Day 352 — December 18th 2021
The Happiness Patrol Part Three and Silver Nemesis Part One
The Happiness Patrol — Part Three
I forgot that I’d turned off the colour on the TV yesterday, so you can imagine my surprise when I turned on the Firestick this evening to find everything rendered in greyscale. I had a moment on wondering exactly what had gone wrong before I remembered. And now I’m hoping I can remember how to turn it back on again after the episode.
Yesterday I complained that so many elements in this story felt divorced from one another, and that it was sometimes hard to get a good sense of how this story works as a whole, and I think that’s been the downfall of this final episode, which I’m dropping down to a 6/10. This is perhaps the first time I’ve noticed just how much the McCoy era can suffer as a result of having had the episodes cut down so much for broadcast, and it’s made me think it might be time to fast-track picking up a new Blu-ray player ready for Season Twenty-Six. Fenric in particular I recall really benefitting from having the extended cuts available.
The biggest casualty here is that the Kandyman’s death seems to come out of nowhere. He escapes into the pipes beneath the city. The Pipe People redirect the flow of fondant through said pipes. This dissolves the Kandyman, who’s robotic skeleton plops pathetically out of a pipe to be discovered by Gilbert in the main square. It’s a fitting end for the character, but it took me a little while to work all of that out, because the episode cuts from the Kandyman in the pipes to the skeleton appearing with almost nothing inbetween. I think we could have done with some model shots in there of the fondant rushing down the pipes. Maybe that’s something to add on the Blu-ray?
I also think it’s a shame that we see the Kandyman in the pipes, because they’ve looked brilliant up to now. With smaller actors running around them — and I include the regulars in that — they’ve looked really impressive and sizeable. Once the Kandyman’s forced to stoop as he shuffles along that effect is a little diminished. It should make him look impressively tall… but it doesn’t.
Anyway! Enough moaning! I’ve been a killjoy for the last two episodes in spite of enjoying them, so I’m going to focus on the positives for this one. Let’s start by sticking with the pipes, because we get plenty of other sequences set in them throughout this episode, and they look fantastic in all of them. The black and white makes the lighting look all the more impressive, and there’s a few shots of Fifi in close up where the thing looks genuinely quite frightening. There’s a great bit where it zips along the pipe at a hell of a speed and it proper surprised me. Also is it just me, or does Fifi look uncannily like Greg Davies? I’ve always thought so, but it’s never mentioned.
Fifi’s owner comes out of this episode very well, too. I don’t think Helen A has been particularly impressive in the first two episodes, but this final one really brings her to the fore, and it helps that she’s allowed to try and justify the things she’s done. She gets two moments in this episode where she explains her way of thinking, and they’re both very good;
Helen A: ‘we will make this a happy planet, in spite of all the killjoys and the bunglers that surround us. And if they’re miserable, we put them out of their misery. After all, it’s for their own good!’
Helen A: ‘They didn’t understand me.’
Doctor Who: ‘They understood you only too well. That’s why they resisted you.’
Helen A: ‘I only wanted the best for them.’
Doctor Who: ‘The best? Prisons? Death squads? Executions?’
Helen A: ‘They only came later. I told them to be happy, but they wouldn’t listen. I gave them every chance. Oh, I know they laughed sometimes, but they still cried, they still wept.’
That sense of one side of the political argument deciding that they know what’s best is as relevant now as it ever was, and the mantra of being forced to shut up, smile and accept what you’re told too feels particularly fitting of some of the ideologies riding a trend at the moment.
One last thing to praise — this episode contains my favourite line for the Seventh Doctor Who;
Earl: ‘Blissful, isn’t it, Doctor? Silence.’
Doctor Who: ‘Ah, not quite. I can hear the sound of empires toppling.’
The Happiness Patrol might not have always managed to do what it wanted, and it certainly suffers from having too many ideas crammed into too little screen time, but the idea of Doctor Who showing up and dismantling an entire dictatorship in a single night is brilliant all the same.
Silver Nemesis — Part One
This was one of the very first stories I ever picked up on VHS. I mean how could you not? Its got the Cybermen, Nazis and a theatrical witch, it’s the 25th anniversary celebration for the series, and on top of that the cover design was completely unique to this story which made it all the more exciting and rare. Back in those days I wasn’t part of fandom so didn’t have any idea which stories were considered good or bad, and I loved Silver Nemesis pretty unconditionally. And you know what? I still do!
