This story is really under rated! I don’t think it gets the love it deserves. 4 and Sarah are at their peak here with their chemistry. The location filming is beautiful and the story is good fun.
This was filmed in Portmeirion, Wales, a tourist village designed by architect Sir Clough Williams-Ellis in an Italianate style. The trippy 1960's television series The Prisoner was filmed on location there.
A fine story but what really pushes it into excellence for me are the stunning visuals. There are times when it resembles a Renaissance painting appropriately enough. The mahogany cathedral-esque decor of the new console room, the piquancy of fresh oranges, the dazzling jewelled spiral of the Mandragora Helix, the cobalt ooze on the Helix's victims, the flair of Hieronymus' purple robe and golden mask bathing in the red ray of Helix light etc. It's a gorgeous episode. And Hieronymus' beard is an awesome sight.
This story marked the first reference to The TARDIS translation circuits explaining how The Doctor and their companions can understand english wherever they go
So many parts of this reaction I enjoyed. :) You're not alone in missing pure historicals at all. I think there's just as much fun in seeing the Doctor and co. trying to avoid being killed in a historical setting as there is with an alien monster. I like to imagine that Jess is present for all of these stories, just hanging out off-screen in the Tardis' spa and never getting involved in the adventures.
This has a special place in my heart as this was my first Doctor Who story ever. I saw it on PBS in Chicago in 1978. I have been pretty much hooked for 45 years.
Not sure of the general fan consensus on this one but I really love Four and Sarah in this story, their dynamic has really hit its stride and Tom and Lis are clearly having fun together.
I love the novelization of this story. And the Doctor's description of Sarah in this scene. The Doctor: Excuse me. I'm a traveller around here. I'm a stranger in these parts, and I was wondering if you'd seen a girl. She'd be about . . . (A group of four horsemen come round the corner and the peasants flee.) The Doctor: She's a friend of mine. She'd be about five foot four and a half. Rossini: (Federico's Captain) Who are you? The Doctor: I'm a traveller. Rossini: From where? The Doctor: Have you seen a young girl, about five foot . . Rossini: Silence! The Doctor: . . probably with orange juice on her chin. Observational accuracy combined with romantic imagery.
This is actually my favorite 4th Doctor story because it was my very first experience with Classic Who. I was surprised with how great the writing was, how well the visuals worked, and of course how great Tom and Lis were. It actually inspired me to go back and watch the Sarah Jane Adventures.
That the writing is excellent is not surprising. Louis Marks who wrote this story earned a PhD in History at Oxford, specializing in the Italian Renaissance in the 1950s.
The production on this story is great! BBC always has great costumes for historical episodes. This story introduces a new tardis interior plus the police box prob was brand new and made of fiberglass.
The Sarah Jane Adventures story with The Ancient Lights and Mr. Truman was originally meant to be a pseudo-sequel to this story. It was later changed for simplicity reasons.
This story has the best costumes Ever, classic or NuWho! I want to point out this is Sarah-Jane's 4th season opener!! No other companion outside of UNIT personnel has done that!
You’re right the “pure” historircals, with no added sci-fi elements were phased out in the 2nd Doctor era. I may be wrong, but it may have be the Highlanders, Jamie’s first story that was the last one to this point.
Creative concept and execution. The Mandragora was meant to be in The Sarah Jane Adventures but due to having to change so much of the entity they opted for the villain to be The Ancient Lights instead. Many see the two as 'cousin' entities I say the pair are a part of a triad. Madragora as a present sentient constellation Ancient Lights as a pre universe force And the third being from the next universe that will replace ours
I honestly think Season 14 is one of the best seasons in all of Doctor Who, including both Classic and New. A rare season where there isn't a single bad story (I mean, there is one that is problematic for obvious reasons, but that's a discussion for another day...). I look forward to seeing this season again together with Sesska and all of you.
its a shame because the one that you are talking about is (arguably) one of the best Doctor Who stories done, but its often over shadowed by the problematic elements
The Italian town, is in north-center Wales. Portmerion, built and assembled by an eccentric architect, between the 1920-60's. It on the coast, near the wonderful national park Snowdownia. There are coal, and slate mines in the region (I toured underground in the Slate mine.) Near the town of Ffestiniog. The British espionage/sureal television shown, The Prisoner was filmed in 1967 in Portmerion. Doctor Who, couldn't then afford to go to Italy,...could only occasionally splurge for Wales (two other filming visits in 1967 and 1973). I've visited Portmerion twice. And Wales is wonderful to visit too.
