I love it when the Second Doctor says "Our lives are different to anybody else's thats the exciting thing, there’s nobody in the universe can do what we're doing" always sends a shiver down my spine, that line, I think that sums up all of Doctor Who for me
This is the episode that made me really mourn the fact that so many 2nd Doctor episodes are missing, because Patrick Troughton is so fantastic as the Doctor.
Fun Fact: this is also Matt Smith's favorite story (Patrick Troughton is called "The Doctor's Doctor." Because several of the actors to play the Doctor-- Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy, & Matt Smith-- cite Troughton as their favorite Doctor)
The audios for the missing stories where released on CD some time ago but most of them are out of print but you can still watch the fan reconstructions here www.dailymotion.com/DavidAgnew/playlists they basically take the original audio put still photographs from the episodes and use whatever surviving footage exists over it.outside of the official animated reconstructions they are the best way to watch the missing stories
Yeah, Moonbase has the same design; well a similar one; the Tomb ones have boots and more pipes. But the Moonbase Cybermen did look practically identical to these ones.
They intended to. That's why they were created in the first place (at least that's what I've read) but they couldn't find the right company to produce them.
Same, Even though I've only seen one serial of 3 and none of 4-8 I think Troughton will always be my favourite or have a very special place in my heart.
This is one of the few classic doctor who stories I've seen and I really like it. The music when the cybermen were breaking out was amazingly haunting, it's been years since I have seen this story and i can still remember the music(its so good).
My favorite Troughton storyline is The Enemy of the World, but this one is also good. The scene where he counsels Victoria about her dead father is worth the price of admission all by itself.
This story is the very definition of being doomed by reputation. For decades it was regarded as a lost classic, and then the story of its discovery was so weird and out of nowhere...and then people actually got to see it again and were forced to admit their memories had built it up way too much. Still, "Now I know you're mad, I just wanted to make sure" is one of Two's greatest moments. A lot of that annoyance from Victoria comes straight from her actress Deborah Watling, who spoke several times about her frustration that the show was such a boys' club at the time. She passed away from cancer last year, but rather awesomely managed to live just barely long enough to see the announcement of Jodie Whittaker's casting.
Such a good story with some iconic moments. The only bad thing is the black character being a mindless servant, which is frankly a bit shocking by today's standards.
Apparently he was actually supposed to be deaf, but they managed to remove every explicit reference to that during filming. It makes the whole thing make a lot more sense.
how do you know they were making him the way he was BECAUSE he was black? i'm sure there are plenty archetypes of white mindless thugs too. and there will be archetypes of black characters whom are good. it's variety. I get kind of sceptical on this whole thing, tho I admit it's not completely in ppl's pattern seeking minds, I just don't know how you'd tell it apart and therefore whether it's worth worrying about
I think that from today's perspective the way Toberman was portrayed seems utterly racist. BUT - it was stated somewhere in the third (I think...) part that he was in some way disabled (I understood it to be cognitively, but that was just me guessing) and therefor depending on his employer. And it is mentioned within the episode by the doctor and his companions that Toberman behaves ... well, weird, for the lack of a better word. I think at some point they did even try to talk about this with Toberman himself, but he didn't seem to be fond of conversation - or maybe not able to understand at all what they were saying. Anyway, for me this portrayal is set into perspective by coming a little while after the episode with the space-captain in The tenth planet - black, smart, astronaut alongside with guys and a pretty cool character. I just can't say for sure whether his dialect is afroamerican or something else, English is not my native language. So I didn't understand Tobermans portrayal to be racist, but specifically about Toberman as a character, since Doctor Who had at this point already shown that they considered black persons to be perfectly capable scientists / astronauts / heroes. What I forgot to add - I still don't think that Toberman saving the day or being subtly (I didn't just imagine that, did I?!) hinted at being, maybe, somewhat handicapped, excuses a writing that could very easily be read as racist stereotypes. Like with the question of why the Cyberman are scary - they are, the tenth planet and other episodes had their goals and danger set up - but in this one there is not enough to re-establish this set up. And since in writing the rule is 'write it or it's not there'... It plainly isn't. Sadly, though. I would have loved a cognitively challenged character ending up being the hero...
These cybermen were same design in the moonbase. It's the only look they had in the 60s to last more than one story. Yeah Evil is mostly missing, Part 2 still exists though.
While this isn't my favourite Troughton Cyberman story, that goes to The Moonbase and The Invasion, this is still a great story. The Cybermen are incredibly effective here, Troughton is on point (when is he ever not effective though), 2's relationship with Jamie is finally 100% perfect (their relationship didn't really start until The Macra Terror), Victoria really comes as a capable companion even after all she went through in the previous story, the only weak thing about the story is that the side characters are stereotypical. Besides that, great story to start out for one of my favourite Classic Who Seasons
I remember my dad getting me this story on VHS shortly after it was recovered (from Hong Kong, iirc?). Even by the age of twelve, i loved the old Universal and Hammer horror movies so Doctor Who doing a Mummy's Curse story was always going to be a winner in our house. Actually, come to think of it, George Pastell who played Klieg was in the Hammer version of The Mummy. That had to be deliberate. My Commodore 64 voice emulator sounded just like this model of Cybermen. "YOU BELONG TO UZZZZ!" Another thought: the Doctor's speech about his long-lost family 'sleeping in his mind' had a nice echo from Jodie at the end of last week's episode.
There is audio for all Classic Who, thanks to the original fans who recorded the audio on cassettes--the BBC has them all. I understand one can find a download of all adventures with the audio matched to production photos. Hoping the BBC will begin animating the episodes to match the audio (which they have done on a couple of occasions to date).
No need to download, some of them even are on youtube. And most on other, similar platforms. And a lot of fan-productions offering different kinds of animation for the lost episodes - some pretty silly looking, though. :-D
I love the part where the doctor and Jamie walk in holding hands. It was Patrick and Fraser's idea and they made sure their hands were high enough to be in shot.
That moment with the Doctor talking with Victoria about his family is my favourite moment with the Second Doctor, and one of my favourites over all with any Doctor.
Thanks almost exclusively to badass audiophiles in the audience who broke out their at-the-time hideously expensive reel-to-reel recorders to capture the sound from a teatime family program. That's right, the audio was saved by technical copyright violation. 😁
Quick note: there are audios for every missing story, and telesnaps for most of them. So, yeah, if you’re satisfied with an audio, you can “watch” all of classic Who.
The Cybermats were an idea ahead of their time and they got used and re-used better in later occurances. Originally the Cybermats were intended to be Parasites and in the books they worked well. The cybermat would attach itself to the back of the persons neck and allow the cybermen to control them. It's implied at one point in this story but the studio couldn't really implement it well with that technology..
I saw a documentary ages ago about how they did the Cyberman voice back then. The VA got his dentist to mould his upper set of teeth and make a flat plate that neetly fitted up in the roof of his mouth. Then the BBC effects people built a buzzing/vibrating plate into it with a battery and on/off switch. When he voiced the lines he had to slowly and loudly speak around the buzzing to get a decipherable enough voice to come out. I always found it crazy that off camera throughout filming there was a man who had a mouth full of vibrating metal and plastic. He'd be standing there waiting for the cyberman's mouth to drop open then force the line out. Couple that with the stress of having to remember all the lines while his braincase and teeth are getting constantly rattled.
Victoria was with the show for about a year but little remains, Deborah Watling was on the tapes for the period most badly hit by the wiping. Until the rediscover of the complete "Enemy of the World" about 2 years ago her only complete surviving story was "Tomb of the Cybermen." There is a reconstructed "Evil of the Daleks", I haven't seen it but I believe it has the missing scenes replaced with animated remakes as with "The Invasion."
