There are quite a few separate story-lines to follow with this episode, so I figured I might as well review each of those in this post.
The Doctor
Finally back on his feet, we get to see the first real glimpses of Three here. For some reason, he seems quite like a squirrel to me, nervously scurrying his way around the hospital. Yes, that's right. Nine is a tiger, Ten is Tigger, Eleven is an uncoordinated house cat, Twelve is an owl, but Three, Three is a squirrel.
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| A precedent for generations to come |
He finds a hospital locker room and does what he does best in hospital locker rooms: steals from it. Well, first he takes a shower. Gratuitous shirtless scenes aren't just a thing of NuWho, are they? I mean, this scene is literally just as pointless as Eleven having to be naked to go to the Church of the Papal Mainframe (Silence), and more pointless than Eight wearing just a sheet, Nine being shirtless, and TenToo being naked when he regenerates from the hand.
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| I really hope whoever brought this outfit to work at the hospital was going to a costume party too. |
Anyway, he soon finds clothes to put on, choosing a rather absurd outfit cobbled together from various doctor's outfits that they left here. What I want to know is, what doctor dresses like that? Who wears a black and red cape to work? I'm pretty sure even in 1970, they didn't do that. So I don't know why those clothes were there. But they were, and he takes them, and wears this absurd outfit out the door.
And we find out another interesting thing about the Doctor. He doesn't know how to drive a car. Of course he doesn't, he's a five hundred year old (give or take a few centuries) Time Lord from Gallifrey. They don't drive cars in the Citadel of the Time Lords. It doesn't take him long to figure out, though, after pulling just about every lever on the dashboard, and accidentally going forward instead of reversing, he's completely got the hang of it and can drive like he's been doing it for years. I guess when you (sort of) know how to fly a TARDIS, driving a car can't be that hard to figure out.
And he heads to UNIT HQ. I may be wrong here, but the scene where the Doctor yells at the guard that he wants to see the Brigadier and he isn't going to give any sort of identification seems rather like Two. He did that a lot in The War Games, if I remember correctly. Then again, the new Doctor does tend to act like his previous incarnation in his first story--or maybe this is the story that set the precedent for that. This story sets a lot of precedents (more on that later).
And he comes in to the laboratory, and meets...
The Brigadier and Liz
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| Much sarcasm |
What to say about these two? They pretty much start by rehashing the old conversation they had in Episode One, where the Brigadier believes in aliens and Liz doesn't, because that sort of stuff is silly and she's a scientist and believes in facts etc, etc.
We definitely get more character development for Liz here. She's very proper and stubborn, to the point that it infuriates the Brigadier. She doesn't want to be at UNIT--I guess I missed that in the first episode? Why is she there if she doesn't want to be? She's also wonderfully, amazingly, hilariously sarcastic. I hope that sticks around, because she's going to be magnificent. Just a few gems:
Talking about opening the TARDIS, "There might be a policeman locked inside."
And, the best one, to the regular army liaison with UNIT. "It's not a police box. It's a disguise. That's actually a space ship."
And of course, she deals in science not science fiction. Ha!
The Brigadier continues to be very realistic in this episode, but you start to see here that his version of realism is very different from Liz's. He's seen aliens. He knows they exist. And he's realistic about that. He'll assume an alien origin to something if the facts point that way. She simply refuses to believe something so out of the ordinary could happen.
Also, the Brigadier comes across as much less formal as compared to Liz's very proper attitude towards him. He's frustrated with her, and I imagine that'll probably continue to happen.
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| Guess Who else speaks excellent Delphon? |
When they meet the Doctor, Liz and the Doctor take to each other immediately. He's very friendly, much more friendly than he's been to anyone else in this story so far. Saying hello in Delphon was such a great way to break the ice that it almost seems to have cemented a friendship between the two (I know she's going to work with him, so I at least hope that's the case.)
As for the Brigadier, he still doesn't quite believe that the Doctor is actually the Doctor. The Doctor responds with some deep thing like, "Ah, but you don't [know that I'm the Doctor]. Only I know that." I imagine he'll do this sort of philosophizing a lot. I mean, his last words were "While there's life, there's [hope]."
Sam Seeley
Yeah, he's going to die. (Does he, I don't remember?) He's a jerk to his wife, and his wife, in turn, is some sort of stereotypical nagging hag. I don't know what he's doing with that pulsy-glowy sphere, but it's going to get him killed. The last we see him, the Autons are approaching his shed, ready to get that thing back.
Not going to end well.
The Plastics Lab
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| Possessed or evil? Or both? |
I didn't catch any names here, so the three main people from the plastics lab are henceforth known as Head of Company, Creepy-Staring Guy, and Scientist.
Nah, just kidding. That's what I call them in my head, though, because I didn't catch their names. On the Tardis Data Core Wiki, it gives them as George Hibbert, John Ransome, and Channing.
George Hibbert doesn't seem to really know what's going on. He seems skeptical of the fact that energy units could be alive, to say the least, and while he's in on Channing's plan, he doesn't seem to know the full extent of what's going on.
John Ransome, well, he's probably going to die. That's my default theory for all minor characters who become too involved in the story for it to be acceptable to the villains. He even breaks into the plastics lab to get back into the place where his lab used to be. And gets attacked by Autons.
Channing. Well, Channing is obviously evil and working for the Autons/Nestene Consciousness. That's the extent of his characterization at this point. He prowls around, stares at people in a threatening manner, and that's about it. I mean, it's very creepy, but that's all he's done so far.
Side Note: Parallels
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| Sometimes he speaks better Delphon than others. |
I'm starting to think that this story was a template for all subsequent regeneration stories.
The most obvious being, of course, the Doctor stealing clothes from the hospital locker room. Setting a precedent for many Doctors to come, Three gets his outfit from a bunch of Doctors who obviously dress very strangely. Now, with Eight it was explained that they were going to a costume party, and with Eleven, well, a doctor can be excused for wearing a bow tie because bow ties are cool. But these doctors just dress very strangely.
Still, it is appropriate that, being called the Doctor, the Doctor would get his outfit from a hospital.
Also, the Doctor acts (I think) like his previous incarnation for a moment at UNIT headquarters, something repeated with almost all Doctors following Three.
Stealing a car? Eleven stole a fire truck. Eight stole a motorbike.
Autons? Nine had just regenerated too.
An old acquaintance/friend not accepting that he's the Doctor? Ben and Polly didn't believe Two (It didn't help he was referring to One in third person). Grace didn't believe Eight. Rose and Jackie didn't believe Ten. Clara...well, we'll see. She knows about regeneration, but Moffat said....never mind. Rule Zero: Moffat lies.
I admit I probably don't have a full list for these, as I never finished Robot or Time and the Rani, barely even started The Twin Dilemma, and don't remember Castrovalva that well. I know NuWho inside and out. Other than that, my knowledge is questionable.
Final Note: The Cliffhanger
Really? Okay, so I knew that this one was coming, but it's really not very worrisome. In fact, because I was already theorizing that Ransome was going to die, this cliffhanger actually makes me less worried about it. I mean, a cliffhanger is supposed to make you wonder how the character is going to get out of a situation. There's no point in having the resolution of a cliffhanger be "The character doesn't get out of the situation and is killed." It just doesn't work like that.
So this cliffhanger is the opposite of worrying. I now fully expect Ransome to live for a while longer now.
Still, I want to see more of Liz, the Brigadier, and the Doctor, so I anxiously await Spearhead from Space, Episode 3.
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