Day 244 — September 1st 2021
The Ribos Operation Parts One and Two
The Ribos Operation — Part One
This is one of the few Old Testament Doctor Who stories where I can date with certainty the first time I saw it; September 24th 2007. I can pinpoint it so clearly because it was a busy day. It was the day the first series of The Sarah Jane Adventures began (following on from the pilot, which had aired at New Years) and it was also the day I started university. But before I could go there, I had to stop at Woolworths because it was also the day they released the ‘Limited Edition’ Key to Time DVD box set, containing the six stories of Season Sixteen.
I’d been buying the new DVDs on release date since the summer of 2005 when the New Testament turned me from a casual fan to a die hard, and picking up the older titles as and when I could. I was excited about the Key to Time set but didn’t expect to grab it immediately because it naturally cost more than the usual releases at the time. But in the days leading to release rumours began to swirl on the internet that they had made the set too limited edition, and that it was likely to sell out very quickly.
I borrowed the money from somewhere (my mother, probably, who likely shook her head and despaired), waited at the door for opening time, and then dropped the set off home before catching the bus into Norwich to start some learning. That night, having watched Sarah Jane battle the Slitheen, I sat down to watch The Ribos Operation, as the first night of my plan to watch the whole series over the following week. I can’t remember what I thought of it at the time, but I vaguely recall not making it through the whole season until I did my big marathon years later, which perhaps doesn’t bode well…
I’ll say up front that watching this episode hasn’t been some incredible ‘night and day’ contrast with the awful run of episodes I’ve just been through. It’s better, certainly, but perhaps not as much of an uptick in quality as I was hoping for. I’ll also say that I don’t think that’s necessarily the fault of this episode, but more the fact that it has to set up an entire season storyline, so naturally it’s a bit leaden with exposition.
The first ten minutes or so are so packed with information that it’s almost tricky to keep up. We’re introduced to the White Guardian, told about the Key to Time, introduced to Romana and the quest that our heroes will have to undertake, and only after we’ve done all of that do we get to actually visit Ribos and spend the next five minutes watching that world being set up. It’s probably all a bit too much to cram into a single episode, and it doesn’t leave a lot of room for much other excitement.
That’s not to say that it’s all badly done. The TARDIS being stopped mid-flight and the bright light shining through every roundel is a gorgeous moment — I wish they shot the set like this more often. It looks fantastic, and I love that the image slightly over-exposes. It’s possibly just a mistake in production, but it adds to the effect of the light being so intense. I also love the Guardian’s attitude when talking to Doctor Who; there’s something incredibly assured about him (which is, I suppose, the point) and his casual threat is brilliant;
Doctor Who: ‘Ah! You want me to volunteer, isn’t that it?’
White Guardian: ‘Precisely.’
Doctor Who: ‘And if I don’t?’
White Guardian: ‘Nothing.’
Doctor Who: ‘Nothing? You mean nothing will happen to me?’
White Guardian: ‘Nothing at all. Ever.’
Doctor Who: ‘Ah.’
I’ve banged on loads lately about the show trying to make villains seem powerful by having Doctor Who scared of them, or writing around in pain. Some of the attempts have been more successful than others. I think this must be the best example, though. The White Guardian is supposed to be one of the most powerful beings in the universe, and I can believe that watching him here. Even if he does look uncannily like Colonel Sanders.
The spiky relationship between Doctor Who and Romana is a lot of fun, too. I complained when he was rude and combative with Leela, but that’s because I enjoyed it so much more when he was kind to her, and when it felt like they were friends. I don’t mind the attitude between this pair as much because it’s established as the status quo. I’ll tell you what, though, Romana doesn’t make a great first impression does she? Arrogant, a bit rude… I’m sure I’ll warm to her but it’s not an instant connection!
One thing that comes up in this scene is something that’s generally accepted within Doctor Who canon but which I’ve never been a fan of — the idea that Doctor Who was a bit of a drop out at school. Romana calls him up on his poor results during their first meeting;
Romana: ‘I may be inexperienced, but I did graduate from the Academy with
a triple first.’