1:47 “She has a spunk to her that I really like”... to British viewers: so I after some Googling I’ve discovered that in America, spunk essentially means sassy... to American viewers: spunk, in the UK, means semen... I don’t know how that happened...
had to look up the UK meaning of suspenders. interesting mental image, to be sure. And something tells me the fanfic already exists and probably did before the first episode aired lol
No we can say spunky in the UK to mean spirit. Words can have multiple meanings, which leads to double entendre, a type of comedy Britain made an industry on during the 60s and 70s in cinema and TV.
Tomb is great, but a really under appreciated 2nd doctor adventure is the mind robber: it’s so strange and creepy and way ahead of its time, it feels almost like a really good Moffat episode, and isn’t even hindered by the hilarious swapping out of the Jamie actor for one episode😂
Sam Quinn i think Frazer Hines had a holiday planned so they needed a different actor for a week. Cant think of this happening in any program any where else in the world ever. Before or since.
from what I read, I believe frazer hines was ill hence why it was a very sudden, random and hasty thing. normally holidays are planned in advance and so the scripts written with that in mind
Fantastic review! Was nervous you were going to pull it apart and hate on it (which would be fine of course, but as it’s probably my all time favourite ‘rainy day’ Doctor Who story) but I it was a really measured and thought provoking review. Loved it, many thanks!
@Councilofgeeks, What you and many other viewers keep failing to address with this story, in regards to Toberman, is the character's ultimate status as the story's HERO. Toberman is ultimately my favorite character, in spite of the stereotypes portrayed by his character, BECAUSE of what he does towards the end... AFTER he has been freed from both Kaftan's ownership and the Cybermen's control... The Doctor gives him his freedom, at this point, Toberman is his own person and makes the decision that the Cybermen must die for what they have done. From here out, he helps The Doctor, NOT because he considers himself The Doctor's servant but because the two now share the same goal. This leads to Toberman becoming the story's hero as he sacrifices his own life to achieve this goal. I don't want to spoil too much... Just re-watch Episode 4 and pay attention to what Toberman does throughout it. He IS the hero of this tale... And, to me, that outshines by far any of the racial stereotypes that hang around this character. He IS redeemed in whole by this story... 😊😊😊😊
I didn't fail to address that so much as i didn't want to get into ending spoilers. However that only fixes half the problem with his character. It arguably removes the villain problem, but the sub-par intelligent & subservient status of the blackest person in the story still remains.
@@CouncilofGeeks someone else said he was originally intended to be d/Deaf so it sounds like an ableist thing. If they hired a Deaf black actor maybe they could have shown some use of BSL or ASL to make it explicit and get rid of the tropes.
I'm not sure his saving the day makes his portrayal up to that point any less cringey. Viewers had to sit through a LOT to get to the payoff. I remember it making me seriously uncomfortable as a kid and that was in the much less progressive 1980s
I just find it sad how so many "modern fans" have to shove everything thru these Modern PC Filters before they can accept things. Really kind of silly especially when you look at the nonsense that is going on today.
My favorite 2nd Doctor story as well. The Invasion (another Cybermen story) is up there as well. You mentioned the 'mummy's curse' early on. It's not a big secret that this story was based on the Mummy movies Universal and Hammer made. In fact, the actor who played Klieg was in one of the Hammer Mummy movie.
Victoria was from a wealthy family from Victoria England. So I assume she would have been maybe a tad disappointed by what to her was the far future and how the future people treated her. I am just kind of surprised she was willing to wear that outfit. I understand the debate about Toberman - no matter how you look at it he could have been better written. But I liked the logic puzzle and the idea that the Cyberman were willing to do ANYTHING to survive.
Even though Toberman was unfortunately a character of the time, there are two interesting things that came from it. 1. He has two maybe three lines in the entire story. But that was actually a fluke, there were some deleted scenes or smth with more of him. 2. Maybe it's just how I read the moment, but the message from the Doctor to Toberman around the end was basically "Don't join them, they don't care about who you are, they'll erase *you*" and that was really sweet and pretty cool.
Evil of the Daleks is available on Amazon's Audible. It appears to be the audio recording of the episodes with Frazer Hines (the actor who played Jamie) reading scene transition notes.
Always a joy to see you tackling Classic Who serials Nate, and now you've finally reviewed my first ever adventure of Doctor Who. Saw this when I was 2 years old with my dad and while I agree with many of your gripes, I can say that I didn't have a real problem with the Cybermats. But anyway, awesome review as usual, hope you have a great day, and I look forward to next Sunday's review.
This was the story I used to introduce my father to Doctor Who in general -- it was one of two VHS tapes in the library that *wasn't* a Tom Baker story. And as much as I love Tom Baker, I wanted to make sure my dad understood that there was a lot more to the show than just him. As father was watching the first episode, he said something like: "Oh. I get it. What makes the Doctor a hero isn't any special powers... just that he's seen more of the universe than anyone else, and has a better perspective to solve problems" Or something like that... this was like, 20 years ago, or so. As for the cybermats, I agree. I don't think the writers ever worked out what their threat was supposed to be (as I recall, there's a line in the script about how they induce fear, and that's how the cybermen know you're vulnerable to conversion...But that doesn't make much sense to me. Based on the closing shot of the last episode, of a cybermat trundling across the desert, I came up with the theory that if you're *bitten* by one of those things, that starts the cyber-conversion process. So everyone who survives leaves Telos at the end, thinking every last cyberman has been destroyed in their base, bus this lone cybermat is seen escaping... And if it bites anyone else, we may get more cybermen, after all. Have you seen "The Invasion"? The first episode has been lost, but it's been recreated with the audio and black and white animation, and the all the other episodes are intact. That's another of my favorite Second Doctor stories. It's another one that features cybermen, and an megalomaniac that thinks he can control them. But this time, it's the Doctor, Jamie, and Zoe, who gets to team up with another young woman and helps save the day (twice) with her own STEM-based superpowers.
I can't cite a good source, but I've heard that one of the problems with Toberman (besides the obvious) is one of conveying an idea which didn't come across very well - he was supposed to be somewhat hearing impaired, if not in the actual version presented then at least in concept. This somewhat explains why he comes across as dimwitted and not very articulate, rather than just being dumb muscle; it doesn't solve the issue of presentation though, given we have a big burly black man who is a willing servant of the villains. The saving grace to the character, of course, is that he ultimately sacrifices his life in order to stop the Cybermen from escaping... still problematic though, and the other villains are only a little better overall.
This episode made me laugh so much, but in a good way. I love the dynamic between the doctor and Jamie. Like when Victoria asked if her skirt is too short and the doctor says: No, it's not, just look at Jamies! :D
Definitely in my top 15 of this era. Not one of my favourites but I still really enjoy it. Victoria is at her best here, Jamie and the Doctor are as great as ever and while there are some issues in pacing or the side characters there is a lot that prevents me from disliking this serial.
I want to love it more but it does drag and has a pretty forgettable group of side characters. I can also think of at least 5 serials I like more - Fury From The Deep, The Web Of Fear. The Mind Robber, The Invasion and The War Games. Still really like the story though - the Patrick Troughton era doesn't have a lot of duds in episodes or serials.
