Day 231 — August 19th 2021
Horror of Fang Rock Parts One and Two
Horror of Fang Rock — Part One
I don’t think I’ve ever noticed it before, but Tom Baker doesn’t wear his oatmeal grey coat at all in Season Fourteen. He first dons it in The Android Invasion and wears it through the rest of Season Thirteen, but then he’s on the brown velvet-y coat — or a one-off Sherlock Holmes pastiche — for every story after that until now. Thinking ahead for the rest of this season I think we’re about to get a lot more presence for this coat. I also wonder if I was wrong to say that the brown coat was my favourite for him, because it really looks right when he turns up in this one today. When he adds the bowler hat I think it looks ever better — I wouldn’t want it as a permanent addition, but it feels right in context!
I’m loving Leela’s outfit in this one, too, when she’s changed into the grey jumper. I wasn’t keen on her period outfits in The Talons of Weng-Chiang because they felt so out of place for her (which was the point, I suppose), but this look suits her perfectly. I find I don’t often spend much time talking about the costumes in this show — especially for the regulars — so it’s nice when I think everything compliments perfectly like this and is worth a mention.
The grey colour scheme fits in nicely with the setting, too. This must be the most washed-out colour palette we’ve had since the series moved into colour — it’s about as far away from The Claws of Axos as it’s possible to get! It’s brilliant, though, and feels like an evolution in the series somehow. After all my worrying yesterday about the series looking cheap as soon as Graham Williams comes along, they go and give us something which looks as lavish as this!
A big part of that is down to the model work, which is as incredible as I’ve come to expect at this point. There’s several shots of the lighthouse peppered throughout the episode which are especially gorgeous, and with the muted colours and slight soft focus they have the appearance of an oil painting, which feels totally in keeping with the story, and I can only assume is a deliberate choice. There’s plenty of great shots looking up at the structure from the ocean, too, and they’re just as successful. If there’s one place the models fall a little short then it’s probably in the cliffhanger. I don’t think you’re ever in doubt that it’s a miniature ship you’re looking at, and the sequence is directed a little too leisurely to feel as dramatic as the script intends.
I complained that the last story felt a bit too dense for me, and I think the same could be said for this one, too, but it doesn’t feel like it drags it down in quite the same way. Here it feels like there’s so much focus in establishing the setting and the dynamics of the characters before out regulars have even arrived and I’m totally invested in it all. Even when the TARDIS does rock up on the… well, rocks, it’s done as an aside, and we cut back to the guest cast inside the lighthouse for a bit before we catch up with Doctor Who and Leela below. That feels quite novel, and a world away from the opening of the last season, which was an extended sequence of the regulars wandering around the ship!
When Doctor Who and Leela do get to meet the guest cast, it’s done with one of my favourite introductions ever;
Vince: ‘Who are you, then?’
Leela: ‘I’m Leela.’
Doctor Who: ‘I’m the Doctor. How do you do. You seem to be having some
trouble here.’
Vince: ‘How’d you get here?’
Leela: ‘We came in the TARDIS.’
Doctor Who: ‘We’re mislaid mariners.’
There’s something about the idea of these two turning up right when you need them the most which really appeals to me, and they’re clearly having a whale of a time exploring the fog.
Something I’ve been trying to work out idly today; is this the first time the series has ever done two trips into history back-to-back like this? Of course there was a break of five months between stories as broadcast, but in a marathon like this it’s surprising to me, and especially with only around 20 years between the setting of Talons and this one. The closest example I can think of is parts of The Chase and then all of The Time Meddler, but that doesn’t feel like it really counts in the same way.
It’s a great start to the new era and I’m thrilled. I’m going with an 8/10.
Horror of Fang Rock — Part Two
There are some Doctor Who stories which have built in ‘facts’ attached to them. The Reign of Terror is the first story to feature location filming, and The Dalek Invasion of Earth is the first to take the regular cast on location ,for example. Spearhead From Space is the first story shot entirely on film (and in colour), while Revelation of the Daleks is the last in the programme’s original run to use film for the location sequences, switching exclusively to video from Trial of a Time Lord onwards.
