Day 76 — March 17th 2021
The Moonbase Episodes One and Two
The Moonbase — Episode One
I can’t explain why, but there’s something a bit magical about The Moonbase. Always has been. When I think of early Troughton, or Season Four in general, for some reason my mind automatically defaults to the image of Doctor Who, Ben and Polly in the TARDIS from this story, and it just is this era. I wonder if it’s because when I was first getting into the series this was the most complete of the early Troughton serials? There was 50% of this one in existence, compared to 33% of The Faceless Ones, 25% of The Underwater Menace, 14% of The Evil of the Daleks, and 0% of The Power of the Daleks, The Highlanders and The Macra Terror. Of course since then Underwater Menace has gone up to match the 50% survival rate, and with animations you can technically add three more of those tales to the shelf.
It’s also the first time Troughton’s Doctor Who encounters the Cybermen, who’ll go on to be his ‘iconic’ opponents, so that gives it a certain weight of importance, too. I’ve never really thought about it before, but these are only the second enemy to make a return appearance to the series, and it comes a few years after the Daleks were the originals. We’ll start seeing a lot more recycling of elements over the next few years.
I’m glad, coming into this one with a sense of importance, to find that it’s a lot of fun, and really easy listening. The opening few minutes focus entirely on the TARDIS crew, and it’s hard not to get sucked into the enjoyment they’re having in each other’s company. There’s more gentle teasing of Jamie in the TARDIS, and then plenty of larking about on the surface of the Moon, which just makes you want to spend time with them. I think this is the first time we’ve really had a team like this — who come across as just good friends having fun in time and space. Hartnell’s Doctor Who was always slightly removed from his companions; if he was friendly with them it was from the point of view of a grandfather, rather than a best mat. It really suits Troughton’s Doctor Who, though, and I think if I had to pick any line up from the series to travel with, it would be this one.
There’s an interesting thread running through these early Troughton episodes which I’ve been enjoying greatly — people taking a dislike to his costume. In The Highlanders he’s dismayed to find that someone has put it out with the rubbish (to no surprise from Polly), Ben comments on the trousers in The Underwater Menace, and here Hobson says ‘You could do with a extra bacteria check by the look of it’ upon seeing him. I have no issue with Troughton’s costume, indeed I can’t imagine him in anything else, but it is tatty, and it’s nice to see that noted on screen. It’s no wonder no-one ever listens to him!
I’d love to know how the Moon stuff looked. The behind the scenes photos show up some fairly obvious wires suspending Anneke Wills above the ground, but the few tele-snaps we have from this sequence look quite impressive. It also feels like something really new for the programme — I can’t imagine them doing this in the Hartnell era, and yet it’s so on topic for the zeitgeist of the time, with this episode being broadcast a couple of years before we really made it to the Moon.
Inside the base it’s very much what we’re going to think of as ‘business and usual’ for the next two seasons, and it’s interesting to note how this story takes the ‘Base Under Siege’ format introduced in The Tenth Planet and pushes it further. Interestingly, I think this is probably the only one of these stories which actually does feature a base under siege.
Something which is especially enjoyable about doing this episode via the Narrated Soundtrack is that the threat is kept a mystery for now. There’s nothing so far to actually indicate that it’s the Cybermen, and when it comes to the cliffhanger we only get descriptions of ‘a shape’ and ‘a shadow falling over Jamie’. I quite like that, as the suspense in this episode is top notch already, and that adds an extra level to it.
A great start to the story, and an 8/10 on the ratings.
Something else to note today is that this is the first time we really get to see the discrepancy between the TARDIS model built for The Rescue and the full-size prop following its refit during The War Machines. The model shows up in The Underwater Menace for both the arrival and departure, but we don’t get to see the full size prop to compare. Here, though, the Saint John’s Ambulance badge is clearly visible whenever you cut to the model.
The Moonbase — Episode Two
I had a minor panic sitting down to watch this one, because the BritBox image for this episode is a shot from the animation and I suddenly thought I’d misremembered which two episodes of The Moonbase exist. For a moment it seemed like all my ‘I wonder how this would have looked’ stuff about Episode One was going to prove redundant. That would be a fun way to have an episode recovery, though, wouldn’t it? Just stick it up on Britbox without any fanfare and see how long it is before someone notices.
Anyway, this episode does exist, so I got to sit down and watch it. And how lucky are we to have it, given that it contains perhaps the most iconic Troughton moment;
Doctor Who: ‘There are some corners of the universe which have bred the most terrible things. Things which act against everything that we believe in. They must be fought.’
I’ve spoken a fair bit on this blog about when the character becomes the Doctor Who we know and love, and while I’ve always said that it happens over a period of time during the Hartnell era, I know this is one of the times that often gets picked out by fans as a defining moment. It’s a brilliant line superbly played. There’s a reason it’s become iconic.
As much as I took to the design of the Cybermen from The Tenth Planet this time around, I think they look better here already. What’s interesting is that — within the fiction — there’s a suggestion that we’re just supposed to go along with the new look and pretend this is what they looked like last time, too.
Certainly there’s a chance that Polly recognises that they’re Cybermen because of the handlebar design on the head, and that there’s a unit on their chest, but otherwise I think they look so different that she’d not make the connection so quickly from such a fleeting glimpse of them. It’s also telling that neither Ben or Doctor Who comment on the fact that they’ve had a total redesign either.
The promotion of this story was done with a load of Cybermen out and about in ‘real’ London locations, waiting around at bus stops and using telephone booths, and there’s something brilliant about those photographs that really fires my imagination. They’re so out of character, but they’re magical in their own way, too.
A 7/10 from me for this one.