The last ever pure historical was "The Highlanders" which was Jamie's debut episode. Although this is considered a historical it's a fictional historical it's not based on any real people or any real life events from history. The reason they stopped doing pure historicals was because they weren't as popular in the ratings as the science fiction stories were. Kids wanted Daleks or Monsters they didn't care history so that's why they do historicals with abit of sci fi precense so it's the best of both worlds really. This is the first ever story to show the TARDIS other rooms other than the console room and the first appearance of the wooden console room which i love alot of people hate it but i personally love it it has a gothic presense to it.
Ratings for Historicals: Marco Polo 9.5 (The Daleks rated 9 and Keys of Marinus 9.1) The Aztecs 6.5 The Reign of Terror 6.7 The Romans 11.6 (4th highest rated Hartnell story (and 9th highest of the entire classic run!) The Crusade 9.4 The Myth Makers 8.4 The Massacre 6.4 The Gunfighters 6.3 rated better than The Savages and The War Machines in season 3. The Smugglers 4.5 worst ratings until season 23. The Highlanders 7.1 Got better ratings than both The Tenth Planet and Evil of the Daleks in the 4th season. So the historicals are just like the sci-fi stories-a mix of good and bad.
A decent opener for a season some consider to be one of the greatest. It is difficult to remove one's impressions of Portmerion from The Prisoner - with which it is indelibly associated - but I suppose it was very difficult to recreate the era without actually travelling to Italy; in a time when the show simply didn't do this. And it's better than trying to do it all in studio as they did in The Romans.
Years later, as I re-watched this story while getting a broader understanding of the world of that time, I was struck with a thought. Hieronymous sounded like the type of guy who have played around with "astrological tools" of that era like lead and mercury. He could have been bat-crap crazy from exposure to one or the other or both long before The Helix arrived.
Probably already mentioned but the wild-haired purse-lipped Demnos priest is played by Robert James, who last played the obsessive scientist Lesterson in Patrick Troughton’s debut The Power Of The Daleks who thought it was a marvellous thing to reactivate them until his sanity went at witnessing their mass production line. Also in that story were Bernard Archard as power-mad security chief Bragen; Archard later plays the Sutekh-possessed cadaver of Marcus Scarman in Pyramids of Mars - and Peter Bathurst as the pompous colony governor Hensell, and later played the equally pompous bowler-hatted Chinn, trying to secure British rights to Axonite in The Claws Of Axos.
Season 14 is SOOO GOOD Love the Steampunk Console Room with the wooden concole! The Jule's Verne Console Room!! This is was a good start to Season 14. This Season is SGOOOOOO GOODDDDDD!
It's hard to follow up The Seeds of Doom but I love that they didn't really want to also. This season opener is just a nice warm (compared to Antarctica last week) Italian historical, the political stuff is great. Some really good character moments with Juliano. Excited for the next part🧡
Interestingly, the secondary console room does not have the iconic time rotor, meaning the console can function as a table, and instead of visible controls, they are hidden behind panels. As you will see during a lot of Tom Baker stories, you will notice that you can’t actually see the surroundings outside the TARDIS from inside the TARDIS, and in this season, they usually walk out the entrance and to the right. In a personal headcanon of mine, there is a tiny hallway, which connects the main and the secondary control rooms directly.
This one's always been a favourite, from the lovely bit of expanding the TARDIS lore at the start ("Boot cupboard. Not very interesting." =:o} ), the banter between the two leads, through Dudley Simpson's music, and the booming voice of Hieronymous, to the glorious - if somewhat innaccurate - presentation of the rennaisance era's kick-starting of what grew into modern science (a perfect primer for school kids of the 1970s!). Louis Marks (returning to Doctor Who for the first time since "Day of the Daleks") was the perfect writer for this, knowing how to work-in historically authentic touches without hitting us over the head with them. Case in point: The relationship between a young prince and his "companion", which would have been perfectly unremarkable for Rennaissance-era aristocracy, but which couldn't be spelled out *too* clearly in case Mary Whitehouse - or other busy-bodies - noticed what was going on in a 1970s "kid's show"!
A very underrated pseudo-historical and a fun start to Season 14. The new TARDIS perfectly fits with Tom's Doctor and it's a shame they didn't use it more for him.
@@julianblake3140 The "warp in storage" thing is a myth, as most of the set gets reused later but painted white... I even saw some of it in a Colin Baker story.
