TV Review 4: Marco Polo, written by John Lucarotti (1964)

Broadcast: 22^nd February-4^th April 1964

Cast:

The Doctor – William Hartnell

Ian Chesterton – William Russell

Barbara Wright – Jacqueline Hill

Susan Foreman – Carole Ann Ford

Marco Polo – Mark Eden

Tegana – Derren Nesbitt

Ping Cho – Zienia Merton

Kublai Khan – Martin Miller

Chenchu – Jimmy Gardner

Malik – Charles Wade

Acomat – Philip Voss

Ling-Tau – Paul Carson

Wang-Lo – Gabor Baraker

Empress – Claire Davenport

Man at Lop – Leslie Bates

Mongol Bandit – Michael Guest

Kuiju – Tutte Lemkow

Vizier – Peter Lawrence

Office Foreman – Basil Tang

Yeng – O. Ikeda

Main Production Credits

Producer – Verity Lambert

Story Editor – David Whitaker

Writer – John Lucarotti

Directors –Waris Hussein (Episodes 1-3; 5-7), John Crockett (Episode 4)

Designer – Barry Newbury

Costumes – Daphne Dare

Title Music – Ron Grainer, Delia Derbyshire and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop

Special Sound – Brian Hodgson and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop

Incidental Music – Tristram Cary

Make Up – Ann Ferriggi

Production Assistant – Douglas Camfield, Penny Joy

Studio Sound – Jack Brummitt, Hugh Barker, Derek Miller Timmins

Story Summary (SPOILERS!):

The TARDIS arrives on the Plain of Pamir on the outskirts of the Himalayan mountain range in 1289, and promptly develops a significant fault. In search of alternative shelter, the Doctor, Ian, Barbara and Susan are rescued by Marco Polo’s travelling party. However, just when the Time Travellers think they’re safe, dangerous plots embroil them in an adventure they’ll never forget...

Marco Polo deceitfully steals the TARDIS, hoping to use it as a gift to bribe his leader, the Mongol ruler, Kublai Khan to allow him to return home back to Venice. The Doctor and his friends frequently attempt to take the TARDIS back from Polo, but are thwarted at every turn. Unbeknownst to all of them though is that the Mongol War Lord Tegana, whom Marco Polo is escorting to a peace talk with Kublai Khan, has a murderous plot of his own. Tegana is the representative of rival Mongol leader Nogai, who claims to want to a peace settlement with Kublai Khan. In reality, Nogai wants another chance to take over Kublai Khan’s large empire, using Tegana as a secret assassin.

The Time Travellers frustrate and thwart Tegana’s many attempts to murder Marco Polo and his travelling party, and Tegana in turn spreads lies and suspicion in the group, turning Polo against the Doctor and his friends. However, once Tegana’s treachery is exposed and defeated, Marco apologetically gives the TARDIS back to its original owners, allowing them to leave and travel through space and time once more.

Story Placement

Between The Edge of Destruction (TV Serial) and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (Virgin Missing Adventure Novel)

Favourite Lines

Susan – “One day, we’ll know all the mysteries of the skies, and we’ll stop our wandering”.

Marco Polo – “On my travels to Cathay, Ian, I have come to believe many things which I’d previously doubted. For instance, when I was a boy in Venice, they told me that in Cathay there was a stone which burned. I did not believe them, but there is such a stone. I have seen it”.

Ian – “It’s black isn’t it”.

Marco Polo – “Yes”.

Ian – “Coal”.

Marco Polo – “In Cathay we call it the burning stone. And if a stone burns, why not a caravan that flies? Birds fly. I have even seen fish that fly. You are asking me to believe that your caravan can defy the passage of the Sun? Move not merely from one place to another, but from today into tomorrow, today into yesterday? No, Ian. That I cannot accept”.

Kublai Khan (to Ping-Cho) – “Your beloved husband-to-be, so anxious to be worthy of your love, drank a potion of quicksilver and sulphur, the elixir of life and eternal youth, and expired on the spot”.

Marco Polo – “I wonder where they are now – the past or the future?”

Review:

It’s not easy trying to review a story that doesn’t exist. On the one hand, you’re probably thinking that I’m being somewhat dumb stating the obvious. After all, any visual records of the Marco Polo episodes in question have been wiped, destroyed or lost sometime over the last 49 years (or at least that very much seems to be the case so far). On the other hand, we have the original scripts, a novelisation of the story produced years afterwards, but most importantly we have audio recordings of the transmitted episodes, taken by a few devoted viewers of the time; and more recently photographs taken by John Cura of individual frames of most of the episodes, courtesy of the director of the serial itself, Waris Hussein. Through these combined items, Doctor Who fans and TV historians are fortunate to be able to gain at least a partial sense of what the serial was like. We can examine and critique the script and the narrative; we can understand some of the quality of performance, post-production and direction via the audio, and get some glimpses as to the visual direction, set design, costume, and cinematography.

However, partial is the operative word, so unless (hopefully just until) the video images of this old TV production are recovered, if they ever can be, then we can never truly be able to appreciate the quality of the cast performances or direction, or even be able to appreciate Marco Polo in the way it was meant to be experienced – the visual medium. So for a reviewer of any old TV programmes that sadly no longer exist, even one that has substantial recovered scraps and extras to help partially realise what once did, like Doctor Who; it’s hard to know for sure if one is ever doing complete justice to its merits, and I’m sad to say that’s the case for many a 1960s Doctor Who serial, particularly during the Patrick Troughton years. However, the metaphorical axe that came down on these old TV episodes was indiscriminate and mostly random, so that many of what I personally consider great Doctor Who TV serials from both the First and Second Doctor eras, for now at least seem to be lost forever, including the original master tapes of over half of the Third Doctor era, which fortunately survives through several different ways, recoveries and technological miracles over the last 40 years.

