The Five Doctors The Three Doctors |
BBC The Two Doctors |
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| Episodes | 3 45 minutes each |
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| Story No# | 141 | |
| Production Code | 6W | |
| Season | 22 | |
| Dates | Feb. 16, 1985 - Mar. 2, 1985 |
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With Colin Baker, Patrick Troughton,
Nicola Bryant, Frazier Hines. Written by Robert Holmes. Script-edited by Eric Saward. Directed by Peter Moffatt. Produced by John Nathan-Turner. |
| Synopsis: The paths of the second and sixth Doctor cross as alien omnivores plan to steal a secret of the Time Lords with the help of the Sontarans. |
Doctor Who versus the Iron Chef by Jason A. Miller 20/11/03
If memory serves me right, the TARDIS never materialized in Kitchen Stadium. However, by the time the 2nd Doctor rattles off a list of unusual Earth recipes in Part Three of The Two Doctors, and mentions Brillat-Savarin, and when Shockeye wonders if shepherd's pie contains actual shepherds... then it's surely no coincidence that the story's villain, Chessene, is wearing a metallic silver gown of the type often worn by Chairman Kaga.
The Two Doctors is the best story of Colin Baker's abbreviated tenure as the Sixth Doctor. The episode was written by Robert Holmes, one of DW's top scribes, and therefore contains literally pages of quotable dialogue -- and that's just in Part One. The story contains the superfecta of Doctor Who tradition: the over-the-top villainness (Chessene), the quotable henchman (Shockeye), the duped human stooge (Dr. Dastari), and the prolonged gory death, complete with green ooze (Stike).
Not only that, but, being the longest DW story completed in the 1980s (not counting The Trial of a Time Lord), there's a multi-layered plot which improves with age. Consider that I'd always thought the reappearance of Holmes's own Sontaran enemies in The Two Doctors to be a bit of a time-waster. With this viewing, however, I realized that both Sontarans are well-acted, with witty dialogue -- and, more importantly, their shaky alliance with Chessene allows for, as the Doctor observes, "a double-double-cross". They don't waste time at all. Indeed, by story's end, of the seven major guest characters, all but one are dead. Similar to Holmes's previous script, The Caves of Androzani, only a woman survives.
To call this the best Sixth Doctor TV story may come as faint praise, but it's impossible to overstate Patrick Troughton's importance to the affair, in his Second Doctor swan-song. Strapped to a table for most of Part Two, Troughton still gets about 9 memorable quotes off in the first 9 minutes of Part One, and has a terrific turn as an Androgum gourmand in Part Three. Also notable is that the story's climax is interrupted so that the 2nd Doctor and Shockeye can drive into Seville (Spain) for a lunch that costs, in 1984 terms, $233 US. No-one pays the tab.
Also welcome is the return of old companion Jamie (Fraser Hines), who picks up the part after 15 years as if he hadn't missed a day. Teamed up with the vintage cast, both the 6th Doctor and Peri (Nicola Bryant) are at their most appealling. The best facet of Baker's tenure as the Doctor was his line delivery, and Holmes feeds him several zingers which he reads with obvious relish (pardon the pun). Some great clowning, also, as the 2nd Doctor defends himself against Shockeye with a cucumber, and the 6th Doctor later brandishes a banana.
The addition to Time Lord mythology is interesting (and sets up the Time Lords as the selfish villains they'd become in later TV shows and books). Less welcome for me was the 6th Doctor's sudden embrace of the "healthy vegetarian diet", although this part of the character would thrive for another 15 years; and his unsubtle dig at Christopher Columbus (who, if memory serves me right, is interred in Seville). You can also tell that the Seville restaurant scenes were originally scripted for more food-friendly New Orleans, before budget concerns intervened -- witness how the 6th Doctor stages a mock arrest of his earlier self, by reading the Miranda warnings. To quote the 2nd Doctor in Part Three... "Oh, my giddy aunt. Oh, crumbs!"