Not to burst your balloon, but we never see Giuliano or Marco out of their tights - it is a deficiency in the story that many have lamented over the years. Quite a bit of fan fiction has attempted to address this over the years. 😘 Gareth Armstrong (Giuliano) has done all sorts of theatre stuff over the years but not too much TV or film whereas you've probably seen Tim Pigott-Smith (Marco) many times, he became a go-to English/classical guy in lots of stuff in the 2000s, including "The Remains of the Day", "The Four Feathers", "Gangs of New York", "V for Vendetta", and "Quantum of Solace" and loads of TV. Tim also wrote some children's books about the Baker Street Irregulars that I've been meaning to check out at some point. Stacked cast in this story, even by the standards of the time. Norman Jones (Hieronymous) was in a lot stuff too, including an extraordinarily good turn in the Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes telling of "The Crooked Man." Jon Laurimore (Federico) played lots of overbearing authority figures in stuff for decades and seems to be an unexpectedly delightful person in real life, if interviews are anything to go by. No girls in this story at all apart from Sarah, but that can be chalked up to the time it was made, I guess. This story is one of my favorites but it doesn't seem to have a high profile among fans. It does tick a lot of boxes for '70s "Who" but I don't see that as a bad thing at all. All the location sequences were filmed at Portmeirion where they filmed "The Prisoner" a few years before. As much of "Doctor Who" was filmed at stately homes or quarries, something like this stands out in my head for obvious reasons. That lovely Victorian/Edwardian console room was another massive highlight for me - if I had all the money I'd custom-build an office for myself that looked like that. As I've gathered here and there, someone please correct me if I'm wrong, the plan was for this to be the console room moving forward but they stored the set pieces wrong between this season and the next and everything warped beyond usability. Other behind-the-scenes events prevented it from being rebuilt or restored and they ended up reverting to the much simpler and more convenient 'traditional' design for the next season and thereafter.
That opening effect of whirling crustal and energy and the void of space: 'Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-precious Stones'. A story that may have influenced the visuals a least.
Love the wooden paneling-roundels of the secondary TARDIS Control Room. The console, I could take-or-leave-it. They should bring it back in NuWho at some point. In my Head-cannon, it's the "captain's quarters" as it more meant for a singular pilot, and has a more intimate size. After all, it does control the Primary console by remote. Further, I like to think the Console Room from 1996 TV-movie is this one, but updated!
Happy New Year Jess! I agree, I think both the classic and modern eras of the show have the scope and capacity to have purely historical stories. I think the can be engaging and entertaining, but like you, fear I am in the minority on that argument. At this stage of your Doctor Who journey, we are 14 seasons into the classic era and 13 series (plus specials) of the modern era of the show. Alas, I don’t think anyone who travels in the TARDIS, has picked up on the buddy system, as yet.
Totally agree about pure historicals. There would be more drama and more peril without the old "What's causing the strange goings-on? Lo and behold - aliens!". There is only one more pure historical in the Classic Who era (much further ahead in your viewing, Jess), but the next one that you will see set in the past is BRILL-I-ANT.
A weird fun fact about this story that many Doctor Who fans don't know is that it was referenced (or, perhaps, ripped off? 😉) in Marvel Comics. Fantastic Four issue 254, released in 1983, was called "The Minds of Mantracora" and had the Fantastic Four facing a masked villain who looks incredibly similar to the masked cult leader from these episodes. I guess John Byrne (writer & artist of that era of Fantastic Four) must have been watching some Doctor Who reruns on his local station that month.
Canadian-born Marvel comics writers tended to have a lot of British TV to draw upon. As Marvel was based in New York, it was easy to tune your TV to pick up Canadian TV as well. It why Irwin Allen made TV series like 'Time Tunnel', 'Land of the Giants' (Doctor Who's Planet of the Giants'). The 'Airport' disaster movie series 1974- followed episodes of 'Thunderbirds' dealing with the 'Fireflash' airliner's problems. Arguably 'Towering Inferno' is a Thunderbirds episode as well. There's also the Star Trek The Next Generation bit about the Borg using Cybermen lines from 'Tomb of the Cybermen' as well.
Brilliant, you have now reached the season where they used the secondary control room. I’m not 100% sure, but I believe the reason it was introduced was because the ordinary control room set was undergoing repairs and they needed to use it.
Barry Newbury's replacement Police Box design is the most inaccurate version we've seen and is sometimes highlighted as an example of how standards were supposed to be slipping. But this is still the Hinchcliffe era (with this season even boasting a different font for the titles and end credits), so it was all rubber-stamped. I guess convenience was the overwhelming consideration.