For the benefit of those that don’t know what I’m talking about, here’s a quick summary about the problem of missing Doctor Who episodes. Before the commercial distribution and selling of video cassettes (firstly Betamax, before VHS took over the home video market, and of course a long, long time before DVDs), British TV companies frequently wiped and destroyed all copies of their old programmes once their appeal for broadcast was exhausted, as they thought they had no further use. The master tapes were often the first to go after repeat possibilities dried up, and then all the remaining copies once all their export copies had lost their viability to be sold for TV transmission abroad, including sadly copies returned to them from other countries from said past export sales. This practice was common within the BBC till the early 1980s, partly down to the cost of using film (so a film could be used to record other programmes) or limited storage facilities. As a result of the wiping and junking of original and duplicate copies of old TV material, several classic programmes produced up to that time were badly affected by the purge including Steptoe and Son, Dad’s Army, Z Cars, Monty Python, the BBC coverage of the 1969 Moon Landings, and of course Doctor Who. Nearly all of the Doctor Who master tapes between 1963 and 1974 were completely disposed of, as well as most of even all the inferior export copies of the episodes between 1963 and 1969. We are immensely fortunate that all of the Jon Pertwee era of Doctor Who (1970-1974) has been saved or preserved on video in some form or another, with modern restoration techniques bringing even poor or black and white copies of colour episodes much closer to their original state than ever before for our enjoyment. All archive Doctor Who from late 1974 onwards has thankfully been kept, in fairly close to its original state. However, the 1960s period was, and still is fairly decimated in comparison, heavily impacting on both of the William Hartnell (1963-1966) and Patrick Troughton (1966-1969) eras of the show. Again, fortunately every decade or so since the early 1980s, a very small number of export copies of old 1960s episodes have come back from various sources (some old foreign TV stations/archives, others from film collectors), allowing us to experience a small part of previously lost TV history again, and to enjoy and appreciate the Doctor Who stories they represent far better. The more depressing fact though is that despite these lucky and wonderful recoveries, there is still to this day 106 Doctor Who episodes completely lost (for now at least), most of which being from 1965-1969, including some sizeable casualties in the Patrick Troughton era especially. Marco Polo represents the first chronological Doctor Who story that has both episodes still missing, but is also still missing in its entirety.

Marco Polo is a story of great significance and interest during the early years of Doctor Who, even without accounting for its status as a missing serial. It marks the first story to be a fictional tale both set within and written about real historical events, places or civilisations. An Unearthly Child may have been set in the past too, but this the first time when recorded history is used as a basis for creating a fictional tale. This type of story first used in Marco Polo also represents the beginning of a reoccurring story format, these days more commonly referred to as the “pure historical”, in the sense that these stories would only include a fictional world and events set within recorded history, without any fantasy or science fiction elements, with the obvious exception of the TARDIS, which in these stories was merely a plot device to get them to the historical location in the first place in order to begin the serial’s narrative. The true extent of how many elements, events, facts, or people from recorded history were actually included and used in each serial, varied from story to story; but there was always due care to make sure there were no obvious mistakes in its depictions according to the accepted history interpretations of the day. Of course, this has made some stories that venture into history a bit dated as new ideas and discoveries have changed the history books over the decades, but I don’t think that de-values the quality of any past Doctor Who production at all, as the show’s main remit was to be adventure, entertainment and drama, after all.

A common assumption about the origins and early development of Doctor Who as a TV programme has always been that these “pure historical” stories were intended purely on the grounds of education. In other words, entirely or specifically for kids, which is another barely questioned assumption about the whole programme in general, and one that I strongly disagree with. While that may have been the early initial aim during the creation of Doctor Who, the final reality was very different. To illustrate this, permit me to quote from my own University dissertation from 2011:

“During the early days of Doctor Who and its creation, the BBC and Sydney Newman, its principal creator, clearly wanted the historical episodes of the show to have “a distinctive educational slant” to its narratives (Graeme Burk, 2000, 2010 p.37), particularly stating that he wanted Doctor Who to concentrate on producing “drama based upon and stemming from factual material and scientific phenomena and actual social history of past and future” (Sydney Newman, 1963 cited in Howe, Walker and Stammers, 1994, 2005 p.61). Some commentators have leapt on this fact as proof that Doctor Who was specifically a show for children (Kim Newman, 2005 p.1), and is often used to support a negative critique of Doctor Who by those who dispute its merit. However, just as The Daleks (1963/4) serial railed against Sydney Newman’s directives of having “no bug-eyed monsters” (Newman, 1963 cited in Howe, Walker and Stammers, 2005 p.56), the historical serials became different to their intended nature too, concentrating more on drama, than conveying facts. There are educational elements to these serials, which include The Aztecs (1964) and The Massacre of St. Bartholomew’s Eve (1966), but they are very minor in detail, and only really serve as a framework to help dramatically ground the narrative for the audience, acquaint them with the historical characters in question, or even simply as further ‘window dressing’ to help give the drama an added richness that some of it’s more specifically science fiction serials might have found difficult to achieve. The BBC may have originally wanted the historical serials to be purely educational, but with Doctor Who being a drama, they conceded after complaints from schools after the Marco Polo (1964) serial that historically educational drama serials “posed the danger of misrepresenting historical events and characters and thus undermining the lessons given at school” (Richard Bignell, 2009, p.11). As a result, the emphasis on education in historical Doctor Who serials was significantly reduced, even throughout the majority of the 1960s, so these serials weren’t really as primarily aimed at children as suggested.”

So in other words, Doctor Who’s ‘pure historical’ serials only used recorded historical events, people and locations as a framework to create fictional works of drama or comedy (or both) within, and to avoid any direct science fiction or fantasy elements that would disrupt the added depth and potential realism the historical framework lent them, and definitely not education in any real significant sense, despite Sydney Newman’s original intentions.

However, Marco Polo certainly gives the illusion of being educational, possibly hence the complaints the BBC received after its original transmission. During about 10 minutes of the serial’s third episode, Five Hundred Eyes, the plot is suspended to make way for a telling of a folk tale by Ping Cho, and then Marco Polo that gives the impression to any unknowing or unaware viewer that they’re receiving a partial insight into Mongol or Chinese culture, when in fact it is nothing of the kind. Although the story is very loosely based around Hulagu Khan’s siege of Alamut in 1256, it contains little but reference to the event, no historical detail, just embellishment and romanticism. In short the story is merely a lyrical fairy tale, entirely, albeit very imaginatively, invented by John Lucarotti.

Actually, I don’t think the teachers of the day needed to be that worried, because even after just a little research, it becomes increasingly obvious that surprisingly for Doctor Who’s first ‘pure historical’ adventure, there is hardly any real history to be found in the script at all. By all accounts the siege of Alamut referenced in episode three, and the destruction of Karakorum, the capital city of the Mongol empire, described briefly in episode six are the only real tangible bits of history we can be sure of. The presence of Kublai Khan is of course correct for the time period the story is set, but his use in the story is mainly as both a lightly comedic character and catalyst for both the plot and its climax, rather than any recorded historically accurate interpretation. Nogai (or Noghai), Tegana’s off-screen leader also existed, a Mongol Tatar leader of the Golden Horde; but from what I can make out, Nogai never made any recorded attempt to overthrow or even oppose Kublai Khan.