10 1st and Susan 9 3rd and Liz Shaw 8 9th and Rose 7 10th and Donna 6 1st and Barbara/Ian 53rd and Jo Grant 4 11th and the ponds 3 3rd/4th with the brig 2 4th with Sarah Jane 1 2nd and Jamie
Troughton is my favourite Doctor and Tomb Of the Cybermen is my 2nd favourite series. I was about 7 when I first saw it. The scene that really gripped my was at the end when the Cybermen climb back into their tombs and seal themselves back in. As a 7 year old I thought it was proper scientific stuff the way they did it, though obviously I know now that it's the scene at the beginning when they come out of the tombs played in reverse lol. Magical stuff either way though. BTW, my favourite series was The Evil Of The Daleks, mainly for the fight scene at the end in front of the Emperor Dalek. Watching daleks exterminating each other was was fantastic telly. 👌
There is audio for every missing episode. Also, The Evil of the Daleks isn't all missing, Victoria first appears in episode 2, which is the only existing episode of the story
I think this season (season 5, or the second season of Troughton) is one of the strongest seasons of Doctor. And of course Troughton is magnificent in most of his stories.
I've always assumed, and I think it's an assumption most writers make as well, that the Cybermats are meant to infect people with nanites used in the cyber-conversion process.
At the 9 min mark you mention that Klieg financed the expedition. I believe it was Professor Parry who financed the expedition. The professor keeps reminding them that he's in charge. The professor reminds the Captain of the ship "that is what I'm paying you for."
Oh and YES - since these episodes were aired within a week after the episode was made, often with the studio filming three story arcs at a time, and popping them out over the coming months (none of this - film it all and air it the year later) - THEY REALLY DID have to pad episodes. Frequently! They were often told "You know this three episode arc - we need to make it a four ep!"
I love this story, too. FWIW, I thought Kleeg and Kaftan or whatever her name was were supposed to be German, but that's a minor point. Toberman, though, I think people who think the portrayal of him is racist are missing a lot. First of all, he's not stupid. Check out the scene where the ship captain is reporting the damage to the ship to the expedition leader. While they're discussing what could have happened, Toberman is in the background smirking, 'cause he knows what happened and is amused that they can't figure it out. That's probably the second best scene in the whole story (the best, of course, is the conversation between the Doctor and Victoria you mentioned). And keep in mind, at the end of the story, he's pretty much the hero.
I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with this story. There are good moments, but a lot of it doesn’t seem to work very well in my opinion. Regarding the Moonbase, that story had these Cybermen.
It’s nice to finally see a review that acknowledges the race problems but also recognises there’s not much point getting upset about race in a 50 year old epsiode. So many people make reviews of this and spend 10 minutes talking about why racism is bad but doesn’t even mention the actual story itself
Also impressive is the fact that the guys in the cyber man suits didn’t fall trying to climb out of those tombs since they could only see out of those tiny holes.
One story I got on dvd, I love that scene where the Doctor thinks he's leading Victoria in but it's Jamie. One thing about Cybermen, they always betray their allies. I think the cellophane was supposed to be ice, I could be wrong on that. Great 2nd Doctor episode.
All the lost episodes have surviving audio. Back then, before video recording, all fans could do was use sound recorders plus the BBC kept some of the audio tapes too. Sadly Evil of the Daleks is mostly missing in video aside from episode 2. A lot of the second Doctor's best stories are. If only the TARDIS were real....
And all of the lost episodes are available as reconstructions using the full audio and stills. Loose Cannon did the best ones in my opinion - you can usually find them either here on CZcams or on Dailymotion.
Matt Smith said he watched this story and decided that his Doctor would be like the Second Doctor in some ways. Also I think the Cybermen saying ‘You will bee like uss...’ is scary and like the ‘we will survive’ line speaks of what the Cybermen are as well.
I suggest a top (?) historical characters/historical episodes in Dr. Who. I always enjoy the show tackling a time period and I’d like to hear your opinion on Dr Who’s portrayal of these larger than life figures or how well they interpreted a point in history.
STORIES not episodes, for that look mostly at 1st! That was exactly what he did! the very first story, after the introduction was cave men, not thrilling marco polo crusade the aztecs the romans mythmakers Reign of terror the massacre the gunfighter (maybe)1st highlander from 2nd visitation black orchid 5th empty child 9th girl in the fire shaskespear code fires of pompeii the unicorn and the wasp for 10th vincent for 11th this are all the historicals or semi that I've seen
After so many times I've watched the whole story, especially part 1, I fully understand why 2 keeps slapping Jamie's hand away from the TARDIS Console buttons
Yes, there’s definitely something special about the Troughton Cybermen stories. Really tough to pick a favourite but at the time, The Wheel in Space impressed me most - the contrast of human frailty and Cybermen capability in outer space resulted in such an unrelenting, creepy and claustrophobic story. I suspect it’s full recovery would lead to a massive re-evaluation.
This was my first Troughton story, back in high school on PBS, and it remains my favorite Troughton (though I love every Troughton I've seen), and my favorite Doctor Who story of all time. It definitely has its issues, and I've seen them more as I've gotten older - 15 year old me in 1995 didn't see how problematic Klieg and co. were - but the issues don't break the story for me, personally. I enjoy Toberman's story arc, such as it is, and I wish they'd fleshed out his character in particular a little more. Why is he so devoted to Kaftan? What is it about her death that breaks his conditioning, when otherwise he would have remained the Cyber Controller's puppet? I also love the rapport that the Doctor, Jamie, and Victoria have together. Victoria's initial reticence about her non-period dress - "I wouldn't worry, look at Jamie's!", and how quickly she adapts to the situations - realizing she's been drugged, playing up her fear to throw off Kaftan, taking out a Cybermat on her own (she's a good shot!), and working on her own initiative to do what she can. I love her here. If a friend asks me to recommend them a classic Who story, this is my go-to. I've introduced more friends to Doctor Who with this than I can count, and most of them, once they got over the inherent 1960s-ness, really enjoyed it, and were willing to watch more stories.
Toberman wasn't a problem for me; the role he fulfilled was that of the silent and not terribly intellectual 'heavy'. Traditionally, that role would have been filled in a British drama of the period with a London thug. That it was played here by a black actor could be seen, if anything, as a step forward in colour blind casting. The character did, of course, have his moment of heroic redemption in the end. I really hadn't considered (or noticed) that Kaftan and Klieg, the primary human antagonists, were both non-British. I guess that it was simply a convention at the time, in the same way the British actors are currently cast as antagonists so often in US productions. Kaftan, I assumed, to be written as a generic 'Mediterranean' character (Spanish/Italian etc)--dark haired and fiery. Klieg I have no idea about. The name seemed vaguely Germanic but the accent is difficult to place (!) The music was actually all stock from the BBC library but there were some good choices made and it shows that it is not always necessary to commission new material to build a good atmospheric soundtrack. The chemistry and friendship which had grown between Troughton and Frazer Hines is demonstrated by the unscripted addition by them of the accidental hand-holding as they entered the tomb. They planned it knowing that the shooting budget made it highly unlikely that the shot would be cut. Speaking of shooting, the whole scene of the Cybermen bursting out from their freezers was shot in a single take--a great achievement given the cumbersome cameras and the size of the set.
Thanks for the insight, I don't know anything about British theater, let alone at that time. What I wanted to add about Kaftan and Klieg - up till this point the villains, stubborn hindrances and attempting masterminds opposing The Doctor were aliens such as the Cyberman or the Daleks - or white men. Preferably white- or gray haired. Do you happen to give a little guess about the symbolism in villains back then? Just asking, your comment is so well structured and interesting, I thought I'd just ask. :-)
Where the villains are human it would have made sense for them to generally be older men as they were most likely to hold reins of the power in society at the time. This type of villain is typified by Mavic Chen in _The Dalek Master Plan_ or Tobias Vaugh in _The Invasion_ (both played by the wonderful Kevin Stoney) respectively the Guardian of the Solar System and CEO of International Electromatics. Of course the show also stands this on its head from time to time, for example in _Galaxy 4_ where the antagonists are all women.
thank you, this is really interesting. I watched all the original episodes, but I never quite analyzed the villains. You're right, of course, older men simply being more likely in positions of power... I feel kinda stupid now. :-D But as you said, every now and then the whole dynamics are changed, switched around or played with, so I never took a look at the elements as groups, aka I didn't think too much about the villains or antagonists. Thanks a lot for your input!
