Harry -
Pass the gin, Sarah.
Sarah -
Brave Heart, Old Boy. And don't worry, I bought the extra-large bottle.
Harry -
After the sad demise of the Fifth Doctor, one might have hoped that JN-T and crew might have eased us into a new Doctor. No such luck. It's regeneration crisis times a thousand with this new bloke. If he was any more in your face he'd come right through the screen.
Sarah -
Adios, feckless charm -- it's time to strangle the companion! I remember all too well my complete shock the first time I watched this regeneration. It's still a bit shocking, but I was able to appreciate the subtleties in Colin Baker's performance. There are so many bombastic moments that overwhelm the contrite moments when he's overwhelmed by the guilt of his actions. Peri is not far off when she diagnoses him as having a "manic depressive paranoid personality." This is the most bipolar regeneration crisis we've seen so far.
Harry -
It's notable that Peri's initial reaction to the new Doctor is negative, guiding us the viewers to take the same position early on. I don't know if any of the Doctor's lines were meant to be humorous, but everything is lost in Colin Baker's overwhelming delivery. There's definitely a lot of Colin here. Nicola Bryant is practically flinching during some of his outbursts.
Sarah -
We've seen companions dismayed and suspicious after a regeneration, but we haven't had anyone look like they want to throw themselves out of the TARDIS before now.
Colin's camp delivery of the Doctor's assessment of his new look made me laugh: "A noble brow. Clear gaze. At least it will be, given a few hours sleep. A firm mouth. A face beaming with a vast intelligence. My dear child, what on Earth are you complaining about?" He clearly was trying to bring something to it. Can we blame poor direction by Peter Moffatt?
Harry -
As with all regenerations, it's time for a new wardrobe. Oh yes, the new wardrobe.
I'll get the tonic and ice. Lime or lemon, Sarah?
Sarah -
Screw the mixers -- just pass me the bottle!
Is there anything left to say about the coat? It's dreadful and ridiculous. The only compensation is that we get to riffle around in the TARDIS wardrobe a bit. Look, it's the Second Doctor's coat and trousers! The Third Doctor's jacket and Tegan's coat! Ah, the memories of better days...
Harry -
There isn't much left to say about the coat. It's one of the worst decisions ever made by a Doctor Who showrunner. There's an interesting theory floating around that JN-T (who was no stranger to loud, tacky attire) essentially created the Doctor in his own image. I hate the coat. You hate the coat. Everyone in the universe hated the coat, except the one person that mattered.
Sarah -
There are several clips in the bonus DVD footage of Colin on chat shows, wearing the coat and gamely answering questions about it. Knowing how much he hated the costume, it's impressive that he was able to defend it. That's why they call it acting, eh?
Harry -
This is a unique story in that we got a mid-season regeneration. Well, there was one story to go, anyway. What I would have loved was if everything in this story was a one-off, reflecting the Doctor's regeneration fits. The clothes selection, the manic behaviour, the rudeness! Wouldn't it have been better if the next season started with the Doctor having settled down -- a less bombastic, less arrogant Doctor, dressed in muted shades -- and everything about this story just a momentary abberation before we got to the good stuff? Like David Tennant spending a story in his jim-jams before getting down to it. Unfortunately, this was the template that the following season's writers had to work from, so they continued with the Doctor that was set down in this story. JN-T was very wrapped up in the convention scene at the time, and might have been convinced to take that alternate path had someone offered it up, but alas. Oh, what might have been.
Sarah -
So, what did you think of the actual story?
Regeneration crisis aside, I was dreading "The Twin Dilemma", which may have turned out to be a good thing. It could almost only be better than expected. My memory of the story and everything in fan culture made me expect that it would be unwatchable, but it's certainly not the worst Doctor Who. My one-sentence review: "The Twin Dilemma -- at least it's not Time-Flight!"
Harry -
As a Doctor Who story -- especially for a post-regeneration story -- it's not bad at all. While the tempest rages aboard the TARDIS, we see cutaways to a futuristic household. A pair of twin teenage boys behave like a pair of teenage boys, dissing their dad before he steps out for the night. The twins play video games when an old man suddenly materializes in the middle of the room. The boys seem more impressed than alarmed by the feat. I mean, that sort of occurrence happens to all of us at some point, no?
Sarah -
Perhaps it only happens to maths geniuses? That would have left the two of us out.
