The Sea Devils may well
truly deserve the mantle of the quintessential Jon Pertwee era story. It has
every vital ingredient. It has Jon Pertwee on extremely fine form indeed, and
he is complemented and truly aided by Katy Manning as the awesome Jo Grant. It
also boasts one of Roger Delgado's very finest outings as the Master. He always
was the perfect Moriarty to Jon's Sherlockian Doctor. And this story for once
does give us just a bit of a breather from the usual UNIT flavoured background
of almost every other Jon Pertwee Earth bound adventure.
Yet again Malcolm Hulke
writes a story that delivers rich characterisation and this is never once at
the expense of plot. It is assured and confident writing. Which is hardly
surprising seeming as Mac was always one of the most gifted classic era
writers. He tended to write many characters you cared for while watching. And
what Mac also possessed was the pen for also writing grey and selfish
characters too that one loves to loathe. In the Sea Devils it’s the snivelling Parliamentary
Private secretary whom one really loves to detest in almost every way.
The Sea Devil design was
one to give me nightmares. one can see their look is based on turtles but for
some reason when I was young, they scared the pants of me and then some.
Although I think the memorable and highly effective score from the Radiophonic
workshop aided my nightmares. The score of this story works extremely well, and
is definitely an experimental approach that succeeds. Several scenes indeed are
laced with palpable menace and are branded onto my memory because of this.
Michael Briant's direction
is superb within this story. There are several superb scenes. There is even the
smallest amount of pathos when the Doctor recalls to Jo at he and the Master
once being such good friends and his sadness at how that has changed. Then
there is the very impressively choreographed sword fight between Jon and Roger
which leads to a memorable climax for part two. (Aside from the sandwich that
falls off the table then miraculously jumps back onto the table a second
later!)
Declan Mulholland
particularly deserves praise for his role as the frightened sea fort worker
Clark. He is superb in his display of total fear at being attacked and cornered
by a sea devil. A superb scene follows as the Doctor uses his jiggery pokery to
set up a trap and thus drive the sea devil off. It’s actually a shame he
couldnt have been in the story just a little longer. But one is glad that he
survives the story and makes it out alive! When he turns his head towards the
darkness and sees the sea devil, I was well and truly scared out of my noggin
when I first watched this scene.
This story's cast are all
memorable and confident and competent. The pace of the story is extremely well
maintained too and yet again just not feel like nearly two and half hours’
worth of TV. Clive Morton is robustly sublime as the troubled Trenchard, who
ends up paying the price for being a cohort of the devious Master. His sense of
betrayal when he learns of what the Master's plans really are do a nice little
flip and make one feel sorry for him in his final moments as he defends the
prison from the invading sea devils.
Edwin Richfield too is
excellent as Captain Hart. In that he portrays a military naval man, but he's
not a complete bumbling idiot and he does know when to listen to the Doctor in
the end. June Murphy too copes easily and very well with the could have easily
been thankless role of Jane Blythe and somehow makes her seem far more of a
character than she may have come across as if done in any way differently!
However there maybe is
just one small sore point for me with this story. Sometimes the force of the
resistance of the enemy takes its toll on the Doctor, and here is a classic
example of it at the climax of this story. In the Silurians the Doctor was
incensed that the Brigadier would seal the Silurians into their base in Wenley
Moor, effectively wiping them out. His moral stab at the Brigadier in that
story's final scene was one of the Third Doctor's finest moments. But even with
the knowledge that the Sea Devils will not broker a peace with the humans, the
third Doctor is rather two faced here as he blows up the Sea Devil base, and
then he somewhat lamely announces that he did this to prevent a war. But to me
this seemed rather hypocritical for a man who had previously chided the
Brigadier for doing the self-same thing to the Silurian’s. But then again war
is never easy is it? War is useless and sometimes in the darkest moments there
is no happy outcome that can be brought.
The human’s butchery of
the sea devils with guns and depth charges smacks of total realism to me too.
If there were such creatures on the planet the plot seems highly believable in
that this scenario seems very like what humanity would do if they suddenly had
to share the planet with others. Maybe this story has a few Politically Correct
moments. Although I prefer to call them moral overtones myself. I for one
delight in good moral food for thought from a story and Malcolm Hulke's stories
always deliver them in abundance.
The location works well
and there are plenty of brilliant moments of tension and fear as this almost
perfect story unfolds. Its little wonder this story is so highly regarded. It
may not be quite as forceful in its moral ambiguity as Doctor Who and the Silurians,
but it still gets its message over loud and clear.
Yes, it’s no surprise this
story is seen as a true gem of the Jon Pertwee era.
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