What of Marco Polo himself you ask? Well here’s the fascinating thing. Although The Travels of Marco Polo do tell of Marco Polo’s servitude and visits to Kublai Khan (along with his family, who happen to also be absent from Doctor Who’s fictional depiction), and that he did leave Khan’s court and service in 1290 AD (and leave Venice in 1271), a year after the Doctor Who narrative is set; once again there is no actual recorded historical evidence of Marco Polo ever visiting Kublai Khan, and that’s if he even went to China at all, which is odd considering the recorded historical visits of other Europeans to Kublai Khan’s court. In fact, because the only real details about Marco Polo and anything he did seem to only exist in the famous book series of related tales, The Travels of Marco Polo, there is real debate as to whether Marco Polo himself ever existed. Having said that though, John Lucarotti writes a ready-made ‘get out clause’ at the very end of the serial, allowing him freedom not to be tied down to historical fact with Marco Polo’s statement that people back home wouldn’t believe in half the things he’s seen in Cathay (Medieval North China).

So with that in mind, it’s fairly clear that John Lucarotti script is almost entirely fictional in every way (including unknowingly to Lucarotti maybe even Marco Polo himself), which perversely makes Doctor Who’s Marco Polo all the greater, and feels all the more impressive and special. Creating a good fictional narrative within the fixed constraints and facts of recorded history is hugely difficult in itself, but the fictional world set in 13th century Asia that Lucarotti creates is so multi-dimensional, extensive and convincing, that it is a written wonder to behold. So much so in fact, that if I hadn’t done any research, I would’ve been convinced that a quarter of the script did reflect true recorded history. The level of detail and thought in both his imagining and descriptions of the locations that Marco Polo travels to, as well as the myriad of different characters really sells this story as both a historical epic, and a wonderfully romantic vision of the eastern World, even if it is almost certainly false. However, it also probably helps that Lucarotti is drawing much inspiration from the potentially fictitious Travels of Marco Polo as well. The character of Tegana himself is a decent example of this, seemingly inspired by the character of Ahmad, a murderer and perpetrator of evil, who bewitched those around him, particularly those in authority.

Another fascinating aspect of Marco Polo’s narrative is that Marco Polo is himself the focus of a high portion of the story, rather than the Time Travellers. Marco himself narrates their group’s journey across Asia non-diegetically, but at the same time the scenes that share the narration wonderfully show Polo writing about his journey in a diary, a homage to the books of The Travels of Marco Polo no doubt (even though their contents may be fictional, and were claimed to be made from another person’s accounts of Polo’s travels as relayed to him by word of mouth, not written text). During the narration, there’s also (according to telesnaps) an edited film montage of the straight forward and less dramatic parts of the journey so fortunately the audience doesn’t even have to suffer it in a quarter of real time (although it’s definitely long enough as it is!). It also feels that some of the portrayal of the Doctor and his companions in the script represents Marco’s own interpretation of them, particularly noticeable in the last part of the final episode as he wonders where the TARDIS crew’s travels will take them. Although of course, an equal portion of the script is free from his view of events to allow the audience to see the whole story and the many sides of it that take place.

Taken from purely a plot point of view though, it’s hard to get around the fact that Marco Polo is a fairly simple story. There are two basic, good plots, which combine together in the final episode for a joint resolution. Firstly, our time travellers meet Marco Polo, who steals the TARDIS as a gift for Kublai Khan, and our heroes struggle to get it back again. Marco Polo marks the first time the TARDIS has been stolen, whether for its power, technological abilities or just as a hold over the Doctor, and here it works wonderfully within the historical context. Marco Polo sees it as a magical item he can gift to the Khan in return for leave from his service, allowing him to go back home to Venice. In fact it’s surprising that as a plot device, the theft of the TARDIS hasn’t been used more often. The other and rather obvious subplot, Tegana’s conspiracy to murder the Khan in the name of a takeover by his Mongol leader Nogai, is well written too. To Tegana, Marco Polo is both the means by which he travels to meet the Khan under false pretences, and also one of Kublai Khan’s lines of defence, to be confounded and disposed of at the most convenient opportunity. Although it is always obvious to the audience of Tegana’s villainy, it is fascinating to see how he manages to always worm his way out of trouble and get back into Marco Polo’s favour, not to mention drive a wedge between him and the Time Travellers without being found out by the Venetian. The only thing that does spoil it perhaps is the fact that Lucarotti casually reveals Tegana from the very first episode, and clearly signposts this as early as ten minutes into the serial, wasting the potential for any mystery or additional suspense. In itself, these are great plotlines for a four episode, 100 minute story, but at a mighty seven episodes, I think it’s fair to say there is a sizeable amount of padding in this serial. Amazingly though, Lucarotti somehow manages to turn this into as much of a strength as a flaw.

John Lucarotti has carefully structured the narrative to follow a much gentler pace than usual, so that every episode has elements of sizeable significance to the overall plot. There are still big chunks of filler material of course, but it is mostly fairly spread out, not lumped into two whole episodes, so it doesn’t spoil the overall ‘viewing’ experience (if I can call watching a picture slideshow-style recon viewing that is). Even in the periods that the plot is on hold though, Lucarotti inserts interesting details and additional elements to stop the audience from getting too bored, such as the ‘singing’ sands of the Gobi desert, and the titular ‘Cave of Five Hundred Eyes’. One of the other positives from Lucarotti’s re-structured narrative is that you get a real sense of how big Marco Polo’s journey is, as well as the sheer distances and long number of days and weeks that are being undertaken in achieving it, something that you wouldn’t really appreciate as much if it was edited down to under an hour of screen time. Due to the padding, there is also some repetition of plot elements, with the time travellers repeatedly trying escape in the TARDIS, and Tegana’s various attempts to kill Marco Polo and thwart his journey progress towards Cathay. However, every attempt, and every escape takes place in different circumstances, so although on paper, it’s obvious they’re repeating the same plot function over and over, in practice it feels like a natural part of the story. In fact, every attempt by the Doctor and friends to regain the TARDIS, by being caught out and trying again feels like a more believable development than the usual quick fix, as in reality various obstacles often exist to any desired aim. Furthermore it also adds an extra layer of tension, as well as an increasing sense of desperation from the time travellers as the possibility of them becoming stranded in this time grows ever more likely.

The best strength from having the extended narrative is that the extra time allows John Lucarotti to extensively develop the main characters of the story, working in extra layers and subtleties, but most brilliantly creates and changes the relationships between them as time goes on, and as plot points make them react in different ways. Nowhere is this more noticeable than with Marco Polo and his ongoing friendship with the time travellers, and Ian in particular. At the start, they are innocent people lost in the mountains which he feels duty bound to care for. Later, they warm to each other and become friends. However, when Tegana stirs up their differences, as well as making trouble, and the Doctor and his companions try to escape with his prize, again and again, Marco becomes initially angry, but later rather more distant, weary and untrusting of them, until the climax of the story when the penny drops, and he tries to make up for his behaviour to them, by giving them back the TARDIS. Complex changes and developments in characterisation is as much a part of great storytelling as a good narrative and plot, and during Marco Polo, John Lucarotti produces it in spades.