On a side note, remember the sisters dressed as the twins at Chicago TARDIS a few years back? Those were amazing costumes.
Harry -
They do an impressive job every convention.
The old man who has appeared calls himself Professor Edgeworth, and promises to return when the twins' dad is home. But he suddenly seizes the twins and they all dematerialize, landing on a ship in outer space. Cue the feather-headed alien pilots! They looked like something out of the Hartnell era.
Sarah -
I love the Jacondans! Those are some seriously impressive alien costumes -- absolutely classic.
The twins' father returns home to find them gone and traces of Zanium, a residue of transmit, in their room. Realizing they've been kidnapped, he alerts the authorities and Lieutenant Hugo Lang is dispatched to track them down.
I'm not going to lie, Harry, I found Hugo to be quite a dish back in the day. He looks a proper rude boy with those suspenders and Ian Curtis haircut -- exactly what my teenage self was after.
Harry -
Hugo Lang, Space Cop. I like. We'll see plenty of handsome and hunky males in these stories as the JN-T era rolls on, and that's perfectly fine with me.
Sarah -
We've got to take what we can get.
Harry -
As the Colin Baker era rolls on, we'll see something I always found highly amusing: the extreme close up cliffhanger. There are three of them in this story alone! At the end of part one, Lang's spacecraft is shot down on Titan 3. The Doctor and Peri rescue him and bring him aboard the TARDIS. When he comes to, Lang pulls a gun on the Doctor, proclaiming him a murderer. EXTREME CLOSE UP ON COLIN'S FACE OF SHOCK, AND ROLL CREDITS!
Sarah -
It's fortunate Colin can bring the shock. Unfortunately, theses cliffhangers just made me laugh.
Harry -
Fortunately the space cop is subdued and the threat comes to nothing. While the TARDIS had come to Titan 3 so that the Doctor could take up a life of contemplation as a hermit, Lang was there in pursuit of the Jacondan ship. Edgeworth and the twins landed there and the boys were immediately put to work on some calculations for a powerful energy source. Their taskmaster is Mestor, who needs their genius to advance his ambitions.
Sarah -
I thought the whole "I'm going to live a life of contemplation and you will be my disciple" scene was amusing. Peri's "WTF?" response was hysterical.
DOCTOR: Titan Three. Thou craggy knob, which swims upon the oceans of the firmament. Receive this weary penitent.
PERI: I think I'm going to be sick.
Harry -
HAHAHAHAHA!
The Doctor and Peri go for a recce underground, eventually running into Edgeworth. Only the Doctor recognizes "Edgeworth" as Azmael, a fellow timelord.
Sarah -
Azmel's reaction to their arrival is just as amusing as Peri's
DOCTOR: We came to Titan Three of our own free will.
EDGEWORTH: Who in their right minds come to Titan Three of their own free will?
Harry -
HAHAHAHAHA!
Sarah -
I love the scene when the Doctor realizes Edgeworth is his old friend Azmael. His memories of their drunken night around the fountain sound exactly like something the Fourth Doctor would have gotten into.
Harry -
Can totally see that. Actually, any of the first four Doctors might have had that wild night at the fountain.
Sarah -
It's hard to imagine it happening after that.
Harry -
True.
Back on the TARDIS, Lang wakes up again and does what any of us would do: he enters the wardrobe of a total stranger and changes into the loudest shirt he can find. Who among us can say we haven't done that?
Sarah -
We've all been there. And who hasn't been tempted to hide a gun's powerpack in the loudest shirt we can find?
The Doctor is horrified by Azmael's plan to use the twins to do Mestor's bidding and implores him to stop. Not believing that he has a choice in the matter, Azmael locks the Doctor and Peri in the base and hightails it out of there with the twins and Jacondans. What he doesn't know is that Noma has set the base to self-destruct. The Doctor starts out trying to break the combination lock on the base, until Peri alerts him to the self-destruct mechanism. He immediately starts to work on modifying the transporter, sending Peri to the TARDIS, where Hugo is waiting. She expects the Doctor to arrive after her and can only think the worst when the base explodes.
Harry -
PERI: Oh no, Docterrrrr!
EXTREME CLOSE UP ON PERI'S FACE OF GRIEF, AND ROLL CREDITS!
Sarah -
I can only imagine Nicola hated that final shot.