The Horror of Fang Rock is one of those stories, being the first serial of the 1970s to be filmed entirely in a studio outside London, with the main production taking place at Pebble Mill in Birmingham. The way the story usually gets told is that the serial suffers for being made in a setting which wasn’t up to the demands of a big production like Doctor Who, but I don’t think that shows up as true on screen. Indeed, this feels like an unusually confident production, and it features some of the best CSO work we’ve ever had in the series.
There’s a point early on in Part One where we get a nice clear view out over the ocean from the top of the lighthouse. I wondered initially if it had been done with a painted backcloth, because it’s just too good to be anything else, but I suspect I just hadn’t gotten to grips with it all yet. Once the fog rolls in they’re definitely using a blue screen, and while the cutting out around characters can be a little sharp at times (Tom Baker’s curls suffer more than most), it doesn’t show any signs of the ‘fringing’ which always defined this type of effect in the Pertwee years. It probably also helps that CSO isn’t used quite so frequently as a technique at this stage, so it doesn’t outstay its welcome as often as when Barry Letts was in control. I can’t say I entirely understand why they decided to go with CSO to provide the view outside, when a painted backdrop and a smoke machine would have likely been an easier task.
But I can’t criticise too badly, because the direction in this one continues to be brilliant. It’s Paddy Russell’s fourth and final directing job on Doctor Who, and as with her previous two stories (we can’t see The Massacre to check) she’s especially good at framing and shooting the regular cast. There’s some fantastic shots of Doctor Who and Leela early on in this episode which I’m amazed I’ve not seen shared around more often, because I don’t think they’ve ever looked better together. And then there’s a brilliant composition right at the end, where Doctor Who stands in a doorway and Baker looks fabulously dangerous and brooding.
The real success of this episode has to be the expansion of the guest cast. We saw a ship crash at the end of Part One and that leads to the addition of four new characters here, and they’re the absolute heart of the story. We get our first glimpses at the blobby green alien during this episode but all my attention is being drawn by the dynamics of the humans inside the lightouse. Over the last few seasons I’ve been forthcoming with praise for the characters created by the liked of Robert Banks Stewart and Chris Boucher, but I forgot just how rich the ones created by Terrance Dicks could be, too.
Every one of the four has their own distinct personality, and they way they play off each other is brilliant to watch. I remember Russell T Davies once saying that Voyage of the Damned is about people pulling together in a crisis, while Midnight is the same concept in reverse, and I think this story very much fits in with the latter category. Instead of working together to negate the threat outside everyone is too interested in saving themselves. It’s great to watch, and it feels like surprisingly grown-up drama for Doctor Who. I’ve loved it, but I wonder if the kids watching at home would have been checking their watches waiting for the real monster to arrive?
There’s also some incredible dialogue and character moments in this one. It’s the relationship between Doctor Who and Leela which comes out of this episode the best, and they’re back to the kind of pairing I loved so much in their first few stories together, rather than the slightly combative and patronising one we had in Talons.
My absolute favourite moment of the story so far is when the pair are told the tale of the ‘Beast of Fang Rock’ and we linger on their contrasting reactions. Doctor Who grins with excitement while Leela worries. Not all of the praise for moments like this can be laid on the script; in this instance it’s clearly a reaction which has been worked out in the rehearsals (the script specifying only that they look at each other), so the credit should really go to the actors themselves, or perhaps Paddy Russell.
Another favourite moment does come directly from the script, though; Leela telling Doctor Who not to be afraid. There’s something in that which is so innocent and brilliant and I absolutely love it. It seems mad to me now that I worried about how much I’d enjoy this pairing after loving Sarah Jane so much.
My notes for this episode are filled with little snippets of dialogue which I’ve loved, but I don’t just want to quote them all, so I think I’ll just go for my favourite bit, which is Doctor Who explaining the threat to everyone else in the lighthouse;
Doctor Who: ‘Come on, sit down. Sit down. All that can wait. Gentlemen, I’ve
got news for you. This lighthouse is under attack, and by morning we might all
be dead. Anyone interested?’
He’s so loving all of this, and Tom Baker is clearly having a whale of a time playing it. I’ve said it before but it remains true; when Baker is enjoying himself it’s positively infectious. I’m going with a 9/10 this time around.