It is in the nature of the fan brain to see an inconsistency and contrive a theory to explain it. The 'old' control room doesn't tally with anything we now know about the show or even its pre-history. My theory is that the Doctor initially used the alternate control room in his new life following the Division and then gravitated towards the white-walled version we know and love as some faint memory of his old life returned. Which may explain a lot of other inconsistencies in memories and skills.
2's recorder and 3's red velvet jacket and frilly shirt. Your on to another great season i am however nervous when you get to the final story as thats the most popular but one outdated thing the modern audience are so fixated on sadly.
I miss the pure historical stories too - RTD tried making them supernatural stories (ghosts / werewolf / witches in his first three seasons of New Who) - but it didn't last long - more recently Rosa had a nice twist with the time traveller looking to change history, similar to the first Doctor meeting the Meddling Monk - but generally I think there's something compelling about watching the Doctor trying to survive historic events / keep history on track that has long been left unexplored in Doctor Who adventures - I'd like to see them give it another go, would give a different flavour of story to tell.
Did you notice Sarah Jane gets the alphabet backwards? She goes W, U, V. Rather than W, V, U. And everyone assumes Three is the beat the crap out of you incarnation. He is, but *Four* is also, but only when he *needs* to be.
I completely agree that it's a shame we never saw more purely historical stories, they're perfectly capable of being gorgeous and rich Dr Who (and a lot of Who novels during the wilderness years did it brilliantly.) Sadly after "The Highlanders" the show itself never did it again... almost entirely unique to Hartnell.
I imagine the fans hated the 2nd control room which is why we went back to the same old boring thing for basically all of classic. The american movie gets so much hate despite it having one of the best tardis interiors in the history of the show
Didn't release you are this far into Sarah Jane's adventures with the doctor one of my least favourite stories with her in but better than future seasons
This gets more hate than it deserves, I feel. It's not fantastic, but it's not rubbish either. It is, though, in my humble opinion, the weakest story in S14 which has some superb stories
This is probably the most lavish classic Who story, the costumes/sets and production values are far beyond the standard for this time. Unfortunately I find this story rather dull.
This story is really under rated! I don’t think it gets the love it deserves. 4 and Sarah are at their peak here with their chemistry. The location filming is beautiful and the story is good fun.
This was filmed in Portmeirion, Wales, a tourist village designed by architect Sir Clough Williams-Ellis in an Italianate style. The trippy 1960's television series The Prisoner was filmed on location there.
A fine story but what really pushes it into excellence for me are the stunning visuals. There are times when it resembles a Renaissance painting appropriately enough. The mahogany cathedral-esque decor of the new console room, the piquancy of fresh oranges, the dazzling jewelled spiral of the Mandragora Helix, the cobalt ooze on the Helix's victims, the flair of Hieronymus' purple robe and golden mask bathing in the red ray of Helix light etc.
It's a gorgeous episode. And Hieronymus' beard is an awesome sight.
When the Helix recreates the temple, imagine that in 4k , I claudius standards
Yes!!! I bet the BBC raided their Shakespeare Italian plays wardrobe for this. I always thought the young Lord looked like Cosimo De’Medici.
This story marked the first reference to The TARDIS translation circuits explaining how The Doctor and their companions can understand english wherever they go
So many parts of this reaction I enjoyed. :) You're not alone in missing pure historicals at all. I think there's just as much fun in seeing the Doctor and co. trying to avoid being killed in a historical setting as there is with an alien monster.
I like to imagine that Jess is present for all of these stories, just hanging out off-screen in the Tardis' spa and never getting involved in the adventures.
This has a special place in my heart as this was my first Doctor Who story ever. I saw it on PBS in Chicago in 1978. I have been pretty much hooked for 45 years.
Not sure of the general fan consensus on this one but I really love Four and Sarah in this story, their dynamic has really hit its stride and Tom and Lis are clearly having fun together.
You used the words “fan” and “consensus” together there. Must be a mistake 😆
I've always adored it. But I note it doesn't top any kind of fan polling. Unlike several other stories from this era.
It's actually one of my favorite classic stories.
I’ve always liked it, but it seems to be regarded as one of the weakest stories of an admittedly excellent Season 14
I love the novelization of this story.
And the Doctor's description of Sarah in this scene.
The Doctor: Excuse me. I'm a traveller around here. I'm a stranger in these parts, and I was wondering if you'd seen a girl. She'd be about . . .
(A group of four horsemen come round the corner and the peasants flee.)