I always liked Toberman - he's playing a traditional "heavy" archetype as you say, nothing racist about it (and he is huge compared to the Doctor & Jamie - which is actually quite funny as Jamie is obviously wary of him, and seems to spend a few early scenes sizing him up deciding if he could take him). He was also one of the first black actors to even get a part in the show (would have to check to be sure but I think he may actually be the first?). So you can't really accuse them of typcasting the black actor when they hadn't really had any cast before him.
The Cyber-Controller had _five_ brains in there. In contrast, Cybusmen are tedious and too robotic. Victoria didn't stick around very long. She left at the end of _Fury From The Deep_ (absolutely excellent and disturbingly weird to my then eight year old self) but I did very much like her, she was just _very_ out of her time and comfort zone.
The Evil of the Daleks _does_ have audio available and it is also really good. The Daleks are interesting and imposing villains - their plot, reminiscent of 'Daleks in Manhattan,' relates to the tension between their self-supposed supremacy and the actual constrictions of their species - and the Doctor is explored as a morally ambiguous trickster in a way that wasn't done much in the classic series (at least, not as far as I've seen) but that reminded me of their new series stories in a way I thought was super-cool. Weirdly, it also had more-or-less the same character problem in the key cast to Toberman in this one - but I thought it was done much better in the former (The Evil of the Daleks) than here.
If you haven;t already yet, I'd love to hear your opinions on The Enemy of the World. It's my favourite 2nd Doctor Story, and my favourite Doctor Who story of all time.
I mean no offence here, I agree with a lot of what you say, but I have no problem with the villains being foreign. I see the Kleig and Katlan (I hope that's the way to spell them) as being foreign villains it's no different from villains in many American films sporting British accents. For Toberman, I love him. He starts as just a henchman but in the end becomes a hero and saves everyone, laying down his life to close the doors and defeat the Cyber Controller. I have no problems with these elements of the story. I like your review though, keep up the good work.
Kaftan was played by Shirley Cooklin, who was the wife of this story's producer Peter Bryant. I don't think she "browned-up" as such, she was just heavily tanned. I'll admit that I struggle with the idea that we should be offended by the racial insensitivities of the past. Acknowledge them, certainly, but there's very little point in challenging the prejudices of yesterday. Is Toberman a slave? There's no indication of that, and his reaction to Kaftan's death, plus his ultimate sacrifice, suggests he's there of his own free will. Could it have been handled better? Certainly.
Is he explicitly depicted as a slave? No. Does he adhere to slave character tropes? You betcha. But yeah, I try to not hold this stuff against the older stories too much, but I do feel they still need to be acknowledged because otherwise this stuff ends up sticking around longer than it should by being grandfathered in. It's like the Indians in the Disney Peter Pan movie. Yeah, it's a depiction consistent with the time... but we're still showing that movie to kids now, and it kind of needs to be at least talked about.
When I think second Doctor I first think of this story. Invasion was good but that story I always felt was the pilot of Jon Pertwee's run as the Doctor.
I love this story. My only problem is that the Doctor was going to re electrify the doors. It only seems to kill the first one to touch the doors and will most likely kill some innocent person who will next try to open the doors.
The casual racism of Classic Who was quite amusing to see. Remember when Doc #1 talked about how the "red savages" of America when seeing a train for the first time would think it was magic? I think that was in the interesting cringy episode about the Aztecs.
Better, actually! It was literally in the show's first episode as how he chose to explain to Susan (and the audience) the mystery of the TARDIS after it was first discovered. "Now, now, don't get exasperated, Susan - remember the Red Indian. When he saw the first steam train, his savage mind thought _it_ an illusion too!"
I would argue for Toberman. I don't think he's a villain. He's been very much led by his beliefs that his master and mistress are doing the right thing at all times. He's led by love, particularly for Kaftan. And he does get redemption at the end. He becomes the hero of the piece. EDIT. Never mind. I see others 'mentioned' it. Doctor Who in the 1960's did tend to hire black/foreign actors at times. For a notable one, look in 'The Tenth Planet' for the small role of a Black, Welsh, Astronaut! My favourite comedy moment? Near the beginning when the TARDIS crew enter the tomb hand-in-hand. Until the Doctor and Jamie realise Victoria isn't with them and they're holding each others hand and quickly release!
I love it when the Second Doctor says "Our lives are different to anybody else's thats the exciting thing, there’s nobody in the universe can do what we're doing" always sends a shiver down my spine, that line, I think that sums up all of Doctor Who for me
Just so you're aware: EVERY single missing Doctor Who episode/story has audio and fan-made reconstructions.
This is the episode that made me really mourn the fact that so many 2nd Doctor episodes are missing, because Patrick Troughton is so fantastic as the Doctor.
Fun Fact: this is also Matt Smith's favorite story
(Patrick Troughton is called "The Doctor's Doctor." Because several of the actors to play the Doctor-- Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy, & Matt Smith-- cite Troughton as their favorite Doctor)
The audio to every Doctor Who story Exists
The audios for the missing stories where released on CD some time ago but most of them are out of print but you can still watch the fan reconstructions here www.dailymotion.com/DavidAgnew/playlists they basically take the original audio put still photographs from the episodes and use whatever surviving footage exists over it.outside of the official animated reconstructions they are the best way to watch the missing stories
TV's first BROMANCE This was also one of the first shows were the got to shot on a Large set
Yeah, Moonbase has the same design; well a similar one; the Tomb ones have boots and more pipes. But the Moonbase Cybermen did look practically identical to these ones.
The bbc missed a bit by not marketing cybermats
They intended to. That's why they were created in the first place (at least that's what I've read) but they couldn't find the right company to produce them.
This story was lost for some time and when it came back it had lost none of it's fun ...One of the best Dr.Who stories.
My second favorite classic story. Right behind War Games.
I love Troughton...
Same, Even though I've only seen one serial of 3 and none of 4-8 I think Troughton will always be my favourite or have a very special place in my heart.
This is one of the few classic doctor who stories I've seen and I really like it. The music when the cybermen were breaking out was amazingly haunting, it's been years since I have seen this story and i can still remember the music(its so good).
My favorite Troughton storyline is The Enemy of the World, but this one is also good. The scene where he counsels Victoria about her dead father is worth the price of admission all by itself.
This story is the very definition of being doomed by reputation. For decades it was regarded as a lost classic, and then the story of its discovery was so weird and out of nowhere...and then people actually got to see it again and were forced to admit their memories had built it up way too much. Still, "Now I know you're mad, I just wanted to make sure" is one of Two's greatest moments.
A lot of that annoyance from Victoria comes straight from her actress Deborah Watling, who spoke several times about her frustration that the show was such a boys' club at the time. She passed away from cancer last year, but rather awesomely managed to live just barely long enough to see the announcement of Jodie Whittaker's casting.
Such a good story with some iconic moments. The only bad thing is the black character being a mindless servant, which is frankly a bit shocking by today's standards.