A Review by Stuart Gutteridge 4/7/04
Of all the multi Doctor stories, The Two Doctors is the one that stands up best. This is largely because there is something of a plot within the story as opposed to a runaround. It is also the best multi Doctor story for Patrick Troughton laregely because he is given something to do within the story as opposed to bickering with Jon Pertwee. Thankfully his interplay with both Colin Baker`s Doctor and Frazer Hines is a joy to behold. Colin Baker is actually rather good here too, his Doctor is still egotistical and arguing with Peri, but he is also more commanding in the role too.
However the story does have its flaws, the Second Doctor is virtually absent from the first episode once hes been captured, the Sontaran`s costumes do them no favours, rubbery masks and loose collars don`t make for a great returning villain. Similarly some of the other performances are variable, Laurence Payne as Dastari is particularly wooden and Jacqueline Pearce is simply going through the motions as Chessene (virtually playing Servalan in all but name, without any of the flirting.) By contrast however John Stratton`s Shockeye is great fun largely because the character is so well motivated by a desire for food.
If you can ignore the flat direction, Peter Moffat`s introduction of the Sontarans being a case in point, and tolerate some of the acting, then what you are left with isn`t necessarily a classic but is certainly watchable enough in its own right.
A Review by Finn Clark 4/11/06
Just like The Power of Kroll, The Two Doctors starts well but goes downhill. However, in fairness, neither story was written under ideal circumstances for poor Robert Holmes. The Power of Kroll was a last-minute replacement for an abandoned story, while this one had to be wrenched from its original setting of New Orleans. Furthermore it's an old-fashioned six-parter, to date the last since The Armageddon Factor in 1979. It's a mark of Robert Holmes's success on this count that people criticising this story never seem to take that into account.
Personally I think it's fascinating! Part one has a thematic depth and richness that's almost unparalleled throughout Doctor Who. It repays attention in a way one doesn't normally see. Stories like Pyramids of Mars or Tomb of the Cybermen are cracking yarns, but no more. They're just good tales well told. This however has two different extensively explored themes. It's a cliche that six-parters should in some sense be two stories in one, although even a glance at Troughton-era six-parters will show that you violate that rule at your peril. The Two Doctors however has two TARDIS crews with two interweaving plot threads, two sets of villains, two settings and two themes. I was particularly impressed by the latter, most stories not even managing one.
The first theme is about hunting and killing lesser beings, usually for food. The first Doctor-Peri scene is all about fishing, although the Doctor ends up saying, "Did you see the one that got away? The magnificent gumblejack that was trying to eat this poor little fellow?" Naturally he throws back the minnow. Back in 1985 I never took seriously the punchline about "a healthy vegetarian diet", despite the nut rolls in Revelation of the Daleks, but in fact it's the culmination of the story's themes. Robert Holmes was a vegetarian and had strong feelings on these issues, but fortunately he didn't write some "holier than thou" sermon. On the contrary, he dashed off a riot of sick gags and tastelessness. "They don't feel pain the same way we do."
That's one theme. The other concerns your innate nature and what happens when you try to change it, as summed up in the beautiful line: "Give a monkey control of its environment, it'll fill the world with bananas." (a) There's Chessene's double identity as shown in her relationships with Dastari and Shockeye. Dastari thought he could change her, but in fact he created a monster that made horrific plans with the Sontarans. (b) Then there's the Doctor. Colin Baker has mysterious mindlinks with Troughton, after the first of which incidentally it's interesting how quickly he decides to visit Dastari. More importantly, this is a 6th Doctor shortly after his regeneration, meeting an embodiment of his own instability and shapeshifting. He gets affected by his former self being kidnapped and/or Androgummed, although the temporal physics of this is counter-intuitive. "Celery, that's what you need." Jelly babies. There's also the minor detail of Time Lord genetic inheritance!
