Episode #207 : Waters of Mars

"But there are laws. There are laws of time. Once upon a time there were people in charge of those laws, but they died. They all died. Do you know who that leaves? Me! It's taken me all these years to realise the laws of time are mine, and they will obey me!"

Episode #207:      Waters of Mars.
Companions:        The 10th Doctor.
Air Date:              15th November 2009.

Mars, 2059, Bowie Base One. Last recorded message: "Don't drink the water. Don't even touch it. Not one drop."

The Doctor arrives on Mars and discovers the first human colony. A colony which according to history was destroyed with the loss of all hands. When an alien force takes control of the colonists the Doctor finds himself torn between wanting to help and letting this fixed point in time take it's natural course. For once he chooses poorly and things don't work out quite as he had hoped.

The villains of this story are a water-borne virus of sorts which has been frozen in a glacier for thousands of years. The Doctor theories that it may have been trapped there by the Ice Warriors, which is the only reference to them in the entire episode. The Flood, as they are called, take over the colonists and seek to escape to Earth where there is more water than on Mars.

Waters of Mars is a very good adventure which covers the science fiction and horror genres. You could even say that it borders on zombie horror once the Flood begin to possess the colonists. It adds a nice sense of urgency to the adventure which is sometimes lacking recently in Doctor Who.

In this story the Doctor returns to the lonely god aspect that we saw before in The Runaway Bride. Once he starts to think that he can change things he reverts to that aspect. This time he is successful up to a point but time has it's means of fixing the situation and when it does so the Doctor is shown that he isn't as all powerful a lord of time as he sometimes thinks he is. We all like the Doctor to win at the end of the day but it is nice again to see the Doctor humbled at times.

I know that I do focus on some negative elements some times but I can say the only downer for me here is simply that as the story is set on Mars I would have liked more than a passing reference to the Ice Warriors. The red planet was their home and until recently (really) it was also the prison for an Osirian. Just the Whovian in me wanting more connectivity between old and new Who.

Waters of Mars continues the "he will knock four times" plot which leads up to the final episode. Only briefly but its enough to set the Doctor fleeing from his eventual fate. 

Episode #82 : Pyramids of Mars

"Deactivating a generator loop without the correct key is like repairing a watch with a hammer and chisel. One false move and you'll never know the time again."

Episode 82:    Pyramids of Mars.
Companions: 4th Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith.
Air Date:       Four episodes. 25th October to 15th November 1975.

The TARDIS materialises on Earth in the year 1911 inside an old priory owned by Egyptologist Marcus Scarman. Scarman has been possessed by Sutekh, last survivor of the god-like Osirans, who is held prisoner inside a pyramid in Egypt by a signal transmitted from one on Mars. Sutekh desires his freedom and instructs Scarman to construct servicer robots - which look like Egyptian mummies - to build a missile with which to destroy the Martian pyramid.

Pyramids of Mars is an absolute gem of story, one that blends elements of science fiction and horror perfectly. Make a few minor tweaks and this could have been a classic 70's horror movie in the style of Hammer films. The story itself deals with a god-like being, Sutekh, the last of his kind who we can assume influenced the ancient Egyptians. Sutekh is trapped beneath a pyramid in Egypt and desires release so that he can reign over the universe. The key to his prison resides within a pyramid on Mars and it must be destroyed if he is to regain that freedom.

I cannot praise this story enough. It is just that good. However, there are a couple niggles that I am going to raise. The first is Sutekh himself (see picture above). When the Doctor Who team can do such well made masks as they did in stories like The Sea Devils, why oh why can they not do the same for Sutekh in this story? His true appearance just likes terrible. Secondly, and a much less of a niggle, I feel that there is a small continuity issue here as how does the pyramid on Mars influence the Ice Warriors? Surely they know it's there? Do they know what lies within? Some sort of reference would by the Doctor would have been a nice touch there.

There are a couple of interesting time travel elements that come up in this story. One is that contrary to how I always thought the TARDIS works, it seems it is possible to travel forward from an event and see how it plays out even though you know from past travels that it never happened that way, and then return to the point you were at. I had always worked under the assumption that once part of events you couldn't just move away and return as you will. Secondly, events seem to occur before you do them (timey-whimey!). The house where this story takes place burns down and would be rebuilt in the future as UNIT HQ in the UK. Did it burn down before or did the Doctor and Sarah actually do it before they went on this adventure? Sometimes I am glad that time travel isn't real.

The story features the late Michael Sheared as a short lived ally of Sarah and the Doctor. He had previously appeared in The Ark and The Mind of Evil, and would go on to feature in three more stories. Star Wars fans will remember him as Admiral Ozzel in The Empire Strike Back. He was also Mr Bronson in children's drama Grange Hill.

Pyramids of Mars is another classic story that I fully recommend.

Episode #39 : The Ice Warriors

"In 2 minutes 38 seconds, you're going to have an almighty explosion!"

Episode 39:   The Ice Warriors.
Companions: The 2nd Doctor, Jamie McCrimmon and Victoria Waterfield.
Air Date:       Six episodes. 11th November to 16th December 1967.

The TARDIS arrives on Earth in a new ice age and the travellers make their way into a base where scientists commanded by Leader Clent are using an ioniser device to combat the advance of a glacier.
A giant humanoid creature, called an Ice Warrior by one of the scientists, has been found buried in the nearby glacier. When thawed, it revives and is revealed to be Varga, captain of a Martian spacecraft that landed on Earth centuries ago and is still in the glacier. Varga sets about freeing his comrades and formulating a plan to conquer the Earth - Mars itself is now dead.

The Ice Warriors is a story that feels much more like it should have appeared as a Star Trek story. It just has that Trek vibe rather than what I expect from Doctor Who. It even has some odd moments with the female "oooo" sort of singing over things. Very odd. But that aside, it is a reasonable story despite there being one or two moments where I found myself distracted because the story wasn't going anywhere. In places it needed more action.

This is the introduction of the Ice Warriors race who make a handful of appearances later on in the show, mainly for the second and third Doctors. These reptilians are the inhabitants of Mars which has lost its ability to sustain life. They came to Earth thousands of years ago and got stuck in the ice. Very ironic for a race people call Ice Warriors. They are aggressive conquerors but to me they seem a tad simplistic in how they do it. One last thing... although the costumes for the Ice Warriors are suitably iconic, they do often look bloody silly waddling around in them.

A reasonable story that introduces one of the lesser but also iconic villain races.