It helps that this opening episode is brilliant. It’s brimming with the same kind of energy and optimism which was so present in Remembrance of the Daleks, although I’ll accept that it’s not as strong in terms to of production. This is an episode designed to appeal to the widest possible audience, and I think that’s always a good move for Doctor Who to make. As has been the case with several McCoy stories now there’s no shortage of ideas stuffed into this, but that only adds to the excitement and sense of adventure. By the time the Cybermen finally show up for the cliffhanger they feel like the icing on the cake — how fitting for a celebration.
We hit the ground running setting up the key players in the battle — although I’ll accept that some of the imagery is a little… on the nose. We’re introduced to the Neo-Nazis, for example, with a shot of one of them sitting before a framed painting of Hitler while some Wagner plays in the background. It’s not exactly subtle. But I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing, and it’s probably a reason that they can cram so much into this episode without it feeling over stuffed. Things like this are a short hand for us to latch on to.
I don’ think I’ve ever noticed before how much of a nice bit of symbolism it is that both De Flores and Lady Peinforte are introduced while taking aims at some birds with a bow and arrow. Again it works as a quick indication that these two are going to be linked in some way, or that they’ve both got their sights set on the same thing. Or maybe I’m simply reading too much into it, but it felt clever to me all the same!
Their initial scenes are also examples of the kind of things they could do in post production by this point, using paint box to alter the footage in different ways. For the Argentina scenes they add some lush green mountains into the background (which doesn’t look so great in a still screenshot but works well on screen), and for Lady Peinforte’s house they’ve painted out the anachronistic windows in the roof on location. I think this might also be the first time we’ve ever had captions to indicate where and when we are, and that works brilliantly, especially in an episode which takes in more times and locations than any other I can remember. This one hits the ground running and doesn’t let up the pace for a minute.
There’s so many ideas crammed into this episode, and almost all of them are brilliant for capturing the imagination. Lady Peinforte and Richard travelling to the future being represented by the room changing around them while they stay in one place is brilliant. I love that her house is open to the public by 1988 and they arrive in the middle of the tea room — I can’t believe they’ve never done more with an idea like that in the New Testament. And because I’ve always liked this one I find it easier to love several of the things others might find fault with. I know people call out the non-reaction of the patrons in the tea room to the events before them as a problem… but I love it! Hah! I think it’s hilarious. If I’ve any complaint, I think you need to cut to a close up of someone tutting at the disturbance before taking a sip of their tea.
Lady Peinforte’s house is also home to my favourite shot of the story, and one I’d completely forgotten about. It’s the TARDIS arriving in the shadows at the top of the stairs. I’ve not banged the drum for making Doctor Who all on location for a while, so time to do it again now, and this is the perfect example! It looks fantastic — so real. It’s a world away from the sets of The Happiness Patrol. The actual shot is incredibly static, the camera remaining fixed even when Doctor Who and Ace emerge, but it just looks so good to see them poking around in a shadowy, solid house like this.
Most anniversary specials concern themselves with references to the past, but this goes one better by retrospectively containing a couple of references to the future. There’s the chess game which will later be revealed as part of Fenric’s plan, but Doctor Who also pops up wearing a fez and holding a mop, which will be a big plot point at the end of Matt Smith’s first run. I like to think Steven Moffat watched this one the night before writing his finale and thought ‘I’m having that…’.
McCoy and Aldred are great here — isn’t it brilliant watching them sitting around listening to jazz? It’s the Black Orchid situation again, where there’s something genuinely lovely about seeing our heroes given the chance to sit back and have a bit of fun. They look so right sat on the banks of the river with the tape deck, too, and I love that Doctor Who has built it as a replacement for Ace’s old one. I love the thought of him tinkering in a little workshop in the TARDIS somewhere, like my grandfather used to do in the garage. Is this the first time we’ve seen him in just shirtsleeves and pullover, too? It suits him!
If I’ve one complaint about all the material with Doctor Who and Ace it’s that we’re repeatedly told the story is set on November 23rd, when it quite obviously isn’t. The story was shot entirely on location across three weeks in June and July, and that’s exactly what it looks like. It wouldn’t be a problem except every time the date is mentioned (and it comes up a lot, they really want to make sure you got the memo that it’s set on the day of broadcast) it takes me out of things a bit.
Still, that’s a proper minor quibble, and if that’s the worst I have to say about an episode then that’s not a bad thing…! For me, this episode is everything I want Doctor Who to be, which is to say it’s just great fun to watch. A 9/10.