Speaking of characterisation, John Lucarotti’s script delivers many wonderfully multi-layered and relatively complex characters that help set this adventure story alight and raise it above what could potentially have been a fairly average historical tale of globetrotting and pantomime villainy to a near classic Doctor Who serial. The most notable and fascinating of these is undoubtedly the title character himself – Marco Polo. Marco is one of the most complex supporting characters ever written for the Doctor Who television series (although probably not the books and audios). Clearly a seasoned traveller with his wits about him, the Venetian is clearly not above acting out of self-interest when his own need is strong enough. However, he also has a clear and strong conscience, and likes to think the best of others where possible, something which Tegana only too gladly manipulates for his own ends. However, having an open and kind heart, despite his own selfishness, means that he is easily upset and angered when others insult or deceive him, and especially when others seem to betray him, which make up a lot of the dramatic conflicts between the main characters throughout the story. I also love the warm camaraderie that builds up between Marco and Ian, as the Venetian begins to greatly respect and trust the resourceful time traveller, only for his faith in Ian to be broken down by Tegana’s lies and Ian’s attempts to defy him in trying to escape with the TARDIS. Rarely do the audience get to see detailed and fully developed interaction between the regulars and the other main characters so it rightfully feels special and worthy to not only see it happen, but also for it to be so brilliantly thought-out and executed in the final production.

The Time Travellers themselves are also still of great interest as a developing ensemble in Marco Polo, particularly as the story marks the first real adventure they share as friends. The Doctor is the most notably changed, looking out for his human companions, and doing his best for them when they’re in trouble, like Barbara was in the third and fourth episodes. The development is remarkable and just two stories ago would be unthinkable considering his old ways, proving to be a great testament to his more humble and learned character, making good on his promise to Barbara to be a better and fairer person at the end of The Edge of Destruction. However, it’s equally fascinating that the Doctor continues to be almost just as abrasive and unforgiving with strangers as before. When Marco Polo steals the TARDIS, the Doctor rails against him, almost treating him like an enemy, secretly working against him to take the TARDIS back, and resenting the Venetian’s actions against him. However, it’s clear that over the long journey, and by the end of their time together, he too has a grown to have respect for Marco, like his friends, albeit only partially.

Barbara also clearly develops further in this story too. After having cleared the air and made peace with the Doctor during The Edge of Destruction, it’s interesting that now the history teacher is a lot more understanding and sympathetic of the Doctor’s point of view. Her ongoing travels in the TARDIS are also making Barbara a lot braver than ever before, and possibly more reckless and instinctive too, letting her curiosity and suspicion of Tegana lead her to unconsciously wander into danger. Barbara’s courage and steely will though doesn’t stop her from still being appalled and terrified by the high level of danger that she comes across during her travels through time and space. Ian on the other hand remains as the dynamic and physically active member of the TARDIS crew, once again partially fulfilling the action hero stereotype his role was originally created for. However, once again Ian is thankfully given more developed and complex characterisation, probably again partly down to David Whitaker. He spends part of the story as an ambassador and representative for the TARDIS team to Marco Polo, convincing him of their innocent intent as well as their essential need of the TARDIS itself, hoping to reason and convince him to give it back to them. Ian also though spends part of the story befriending and supporting Polo, not just to help convince him of the time traveller’s good intentions, but also to understand the Venetian himself, trying to follow the best and most reasonable course of action that will help them all out amicably, without the need for aggressive opposition. Once he is sure of Tegana’s treachery later in the story, Ian grows a partially loyalty toward Marco, determined to do right by him, even if he is duty bound to care for his friends and look out for the TARDIS first. Susan on the other hand is partly something of a spare part, developing a warm friendship with Ping-Cho, but otherwise purely an observer throughout the story, with her only active involvement being falling into the typical screaming ‘damsel-in-distress’ cliché that her character is quickly devolving towards. However, the Doctor’s granddaughter isn’t completely wasted here and has some good scenes, particularly with Ping-Cho, and is used by the script as partially representing the attitudes of the ‘modern viewer’, protesting strongly against Ping-Cho’s arranged marriage.

Tegana is something of an interesting character. John Lucarotti unfortunately highlights his role as the villain very early on in the story, but even if he hadn’t, it’s obvious that the Mongol warlord is cast as the villain anyway with his regular verbal opposition to the time travellers, spoken mainly only in Marco’s ear, clearly creating tension within the group. If that wasn’t enough, his secret meetings, frequent acts of sabotage and treachery, make Tegana initially look like the Doctor Who equivalent of Dick Dastardly. However, Lucarotti fortunately takes care to make sure that the character never makes ‘public’ displays of his villainy (to the other main characters onscreen) until the final climax, hiding his true intent and contempt behind jibes, barbed suggestions and teasing. Tegana’s most effective weapon though, is his precise, calculating and agile ability to charm others into his way of thinking. There’s a great chilling moment in the final episode when Tegana manages to coldly dress down Marco Polo just by openly criticising his actions to the Kublai Khan, while at the same time bending the Khan’s ear with sweet words, with the Venetian barely a few feet away from them and able to hear every word. It’s a cold demonstration and insult by Tegana to Marco Polo, showing him the power and control he has, even in a royal court he has never stepped foot in before, without openly declaring his obvious opposition to the Venetian, preventing him from arguing back. Rarely do we encounter human villains as well drawn and scripted as this in Doctor Who, so when they do appear they always stand out (like Mavic Chen, Tobias Vaughn, General Carrington and Charles Grover, to name a few).

The other supporting characters are a lot more sleight or generic in nature. Ping-Cho is more-or-less Marco Polo’s equivalent of Susan, albeit infinitely more likeable, and without the tiresome screaming. A young woman in Marco’s charge, Ping-Cho is quietly brave, fairly intelligent and perceptive, but also a very sweet, delightful and kind-hearted person, who the Time Travellers befriend fairly quickly with ease. Kublai Khan on the other hand is more of a token comedy character, a cheeky, witty, but wise leader, whose years have made him positively ancient in demeanour, but who is also rather downtrodden by his significantly younger wife. Tegana also has various secret allies to his cause, either through money or politics, but they all amount to being merely sinister lackeys at the end of the day, plot devices to help reveal a part of Tegana’s plan and intention at the right time in the serial to keep the audience interested in proceedings.

