Harry -
Strangely, it didn't feel like Season 18 had properly started until we got to this, the third story of the season. For all the changes that JN-T, Bidmead and company were bringing to the show, "The Leisure Hive" and "Meglos" felt like they had a foot still in the 70s.
Sarah -
Cue the Killing Joke:
We're living in the 80s! I've got to push. I've got to struggle. I've got to go to E-Space!
Harry -
It's Goodbye 70s!
Matthew Waterhouse is so innocent here.
Sarah -
It's a whole new era and the stage is set for the departure of Romana and K-9.
Harry -
It's very clear that Romana and K-9 are yesterday's news. K-9 spends most of the story trundling around, before having his head knocked off. Horrors! The moment leads to a groanworthy in-joke from Romana: "He can be repaired. In fact, we always seem to be repairing him." Hah!
After that, Romana gets bitten by a huge spider (my personal horror) and is very much not her old self as she goes into shock, then a coma, then becomes part of a sort of hive mind linked with the "marsh creatures" on the planet Alzarius. In short, K-9 and Romana both get the short end in "Full Circle".
Sarah -
As if K-9 hasn't suffered enough these past seasons!
Harry -
Strangely though, in my notes I recorded the fact that for most of this adventure, the Doctor spent all his time just strolling from place to place, having little chats with people until the final rush to the finish. An odd one, this.
Sarah -
Odd, yet still compelling. I put much of this down to the excellent guest actors.
Harry -
Still, Matthew Waterhouse. Couldn't you just bring him home, put him under glass and watch over him forever?
Sarah -
Ah, Adric! Poor, maligned Adric. I have a theory about Adric. Do you want to hear it Old Boy?
Harry -
You have piqued my interest.
Sarah -
Yes, my word, you may well ask what it is, this theory of mine. Well, this theory that I have -- that is to say, which is mine -- ...is mine. *AHEM!* "The Adric Theory by Sarah Jane brackets Ms. brackets." My theory is along the following lines:
-- Adric is a teenage boy.
-- Teenage boys are annoying. (I know this for a fact, as I currently live with one. I love him more than the entire universe + E-Space, but he's still annoying and that's quite beyond his control. It's just how teenage boys are.)
-- Teenage boys who are, or perceive themselves to be, smarter than others are especially annoying.
-- A significant majority of Doctor Who fans were once teenage boys, many of whom would have perceived themselves to be smarter than others.
Adric simply hits too close to home for Doctor Who fans. They either were Adric as a teenager, or knew someone like Adric as a teenager. I know this is only his first appearance and there's more Adric to come, but he's got a bad and unfair rap in fandom. It's become received knowledge that Adric is the worst companion and he's not even close. I don't remember there being so much Adric hate back in the day, but it's become the cheap laugh line to rip on Adric. So cut it out, everyone!
Have I ever mentioned I had a cat named Adric in the 80s?
Harry -
There is much to appreciate in this, your theory, which you have.
Sarah -
And which is mine.
Harry -
It's true we have both rolled our eyes at the cheap laugh lines about Adric over the years.
At the same time, it is interesting to compare his reputation to that of another young character who is something of an outcast, quite brainy but socially awkward, and also presented as someone for viewers to relate to -- I'm talking about Osgood in the current series. Adric is generally panned, but Osgood seems to be popular. She's embraced as a "fan" of the Doctor's, even though Matthew Waterhouse himself was a fan before being cast as Adric. Maybe time will be cruel to Osgood too, as fans "outgrow" her the way most people seemed to outgrow Adric. Three decades from now, people might deride her as "that nerdy fangirl character, ugh how embarrassing."
Sarah -
I hadn't thought of that connection. And, well, she is dead. I know, I know -- spoilers!
Harry -
Back in the 80s, my impression of Adric was that he was this amazing starchild who got to travel with the Doctor. At the same time, it didn't occur to me that he was traveling through time and space in rumpled, dirty-looking pajamas, which is the first thing I see now. It's all in the perception I guess. (This should not imply that I spent my youth shuffling about in rumpled pajamas.)
Sarah -
He did have that star for maths, which kind of spiffed up the jammies!
Harry -
Anyway, Adric isn't even a companion in this story. He's just Matthew Waterhouse playing a kid in a gang. You can tell how carefully he's acting here, almost terrified to get his lines wrong. The actors playing Varsh, Tylos and Keara appear more comfortable in front of the cameras. Ironically, it will be Adric whom we will see again after this adventure.
And I'm not sure if you ever mentioned the cat before. Was it smarter than everyone else?
Sarah -
Mostly, he was annoying.
Harry -
Maybe we should talk about the adventure now. I can hear Christopher H. Bidmead sighing all the way over here!
Sarah -
He does quite enough sighing in the bonus featurettes. We don't need to encourage him. To the adventure!
Harry -
At the end of "Meglos", the Doctor informed Romana that they had received the call -- the call from Gallifrey. Suddenly acting very responsibly, the Doctor set the coordinates for their home planet. Romana's reaction was very much the opposite. Having travelled time and space with the Doctor and K-9, the idea of going back to Gallifrey's static, almost calcified culture of non-interference was horrid to her.
