Doctor Who Season 1: Difference between revisions

SPOILERS TOTAL. You've been warned.

001: '''An Unearthly Child'''

(First watched 2007-01-05, -06, -07, -08) As an introduction to the concept it does its job, especially the first episode.  However, the caveman struggles that dominate the last three are a bit blah.  The Doctor sure was a much more grumpy and truly inhuman man here than the character he's evolved into by 2006.  Knowing quite little detail about the early days of the series, I was a bit surprised to see the two school teachers dragged into the whole mess; I guess I'm most used to the "Doctor + female companion" group.  As a casting note, it seemed pretty obvious that the "15 year old" really wasn't.  By IMDB's reckoning [[Carole Ann Ford|she]] was 23 at the time.

002: '''The Daleks'''

It's hard to call it music, but the combination of low note and following weird sound effect used to convey weirdness of the Dalek city was somehow really effective.

003: '''The Edge of Destruction'''

(First watched 2007-02-04, -05)  The first part had promise.  A mysterious problem.  The people inside the TARDIS being confused, controlled, and knocked out?  Quite a setup.  However, the conclusion didn't do much for me.  So it was the TARDIS itself causing these weird problems to get their attention, because it didn't have a better way to communicate?  What did this have to do with making Susan try to stab people with scissors?  And the problem turns out to be a stuck ''spring'' on the control panel?  I realize this was made 43 years ago, but that seems the craziest thing to go wrong on your futuristic space-time machine.

004: '''Marco Polo'''

It's worth noting we didn't see the Doctor or his companions after the TARDIS disappeared, making this the first serial that didn't actually end with the beginning of the next.

005: '''The Keys of Marinus'''

(After sixth) Conclusion was... disappointing, but understandably so.  After all that work to get the various keys, it's mostly effort wasted as the baddies end up blowing up the thing with a fake key anyway.  On the other hand it did seem weird that their ultimate goal was working to return a sort of planetary mind control device to working order.  Altos needs pants.

006: '''The Aztecs'''

The beginning struck me as rather silly.  Susan and Barbara leave the TARDIS first, start playing around with a bunch of artifacts in a tomb, and then they all get stuck on the wrong side of a door?  I realize they had to write another excuse to keep them away from the TARDIS, but that just made them look sillily careless.

007: '''The Sensorites'''

The ending felt rushed.  I knew it was supposed to be the last episode, but until the last 3 minutes or so it felt like they were reaching the point where, things having taken a turn for the worse, the credits kick in.  But no, it was easy to trick the crazy cave guys, and convincing the First Elder of the plotters was like nothing.

[[Doctor Who Season 2]]