Marco Polo also blesses us with a wonderful cast, nearly all of which are memorable in some way or another. The strongest of the supporting cast though, is undoubtedly Derren Nesbitt as Tegana. Nesbitt took what could so easily have been a tea time pantomime villain, and turned him into a charming and mesmerising portrayal that even now defies simple labelling, an enemy who hides his true self under layers of language, misdirection and wry smiles. Derren Nesbitt tones back some of the character’s excesses on paper, introducing some welcome subtlety, which treats the audience to a convincing wolf in sheep’s clothing. However, Nesbitt makes sure to include moments which offer glimpses of the deadly lion underneath, just to remind us how deadly dangerous Tegana really is. Mark Eden is also superb as Marco Polo himself, portraying the role with stern conviction and authority. Eden also proves a great acting foil to Nesbitt, William Russell and William Hartnell too. Zienia Merton, future Space: 1999 cast regular also gives a delightful performance as Ping-Cho, conveying natural innocence and subtle intelligence with ease.

The regular cast are still on fine form too, especially William Hartnell, who goes through a myriad of expressions; from anger, frustration and his usual steely resolve through to cracking light jokes and enjoying winning at backgammon. Hartnell’s best scenes are usually those where the Doctor verbally faces off with Marco Polo, however for me his best moments in the serial are his bizarre reaction to the sheer helplessness of losing the TARDIS, firstly to Marco Polo, and then to Kublai Khan after losing a second game of backgammon. Instead of anger, despair or bitterness, he falls about laughing hysterically in the face of such hopelessness. It’s one of the facets of William Hartnell’s portrayal of the Doctor that I’ve always loved, his jolly, endearingly mad, and sheer bonkers eccentricity that comes completely from left field like a sudden force of nature. I’m happy to say that you can see a lot more of this glorious side of Hartnell’s performance during Season 2 (1964-5), when the 1st Doctor settles into his more mellow and good-humoured persona, particularly while Vicki’s part of the TARDIS. However, that’s all still in the future where Marco Polo is concerned. William Russell gets the most to do of the regulars, playing off Mark Eden’s Polo, stage fighting against various enemies, playing the voice of the group with wit and conviction. Jacqueline Hill on the other hand, like Carole Ann Ford is mostly restricted to supporting duties by their respective characters taking a step back in this serial, which mostly leaves the two actors reacting with either terror or wonder at the various situations that occur, however Hill continues to brilliantly play Barbara’s understated and instinctive wisdom.

The actual production of Marco Polo, from what the publicity photos and various telesnaps show us, seems to have been rather elaborate too. The costumes and set design appear to be particularly gorgeous, rich in tone and variety (and colour too from some of the production photos). Tristram Cary’s music isn’t quite as memorable or creative as the one he composed for The Daleks, however it is still nonetheless very effective, and rather more understated to contrast with the rather more ‘loud’ aspects of production. The direction though is very hard to evaluate with any kind of certainty, due to the entire video record of Marco Polo being lost/destroyed. However, having directed the first ever Doctor Who story, An Unearthly Child, very well for the type of camera in use at the time, it’s possible that Marco Polo was too, something which the image composition and framing displayed in the surviving telesnaps seem to bear out. The superb performances of the cast also seem to suggest great direction. Despite this though, short of any episodes of Marco Polo being recovered, we will never know just how good Waris Hussein was during Marco Polo, except the surviving original cast and crew themselves.

Throughout all my praise and critique though, it’s worth remembering that I’m only experiencing Marco Polo through a surviving audio soundtrack (released by the BBC), and a video reconstruction by the Doctor Who fan video group, Loose Cannon productions, which plays out more as a picture slideshow. Having said that though, Loose Cannon’s efforts should be applauded, and their recent version still remains the most complete surviving record of the serial so far, even though when I say ‘complete’ I mean as complete as reasonably possible considering how little visual material has survived thus far. It should be noted though, that trying to watch the sheer length of Marco Polo in this viewing format is very difficult, if tried in less than two days. I myself only managed to digest the video recon in three days, whereas I remembering managing to get through all seven episodes as a narrated audio all in one sitting. That doesn’t mean that one shouldn’t at least try the video reconstructions of missing Doctor Who, just that you shouldn’t expect to be able to watch or appreciate it in the same way as video of the ‘moving image’. So maybe you might prefer to just stick with only the audio soundtrack instead.

BBC DVD’s 30-minute reconstruction of Marco Polo on their 2006 DVD release of The Edge of Destruction is also worth mentioning too. While it gives you the general gist of the story, and allows viewers with considerably less stamina to experience it, BBC DVD’s recon only really gives you a portion of the real story, and therefore only a portion of any understanding as to how good it is. Certainly, Marco Polo as a script contains a fair amount of padding, as I’ve already said earlier, but in my view, I can’t see Polo being edited down into less than 90 minutes, without losing some of the aspects that make it into the classic it is, and BBC DVD’s recon proves that. “How”, I hear you ask. Well you lose so many of the great moments of character from both the regulars and the supporting cast, and the developing and ever-changing relationship between them, and especially some of their depth, particularly from Tegana. You also miss out on some of the wonderful cast performances, particularly from William Hartnell and Derren Nesbitt. Furthermore, you also miss out on the epic sense of the globetrotting journey; some of the twists and turns in Tegana’s conspiracy; and some of the story and directorial focus from Marco Polo’s point of view. In short, some of the editing is so ruthless and clinically fast that several layers of creative artistic meaning and endeavour just disappear. In other words, if you want to find the easiest way of experiencing all of the best of Marco Polo, then I would recommend the BBC-released narrated audio soundtrack (as of 2013).

For the last four decades at least, Marco Polo has teased and tantalised us with its absence from the archives. A historical epic on a BBC budget, Marco Polo was a hugely ambitious production for television at the time, rich with great characters, locations and culture aplenty, and blessed with a strong script, cast and (probably) direction that truly delivered on multiple levels. Marco Polo is also significantly the first of a new type of Doctor Who story format that mainly created a script from historical or period elements, and deliberately avoided science-fiction and fantasy (despite the subject here potentially being fictitious). The ‘pure historical’ as it has later become known, is a fantastic story format, and great part of Doctor Who’s genre ensemble that although temporarily abandoned by the TV show itself, was brilliantly updated and resurrected by Big Finish audios in The Marian Conspiracy, and is one that is long overdue from our screens. Marco Polo though, already shows us some of the strengths of the genre, and represents the fourth in four serials to pioneer fantastic developments that shape the success and future of Doctor Who for years to come. Although admittedly a simple story, with padding built into the script (extending the serial to a huge seven episodes long); from the surviving audio, script and photographs, it’s clear to me at least, that Marco Polo is one of Doctor Who’s all-time classic stories (albeit a lesser one). Furthermore, I’m willing to bet that if ever some episodes from Marco Polo do happen to be recovered one day that many more would agree too.