Sprawled out bed pouting followed. The Doctor's strangely dutiful behavior was, well, strange. Did he want to be alone again so badly?
Sarah -
It's definitely out of character. It seems even the Doctor cannot escape the will of the producer...er, I mean the Time Lords...no, really, I mean the producer.
Romana's reaction is brilliant. She entered the TARDIS as an agent of the Time Lords, with barely concealed contempt for the Doctor and his unconventional ways. Now she's addicted to adventure and doesn't want to give up the vagabond life. No one leaves the TARDIS unchanged -- for better or worse.
Harry -
Before we can find out what was going on there, the TARDIS suddenly enters a space-time anomaly event thing. Shaking cameras! The console tells them that they have landed on Gallifrey, but stepping out through the doors, they find an entirely different planet. It's Earth-like with familiar climate and vegetation, and the local culture seems to be an odd combination of mediaeval times and the space age. They aren't on Gallifrey, or Kansas for that matter...
Sarah -
E-Space at last! We meet the locals, who seem to be obsessed with harvesting river fruit and frolicking in the river -- except for the hearty band of teenage malcontents, determined to steal the river fruit. Our band of young rebels is led by Varsh, whose younger brother Adric is eager to join the group. The others are suspicious of him, partly due to the maths badge he wears, which marks him as an elite, not to be trusted. Desperate for approval, Adric says he will steal some river fruit. In an epic twist of bad timing, he's heading to the river just in time for mistfall...
Harry -
Mistfall... Mistfall! The Deciders give the order: "Quick, everyone aboard the starliner!"
Sarah -
"The Deciders" is an odd name for leaders who can't ever seem to make a decision.
Harry -
Hold on now, this society of rural melon-gatherers has a spaceship? There's an odd twist.
Soon enough, we find out that the ship is more like a fallout shelter where everyone is supposed to hide for ten years everytime Mistfall comes around. Supposedly, the air outside cannot support life - a lie soon exposed when the Doctor and Romana arrive.
Sarah -
I also have questions about the demographics of this society. Did you notice that the entire colony seems to consists of four adults and dozens of teenagers? What is with that? Perhaps there are more folks in the starliner, but we never see them. the model does make it look quite large.
Harry -
While the Alzarians are holed up inside the starliner, another race of creatures appears out of the waters. The marsh creatures stagger about, looking scary but as the Doctor observes, they are childlike and confused. At first. It's not very long before they start a rampage, attacking the starliner, attacking our friends, and causing the aforementioned knocking off of K-9's head. Poor dog!
Sarah -
They also end up toting the TARDIS to a cave full of spider eggs just about to hatch (!) -- while it contains Romana, Adric, and the other rebels. These marsh men must be stronger than they look!
Harry -
I mentioned above that Romana being bitten by the spider was horrific. With her sidelined and K-9 in pieces, it falls to the Doctor to get the Deciders off their arses. Their willful procrastination was the reason why the starliner never took off - when it was just sitting there, in a state of readiness, for generations.
Sarah -
It's almost tragic that they spend all their time just maintaining the starliner, when it's more than ready to take off.
Harry -
The Doctor does some sciency stuff too, in order to cure Romana of the spider bite. Turns out the spiders, the marsh creatures and the Alzarians share the same gene pool, and each of them reflect a different stage of the evolutionary process on the planet. There was no home planet for the starliner to go to - Alzarius was the home planet. This "full circle" concept is at the heart of Andrew Smith's story.
Smith by the way was also a youngster, making his writing debut here. He has since cranked out a bunch of Big Finish audio stories, including some set in E-Space.
Sarah -
Discovering the truth of their history certainly makes recent events a bit awkward for the Alzarians. To think they were running from grandma and grandpa all this time.
Harry -
All in all, "Full Circle" is a decent story. It continues the serious, "hard science" theme of the season, introduces some fresh new faces, and bounces along through four brisk episodes.
Too bad about Varsh. He had potential. I wonder where that Adric kid disappeared to at the end...
Sarah -
Who knows, maybe he'll turn up again.
Harry -
Best Line:
LOGIN: "A little patience goes a long way."
DOCTOR: "Yes, but too much patience goes absolutely nowhere."
Favourite Moment: when the ineffectual Deciders introduce themselves with a pompous flourish.
Lasting Image: the marsh creatures emerge like something from the Black Lagoon.
7/10
Sarah -
Best Line:
Romana : "Doctor, I don't want to spend the rest of my life on Gallifrey - after all this!"
The Doctor : "Well, you can't fight Time Lords, Romana."
Romana : "You did, once."
The Doctor : "And lost."
Favorite Moment: Romana doesn't want to leave the TARDIS.
Lasting Image: Romana bit by the spider.
7/10
Harry -
Thank you ever so much for making me search that image, SARAH.
Our marathon continues with Story #112: State of Decay...
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