The Edge of Destruction

Doctor Who

The Edge of Destruction (part 1)

The fourth dimension, it is explodin',
Violence flarin', cavemen loadin',
You're old enough to time travel but not for votin',
You don't believe in war, but whose that Thal you're smotin',
And even the Skaro river has bodies floatin',
But you tell me over and over and over again my Doc

Ah, you don't believe we're on the Edge of Destruction.

The TARDIS goes boom and everyone hits the floor. But they get up again, you're never going to keep them down. Good work on Ian to collapse into a nearby chair.

"Ian Chesterton?" says Barbara as thought she's not read the script. Susan looks drunk. Everyone is acting oddly. And I don't mean "are they possessed?" I mean "do they realise the cameras are filming?" The Doctor is lying down so long you might think he'd pissed off and left a body double.

Even William Russell looks confused.

I'm confused.

Everyone has amnesia and is pausing between words so often even Harold Pinter would have said "too long".

Perhaps he did it, says Ian of the Doctor about the doors opening. You know those pisstakes of Russian theatre, with people saying ominous things slowly, and then a pause before anyone says anything else. This is Doctor Who as done by a sketch by Paul Whitehouse.

Some bad acting from Ford, comically punctured by Ian going "She's FAINTED!"

William Hartnell still can't be arsed getting involved in the episode. Wisest person going here.

Randomly Susan has a scissors and threatens Ian. Instead she stabs a recliner bed to death, presumably for it nearly lifting her skirt up before William Russell intervened.

You know that Assignment 1 with Sapphire and Steel. Childs nursery rhymes, Val Pringle, stopped clocks, etc? That still made more sense than this.

Although in the background they start playing Eric Siday's Anesthesia, which gets me excited because you'll recognise it as background music from The Moonbase! Siday was a pioneer in electronic music - he commissioned the first Moog synthesizer - and until his early death in the 1970s his work appeared time and again in 60s Doctor Who. It feels futuristic, and would lead one day to Visage.

Meanwhile it now time for Susan to threaten Barbara with the scissors. This really is an experiment in wasting time. The sound quality in the Pilot episode (actually the pilot) (Goes Wrong Show gag for you all) was better than here.

So the Doctor does what seems obvious. He poisons everyone, only for someone off screen to strangle him. What an odd cliffhanger to a frankly odd episode.

Oh I should mention Barbara has a right proper go at the Doctor for being an untrusting sod.

And the Doctors phrase "Rash action is worse than no action". Wise.

Doctor Who
Edge of Destruction part 2
The Brink of Disaster

"on the brink of disaster..." Ah it doesn't work as well.

It turns out it was Ian strangling the Doctor. But he stops now the cliffhanger is over. Did I mention the Doctor sneaking in with laced nightcaps on a tray was very funny? Even William Russell can't do the falling in a nightdress to the floor bit. Judging from the angle of the shot, Susan can walk through walls, but never uses this for practical effect. The bloodied bit on the Doctors head bandage has swapped sides of his head.

For the first time all series, William Russell just can't be arsed here. Not sure I can blame him. Apparently the DVD Commentary explains all the bits of the script they couldn't be bothered translating to the screen.

As Susan starts to complain to the Doctor, I can't help but shake the feeling this is made up as we go along, with a distinct need to kill 50 minutes of time.

Ian starts giving Barbara a vigorous back massage, which is prelude to her holding him in his arms. William Russell. But then the Doctor ruins this happy moment for the couple by deciding they are innocent of damaging the ship, without anything happening in between to change his mind.

"We're on the brink of discussion!" says the Doctor, which is surprisingly accurate. So something has gone wrong with the TARDIS, and to let the crew know its made them go insane. I'm not sure that's the most sensible safety warning. Like a house warning you of a fire by spraying petrol.

Anyhow, the Doctor casually announces the crew have ten minutes to survive. Then he slowly walks around the TARDIS set as though that its not that big a deal.

Barbara decides the food machine and the clock were actually giving out clues to what was going on. Later on, when Barbara left the TARDIS, she found fame as the only winner of the 3-2-1 grand prize in history.

The concept of something possessing the TARDIS - mentioned in a throwaway line - is far more interesting.

So this exists because Who was originally given a 13 episode run, and they had 2 episodes spare. Imagine the Daleks never took off, this would be the weirdest run of 13 SF episodes ever.

DOCTOR: I know. I know. I said it would take the force of a total solar system to attract the power away from my ship. We're at the very beginning, the new start of a solar system. Outside, the atoms are rushing towards each other. Fusing, coagulating, until minute little collections of matter are created. And so the process goes on, and on until dust is formed. Dust then becomes solid entity. A new birth, of a sun and its planets.

The Doctor giggling and talking about the birth of suns in a darkened TARDIS room makes as much sense as anything else, but is also a fun Doctor moment. Anyhow, this cheers up the Doctor who gives Susan a big hug, and then stutters an apology to Barbara. Its very odd that this of all things turns the Doctor into "lets be friends".

Barbara is still in a huff. Doctor has a Doctor moment with her but she seems unconvinced.

Meanwhile, Susan is playing in the snow.

Edge of Destruction is an oddity. It tries to be different, and it is, but between the regulars not being on form, and the weird structure of the tales, it feels more like a series of disconnected weird imagery, than a story in its own right.