I love the fact that one of the characters in this is Travers from The Abominable Snowmen - but old. The way that someone we've seen before as a young man can come back as an old one really brings the truth of time travel home in a way that we haven't seen before, and rarely do since.
The tone of the first episode reminds me very much of the old Universal Horror films - the dark creepy house, the warnings of terror, the approach of the monster. It's a great first episode, proper spooky.
I also love the contrast between this and the previous yeti story. One set in the past in a faraway country, and one in the tube lines of London. And again, the creeping fear as the yeti and their web advance, told off in a series of tube stations. "Queensway... Leicester Square... Chancery Lane... All in a half hour. And it's creeping in all the time..."
And then, of course. Here he is. Colonel Lethbridge Stewart. A man initially presented as someone we may or may not be able to trust. A man established in character from the beginning. "That's enough diplomacy for one day. Time for some practical soldiering."
The story uses stock music quite effectively, despite at one point breaking out into what I always think of as "The Cyberman Music". (Space Adventure by Martin Slavin, fact-fans!)
I'm glad that we're reaching the end of the reconstruction desert. The sounds of army fighting yeti make me long to be able to see the visuals that must've accompanied the gunfire.
The end of the story is quite depressing, really. The Great Intelligence escapes! And it seems somewhat odd that it never came back to tangle with the Doctor again.
Except in the books, obv. But we're concentrating on TV, here.
I love the fact that one of the characters in this is Travers from The Abominable Snowmen - but old. The way that someone we've seen before as a young man can come back as an old one really brings the truth of time travel home in a way that we haven't seen before, and rarely do since.
ReplyDeleteThe tone of the first episode reminds me very much of the old Universal Horror films - the dark creepy house, the warnings of terror, the approach of the monster. It's a great first episode, proper spooky.
I also love the contrast between this and the previous yeti story. One set in the past in a faraway country, and one in the tube lines of London. And again, the creeping fear as the yeti and their web advance, told off in a series of tube stations. "Queensway... Leicester Square... Chancery Lane... All in a half hour. And it's creeping in all the time..."
And then, of course. Here he is. Colonel Lethbridge Stewart. A man initially presented as someone we may or may not be able to trust. A man established in character from the beginning. "That's enough diplomacy for one day. Time for some practical soldiering."
The story uses stock music quite effectively, despite at one point breaking out into what I always think of as "The Cyberman Music". (Space Adventure by Martin Slavin, fact-fans!)
I'm glad that we're reaching the end of the reconstruction desert. The sounds of army fighting yeti make me long to be able to see the visuals that must've accompanied the gunfire.
The end of the story is quite depressing, really. The Great Intelligence escapes! And it seems somewhat odd that it never came back to tangle with the Doctor again.
Except in the books, obv. But we're concentrating on TV, here.
A nice, taut little invasion story.
Ah the web of fear
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