Normally the Doctor's just a hero who appears and solves your problems, but here Robert Holmes explored his nature more deeply than any other story. What's more, it's no identikit anniversary get-together. These specific Doctors are important to the story: the 2nd's innocence and the 6th's instability. And all that in a JNT laundry list commission of a multi-Doctor story. I think it's wonderful. (Holmes would soon take these ideas somewhere even darker with the Valeyard.)
We have Troughton being pitched into the Saward universe, with all its brutality and Time Lord obsessions. Much went wrong with Doctor Who in the mid-eighties, but for precisely that reason Colin Baker's era makes an even more complete thematic whole than Eccleston's. It's the rotting fruit of Eric Saward's scary vision: a universe collapsing in upon itself, full of old monsters and continuity. Time Lords are everywhere. We start with a villainous but sympathetic one in The Twin Dilemma and finish with Trial of a Time Lord and the Ravalox conspiracy. In the end even the Doctor will be evil. Somehow the retcon of a shockingly old Troughton working for Gallifrey feels oddly fitting.
Thus his meeting with Dastari ends with a massacre and Jamie abandoned, after which we get the 6th Doctor charging full steam ahead into a killer space station controlled by a homicidal computer. As in Attack of the Cybermen, we get this Doctor's appalling lyricism about death. "Fruit-soft flesh peeling from white bones. The unholy unburiable smell of armageddon. Nothing quite so evocative as one's sense of smell." Peri's response is simple. "I feel sick." Suddenly this unlikeable TARDIS crew works. Troughton's era was about joyful escapism. You wanted to be there, to travel with him. Not so with Colin Baker. Peri whines, complains and doesn't want to be there, but that's understandable since her adventures are so horrible. This is the Sawardiverse, which pours petrol over wish-fulfilment and lights a match.
Robert Holmes even tries to make us wonder if the Time Lords perpetrated this massacre. I never believed that in 1985, but today it's more credible. This is the age of Time Wars and Lawrence Miles's sinister Gallifreyans. "What kind of monster would want to stop the brilliant work that was being done here?" asks the Doctor. Bearing in mind developments in just the Colin Baker era, perhaps we were wrong to be so dismissive of Holmes's suggestions. As an aside, The Two Doctors is almost a prototype for Lawrence Miles's Interference: a multi-Doctor story that puts a classic TARDIS crew from a more innocent age into the grimmer, nastier universe of the then-current era. Both star the worst TARDIS crew ever seen in that medium. Both stories are also riddled with continuity, Time Lords and weird bio-technology, with a Doctor imprisoned for a stretch in the middle.
So I like the script's ideas. What about the production? It's directed by Peter Moffatt, which isn't a good sign, although he's far from my least-favourite director. At least he gives a shit, unlike Pennant Roberts, and he usually elicits decent performances. You can't blame him for the twins in The Twin Dilemma. He's not the best judge of tone, as shown by The Visitation's Richard Mace and here Oscar Botcherby, but on the other hand his shows tend to look pretty. State of Decay, The Visitation and Mawdryn Undead are all easy on the eye. The imagery in The Two Doctors is similarly attractive, with a space station as good-looking as Seville and the Spanish countryside. The Sontarans look unconvincing but no more than usual, while their eyes in that mask can be surprisingly expressive.
Regarding the space station: returning to it in an abandoned state is such a neat visual trick that I'm surprised it wasn't used more often. Doctor Who's best take on that idea to date is actually the Destiny of the Doctors computer game, which took the Graak to all kinds of different time zones, including one that was flooded and underwater. Here of course we have the further twist of wondering what the hell happened, although we have some idea.