The Doctor: She's a friend of mine. She'd be about five foot four and a half.
Rossini: (Federico's Captain) Who are you?
The Doctor: I'm a traveller.
Rossini: From where?
The Doctor: Have you seen a young girl, about five foot . .
Rossini: Silence!
The Doctor: . . probably with orange juice on her chin.
Observational accuracy combined with romantic imagery.
Best. Control room. Ever.
God, it's so beautiful.
This is actually my favorite 4th Doctor story because it was my very first experience with Classic Who. I was surprised with how great the writing was, how well the visuals worked, and of course how great Tom and Lis were. It actually inspired me to go back and watch the Sarah Jane Adventures.
That the writing is excellent is not surprising. Louis Marks who wrote this story earned a PhD in History at Oxford, specializing in the Italian Renaissance in the 1950s.
Loooove you picking up on the sweetness of Marco and Giuliano.
Specifically The Masque of Mandragora was filmed at Portmeirion where the seminal TV show The Prisoner was also filmed exterior wise as well!!!
Giuliano and Marco can get it . And they have one of the sweetest friendships in Doctor Who lore
The production on this story is great! BBC always has great costumes for historical episodes. This story introduces a new tardis interior plus the police box prob was brand new and made of fiberglass.
The Sarah Jane Adventures story with The Ancient Lights and Mr. Truman was originally meant to be a pseudo-sequel to this story. It was later changed for simplicity reasons.
Also there was a doctor who book that was a sequel to this story. The book was called Beautiful Chaos.
@@groundhog5075 10th Doctor, Donna and Wilf? I think I read it
@@jmcdonald.1998 Yeah been awhile since I read it.
This story has the best costumes Ever, classic or NuWho! I want to point out this is Sarah-Jane's 4th season opener!! No other companion outside of UNIT personnel has done that!
An underrated story, which I’ve always loved. Supporting cast are great. As always great reaction and analysis 😊
You’re right the “pure” historircals, with no added sci-fi elements were phased out in the 2nd Doctor era. I may be wrong, but it may have be the Highlanders, Jamie’s first story that was the last one to this point.
That's right. It was the poor reception of Gunfighters that killed them. Except the two that were already commissioned. As far as I know.
@@deebeedaydreamer And the Smugglers had low viewing figures.
The Time Warrior and this one come very close to what is classified as a "pure" historical.
This story is absolutely gorgeous.
You noticed the recorder but not the Fourth Doctor using one of the Third Doctor’s frilly shirts to clean the console.
Creative concept and execution.
The Mandragora was meant to be in The Sarah Jane Adventures but due to having to change so much of the entity they opted for the villain to be The Ancient Lights instead.
Many see the two as 'cousin' entities I say the pair are a part of a triad.
Madragora as a present sentient constellation
Ancient Lights as a pre universe force
And the third being from the next universe that will replace ours
I honestly think Season 14 is one of the best seasons in all of Doctor Who, including both Classic and New. A rare season where there isn't a single bad story (I mean, there is one that is problematic for obvious reasons, but that's a discussion for another day...). I look forward to seeing this season again together with Sesska and all of you.
its a shame because the one that you are talking about is (arguably) one of the best Doctor Who stories done, but its often over shadowed by the problematic elements
@@mattyh2464 only if you let it be, really
The Italian town, is in north-center Wales. Portmerion, built and assembled by an eccentric architect, between the 1920-60's. It on the coast, near the wonderful national park Snowdownia. There are coal, and slate mines in the region (I toured underground in the Slate mine.) Near the town of Ffestiniog. The British espionage/sureal television shown, The Prisoner was filmed in 1967 in Portmerion. Doctor Who, couldn't then afford to go to Italy,...could only occasionally splurge for Wales (two other filming visits in 1967 and 1973). I've visited Portmerion twice. And Wales is wonderful to visit too.
The last ever pure historical was "The Highlanders" which was Jamie's debut episode.
Although this is considered a historical it's a fictional historical it's not based on any real people or any real life events from history.
The reason they stopped doing pure historicals was because they weren't as popular in the ratings as the science fiction stories were.
Kids wanted Daleks or Monsters they didn't care history so that's why they do historicals with abit of sci fi precense so it's the best of both worlds really.
This is the first ever story to show the TARDIS other rooms other than the console room and the first appearance of the wooden console room which i love alot of people hate it but i personally love it it has a gothic presense to it.