Harry -
It turns out that Peri's grief was premature. The Doctor fades back into existence, having set the transporter slightly ahead of time before correcting it. I did like his comment to Peri immediately afterward: "You know, I'll never understand the people of Earth. I have spent the day using, abusing, even trying to kill you. If you'd have behaved as I have, I should have been pleased at your demise." This line anticipates something of Peter Capaldi's Doctor, who is made aware of his appalling rudeness and uses cue cards to help him overcome it -- or at least to be less appallingly rude to people.
Sarah -
It's a good moment and Colin plays it well.
My absolute favorite moment of the story is in episode 3 -- when the Doctor bursts into Azmael's lab, shouting, "Villain! Murderer!" I laughed so hard I had to pause the DVD and then rewatched it twice. There was no scenery left for Colin to chew after that moment!
Harry -
The chase continues, as it's on to Jaconda! We soon discover that the planet is a paradise rendered to dust by the giant gastropods who have taken over, and whose ambitions stretch far beyond it. Here is where we learn of Mestor's incredible ambition. He wants the twins to calculate a means of moving entire planets into the orbit of Jaconda, providing the wasted planet with a new source of supplies. It's celestial engineering on a mind-bending scale. We won't see this kind of madness again until Davros tries to pull it off in "The Stolen Earth / Journey's End".
Ourtraged, the Doctor turns on Azmael. Lang gets clubbed. The Jacondans seize Peri, meaning to kill her.
DOCTOR: No! Periiiii!
EXTREME CLOSE UP OF THE DOCTOR'S FACE OF GRIEF, AND ROLL CREDITS!
It's amazing. Three straight cliffhangers with extreme close ups.
Sarah -
Well, at least it's consistent.
The Doctor rediscovers his compassion and springs into action when he thinks Peri's in jeopardy. The Doctor convinces Mestor that he can help with the planet moving project.
Meanwhile, Mestor decides not to kill her because he likes the way she looks -- yet another creepy alien putting the moves on Peri.
Harry -
NOMA: Why don't you kill her?
MESTOR: I find her pleasing. Pleasing!
My entire body cringed. So awful.
Sarah -
We're going to have to withstand a lot of sexual harassment of Peri in the coming weeks.
Harry -
Turns out, Azmael is not so hot at celestial engineering. The Doctor points out that if two smaller planets are moved into orbit around Jaconda, they will eventually be pulled away and crash into the sun. Double facepalm for Azmael. Woops!
Sarah -
D'oh!
Harry -
At least this helps foil Mestor's master plan, which not only involved feasting on the resources of the two smaller planets, but then propagating the gastropod race by scattering with millions of extremely durable eggs across the universe. All rather brazen.
Sarah -
Mestor was really playing the long game with this plot.
Harry -
I said at the beginning that this story was not bad, but it gets let down by a sham ending. His plans exposed, Mestor attempts to telepathically take over the Doctor's body. Some conveniently bottled acid comes in handy. The Doctor hurls it and it shatters over an exposed Mestor, who proceeds to bubble, gurgle and melt in a very satisfying fashion. Sadly, Azmael dies too.
Sarah -
But not before a trip down memory lane with his old friend, the Doctor.
Harry -
Then, we get treated to an unexpected panto scene featuring Mestor's feathery Jacondan chamberlain, who bows and scrapes and begs to come aboard the TARDIS. It was so stupid but I loved it. The Doctor shoos him away, says something rude to Lang, then barges into the TARDIS with Peri on his heels. That scene was like the entire Colin Baker era in microcosm.
Sarah -
Fasten your seatbelt, Old Boy, it's going to be a bumpy couple of seasons!
Harry -
DOCTOR: "I am the Doctor, whether you like it or not!"
We're going to need a lot more gin.
Best line: "Something's very wrong. Oh no, has it come to that? Regenerate, yet unregenerate."
Favourite moment: the panto chamberlain scene at the end.
Lasting image: The Doctor, Peri and Lang in the TARDIS, wearing the loudest clothes in the universe.
6/10
Sarah -
Best Line: "I am the Doctor, whether you like it or not!"
If that's not a mission statement, I don't know what is.
Favorite moment: "Villain! Murderer!"
Lasting image: The Doctor bursting into the lab shouting "Villain! Murderer!"
6/10
Our marathon continues with Story #137 - Attack of the Cybermen...
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