KINDA part 3
KINDA part 3
Very
enjoyable and different. The Doctor and Todd manage to escape during the
moments right after the strange “dream time” vision they have. Sanders has the
same vision and seems to be crying but he doesn’t escape. Later, Adric, through
various attempts manages to escape Hindle’s “play”----while on that, here,
there are two older men that seem to be drawn to Adric----make of that what you
will----while Aris, infected with the Mara, has left Tegan sleeping on the
forest ground. Todd proves to be a worthy companion in every sense of the word,
easily fending off insults from the Doctor, noticing his own hypocrisy and
gently jibing him about it and smiling at him, getting positive attention from
the “wise” Panna who calls the Doctor idiot, and in general contributing a lot
to the story and the adventure while remaining calm.
The
cliffhanger is one of the most original as the Doctor and Todd come out of yet
another future/past vision “dream time” and the Doctor feels the old woman must
guide them through the forest; the younger girl seems gone. Todd looks at the
old woman who has her eyes open and is still sitting. “Doctor, I think she’s
dead!”
Amazing.
Odd. Weird. Hindle also sets up the dome with blasting equipment to “fire and
acid” the jungle. Huh?
Older review
of parts one to four:
1
That's more
like it. Mind you the Doc lets Tegan fall asleep against a tree and
goes off,
leaving her alone and then worries about her oh, almost 19 minutes
later while
talking with Todd. The guest cast is suitably well experienced and
the acting
is good. Tegan seems to want to go home, only. Adric is the Adric of
season 18
again, thank goodness. He wanders off, makes good scientific guesses,
gets in
trouble (Oh and he shuts the door to the machine that starts it, so how
is that any
different to the Doctor's opening it in the first place?). The Doc
and Adric
ARE very much alike in many ways. And this story makes you think the
two of them
alone would be much much MUCH better than having the two girls along
for the
ride. The nightmare is perfectly creepy until the boring double act
returns...why
have a double of Tegan appear. It's such a cliché. I love the
aliens who
are named after and symbolic of Adric, the Doctor and Tegan. Perhaps
the Nyssa
and Adric ones are the missing crew people? And the Dukka is the Mara
representing
the evil side of the Doctor.
Peter
Davison seems almost totally settled into the role and has some really
good
Davison-isms ("An apple a day keeps the ahh, never mind" and "there's no
need to
shout"). Adric is a great companion still and has warmth ("it's
beautiful")
and wants to be there. He also has some good plans for escape which
the Doctor
nixes here.
The mystery
of what is going on is kept. People have vanished. There are two
slightly
unhinged males at the base and one female who is really quite good as
companions
go. And then there's the chimes, the Kinda who wear double helix
models
around their necks, the tree, the nightmare plain, and what is going on.
It's all
fitting in well with DW as a show again and seems apt to follow the
greatness of
everything from FULL CIRCLE TO CASTROVALVA. The regulars at least
act like the
regulars again and Tegan is still at odds with Adric even though
he's
perfectly happy to be with her or not directly talking to her face. Notice
how she
tries to help Nyssa beat Adric at draughts. She still doesn't seem to
like him but
he still seems to try with her, despite FOUR TO DOOMSDAY where
she's just
more of a moron than he is.
A good ep
and even though studio bound, it feels outdoorsy. Well done. And a
good
cliffhanger...what will they do?
2
What's odd to notice is that during this time
in the show, the producers and
script
editor (Saward sucks) and maybe the writers were trying to, maybe,
emulate the
Fourth Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith with the Fifth and Tegan. Trouble
is the
situations, the writers and especially the actors, were not up to it. The
actors don't
really seem to like each other much less want to interact in THAT
way, thus Davison
and Fielding, even when they are saddled only with Turlough,
don't really
pull it off....AT ALL. The Fifth to me always seemed to want Tegan
to go until
the last moment when she actually does but more on that later.
I love it
when Adric's a part of the action and
here he's center and he tries
to save the
Doctor yet again but fails again. He steals a key and makes the
Doctor play
a game to try to get it, much like his earlier self. The other thing
is that the
Third Doctor used to do what Adric basically did, hide a coin or
another
object and seemingly make it vanish. Somewhere I read that it happened
in COLONY IN
SPACE but I also know he did it in AMBASSADORS OF DEATH. In any
event, the
story moves along well disguising the fact that the Doctor's been
imprisoned
in the dome for a very long time, giving Adric much to do (and
despite the
ignoring from her and her acting like a
biatch, Adric worries about
her when the
Doc doesn't seem to but perhaps that's not fair, he does ask about
her too),
and keeping Tegan in the nightmare realm...uhm, until she gives in to
the Mara and
gets out bodily...is a good idea. I wouldn't have minded if she
died in this
story. The Kinda are sufficiently puzzling and ...uhm, very very good
looking for
the most part. The two female Kinda Panna and the girl appear and
give
Saunders a strange box that enlightens or changes him. He brings it back to
the unhinged
Hindle who makes the Doctor open the box into a great cliffhanger.