Ratings for Historicals:
Marco Polo 9.5 (The Daleks rated 9 and Keys of Marinus 9.1)
The Aztecs 6.5
The Reign of Terror 6.7
The Romans 11.6 (4th highest rated Hartnell story (and 9th highest of the entire classic run!)
The Crusade 9.4
The Myth Makers 8.4
The Massacre 6.4
The Gunfighters 6.3 rated better than The Savages and The War Machines in season 3.
The Smugglers 4.5 worst ratings until season 23.
The Highlanders 7.1 Got better ratings than both The Tenth Planet and Evil of the Daleks in the 4th season.
So the historicals are just like the sci-fi stories-a mix of good and bad.
A decent opener for a season some consider to be one of the greatest. It is difficult to remove one's impressions of Portmerion from The Prisoner - with which it is indelibly associated - but I suppose it was very difficult to recreate the era without actually travelling to Italy; in a time when the show simply didn't do this. And it's better than trying to do it all in studio as they did in The Romans.
The exterior location was shot at where The Prisoner was filmed
Years later, as I re-watched this story while getting a broader understanding of the world of that time, I was struck with a thought. Hieronymous sounded like the type of guy who have played around with "astrological tools" of that era like lead and mercury. He could have been bat-crap crazy from exposure to one or the other or both long before The Helix arrived.
I can't understand why some people don't like the Doctor simply going back in time.
Sarah Jane will always be my favourite companion. I was so thrilled when she got her own show.
I love this, the first apearence cue of lord farqhuard before shrek
Probably already mentioned but the wild-haired purse-lipped Demnos priest is played by Robert James, who last played the obsessive scientist Lesterson in Patrick Troughton’s debut The Power Of The Daleks who thought it was a marvellous thing to reactivate them until his sanity went at witnessing their mass production line. Also in that story were Bernard Archard as power-mad security chief Bragen; Archard later plays the Sutekh-possessed cadaver of Marcus Scarman in Pyramids of Mars - and Peter Bathurst as the pompous colony governor Hensell, and later played the equally pompous bowler-hatted Chinn, trying to secure British rights to Axonite in The Claws Of Axos.
Season 14 is SOOO GOOD
Love the Steampunk Console Room with the wooden concole! The Jule's Verne Console Room!!
This is was a good start to Season 14. This Season is SGOOOOOO GOODDDDDD!
Glad I'm not the only one to pick up on how good of a "friend" Marko is ;)
It's hard to follow up The Seeds of Doom but I love that they didn't really want to also. This season opener is just a nice warm (compared to Antarctica last week) Italian historical, the political stuff is great. Some really good character moments with Juliano.
Excited for the next part🧡
Interestingly, the secondary console room does not have the iconic time rotor, meaning the console can function as a table, and instead of visible controls, they are hidden behind panels.
As you will see during a lot of Tom Baker stories, you will notice that you can’t actually see the surroundings outside the TARDIS from inside the TARDIS, and in this season, they usually walk out the entrance and to the right. In a personal headcanon of mine, there is a tiny hallway, which connects the main and the secondary control rooms directly.
Tom really channeled his Errol Flynn here. 😂
lol the Walking Dead has impressed on Jess to never ever let a friend out of sight
The thing about the buddy system is if they both get caught together, there's no-one free and off on their own to come in and rescue them!
This one's always been a favourite, from the lovely bit of expanding the TARDIS lore at the start ("Boot cupboard. Not very interesting." =:o} ), the banter between the two leads, through Dudley Simpson's music, and the booming voice of Hieronymous, to the glorious - if somewhat innaccurate - presentation of the rennaisance era's kick-starting of what grew into modern science (a perfect primer for school kids of the 1970s!).
Louis Marks (returning to Doctor Who for the first time since "Day of the Daleks") was the perfect writer for this, knowing how to work-in historically authentic touches without hitting us over the head with them. Case in point: The relationship between a young prince and his "companion", which would have been perfectly unremarkable for Rennaissance-era aristocracy, but which couldn't be spelled out *too* clearly in case Mary Whitehouse - or other busy-bodies - noticed what was going on in a 1970s "kid's show"!
"Where's Marco? His ..." [looks to camera] "...friend?" Jess sums up 40-odd years of fan speculation in one sentence!
' - and a thousand historians punch the air...'
A very underrated pseudo-historical and a fun start to Season 14. The new TARDIS perfectly fits with Tom's Doctor and it's a shame they didn't use it more for him.
I agree about the control room - I’ve read the reason they didn’t use it more was because the wooden parts would warp in storage
Totally underrated! Agreed.