Score: 9/10

Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Review Poll!

To mark the 50th anniversary of the greatest TV show ever made, I've decided to review 11 Doctor Who adventures of my followers/friends choosing.

These can be any 11 of your choice from TV, Audios and Books (not comics) as long as they are not stories central to particular story arcs like To The Death, Turn Left, The Ancestor Cell, The Parting of the Ways, Gods and Monsters, The Impossible Astronaut, Arrangements for War, The Wedding of River Song, The Cradle of the Snake, The Angels Take Manhattan or even The Armageddon Factor. However, stories that merely hint at ongoing story arcs like Rose, Aliens of London, Blood of the Daleks, The Lazarus Experiment, Terror Firma, Doctor Who and the Pirates, The Eleventh Hour, The Magic Mousetrap, The Time of Angels, The Book of Kells, The Lodger, etc; are perfectly acceptable too. And standalone stories go without saying. ;)

Just tell me your 11 choices in the comments below. I will pick the 11 most popular choices (probably one for each Doctor) and start on them in the Summer, and may even mark them with youtube vlogs too. Don't be shy. ;)

P.S. As my Marco Polo and Storm Warning reviews will be following within the next few weeks anyway, there's no need to put those down. I also have no idea if I'll be able to celebrate the 50th Anniversary in other ways on youtube as yet, but I'll keep you posted. 

Audio Review 24: The Blue Tooth, written by Nigel Fairs (2007)

Released: January/February 2007

Cast:

Liz Shaw – Caroline John

The Cybermen – Nicholas Briggs

Story Narration and other characters voiced by Caroline John

Main Production Credits

Producer – Sharon Gosling

Script Editor – Alan Barnes

Writer – Nigel Fairs

Director – Mark J. Thompson

Incidental Music – Lawrence Oakley

Sound Design – Lawrence Oakley & Robert Dunlop

Recording – Steve Tsoi at Sound Magic Studios

Title Music – Ron Grainer, Delia Derbyshire and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop

TARDIS Sounds – Brian Hodgson and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop

Executive Producers – Nicholas Briggs and Jason Haigh-Ellery

Story Summary (SPOILERS!):

After Liz’s old university friend Jean and many other Cambridge residents go missing, the Doctor and UNIT investigate finding little but an unusual suicide and empty houses, full of bizarre damage and vandalism. Liz Shaw herself though, follows the trail back to her old University campus, and the onsite Dentist surgery, where horrific treatments await her...

The body UNIT recovers from the suicide is covered with a fantastic alien and blue living metal that defies analysis, until Cybermats start erupting from within. Meanwhile, Amnesic from her experience at the Dentists, Liz is horrified that a sample of the living metal has been implanted in a filling inside her mouth, but more horrors are yet to come as Liz comes under the control of an electronic radio signal. The Doctor’s fears confirmed he allows himself to be lead by the semi-controlled Liz to the hideout and crashed spaceship of the alien aggressors – the Cybermen! However, the original Cybermen seem to have died on impact. It appears an Earth scientist discovered the spaceship, and while examining its properties created the blue living metal, and became cyber-converted in the process. The former scientist, Gareth Arnold, now a Cyberman of sorts, has been implanting micro Cybermats into the mouths of patients at the dentist surgery, which with the metal absorbed from their homes have gone on to gradually convert the humans into a new kind of Cyberman. One of these new Cybermen is the missing Jean, and Liz witness with terror as everything that was her friend is lost and destroyed, turned into a cold, unfeeling monster.

The Doctor destroys the Cyber-converted scientist and escapes with Liz as the other converted humans remain motionless. However, before the Doctor can research into this new kind of Cyberman and reverse the conversions, the Brigadier and UNIT march in to destroy them, and any possible threat they pose. Her friend now lost forever, Liz understands more deeply the anger and frustration feels when life, even alien life, is needlessly destroyed.

Story Placement

Between The Eye of the Giant (Virgin Missing Adventure) and The Scales of Injustice (Virgin Missing Adventure).

Review:

These days it’s hard to watch and listen to the work of Caroline John without being reminded of her recent sad passing in June last year (2012). Her time on Doctor Who as the companion Elizabeth Shaw was sadly short on television, but her performance and character made a vivid and unforgettable impression on the programme as a whole. Arguably the first independent and reasonably developed female companion since Vicki five years previously, Liz Shaw was a highly talented, intelligent and intuitive professor, who was roped into UNIT as a scientific advisor before the Doctor returned properly. Liz still stayed for a few stories afterwards, but her character was partially neglected throughout her TV episodes, although fortunately was at least written with enough thought and decent lines to be convincing. Caroline John herself had to prematurely leave the show after one year due to being pregnant, but both Barry Letts and Jon Pertwee were unhappy with the concept of Liz Shaw as a character for the role of companion, feeling her to be too sterile and coldly intellectual to be a successful audience identification figure, which then led to Barry Letts and Terrance Dicks coming up with the idea of Jo Grant. So with Caroline John’s passing, it is some consolation then that through Big Finish, John was able to revisit Liz Shaw as a character, and get to play a far more developed interpretation of the sharp-witted scientist.

It’s rather a shame then, that The Blue Tooth is a rather so-so script and story from Nigel Fairs that only partly does any justice to both the character of Liz Shaw and the period of Doctor Who it’s so very clearly trying to emulate. Certainly it is good in places and has moments of brilliance, but I personally came away from this audio feeling a bit bored and underwhelmed. We got neither a real detailed insight into Liz Shaw as a character or a well-rounded, fully developed story.

To give Nigel Fairs his due though, firstly I’ll reflect on the good aspects of his script. The idea of the Cybermen attempting to convert humans by stealth via a Dentist surgery is absolutely fantastic, and one of the most original uses of the Cybermen in years. Rather wonderfully it also follows one of the best ever Doctor Who tropes, to introduce and juxtapose the alien within familiar and real world objects, locations and environments, which as it happens reaches its height (of use) during the Jon Pertwee TV episodes. The use of the Dentist surgery also adds another place on the list of everyday things that Doctor Who has subverted and made scary or unsettling. I’m also fascinated by his use of the Cybermats in the story. They’re used far more effectively here than they’ve been in any of their Television appearances, including their recent modern day revamp during Closing Time. Fairs astutely restricts them to creeping around in the shadows, doing weird things with metal, making small tunnels, and staying hidden until their shock reveal as they gruesomely break out of a semi-converted corpse. In addition to this, it’s clear that Nigel Fairs has invented a new and much more unsettling kind of Cybermen, one that pays homage to the creepy originals designed for The Tenth Planet, their 1966 debut TV serial. Instead of the standard iconic late 1960s image of them depicted on the cover, these are people who are gradually converted, implanted and taken over by the Cybermen’s new ‘living metal’ technology. So instead of the usual unsettling mechanical process, the narration describes to us an even more terrifying process of how the ‘living metal’, lines and moulds over the bones, gradually flows and progresses over the face and body, bruising the flesh that it moves against and destroys.