The production's worst misstep is Oscar Botcherby. In the script he's great, being basically Henry Jago from The Talons of Weng-Chiang. Unfortunately, on-screen he's a loser. Yes, he's basically ineffectual and a failure as an actor, but the production undermines his comic moments with inappropriate music and never really has fun with the character. John Stratton has enormous fun with Shockeye (e.g. the rat) and that's why the character is so vivid onscreen. Oscar just seems like a waste of space, which is why his death in episode three feels so wrong. He hasn't been given enough weight to justify it. The production never took him seriously. I don't blame Holmes one jot. The final Oscar's too nerdy and tentative, which undercuts the comedy as well as the drama. He should have been more theatrical, a larger-than-life presence on a par with Shockeye et al. James Saxon achieves a kind of baffled sweetness in the role, but basically he's awful.
Mind you, about Oscar's death everything is misjudged. The guitar music is especially wrong, but that whole sequence is painful. Personally I suspect that Robert Holmes would have played it as comedy so black as to be barely detectable as comedy, if that makes sense.
Incidentally, one could almost regard Oscar as a surrogate 6th Doctor, with Anita his pretty companion. Colin caught fish and Oscar caught moths. Both are slightly pompous characters who love theatricality and language. The difference is that Oscar is squeamish, killing moths but hating the sight of blood. The 6th Doctor on the other hand is practically scary in part three as he sets up Chessene and the Sontarans to murder each other and then sits back merrily to watch the carnage.
Oscar aside however, the cast's fun to watch. Obviously I was delighted to see Patrick Troughton and Frazer Hines again. They've always been one of Doctor Who's most sparkling combinations, even if they don't get enough to do here. Frazer is great even when getting almost no lines, while Troughton is obviously having the time of his life. He even gets to be bad! I was disappointed that his 'Doctrogum' wasn't evil enough to be scary, but he's still relishing every moment. Jacqueline Pearce is fun too, but the obvious standout in the guest cast is John Stratton. He's enjoying himself almost as much as Patrick Troughton, although it's interesting that they didn't try to make him particularly scary. Imagine some huge ex-convict stalking Jamie through the space station or Peri through Seville. That could have been terrifying.
In Season 22 it's curious that Peri has heard of Jamie and Jo, but knows nothing of Cybermen, Sontarans and Daleks. Uh, Doctor? Priorities? On a related topic, it's lucky for Robert Holmes that Pertwee had already known about Sontarans before The Time Warrior.
The Two Doctors is slightly awkward to watch and gets a bit runaroundy in its later episodes, but I don't blame Robert Holmes for that. It's a six-parter! More than anything else, this story needed a director in sympathy with Holmes's gleeful delight in gore and theatricality. Hell, reshooting Oscar Botcherby's scenes would fix 90% of this story's problems. Read the novelisation. It's even more gruesome than the TV version, but it's also hilarious. It's a shame that Holmes never wrote another. This story is full of good stuff, but I like its richness best. Those themes come through loud and clear. I'm coming to realise that Season 22 made some dreadful mistakes, but thematically it's one of the show's richest eras. "There cannot be a creature on the planet that humans do not kill and eat. Many beasts are bred especially for table." Even the Sontarans tie into the theme of using technology to overcome your own nature. They're a clone race, remember?
The multi-Doctor stories seem to rub up many fans the wrong way, but personally I like them all. If you can see past the self-congratulation, there's much to admire. If nothing else, reflect on this. Patrick Troughton appeared in all three multi-Doctor stories, yet only six complete stories have survived from his own era. The Two Doctors may not be another The War Games, but I think it's one of Troughton's most fascinating stories.
A Review by Brian May 27/11/07
The Two Doctors is flashy, glossy, and driven by concepts rather than storytelling: thus it's an ideal representation of Doctor Who in the 1980s. The concepts it relies on - multiple Doctors; the return of the Sontarans; another visit to an overseas locale - are simply dumped into the mix without the foundation of a proper story. If you like, there are too many ingredients and no recipe.