Keep in mind, he did save everybody from the Cyber-Controller
@@theknightsofawesomeness2701 Toberman IS the hero of this story... Look past today's PC culture and this becomes MOST evident... 😊
Apparently he was actually supposed to be deaf, but they managed to remove every explicit reference to that during filming. It makes the whole thing make a lot more sense.
how do you know they were making him the way he was BECAUSE he was black? i'm sure there are plenty archetypes of white mindless thugs too. and there will be archetypes of black characters whom are good. it's variety. I get kind of sceptical on this whole thing, tho I admit it's not completely in ppl's pattern seeking minds, I just don't know how you'd tell it apart and therefore whether it's worth worrying about
I think that from today's perspective the way Toberman was portrayed seems utterly racist. BUT - it was stated somewhere in the third (I think...) part that he was in some way disabled (I understood it to be cognitively, but that was just me guessing) and therefor depending on his employer. And it is mentioned within the episode by the doctor and his companions that Toberman behaves ... well, weird, for the lack of a better word. I think at some point they did even try to talk about this with Toberman himself, but he didn't seem to be fond of conversation - or maybe not able to understand at all what they were saying.
Anyway, for me this portrayal is set into perspective by coming a little while after the episode with the space-captain in The tenth planet - black, smart, astronaut alongside with guys and a pretty cool character. I just can't say for sure whether his dialect is afroamerican or something else, English is not my native language. So I didn't understand Tobermans portrayal to be racist, but specifically about Toberman as a character, since Doctor Who had at this point already shown that they considered black persons to be perfectly capable scientists / astronauts / heroes.
What I forgot to add - I still don't think that Toberman saving the day or being subtly (I didn't just imagine that, did I?!) hinted at being, maybe, somewhat handicapped, excuses a writing that could very easily be read as racist stereotypes. Like with the question of why the Cyberman are scary - they are, the tenth planet and other episodes had their goals and danger set up - but in this one there is not enough to re-establish this set up. And since in writing the rule is 'write it or it's not there'... It plainly isn't. Sadly, though. I would have loved a cognitively challenged character ending up being the hero...
These cybermen were same design in the moonbase. It's the only look they had in the 60s to last more than one story. Yeah Evil is mostly missing, Part 2 still exists though.
Moonbase has the same design as the trapdoor mouth
While this isn't my favourite Troughton Cyberman story, that goes to The Moonbase and The Invasion, this is still a great story. The Cybermen are incredibly effective here, Troughton is on point (when is he ever not effective though), 2's relationship with Jamie is finally 100% perfect (their relationship didn't really start until The Macra Terror), Victoria really comes as a capable companion even after all she went through in the previous story, the only weak thing about the story is that the side characters are stereotypical. Besides that, great story to start out for one of my favourite Classic Who Seasons
I remember my dad getting me this story on VHS shortly after it was recovered (from Hong Kong, iirc?). Even by the age of twelve, i loved the old Universal and Hammer horror movies so Doctor Who doing a Mummy's Curse story was always going to be a winner in our house. Actually, come to think of it, George Pastell who played Klieg was in the Hammer version of The Mummy. That had to be deliberate. My Commodore 64 voice emulator sounded just like this model of Cybermen. "YOU BELONG TO UZZZZ!"
Another thought: the Doctor's speech about his long-lost family 'sleeping in his mind' had a nice echo from Jodie at the end of last week's episode.
There is audio for all Classic Who, thanks to the original fans who recorded the audio on cassettes--the BBC has them all. I understand one can find a download of all adventures with the audio matched to production photos. Hoping the BBC will begin animating the episodes to match the audio (which they have done on a couple of occasions to date).
Yep. And many have animated versions or have been turned into audio plays by adding narration.
No need to download, some of them even are on youtube. And most on other, similar platforms. And a lot of fan-productions offering different kinds of animation for the lost episodes - some pretty silly looking, though. :-D
Fury is out in October, so thats one more!
The Cybermen breaking out of the Cellophane scene is my oldest Doctor Who memory as a Kid. So this will always be my favourite 2nd Doctor story.
I love the part where the doctor and Jamie walk in holding hands. It was Patrick and Fraser's idea and they made sure their hands were high enough to be in shot.
That moment with the Doctor talking with Victoria about his family is my favourite moment with the Second Doctor, and one of my favourites over all with any Doctor.
Audio exists for all the missing stories
Thanks almost exclusively to badass audiophiles in the audience who broke out their at-the-time hideously expensive reel-to-reel recorders to capture the sound from a teatime family program.
That's right, the audio was saved by technical copyright violation. 😁
Quick note: there are audios for every missing story, and telesnaps for most of them. So, yeah, if you’re satisfied with an audio, you can “watch” all of classic Who.
The Cybermats were an idea ahead of their time and they got used and re-used better in later occurances. Originally the Cybermats were intended to be Parasites and in the books they worked well. The cybermat would attach itself to the back of the persons neck and allow the cybermen to control them. It's implied at one point in this story but the studio couldn't really implement it well with that technology..
I saw a documentary ages ago about how they did the Cyberman voice back then.
The VA got his dentist to mould his upper set of teeth and make a flat plate that neetly fitted up in the roof of his mouth. Then the BBC effects people built a buzzing/vibrating plate into it with a battery and on/off switch.
When he voiced the lines he had to slowly and loudly speak around the buzzing to get a decipherable enough voice to come out.
I always found it crazy that off camera throughout filming there was a man who had a mouth full of vibrating metal and plastic. He'd be standing there waiting for the cyberman's mouth to drop open then force the line out. Couple that with the stress of having to remember all the lines while his braincase and teeth are getting constantly rattled.
The guy who did the Cybermen voices was called Peter Hawkins and was also famous for doing the voices of Bill and Ben the Flower Pot Men. 😊
Victoria was with the show for about a year but little remains, Deborah Watling was on the tapes for the period most badly hit by the wiping. Until the rediscover of the complete "Enemy of the World" about 2 years ago her only complete surviving story was "Tomb of the Cybermen." There is a reconstructed "Evil of the Daleks", I haven't seen it but I believe it has the missing scenes replaced with animated remakes as with "The Invasion."
I love this classic episode. Need to rewatch it. I like Patrick Troughton's Doctor and I enjoy seeing aspects of his character in Matt Smith's Doctor.
STORY not episode!
1:47 “She has a spunk to her that I really like”... to British viewers: so I after some Googling I’ve discovered that in America, spunk essentially means sassy... to American viewers: spunk, in the UK, means semen... I don’t know how that happened...
Yeah this stuff comes up. Same thing happened when I said that new Doctor wears suspenders.
Jodie wearing suspenders conjures up quite a different image for UK readers! Interesting. . . but different.
had to look up the UK meaning of suspenders. interesting mental image, to be sure. And something tells me the fanfic already exists and probably did before the first episode aired lol
No we can say spunky in the UK to mean spirit. Words can have multiple meanings, which leads to double entendre, a type of comedy Britain made an industry on during the 60s and 70s in cinema and TV.
GamerWho can safely say I’ve never heard spunk to be used to describe character 😂
Tomb is great, but a really under appreciated 2nd doctor adventure is the mind robber: it’s so strange and creepy and way ahead of its time, it feels almost like a really good Moffat episode, and isn’t even hindered by the hilarious swapping out of the Jamie actor for one episode😂
the mind robber is probably the most underrated Patrick troughton story
Sam Quinn i think Frazer Hines had a holiday planned so they needed a different actor for a week. Cant think of this happening in any program any where else in the world ever. Before or since.
from what I read, I believe frazer hines was ill hence why it was a very sudden, random and hasty thing. normally holidays are planned in advance and so the scripts written with that in mind
To clear it up, Frazer Hines contracted Chickenpox during filming, and had to be replace for 2 and a half episodes.