The first part of the audio is also filled with a fantastic suspenseful atmosphere as Liz reaches Jean’s house, and creeps about inside. The eerie stillness and emptiness are superbly conveyed in the script and performance, and positively gave me chills, like the first time I watched the famous Auton awakening sequence in Episode 4 of Spearhead from Space, where just before the Autons replicas activate in shop windows, there’s a creepy silence and powerful foreboding in the air, hinting at the horrific attack about to commence.

Then there’s also the cunning way Nigel Fairs uses the Cybermen themselves in the story. The idea of humanising a Cyberman has on TV really only been used in terms of being a weapon against them. In The Blue Tooth though, Fairs poses the question of whether Cybermen could ever evolve or be made to become more human as a species. Although Gareth Arnold’s emotions had been removed, there was clearly part of his human intelligence that survived and mixed in with the logical and single-minded instincts of the Cybermen, helped by the fact that the original Cybermen in the spacecraft had died years earlier. Although the question is never really answered, Fairs offers some fascinating suggestions that maybe Cybermen can evolve through their converted victims, although he never explores the idea to its potential, leaving other writers to maybe try and explore it further in future Doctor Who stories.

Nigel Fairs also uses the most effective dramatic way of presenting the idea of the Cybermen, and of conveying how horrific the concept of them can be. By introducing the listener to a friend of the companion, helping them get to know the character and then witness them being converted later on, brings out the emotional drama of losing what it means to be human, and seeing someone slowly die in front of your eyes. With this method, Fairs presents us with one of the best portrayals and most artful uses of the Cybermen as a concept...except he doesn’t, not really. Sure he comes up with the idea to use Jean, Liz’s friend as the emotional focus of the story, by having her fall into the Cybermen’s grasp and be converted, but he completely fails to develop Jean as a character, resulting in the same problem as a lot of other Cyberman stories, including The Rise of the Cybermen, which converts a character that the audience doesn’t really care that much about, and so isn’t really moved by their passing. If it wasn’t for the great description of Jean’s conversion in the narration, you’d forgive any listener for being blasé about it. Sadly there’s more disappointment to follow as almost every aspect of the script is either hampered or underdeveloped in one way or another.

The biggest problem I have is the many unexplained plot holes that are ignored or simply glossed over. Even if we assume that a Dentist randomly wandering around an Airport, falls into an Underground Cavern and comes across the dead Cyberman spaceship, it still seems odd that rather than contact the authorities out of fear, he then took a large portion of the dead Cyberman to examine, even if it could in some way be reasoned as some mad misplaced ambition to pioneer a new discovery in his name. I suppose it is likely that Gareth Arnold studied Forensic science in detail as part of his Dentistry at Cambridge, but it still doesn’t quite explain it. Furthermore, how does a Dentist not only have the abilities to analyse alien artefacts, understand their purpose, and then also have the abilities to create a ‘living metal’ substance, which can grow and takeover organic life forms, almost like an aggressive bacteria. As the Cybermats are instrumental in the delivery of this metal, it heavily implies that Gareth Arnold was already mentally taken over and semi-converted into a Cyberman, with the remains of a Cyber intelligence taking advantage of his skills and experience as inspiration for a new and more strategic method of conversion. It’s a great one too, which gets me wondering whether perhaps a stray Cybermat tried to convert Arnold while he was still in the spaceship, which also makes more sense in him picking up a sample of a Cyberman as well. However, that in turn raises yet another difficult question. How does a semi-converted Cyberman/Dentist move around Cambridge, re-engineer and physically restructure his own Dentist surgery, all without being noticed? I suppose the receptionist could be controlled by a Cyber-implant of some description, but there’s not much suggestion of that either, just that the receptionist is somehow in on the whole hidden conversion setup. Either way, I’m not entirely convinced the logic of the story has been entirely thought through. The simple plot devices of the random effectiveness of the fire extinguisher against the Cybermats in the UNIT Lab, or the lucky escape by the Doctor and Liz from the Cyberman spaceship by the inactivity of the remaining Cybermen are much less of an irritation in comparison; convenient ways to keep the narrative moving quickly, even if they are less satisfying than a more direct, logical or setup solution.

I suppose you could say, “so what? It’s the story of Liz and her character that we care about”. Rather disappointingly though, The Blue Tooth doesn’t make particularly good headway in characterisation either. Firstly there’s Liz Shaw herself, who surprisingly is portrayed with little development beyond what we saw of the character. Fairs writes her as still a rather straight-laced and slightly haughty person, occasionally a bit prudish and superior, but of course still with a strong conscience and caring side to her. However, due perhaps to the strong writing during the Doctor Who TV episodes of her tenure, we knew all of this already, and in fact I’d argue that Liz felt more rounded, fun and likeable on screen, or during The Scales of Injustice than here. Her short tales of a few wild nights out as a student hardly tells us anything worthwhile and if anything feels like superficial filler, trying to pass itself off as character development. Even worse in my view is the introduction to the audio, trying to summarise Liz’s attitude to UNIT by lazily quoting word for word her dialogue from her entrance in Spearhead from Space, making her originally witty lines, feel cynical and tired. More frustratingly it misses the point that the original dialogue was a cynical joke by Liz before she joined UNIT. By making her view on life appear unchanged or even worse more narrow-minded and dismissive of her experiences with the Doctor seriously undermines the great character that we witnessed on TV. So effectively Liz’s character development for that moment is getting worse and not better. It also doesn’t entirely help that Liz spends half the story semi-conscious, relating the events in the third person, so not only do we lose the atmosphere and dramatic build-up to the climax, but we also lose Liz’s views and personal experience on what happened, something which I partly thought was the central point to the Companion Chronicles.

What is a fairly sizeable and great development though is Liz witnessing her old university friend on the receiving end of the alien horrors that her time at UNIT has led her to experience on a weekly basis, and furthermore be destroyed by them. It’s certainly a great way to convey the true horror of the Cybermen, and we get to hear Liz’s intense feelings for the first time, which otherwise would be partially would be hidden behind her brave face. Another interesting point is that through the loss of her friend Jean, Liz is able to fully understand the Doctor’s strong passionate feelings towards unnecessary loss of any life, including alien life. The chance of Jean’s condition being reversed is swept away in a moment by the UNIT forces stepping in to destroy the Cyberman spaceship and its converted victims, and Liz shares the Doctor’s frustration at the potentially tragic waste.

