Good Who - Exhibit D

Can you tell I'm putting off watching Attack of the Cybermen? :)

Anyway, after a rough few days (short version, I've been ill, long version, I've been ILL) I thought I'd make a start on Revisitations 2 as an excuse to head back to another wonderfully daffy story from the stables of Who.  You may, in time, notice a theme about the stories I like, there's an element of silliness to them and this one combines frothiness with potentially a very bleak ending (more of which in time).  Yup, it's spring and in need of a colourful boost I started with "Carnival of Monsters".

In the extras, Terrance Dicks describes Robert Holmes as the best writer Doctor Who had.  To be honest, I can't think of any way to dispute this (even if you include The Space Pirates) and Carnival really highlights everything that is good about "great" Who.  There's the great plot based mystery set up in the opening episode (how does 1926 tie in with an alien world) along with unexpected dinosaur attacks (do you know, I don't even object to the special effects!), some absolutely toppingly spiffing 1920s acting (Ian Marter essentially using this as an audition piece for the role of Harry a season or two later) and a Doctor who is as baffled as we are, even with the extra clues he spots for himself.  On the alien world you've got Vorg and Shirna (more faultless performances) along with the grey-but-scheming officials (slightly dodgy bald wigs but otherwise superb).  Anyone watching episode one must have marvelled at the combination only for episode two to throw in marshland, a circuit board runaround and the most fearsome glove puppets the show would ever see.  Yes, I do actually think the Drashigs look good.  There, I've said it.  Quite frankly there aren't many other things this story could throw into the mix though, with budget, I'm sure there would be things they'd find.  Oh yes, we get a cyberman as well. 

I'm not saying the story is faultless.  The production subtitles do point out a few problems with scale in this story (namely how everything fits in the scope given the information we've got about various sizes) but, with this being such a charming story, my brain simply rationalises it as "Well everything's got a different compression depending on where it is in the scope".  Drashigs get quite a bit of compression because they're thick, humans get virtually lossless compression and Vorg's hand just changes its size depending on which part of the system its in.  Relative dimensions and all that waffle.  Yes, the puppet work isn't seamless but it is damn fine given the era and the budget (by the end of episode two most other shows would have given up by now and gone "let's just go back to the earth based stories again, shall we?") and the masks on the functionaries are ummmmm a little cheap looking but who cares?  This is Carnival of Monsters and you get what the name suggests.  It's a side show full of diversion to keep you away from looking at the mechanics too much.  Slightly dodgy shot of the drashig?  Never mind, it's followed by slick dialogue and nifty plot twists so you forget you saw it.  Until you get to the ending...

I'm in two minds about the ending and even on a day when my spirits are high I still have nagging doubts.  You see this could be (and I do say could, not definitely is) the bleakest ending to any Doctor Who story.  The SS Bernice went missing on April 4th 1926 according to the Doctor, an incident that made it as famous as the Marie Celeste.  Only at the end of the story the ship's returned to the Earth as though it had never been away.  So you've got two choices, an upbeat happy one or a heartbreaking one.  Option one is the upbeat one.  The ship really has been returned to the Earth and the Doctor has, essentially, completely changed time.  Large numbers of people are alive that now shouldn't be and who knows what effect it will have on things (perhaps this is one of the reasons that the Who universe is so different to our own?).  Option two... the ship got returned and the crew settle down for the night having finished their books and had one last gin. But the ship shouldn't be back on the earth and the web of time needs preserving.  Somewhere between nightfall and Singapore something must happen to the ship to ensure that time isn't changed.  Tidal wave?  Lone dinosaur?  Who knows but, if you believe that time can't be changed then "Carnival of Monsters" has to have the more tragic ending where even though the Doctor got the ship back to the earth, something else lay in wait for it.

Carnival of Monsters is an upbeat, highly colourful and extremely flamboyant example of Who at its showmanlike best.  I've loved this story since I saw it on the Five Faces re-run and dread the day I don't enjoy watching it.