Fantastic review! Was nervous you were going to pull it apart and hate on it (which would be fine of course, but as it’s probably my all time favourite ‘rainy day’ Doctor Who story) but I it was a really measured and thought provoking review. Loved it, many thanks!
1:38- *laughs in Fitz Kreiner*
Despite the problems, I love this story!!!! And Jamie is one of my favorite companions ever.
@Councilofgeeks, What you and many other viewers keep failing to address with this story, in regards to Toberman, is the character's ultimate status as the story's HERO. Toberman is ultimately my favorite character, in spite of the stereotypes portrayed by his character, BECAUSE of what he does towards the end... AFTER he has been freed from both Kaftan's ownership and the Cybermen's control... The Doctor gives him his freedom, at this point, Toberman is his own person and makes the decision that the Cybermen must die for what they have done. From here out, he helps The Doctor, NOT because he considers himself The Doctor's servant but because the two now share the same goal. This leads to Toberman becoming the story's hero as he sacrifices his own life to achieve this goal.
I don't want to spoil too much... Just re-watch Episode 4 and pay attention to what Toberman does throughout it. He IS the hero of this tale... And, to me, that outshines by far any of the racial stereotypes that hang around this character.
He IS redeemed in whole by this story... 😊😊😊😊
I didn't fail to address that so much as i didn't want to get into ending spoilers. However that only fixes half the problem with his character. It arguably removes the villain problem, but the sub-par intelligent & subservient status of the blackest person in the story still remains.
@@CouncilofGeeks someone else said he was originally intended to be d/Deaf so it sounds like an ableist thing. If they hired a Deaf black actor maybe they could have shown some use of BSL or ASL to make it explicit and get rid of the tropes.
I'm not sure his saving the day makes his portrayal up to that point any less cringey. Viewers had to sit through a LOT to get to the payoff. I remember it making me seriously uncomfortable as a kid and that was in the much less progressive 1980s
I'm not sure that really manages to make up for the representation of the character over all. It's still pretty damned racist
I just find it sad how so many "modern fans" have to shove everything thru these Modern PC Filters before they can accept things. Really kind of silly especially when you look at the nonsense that is going on today.
You're totally right about the 'complete metal breakdown' joke and the actors' reactions. One of Dr Who's best funny moments.
My favorite 2nd Doctor story as well. The Invasion (another Cybermen story) is up there as well.
You mentioned the 'mummy's curse' early on. It's not a big secret that this story was based on the Mummy movies Universal and Hammer made. In fact, the actor who played Klieg was in one of the Hammer Mummy movie.
Victoria was from a wealthy family from Victoria England. So I assume she would have been maybe a tad disappointed by what to her was the far future and how the future people treated her. I am just kind of surprised she was willing to wear that outfit. I understand the debate about Toberman - no matter how you look at it he could have been better written. But I liked the logic puzzle and the idea that the Cyberman were willing to do ANYTHING to survive.
There is audio of every story.
You got one thing wrong about Kleig’s accent: I think it’s his natural accent, it’s the one he uses in From Russia with Love.
Even though Toberman was unfortunately a character of the time, there are two interesting things that came from it. 1. He has two maybe three lines in the entire story. But that was actually a fluke, there were some deleted scenes or smth with more of him. 2. Maybe it's just how I read the moment, but the message from the Doctor to Toberman around the end was basically "Don't join them, they don't care about who you are, they'll erase *you*" and that was really sweet and pretty cool.
Evil of the Daleks is available on Amazon's Audible. It appears to be the audio recording of the episodes with Frazer Hines (the actor who played Jamie) reading scene transition notes.
Always a joy to see you tackling Classic Who serials Nate, and now you've finally reviewed my first ever adventure of Doctor Who. Saw this when I was 2 years old with my dad and while I agree with many of your gripes, I can say that I didn't have a real problem with the Cybermats. But anyway, awesome review as usual, hope you have a great day, and I look forward to next Sunday's review.
This was the story I used to introduce my father to Doctor Who in general -- it was one of two VHS tapes in the library that *wasn't* a Tom Baker story. And as much as I love Tom Baker, I wanted to make sure my dad understood that there was a lot more to the show than just him. As father was watching the first episode, he said something like: "Oh. I get it. What makes the Doctor a hero isn't any special powers... just that he's seen more of the universe than anyone else, and has a better perspective to solve problems" Or something like that... this was like, 20 years ago, or so.
As for the cybermats, I agree. I don't think the writers ever worked out what their threat was supposed to be (as I recall, there's a line in the script about how they induce fear, and that's how the cybermen know you're vulnerable to conversion...But that doesn't make much sense to me.
Based on the closing shot of the last episode, of a cybermat trundling across the desert, I came up with the theory that if you're *bitten* by one of those things, that starts the cyber-conversion process. So everyone who survives leaves Telos at the end, thinking every last cyberman has been destroyed in their base, bus this lone cybermat is seen escaping... And if it bites anyone else, we may get more cybermen, after all.
Have you seen "The Invasion"? The first episode has been lost, but it's been recreated with the audio and black and white animation, and the all the other episodes are intact. That's another of my favorite Second Doctor stories. It's another one that features cybermen, and an megalomaniac that thinks he can control them. But this time, it's the Doctor, Jamie, and Zoe, who gets to team up with another young woman and helps save the day (twice) with her own STEM-based superpowers.
Just a quick note, but episodes 1 and 4 of The Invasion are missing, but they've been animated.
I can't cite a good source, but I've heard that one of the problems with Toberman (besides the obvious) is one of conveying an idea which didn't come across very well - he was supposed to be somewhat hearing impaired, if not in the actual version presented then at least in concept. This somewhat explains why he comes across as dimwitted and not very articulate, rather than just being dumb muscle; it doesn't solve the issue of presentation though, given we have a big burly black man who is a willing servant of the villains. The saving grace to the character, of course, is that he ultimately sacrifices his life in order to stop the Cybermen from escaping... still problematic though, and the other villains are only a little better overall.
Also that means the problem is bad writing and acting of a disabled person as well. Like hard of hearing people can also use sign languages...
This episode made me laugh so much, but in a good way. I love the dynamic between the doctor and Jamie.
Like when Victoria asked if her skirt is too short and the doctor says: No, it's not, just look at Jamies! :D
Black and white and its gradations are inherently otherworldly in appearance and thus work well for mystery, horror, sci-fi.
Definitely in my top 15 of this era. Not one of my favourites but I still really enjoy it. Victoria is at her best here, Jamie and the Doctor are as great as ever and while there are some issues in pacing or the side characters there is a lot that prevents me from disliking this serial.
I want to love it more but it does drag and has a pretty forgettable group of side characters. I can also think of at least 5 serials I like more - Fury From The Deep, The Web Of Fear. The Mind Robber, The Invasion and The War Games. Still really like the story though - the Patrick Troughton era doesn't have a lot of duds in episodes or serials.
Could you do a top 10 doctor /companion pairings?
It would have to include classic and I’ve got too many gaps to be able to do that yet.
10 1st and Susan
9 3rd and Liz Shaw
8 9th and Rose
7 10th and Donna
6 1st and Barbara/Ian
53rd and Jo Grant
4 11th and the ponds
3 3rd/4th with the brig
2 4th with Sarah Jane
1 2nd and Jamie
Roy Stewart, who played Toberman, also appeared later as a circus strongman in the Jon Pertwee story Terror of the Autons in 1971
Riiiight, thank you, I always wondered but never managed to look it up! Thanks so much!