With Robert Holmes as the writer, you'd be forgiven for thinking he'd provide a worthy follow-up to the previous season's stunning Caves of Androzani. Alas, poor viewer, this was not to be. He's never been preachy before, but his anti-meat message is so didactic it belongs in Star Trek. There's little of his usual sparkling dialogue and, Oscar aside, no memorable characters. The aforementioned concepts were thrust upon him by John Nathan-Turner, who script-edited most of this, and Holmes doesn't seem very happy, whipping up a very tired, bored and boring mess. The plot is vague, motivations are unclear (Chessene suddenly changes her plan midway through) and it goes on seemingly forever.
The length was another Nathan-Turner imposition - and rather a hypocritical one. After all, it was he who did away with six parters, ironically when the last few finally got the pacing right! But this sees a return to the horrid padding of old. Most of part one is tedious, as we follow the Doctor and Peri through the deserted space station. There's only one good moment, when the computer suddenly says "They threatened the Time Lords". It's a nice jolt, and I remember it quite vividly as it was the cliffhanger for the story's Australian transmission, in which it was shown as six episodes (oddly enough, it was edited this way for the VHS release too!) The second episode also drags and only the last section of part three provides anything in the way of movement. The slowness isn't helped in any way by Peter Moffat's lifeless direction. Static images added to a stagnant script don't make for good fare, and this is before you factor in the horrid 80s costumes and design.
The Sontarans are completely wasted. Their return was publicised before airing, therefore denying us any Earthshock-style surprise, but their appearances are still clumsily handled. Their ships are sighted and they are identified as they approach the station, yet the monsters remain unseen as they capture the second Doctor. Why? We know who they are, so there's no real point for this. They then vanish for a while and re-appear in Spain - but they're just walking round and doing nothing, procrastinating, prevaricating and making macho threats. Then they're dispatched when the script has no further need for them, and on top of this the masks are crap; they're extremely ill-fitting, and as they're a clone species one of them shouldn't be more than a foot taller than the other!
Patrick Troughton is also wasted as the second Doctor. His performance is very good, but he's under-used and comes across as nothing more than a boast for the production team. They're showing him off rather than allowing him to be constructive. While there are moments of Troughton magic - the first ten minutes and his wonderful culinary escapade with Shockeye stand out - for the most part he's displayed like a trophy guest star. As much as I like Frazer Hines, he's not very good here. As with Troughton, the actor's enthusiasm is evident, but a 40-something man trying to re-create his youthful verve from two decades ago just doesn't work. Nicola Bryant gives one of her worst performances as Peri, but she's not helped by having her character so badly written. There's zero chemistry between her and Colin Baker, and she still can't say "glass" in a convincing American accent! (cf. The Caves of Androzani). Jacqueline Pearce is a fine actor, but she's stepped straight back into Servalan mode, only a few years after the end of Blake's 7, offering nothing new.
Colin Baker comes out best from all this. He's excellent, and by now has cemented his own interpretation of the Doctor. While he still can be an annoying git, the more unbalanced, disturbing aspects have gone - thankfully. Him killing Shockeye at the end shouldn't be as controversial as it's often been - there's no difference between this and his disposing of the Cyberleader in Earthshock - although the subsequent pun is very tasteless and should have been left out. On the subject of Shockeye, John Stratton gives a fantastic performance, sharing the best acting honours with Baker, although I also like Laurence Payne as Dastari, and James Saxon gives a memorable turn as Oscar. As I said, he's the best example of a Robert Holmes creation, reminiscent of Henry Gordon Jago from The Talons of Weng-Chiang.
While I'm being nice, I must admit the location photography in and around Seville is rather good, and I really like Malcolm Clarke's Sontaran march theme; it's a pity it wasn't used more.
But overall The Two Doctors is a sprawling and uninteresting mess, penned by a writer who seems to want no part of it. It's what you get when those in charge obsessed over gimmicks, image and continuity rather than solid stories. What's more sad is that it's Patrick Troughton's last appearance in the show that so rightly endeared him to countless viewers. He didn't deserve to bow out this way. 2.5/10