@@julianblake3140 The "warp in storage" thing is a myth, as most of the set gets reused later but painted white... I even saw some of it in a Colin Baker story.
Not to burst your balloon, but we never see Giuliano or Marco out of their tights - it is a deficiency in the story that many have lamented over the years. Quite a bit of fan fiction has attempted to address this over the years. 😘
Gareth Armstrong (Giuliano) has done all sorts of theatre stuff over the years but not too much TV or film whereas you've probably seen Tim Pigott-Smith (Marco) many times, he became a go-to English/classical guy in lots of stuff in the 2000s, including "The Remains of the Day", "The Four Feathers", "Gangs of New York", "V for Vendetta", and "Quantum of Solace" and loads of TV. Tim also wrote some children's books about the Baker Street Irregulars that I've been meaning to check out at some point.
Stacked cast in this story, even by the standards of the time. Norman Jones (Hieronymous) was in a lot stuff too, including an extraordinarily good turn in the Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes telling of "The Crooked Man." Jon Laurimore (Federico) played lots of overbearing authority figures in stuff for decades and seems to be an unexpectedly delightful person in real life, if interviews are anything to go by. No girls in this story at all apart from Sarah, but that can be chalked up to the time it was made, I guess.
This story is one of my favorites but it doesn't seem to have a high profile among fans. It does tick a lot of boxes for '70s "Who" but I don't see that as a bad thing at all. All the location sequences were filmed at Portmeirion where they filmed "The Prisoner" a few years before. As much of "Doctor Who" was filmed at stately homes or quarries, something like this stands out in my head for obvious reasons.
That lovely Victorian/Edwardian console room was another massive highlight for me - if I had all the money I'd custom-build an office for myself that looked like that. As I've gathered here and there, someone please correct me if I'm wrong, the plan was for this to be the console room moving forward but they stored the set pieces wrong between this season and the next and everything warped beyond usability. Other behind-the-scenes events prevented it from being rebuilt or restored and they ended up reverting to the much simpler and more convenient 'traditional' design for the next season and thereafter.
That opening effect of whirling crustal and energy and the void of space: 'Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-precious Stones'. A story that may have influenced the visuals a least.
Love the wooden paneling-roundels of the secondary TARDIS Control Room. The console, I could take-or-leave-it. They should bring it back in NuWho at some point. In my Head-cannon, it's the "captain's quarters" as it more meant for a singular pilot, and has a more intimate size. After all, it does control the Primary console by remote. Further, I like to think the Console Room from 1996 TV-movie is this one, but updated!
Happy New Year Jess!
I agree, I think both the classic and modern eras of the show have the scope and capacity to have purely historical stories. I think the can be engaging and entertaining, but like you, fear I am in the minority on that argument.
At this stage of your Doctor Who journey, we are 14 seasons into the classic era and 13 series (plus specials) of the modern era of the show. Alas, I don’t think anyone who travels in the TARDIS, has picked up on the buddy system, as yet.
Totally agree about pure historicals. There would be more drama and more peril without the old "What's causing the strange goings-on? Lo and behold - aliens!". There is only one more pure historical in the Classic Who era (much further ahead in your viewing, Jess), but the next one that you will see set in the past is BRILL-I-ANT.
4 and Sarah doing what they do
A weird fun fact about this story that many Doctor Who fans don't know is that it was referenced (or, perhaps, ripped off? 😉) in Marvel Comics. Fantastic Four issue 254, released in 1983, was called "The Minds of Mantracora" and had the Fantastic Four facing a masked villain who looks incredibly similar to the masked cult leader from these episodes. I guess John Byrne (writer & artist of that era of Fantastic Four) must have been watching some Doctor Who reruns on his local station that month.
Canadian-born Marvel comics writers tended to have a lot of British TV to draw upon.
As Marvel was based in New York, it was easy to tune your TV to pick up Canadian TV as well.
It why Irwin Allen made TV series like 'Time Tunnel', 'Land of the Giants' (Doctor Who's Planet of the Giants').
The 'Airport' disaster movie series 1974- followed episodes of 'Thunderbirds' dealing with the 'Fireflash' airliner's problems. Arguably 'Towering Inferno' is a Thunderbirds episode as well.
There's also the Star Trek The Next Generation bit about the Borg using Cybermen lines from 'Tomb of the Cybermen' as well.
"Be seeing you, Number 4"
No sign of the ubiquitous cat.
Or Rover
"I am not a number..."