Troughton is my favourite Doctor and Tomb Of the Cybermen is my 2nd favourite series. I was about 7 when I first saw it. The scene that really gripped my was at the end when the Cybermen climb back into their tombs and seal themselves back in. As a 7 year old I thought it was proper scientific stuff the way they did it, though obviously I know now that it's the scene at the beginning when they come out of the tombs played in reverse lol. Magical stuff either way though.
BTW, my favourite series was The Evil Of The Daleks, mainly for the fight scene at the end in front of the Emperor Dalek. Watching daleks exterminating each other was was fantastic telly. 👌
Bloody hell!
Two positive Classic Who reviews in a row!
Mind you, they are two of the stories in the line-up of all time best.
There is audio for every missing episode. Also, The Evil of the Daleks isn't all missing, Victoria first appears in episode 2, which is the only existing episode of the story
I think this season (season 5, or the second season of Troughton) is one of the strongest seasons of Doctor. And of course Troughton is magnificent in most of his stories.
I've always assumed, and I think it's an assumption most writers make as well, that the Cybermats are meant to infect people with nanites used in the cyber-conversion process.
There’s audio of all the lost episodes.
Tomb of the Cybermen was the first Doctor Who story Matt Smith watched after getting the role of the Eleventh Doctor and he became a fan ever since.
At the 9 min mark you mention that Klieg financed the expedition. I believe it was Professor Parry who financed the expedition. The professor keeps reminding them that he's in charge. The professor reminds the Captain of the ship "that is what I'm paying you for."
No he keeps reminding them that their financial services doesn't give them a say....its the whole drive if the episode
Always enjoy a classic Doctor Who review. May need to buy some classic Doctor who DVD or Blu-Rays or ask for them for my birthday or Christmas.
KernowShinigamiViper Lil'Dragon What have you seen of the classics out of interest?
theres 158 stories in classic who, and all but 15 are available, and were getting fury back this year! There are PLENTY for you to choose from!
Oh and YES - since these episodes were aired within a week after the episode was made, often with the studio filming three story arcs at a time, and popping them out over the coming months (none of this - film it all and air it the year later) - THEY REALLY DID have to pad episodes. Frequently! They were often told "You know this three episode arc - we need to make it a four ep!"
This is one of my favorite Troughton stories. In fact, it's the first one I ever watched.
I love this story, too. FWIW, I thought Kleeg and Kaftan or whatever her name was were supposed to be German, but that's a minor point. Toberman, though, I think people who think the portrayal of him is racist are missing a lot. First of all, he's not stupid. Check out the scene where the ship captain is reporting the damage to the ship to the expedition leader. While they're discussing what could have happened, Toberman is in the background smirking, 'cause he knows what happened and is amused that they can't figure it out. That's probably the second best scene in the whole story (the best, of course, is the conversation between the Doctor and Victoria you mentioned). And keep in mind, at the end of the story, he's pretty much the hero.
Love the new opening!
I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with this story. There are good moments, but a lot of it doesn’t seem to work very well in my opinion.
Regarding the Moonbase, that story had these Cybermen.
No. They were metal face in Moon Base
It’s nice to finally see a review that acknowledges the race problems but also recognises there’s not much point getting upset about race in a 50 year old epsiode. So many people make reviews of this and spend 10 minutes talking about why racism is bad but doesn’t even mention the actual story itself
Also impressive is the fact that the guys in the cyber man suits didn’t fall trying to climb out of those tombs since they could only see out of those tiny holes.
One story I got on dvd, I love that scene where the Doctor thinks he's leading Victoria in but it's Jamie. One thing about Cybermen, they always betray their allies. I think the cellophane was supposed to be ice, I could be wrong on that. Great 2nd Doctor episode.
All the lost episodes have surviving audio. Back then, before video recording, all fans could do was use sound recorders plus the BBC kept some of the audio tapes too. Sadly Evil of the Daleks is mostly missing in video aside from episode 2. A lot of the second Doctor's best stories are. If only the TARDIS were real....
And all of the lost episodes are available as reconstructions using the full audio and stills. Loose Cannon did the best ones in my opinion - you can usually find them either here on CZcams or on Dailymotion.
Or animation which I prefer when available.
Matt Smith said he watched this story and decided that his Doctor would be like the Second Doctor in some ways. Also I think the Cybermen saying ‘You will bee like uss...’ is scary and like the ‘we will survive’ line speaks of what the Cybermen are as well.
I liked the Cybus Cybermats in 'Closing Time'
Probably my 2nd or 3rd favorite Doctor story, after the Mind Robber and Enemy of the World. I can't wait til you get around to Mind Robber!
I suggest a top (?) historical characters/historical episodes in Dr. Who. I always enjoy the show tackling a time period and I’d like to hear your opinion on Dr Who’s portrayal of these larger than life figures or how well they interpreted a point in history.
STORIES not episodes, for that look mostly at 1st! That was exactly what he did!
the very first story, after the introduction was cave men, not thrilling
marco polo
crusade
the aztecs
the romans
mythmakers
Reign of terror
the massacre
the gunfighter (maybe)1st
highlander from 2nd
visitation
black orchid 5th
empty child 9th
girl in the fire
shaskespear code
fires of pompeii
the unicorn and the wasp for 10th
vincent for 11th
this are all the historicals or semi that I've seen
After so many times I've watched the whole story, especially part 1, I fully understand why 2 keeps slapping Jamie's hand away from the TARDIS Console buttons
Possibly the best cyberman story ever, in close competition with both Earthshock and World Enough and Time. Can't decide which one I adore more.
Yes, there’s definitely something special about the Troughton Cybermen stories. Really tough to pick a favourite but at the time, The Wheel in Space impressed me most - the contrast of human frailty and Cybermen capability in outer space resulted in such an unrelenting, creepy and claustrophobic story. I suspect it’s full recovery would lead to a massive re-evaluation.
Only started watching but I’m sure it’ll be great 👍🏼
This was my first Troughton story, back in high school on PBS, and it remains my favorite Troughton (though I love every Troughton I've seen), and my favorite Doctor Who story of all time. It definitely has its issues, and I've seen them more as I've gotten older - 15 year old me in 1995 didn't see how problematic Klieg and co. were - but the issues don't break the story for me, personally. I enjoy Toberman's story arc, such as it is, and I wish they'd fleshed out his character in particular a little more. Why is he so devoted to Kaftan? What is it about her death that breaks his conditioning, when otherwise he would have remained the Cyber Controller's puppet?
I also love the rapport that the Doctor, Jamie, and Victoria have together. Victoria's initial reticence about her non-period dress - "I wouldn't worry, look at Jamie's!", and how quickly she adapts to the situations - realizing she's been drugged, playing up her fear to throw off Kaftan, taking out a Cybermat on her own (she's a good shot!), and working on her own initiative to do what she can. I love her here.
If a friend asks me to recommend them a classic Who story, this is my go-to. I've introduced more friends to Doctor Who with this than I can count, and most of them, once they got over the inherent 1960s-ness, really enjoyed it, and were willing to watch more stories.
Toberman wasn't a problem for me; the role he fulfilled was that of the silent and not terribly intellectual 'heavy'. Traditionally, that role would have been filled in a British drama of the period with a London thug. That it was played here by a black actor could be seen, if anything, as a step forward in colour blind casting. The character did, of course, have his moment of heroic redemption in the end.
I really hadn't considered (or noticed) that Kaftan and Klieg, the primary human antagonists, were both non-British. I guess that it was simply a convention at the time, in the same way the British actors are currently cast as antagonists so often in US productions. Kaftan, I assumed, to be written as a generic 'Mediterranean' character (Spanish/Italian etc)--dark haired and fiery. Klieg I have no idea about. The name seemed vaguely Germanic but the accent is difficult to place (!)