Doctor Who: ‘I suppose you think we should be impressed by that, too?’
Romana: ‘Well, it’s better than scraping through with fifty one percent at
the second attempt.’
Doctor Who: ‘That information is confidential!’
I can picture Tom Baker’s Doctor Who scraping through like that, absolutely. It suits the kind of character he’s playing now in the latter half of his tenure. But when I think of Hartnell’s incarnation, I can’t see it there. I suppose the gag is that he wasn’t very good in the eyes of the Time Lords but now he’s travelled the universe he knows more than they could ever hope to learn. But I imagine Hartnell passing the Academy with a decent-if-average mark, and then still deciding that he’s bored by all that. We’ll see more touches of this cropping up as the series goes on.
Overall, I think I’m going with a 5/10 for this opening episode, and hoping that the story will engage me more now the exposition is out of the way.
The Ribos Operation — Part Two
I often think of Doctor Who as going through phases when it comes to the amount of location work involved. I picture the early 1960s as entirely studio-bound, the late 1960s featuring a bit of material, then from about 1970–1986 I think of every episode as having location work until you reach the McCoy era and they start being clever with the production schedule. In actuality, though, there’s a surprising amount of studio-bound stories in this period. Ribos is one of them, but I can’t say it looks bad. As ever the BBC have delivered when asked to provide a medieval setting, and while I’d usually be saying that I wish they’d gone out to a real castle, I don’t think they could have made it look any better, especially with all the snow effects.
There’s a lot of world building in this story so far, and yet I don’t feel as though I know the world of Ribos especially well beyond the vague sketching in of it being pre-enlightenment and having long seasons of extreme weather. All the depth in this story so far has gone into the characters, and specifically into the ones who aren’t even from this world. That’s not a complaint; I’ve really enjoyed them in this episode, and we’ve got the perfect example of a Robert Holmes ‘double act’ in Garron and Unstoffe.
They’re the highlight of the episode for me, and the scene in which Unstoffe inflates his part in the scam is fantastic. I genuinely believe in these characters, and I could watch them pulling a con all day long. This feels like an episode played almost entirely for comedy more than any we’ve had in a long time, and that’s nice to see. There’s been elements of humour in recent stories but the series has all seemed a little po-faced for a while now. This episode — and this pairing of characters in particular — feels far more like it’s having fun than any we’ve seen in ages.
That atmosphere extends to Doctor Who and Romana, too, who retain their slightly spiky relationship from Part One but find some space for a laugh as well. I think my favourite part of this episode — ridiculous as it might sound — is Tom Baker pressing his nose up against the glass of the display case while he listens to Unstoffe make up a story. It’s only a brief cut-away shot but it made me proper laugh.
We even get a flash of the kind of brilliance Tom Baker used to bring to the role, when he’s lit up by being asked about all the strange creatures in the universe;
Romana: ‘That thing. What is it?’
Doctor Who: ‘A Shrivenzale.’
Romana: ‘I never imagined... Are there many creatures like that in other worlds?’
Doctor Who: ‘Millions. Millions! You shouldn’t have volunteered if you’re scared of a little thing like that.’
It’s another tiny thing, but there’s something about the way Tom Baker puts the emphasis on his second ‘millions’ which really clicked for me, and he felt engaged with the material more than is currently the norm. I’m crossing my fingers that he finds more to enjoy in the series this season, too — I think you can very much tell when he’s enjoying a script or not.
While we’re tangentially on the subject of the Shrivenzale, I don’t think it looks half bad! I’ve often seen it held up as an example of a poor Doctor Who monster and something of a weak link in this story, but I think it looks pretty good here. Oh sure it doesn’t do a lot, and I think later in the story it might start trying to move around a bit, but from what I’ve seen in these first two episodes, I think it’s far from being one of the programme’s worst effects.
I’m going up to a 6/10 for this one.
