"The point is, the Doctor doesn't
get to Tigella!"
"Oh, but he does gentlemen, he
does...We mustn't disappoint the Tigellans!"
Far from being a lacklustre season, season 18 was an incredibly
strong farewell to Tom Baker as the Doctor. Over the course of seven wonderful
years he had taken the show to the zenith of its popularity. But as the 80s
began Doctor Who was seriously up against some serious viewing figure
challenges like never before. The viewing figures for Season 18 were very low
indeed. But this is by no means any indicator that the show was lagging.
Because it was actually entering the 80s with quite some mature and fervent
bang to be honest.
From the opening scene of Meglos though one can see that our
wonderful main man of the moment, Tom himself, is in very distinctly poor
health. He looks worn out and even haggard and it’s a true credit to his acting
ability that he still gave his utmost to the role even when poorly and
discontent with the show. The changeover in production had not sat well with
Tom and so he reluctantly decided to leave. But with Meglos that happenstance
is still five stories away.
In many ways Meglos is perhaps the most traditional of all the
season eighteen stories. It has the megalomaniacal despot, this time though in
the very distinctive form of Meglos. Meglos of course resembles a cactus in his
natural Xeraphite form, but this cactus is one mean and nasty baddie indeed. It
is a real pleasure that we get none other than Tom Baker playing Meglos too,
and his performance is unsurprisingly rich and superb. There is a real vein of
acidity in his performance of Meglos. Of course, with Tom playing both the role
of the Doctor and Meglos its inevitable that we will have the epic meeting of
the dopplegangers at the climax of the story. But as with every single
doppleganger story before in the show, here it is a brilliant moment that caps
off a very entertaining and very underrated romp indeed. Yes, and the Meglos
make up looks phenomenally good on Tom, even though it must have been
uncomfortable for him to perform in. What a trooper Tom, thank you!
Lalla Ward is hilarious when she leads the Gaztaks around in
circles and makes fools of them. I love the streak of grit that runs through
both of Romana's hearts. She is not a pushover; she could easily manage being
the lead of her own show.
Bill Fraser is a wonderful henchman to Meglos, his General
Grugger being rough and tough and sharp tongued. However, it is his own
underling Brotadac, played with zeal and aplomb by the superb Frederick Treves
who rather steals the scenes. It’s very amusing to think the writers of the
story came up with the name Brotadac as a funny re arrangement of the words Bad
Actor, with them seeing the character whilst writing it as perhaps being
portrayed by some hammy or underwhelming actor! John Flannagan and Andrew
McCulloch have since quoted Frederick as playing the role extremely well
indeed, and one cannot disagree with them.
Another great yet understated performance is given by
Christopher Owen as the Earthling. I wonder how any normal person would feel
being kidnapped by Gaztaks and then taken over Meglos! Considering this very
thing happens to his character, the Earthling still gets some good moments when
he rebels and fights desperately to free himself of Meglos's spines. You root
for him and eventually he does shake off Meglos. Although his last comment to
the Doctor before he gets to go home is rather casually sexist and unnecessary.
But this is only a very minor quibble and can pass by the way.
Jacqueline Hill! Oh, to see the wonderful actress back in a new
Doctor Who story is very special and very, very welcome. There is absolutely
nothing of Barbara Wright in Lexa. Lexa in fact starts out brash and perhaps
bordering on the typical religious zealot, but when she knows she is the wrong
for almost having the Doctor executed as a sacrifice she comes good. And then
the poor women is shot in good old trusted "Let’s kill off the best
characters in the show" brigade. But it is a chance to be savoured seeing
Jacqueline light up the screen again after so long.
Colette Gleeson and Crawford Logan are equally diverting in
their roles as Caris and Deedrix. their early run ins with Lexa are brilliantly
charged and performed. They spice up the early segments of the story nicely.
Edward Underdown is rather kindly, and portrays the Tigellan
leader Zastor with a huge amount of gentle pathos. He is unassuming and this
helps him stand out as one of the more reasonable and approachable leaders of
an alien society on another planet.
The story's use of Scene Sync is very impressive, and here
works very well indeed, it’s a considerable leap forward from Colour Separation
Overlay.
Perhaps the story's main shortfall is it does seem terribly
short. The last three episodes of the story seriously underrun, the last in
particular being a very meagre 18 minutes! The other shortfall is the poor
realisation of the jungle, particularly the bell plant designs. They fail to
remotely convince and its strange thinking these same designs come from the
same show that a few months previously had produced a spectacular jungle in The
Creature from The Pit. But despite the limitations of the budget, this story is
still well paced, with a very strong central villain.
And just because this is the most traditional of the season 18
yarns, there is still some very good ideas floating around in this story.
Especially the Chronic Hysteresis. How the Doctor and co escape from the trap
set by Meglos too is wonderfully simple and yet comes over as a brilliant means
of breaking the fold of time.
Meglos is one of those stories you never hear much spoken of.
It has plenty of worth and merit. It’s a very solid story in a vastly
underrated overall season. Tom Baker did not bow out with a whimper, he went
out with a bang. And a resounding and brilliant bang at that...