The music was actually all stock from the BBC library but there were some good choices made and it shows that it is not always necessary to commission new material to build a good atmospheric soundtrack.
The chemistry and friendship which had grown between Troughton and Frazer Hines is demonstrated by the unscripted addition by them of the accidental hand-holding as they entered the tomb. They planned it knowing that the shooting budget made it highly unlikely that the shot would be cut. Speaking of shooting, the whole scene of the Cybermen bursting out from their freezers was shot in a single take--a great achievement given the cumbersome cameras and the size of the set.
Thanks for the insight, I don't know anything about British theater, let alone at that time. What I wanted to add about Kaftan and Klieg - up till this point the villains, stubborn hindrances and attempting masterminds opposing The Doctor were aliens such as the Cyberman or the Daleks - or white men. Preferably white- or gray haired. Do you happen to give a little guess about the symbolism in villains back then? Just asking, your comment is so well structured and interesting, I thought I'd just ask. :-)
Where the villains are human it would have made sense for them to generally be older men as they were most likely to hold reins of the power in society at the time. This type of villain is typified by Mavic Chen in _The Dalek Master Plan_ or Tobias Vaugh in _The Invasion_ (both played by the wonderful Kevin Stoney) respectively the Guardian of the Solar System and CEO of International Electromatics. Of course the show also stands this on its head from time to time, for example in _Galaxy 4_ where the antagonists are all women.
thank you, this is really interesting. I watched all the original episodes, but I never quite analyzed the villains. You're right, of course, older men simply being more likely in positions of power... I feel kinda stupid now. :-D But as you said, every now and then the whole dynamics are changed, switched around or played with, so I never took a look at the elements as groups, aka I didn't think too much about the villains or antagonists. Thanks a lot for your input!
I always liked Toberman - he's playing a traditional "heavy" archetype as you say, nothing racist about it (and he is huge compared to the Doctor & Jamie - which is actually quite funny as Jamie is obviously wary of him, and seems to spend a few early scenes sizing him up deciding if he could take him).
He was also one of the first black actors to even get a part in the show (would have to check to be sure but I think he may actually be the first?).
So you can't really accuse them of typcasting the black actor when they hadn't really had any cast before him.
The Cyber-Controller had _five_ brains in there. In contrast, Cybusmen are tedious and too robotic. Victoria didn't stick around very long. She left at the end of _Fury From The Deep_ (absolutely excellent and disturbingly weird to my then eight year old self) but I did very much like her, she was just _very_ out of her time and comfort zone.
This has my favourite Cyberman track. Space adventure part 2 encompasses the Cyberman so well.
The Evil of the Daleks _does_ have audio available and it is also really good. The Daleks are interesting and imposing villains - their plot, reminiscent of 'Daleks in Manhattan,' relates to the tension between their self-supposed supremacy and the actual constrictions of their species - and the Doctor is explored as a morally ambiguous trickster in a way that wasn't done much in the classic series (at least, not as far as I've seen) but that reminded me of their new series stories in a way I thought was super-cool. Weirdly, it also had more-or-less the same character problem in the key cast to Toberman in this one - but I thought it was done much better in the former (The Evil of the Daleks) than here.
Can you please review invasion of the dinosaurs and I'm only saying this in the comments is because I can't offered the patreon
If you haven;t already yet, I'd love to hear your opinions on The Enemy of the World. It's my favourite 2nd Doctor Story, and my favourite Doctor Who story of all time.
Did that one as a podcast review: councilofgeeks.libsyn.com/overdue-classic-who-review-the-enemy-of-the-world
@@CouncilofGeeks thanks
I mean no offence here, I agree with a lot of what you say, but I have no problem with the villains being foreign. I see the Kleig and Katlan (I hope that's the way to spell them) as being foreign villains it's no different from villains in many American films sporting British accents. For Toberman, I love him. He starts as just a henchman but in the end becomes a hero and saves everyone, laying down his life to close the doors and defeat the Cyber Controller. I have no problems with these elements of the story. I like your review though, keep up the good work.
The moondase was a major redesign.
Kaftan was played by Shirley Cooklin, who was the wife of this story's producer Peter Bryant. I don't think she "browned-up" as such, she was just heavily tanned. I'll admit that I struggle with the idea that we should be offended by the racial insensitivities of the past. Acknowledge them, certainly, but there's very little point in challenging the prejudices of yesterday. Is Toberman a slave? There's no indication of that, and his reaction to Kaftan's death, plus his ultimate sacrifice, suggests he's there of his own free will. Could it have been handled better? Certainly.
Is he explicitly depicted as a slave? No. Does he adhere to slave character tropes? You betcha.
But yeah, I try to not hold this stuff against the older stories too much, but I do feel they still need to be acknowledged because otherwise this stuff ends up sticking around longer than it should by being grandfathered in. It's like the Indians in the Disney Peter Pan movie. Yeah, it's a depiction consistent with the time... but we're still showing that movie to kids now, and it kind of needs to be at least talked about.
When I think second Doctor I first think of this story. Invasion was good but that story I always felt was the pilot of Jon Pertwee's run as the Doctor.
I love this story. My only problem is that the Doctor was going to re electrify the doors. It only seems to kill the first one to touch the doors and will most likely kill some innocent person who will next try to open the doors.
thats the point, to keep people out! Yes its dangerous, but whats inside is more so!
I... have not yet seen it. But I enjoyed hearing your views on it none the less.
It’s the most incompetent science crew mission this side of Prometheus!
Like the bbc hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy American accents
I never looked at the character of Toberman as a racist thing. To me he was like Jaws from James Bond.
Cybermen featured in The Moonbase were the redesigned ones.
If you liked Victoria, you’re going to love Zoe. Evil of the Daleks is available as a reconstruction if you’re interested, btw.
immoralq He’s seen Zoe when he reviewed the War games.
The casual racism of Classic Who was quite amusing to see. Remember when Doc #1 talked about how the "red savages" of America when seeing a train for the first time would think it was magic? I think that was in the interesting cringy episode about the Aztecs.
Concerned Citizen The Aztecs was an amazing story. One of Hartnell’s best next to Dalek invasion of Earth and the Time meddler.
Better, actually! It was literally in the show's first episode as how he chose to explain to Susan (and the audience) the mystery of the TARDIS after it was first discovered.
"Now, now, don't get exasperated, Susan - remember the Red Indian. When he saw the first steam train, his savage mind thought _it_ an illusion too!"
Have to agree with you on this one. Some of The Aztecs is cringe making. Never understood why some people seem to rate it so highly.
I would argue for Toberman. I don't think he's a villain. He's been very much led by his beliefs that his master and mistress are doing the right thing at all times. He's led by love, particularly for Kaftan. And he does get redemption at the end. He becomes the hero of the piece.
EDIT. Never mind. I see others 'mentioned' it. Doctor Who in the 1960's did tend to hire black/foreign actors at times. For a notable one, look in 'The Tenth Planet' for the small role of a Black, Welsh, Astronaut!
My favourite comedy moment? Near the beginning when the TARDIS crew enter the tomb hand-in-hand. Until the Doctor and Jamie realise Victoria isn't with them and they're holding each others hand and quickly release!
You didn’t mention they were on the planet Vulcan.
What does _Power of the Daleks_ have to do with this?
Greppellio i thought that was the name of the planet they were on in Cyberman?
Nothing to do with the plot," no one in the universe can do what we are doing"-it is just a beautiful piece of writing.
Hey
This one is really good, but The Enemy Of The World is still my fauvorite 2nd Doctor story.
Atleast so far...