However, despite the fantastic idea and the wonderful chilling narration during Jean’s transformation, any desired emotional effect or character-based drama is almost completely undermined or made non-existent by the fact that we don’t feel for Jean as a character, or in fact know much about her at all. The narration describes Jean as a wild free spirit of the 1960s, who is both fashionable and has a striking hairstyle, who loves partying hard on the town from time to time, owns a cat with a silly name, and also loves a regular fry up for breakfast. Not really much to go on is it. The problem is that once again, all we know is meaningless superficial details that don’t really say very much, not to mention the fact that half of her description is a vague cliché of a 1960s hippie. There is no real character there to understand, relate or even empathise with. So the result is that when all these horrible things happen to her, that although we take notice of the event of her Cyber-conversion and its gruesome/creepy nature, I for one, was not really moved or shocked by her plight. Nigel Fairs’ wonderful ideas were entirely wasted dramatically, as he failed to execute them to their full potential, by not giving us a real character to care about.

The remaining UNIT characters are also disappointing, with the Brigadier resembling his own traditional clichéd persona, and the Third Doctor only faring slightly better, with even some curious anomalies. As a big fan of the Third Doctor myself, I can never imagine him ever addressing a Cyberman with “my friend”, even if he does address his friends with old-fashioned affectionate language such as “old chap”, for instance. I confess though to getting a small thrill to hearing the Third Doctor have a small vocal face-off with a Cyberman, even more so when you have an authentic Cyberman voice on the end of it.

The only other criticism I have of the script is that Nigel Fairs bizarrely includes some badly-timed/used inclusion of specific continuity references that while tie into the era they’re set, offer no real purpose other than some rather trivial and superficial fan service. I’ve already mentioned the irritating and lazy inclusion of Liz’s onscreen dialogue in Spearhead from Space, rather unimaginatively used to represent her general point of view, but there’s another reference which is just dropped right in the middle of the build-up to the climax of episode one, and for no good reason that I can see. After the atmospheric and creepy tone as Liz explores Jean’s empty and seemingly vandalised house, the Doctor turns up, and he and Liz have a quick chat about his new colourful jacket. Now this would have been ok halfway through the story in a quiet scene where little of any dramatic significance is taking place, but right in that placement within episode one it completely dissipates any tension successfully built up over the last 5 minutes or so, and undermines a lot of Fairs’ hard work. The basic Tomorrow’s World quip about the Doctor’s gadgets sunk like a lead balloon for me as well. There’s never any real dramatic tension again until the Doctor and Liz are trapped within the Cyberman spaceship. The Cybermat reveal at the end of episode two is good, but ultimately it’s more of a shock entrance than any real built up tension. Furthermore, it also strikes me that Fairs’ story and plot is very visual, and that while some magnificent narration relishes in the imagery Fairs creates, a lot of other images that would have come across brilliantly in video; don’t really translate as well to audio.

What does greatly strengthen the story’s success on audio however, is Caroline John’s great performance and delivery of the script. Despite the many decades that have passed in her last performance in the role, John settles back into the character well, reflecting her confident intelligence, but also brilliantly acting out Liz’s rarely seen vulnerability, particularly during the last two episodes. Although the script offers the Character of Liz Shaw a small portion of development, Caroline John takes this with both hands, figuratively speaking, expertly showing her disgust and terror as Liz witnesses Jean’s Cyber-conversion, while warming relating Liz’s reminisces of staying round Jean’s house in the past. Another great part of John’s performance is her wonderful underplaying, lending a natural subtlety to her acting, and making Caroline John a fantastic narrator. John’s impressions of the Third Doctor and the Brigadier though, aren’t as good, but then I’ve yet to hear many actors who can successfully impersonate fellow peers of the opposite gender, so it’s a common problem that’s always going to come up with narrated audio drama, it can’t be helped. Nicholas Briggs once again lends his skilled voice to the Cybermen and significantly helps in supporting the drama of the latter episodes of the story, by making it feel more real. Like his Dalek performances, Briggs’ Cyberman performances are always superb and lend a real frisson to the dialogue being acted out.

The production is a marked improvement too in comparison to Fear of the Daleks. Caroline John is clearly brilliantly directed, and gives a wonderful performance, as does Nick Briggs, but I suspect that Briggs probably directs himself in his alien roles as much as any production director, so it’s hard to judge that just by listening. The sound design is once again quite minimalist, but unlike Fear of the Daleks, which was supposed to be a futuristic city in outer space, it works much better, and feels more appropriate. Lawrence Oakley’s incidental music is a sizeable leap forward from his amateurish work on Fear of the Daleks. In The Blue Tooth though, Oakley’s composition is much better, still fairly simplistic, but it’s much more creative, and with the lead guitar-based sound gives a nice nod to the James Bond-style feel of the Jon Pertwee era of Doctor Who. Furthermore I also noticed the occasional neat homage to the early Dudley Simpson music of the period, particularly during pieces reflecting tension and danger. The soundtrack is still a long way off the semi-symphony written by Jamie Robertson for Robophobia, or even his superior Dudley Simpson-esque themes and incidentals for Destination: Nerva, but Oakley is at least back on form and going a few steps in the right direction.

Looking at the individual elements of The Blue Tooth, it’s hard not to once again be saddened at yet another missed opportunity, not just for Doctor Who on audio, but also for the Companion Chronicles as well. Nigel Fairs came up with so many great ideas, such as the Cybermen’s novel strategy to stealthily convert people through dentistry, or dramatically conveying the chilling concept of the Cybermen by converting someone we get to know throughout the story. However, all this inspiration was wasted on poor execution, one way or another, whether it be through glossed over unexplained plot holes or superficial and underdeveloped characterisation. I honestly couldn’t tell if it was the constraints of the Companion Chronicles format, a rushed script or an inexperienced writer. There are fortunately still many good aspects to enjoy such as Nigel Fairs’ mostly brilliant narration, his original ideas, better incidental music, but most of all, a delightful performance by Caroline John, returning to the role of Liz Shaw for the first time in 46 years. As I gradually get through more and more Big Finish audio releases, its increasingly clear to me that the Companion Chronicles is a fantastic format for audio Doctor Who that has the potential to create wonders given some finessing of the format and type of scripts it requires to excel as well as getting writers are more accustomed to the kind of scripts that work within such a format (of course these are past releases so these improvements have probably already been done years ago by now). Nowhere at this moment is that made more clearly than while listening to The Blue Tooth, because it’s an audio that had real potential from the start, and failed to utilise it. Overall I think it’s a great shame, because given some finessing and another rewrite or two on the script, The Blue Tooth could have been a real gem of a production.

Score: 6/10