Yet we know
it didn't really kill Saunders when he opened it. So...we know it
probably
won't do anything to them.
Again,
another good episode, tension filled in a way. Nyssa doesn't appear at
all. Thank
Goodness. :) Davison still seems a bit
flat and his Doctor seems in
over his
head ALL the time. No other Doctor was like that except maybe Hartnell
in his early
stories and maybe later on too. It's not a bad thing, just very
noticeable.
OHHHH and wouldn't Todd make a much better companion than Tegan and
Nyssa. She
certainly works well with this Doctor AND with Adric! And she knows
something...believably.
3
Well that
was weird. But good and Tegan is just seen once or so, on the ground,
sleeping.
Good. Todd is proving a more interesting companion that Tegan and
Nyssa, yet
again. Adric has a lot to do, mostly trying to escape the so called
dome ,but it
doesn't look like a dome. I must admit the first time I saw this I
thought
Panna's mumbo jumbo was just another of DW's time jumbles but I've since
realized or
found out it was a Buddhist thing. Really? I wish it was explained
better here
but that's manmade spirituality for you. Anyway Kuruna, Panna, and
Aris as well
as almost all the Kinda but the jester or trickster are interesting
and
different. I'm glad the Kinda cannot talk, one of the only aliens on DW to
not do so.
It makes a nice change and makes them very alien-----ish. The name
Mara is only
presented here and the cliffhanger is nice. A lot more tension
arising and
Hindle and Saunders both going off the deep end. And both are sort
of...uhm...fond
of Adric it would seem. Hindle's put off Adric's punishment from
ep 2 (funny
scene in ep2 is Hindle saying punishment to make Adric wash behind
the ears).
Again, Matthew Waterhouse makes for a great range of fear,
bemusement,
and craftiness. The Doctor is called an
idiot by Panna several
times and he
says nothing for the most part only that he's been called that
before. In
all, these episodes are not as gripping as a Tom Baker story (with
maybe four
or five exceptions) but they do manage to be different, do manage to
create a
world, nay a universe of possibilities and do manage to keep one
thinking,
and guessing and moving forward. Each story also seems to be different
from each
other. I also hoped the Doctor and Adric would travel on for many more
adventures.
Not to be. Their coupling is soon to be
ended. I also like how
this Doctor
leaves Adric, "He's very resourceful."
Indeed.
Famous near last words? Anyway a good story and it must have a cracking
end with the
Mara realizing its full power in a terrific show of special
effects?
Right?
4
Strange.
There's filler with Adric and Tegan bitching at each other and in the
past, I felt
this added to the tension of the story but all it adds is tension
between the
two characters and this is exactly what is not needed. They needed
to be nice
to each other for us to care about both of them. Adric could have
disarmed the
bomb but it makes for nice foreshadowing for EARTHSHOCK as we now
know what
will happen but back then we didn't.
Davison,
too, while good, is not Tom Baker. I know I keep saying that but after
having
watched all of Tom, the comparison is there. Take for example his speech
about
discovering it is Tegan that the Mara used to come through. Tom would have
made us feel
the discovery in a whispered hush and reveal that he missed that
and didn't
know that with just his voice and his tone and his look. Davison just
says the
lines. He's pretty poor in that pivotal scene...
He also
doesn't have the relationship with Tegan that he should, nor with Adric.
Both,
despite being poorly written, are viable adventure characters and his
Doctor
should be able to relate to them both but he just doesn't. It could be
because he's
relating wonderfully to Todd but she's gone after this ep and it is
as if they
have to start all over from scratch with THE VISITATION. Did anyone
on the show
at this time have any idea how to have the regulars relate and stay
relating
in a positive manner? Does the bickering
add anything to the show? It
really
doesn't until maybe VISITATION's opening and from VISITATION onward the
team acts
like a team but it's not long before they're broken up, and broken up
and broken
up.
Ahh, yes,
that snake. It's not too bad when it first comes out of Aris and
wrestles
with him but...the larger version. If one can ignore it, the story is
fine and
imagination is always key on DW and you have use it here to find the
Mara a
creepy idea. There's a lot of the great book THE POWER OF NOW and the
follow up
THE NEW EARTH to think about here. Time is the enemy, the present is
all that
matters, the enemy is from the inside, it cannot look at itself so if
you observe
yourself you can find and rid yourself of the dark thing that is
inside. Lots
of good spiritual stuff. But like Tegan, I found myself a bit not
understanding.
I also wonder about Kuruna and Panna sharing a body! WTF?
Anyway, a
good story and with some good events, Adric making a mess of things
but trying,
as he says in the next ep, so hard to do the right thing. It is his
observation
though that makes the Doctor realize the Mara can be casted out with
mirrors. Of
course, he's a banana and it is still hiding in Tegan...
Comments
Post a Comment