
Doctor Who: ‘Beware Sutekh.’
Sarah: ‘Sutekh?’
Doctor Who: ‘Better known to you as Set?’
Sarah: ‘Of course, Egyptian mythology. Set or Sutekh was one of their gods. He was killed by Horus, god of light’.Doctor Who: ‘Sutekh was only defeated in the end by the combined might of seven hundred and forty of his fellow Osirans led by Horus.’
Sarah: ‘The seven hundred and forty gods whose names were recorded in the tomb of Tutmoses the Third?’
Doctor Who: ‘Could be.’
Obviously her role here is to explain all this mythology to the audience, and I suppose someone needs to do it, but how come Sarah knows so much about it and in great detail? It’s not the kind of thing they taught at school, and again she’s never previously shown any interest in the subject before now. It’s something which, again, I think I’d buy if they simply added in some line to cover it. Have her react with delight when they first arrive at the Priory and discover the Egyptian artefacts! If she’d reacted with pure excitement on arrival and told Doctor Who that Ancient Egypt was her favourite topic as a kid then I’d absolutely buy her extensive knowledge of the topic. As it is, she only seems to know this stuff because the plot dictates that someone has to, and Laurence isn’t around for the whole story.
I feel like I’ve been incredibly negative about our heroes today, so I’ll end on a positive note — there’s some gorgeous close ups of them both when they’re peering around into the courtyard. It’s a little thing, but at least it’s not all bad…! I’m going with a 6/10.
Pyramids of Mars — Part Four
I was hoping that things might all turn around in the final episode and we’d end this one on a high, but I’m really sorry to say that’s not been the case. Indeed, I think this is my least favourite episode of the story, and it’s dropped down to a 5/10.
Let’s start with some positives on this one, shall we? Gabriel Woolf gives an incredible performance as Sutekh. His voice is genuinely powerful, and when he’s torturing Doctor Who at the start of this episode and laughing to himself as he does so it’s properly un-nerving. It’s no wonder the New Testament was so quick to bring him back the second they had to voice a sinister devil creature, because he’s honestly given one of the best villain performances that we’ve ever seen.
Unfortunately, that’s sort of where my positivity ends, because I have to say that I’m not a big fan of the look of Sutekh, in either of his forms. I get what they’re going for, with the Egyptian theme, but I find that both masks look a bit cheap. The main one he wears feels far too big for his head, and the Jackal looks a bit too much like it’s made of Papier-mâché to ever be really frightening. All in all it’s a bit of a let down.
I should qualify my statements by saying that I don’t know what I’d have wanted them to do instead, and I certainly couldn’t have made something better, just that what we did get doesn’t do it for me. It also means it’s harder to overlook such obvious mistakes like the hand which holds down Sutekh’s cushion when the man stands up… surely that’s going to be something they fix with CGI on the Blu-ray release?
The other big problem I’ve been having with these last few episodes is the sense of scale to the threat, and I think it suffers in comparison with Planet of Evil. In that story I praised the way that the threat felt totally real and believable, and that I was happy to go along with it as the situation became increasingly tense for our heroes. I’m not getting the same vibe from this story, and indeed the more that Doctor Who tries to tell us that this is the most dangerous foe he’s ever faced the more I think ‘the lady doth protest too much’.
We get that scene in Part One where we’re shown what will happen to the world if Sutekh isn’t stopped, but I never actually get any sense that he’s really all that powerful. He spends most of the story sat on a chair, and needs a helping hand when he finally does stand up! Yes he manages to possess Doctor Who and force our hero to pilot the TARDIS to Mars, but I feel like even that gets wasted, because seconds after they’ve arrived Doctor Who is up and about again and back to normal. There’s no struggle against the control, it’s just there to serve a purpose in the plot and then it’s cast aside.
I haven’t a whole lot else to say on the subject of this one, I’m afraid, and I’m honestly disappointed not to have had my opinion on the story changed on this occasion. Everyone seems to think that Pyramids of Mars is an incredible Doctor Who story (it came 8th in Doctor Who Magazine’s 2014 poll), but I just don’t get it.