I’m glad you got to season with Sarah Jane this is the best season because of her RIP Elizabeth SLADEN
Previous season, 13, had no returning regular foes at all! Yet season 12 before had 3 in a row
I swear his doctor is a mentalist. The way he distracts the enemy. The way he blindsides the guy at his execution with inappropriate charm is mad.
Brilliant, you have now reached the season where they used the secondary control room. I’m not 100% sure, but I believe the reason it was introduced was because the ordinary control room set was undergoing repairs and they needed to use it.
And then they ruined this one over holiday breaks
The first story to feature the secondary control room but had to had to go, eventually the heat of the lights broke the wooden walls.
Yes, the Second Doctor's recorder...
Barry Newbury's replacement Police Box design is the most inaccurate version we've seen and is sometimes highlighted as an example of how standards were supposed to be slipping. But this is still the Hinchcliffe era (with this season even boasting a different font for the titles and end credits), so it was all rubber-stamped. I guess convenience was the overwhelming consideration.
Any experienced executioner would never attempt a sword beheading with 10' of scarf wrapped around the prisoners neck.
It is in the nature of the fan brain to see an inconsistency and contrive a theory to explain it. The 'old' control room doesn't tally with anything we now know about the show or even its pre-history. My theory is that the Doctor initially used the alternate control room in his new life following the Division and then gravitated towards the white-walled version we know and love as some faint memory of his old life returned. Which may explain a lot of other inconsistencies in memories and skills.
Yeah pure historicals are my favourite too it’s a darn shame they don’t make them anymore
2's recorder and 3's red velvet jacket and frilly shirt.
Your on to another great season i am however nervous when you get to the final story as thats the most popular but one outdated thing the modern audience are so fixated on sadly.
The real DOCTOR.
This story gets mixed reviews from fans, but I think it's one of the best Fourth Doctor/Sarah stories.
I miss the pure historical stories too - RTD tried making them supernatural stories (ghosts / werewolf / witches in his first three seasons of New Who) - but it didn't last long - more recently Rosa had a nice twist with the time traveller looking to change history, similar to the first Doctor meeting the Meddling Monk - but generally I think there's something compelling about watching the Doctor trying to survive historic events / keep history on track that has long been left unexplored in Doctor Who adventures - I'd like to see them give it another go, would give a different flavour of story to tell.
Did you notice Sarah Jane gets the alphabet backwards? She goes W, U, V. Rather than W, V, U.
And everyone assumes Three is the beat the crap out of you incarnation. He is, but *Four* is also, but only when he *needs* to be.
Now you’re watching this, may I recommend to you the Big Finish Sarah Jane Smith Audio Dramas? 🙂
I completely agree that it's a shame we never saw more purely historical stories, they're perfectly capable of being gorgeous and rich Dr Who (and a lot of Who novels during the wilderness years did it brilliantly.) Sadly after "The Highlanders" the show itself never did it again... almost entirely unique to Hartnell.
- and of course 'Black Orchid'.
Yeppy. This was my first story of Doctor who. My 12 year old self is just gitty.
Just to be clear - if Sarah Jane had closed the TARDIS door, the Helix wouldn’t have gotten in, so most deaths in this serial are her fault.
Lineages might have just popped out of existence!
She should be brought up on charges before she travels past the statute of limitations
Welcome to season 14. I cannot wait for story 3 it’s my 2nd favourite story
Yeah I''d probably stay in the TARDIS and hang out in the spa too
My favorite tom season
Where’s Marco? His….. ( eyes to camera ) hi friend ( yeah that’s my theory )
I imagine the fans hated the 2nd control room which is why we went back to the same old boring thing for basically all of classic. The american movie gets so much hate despite it having one of the best tardis interiors in the history of the show
Don't you think that Count Federico looks like Angelica Huston?
Based
👍👍💐
This is a weird one for sure.
Didn't release you are this far into Sarah Jane's adventures with the doctor one of my least favourite stories with her in but better than future seasons
For me, it's a superb production propping up a forgettable story.
This gets more hate than it deserves, I feel. It's not fantastic, but it's not rubbish either. It is, though, in my humble opinion, the weakest story in S14 which has some superb stories
Loving this so much but so sad to see this coming up, so close to the end of Sarah's time. Such a classic set of stories that really stood out.
This comment is a spoiler for the reactor & should be deleted. 🚨
Why do you feel the need to say this, why ? What is wrong with you?
This is probably the most lavish classic Who story, the costumes/sets and production values are far beyond the standard for this time. Unfortunately I find this story rather dull.
Sorry to say that for me this is tedious and drags on