Eruditorum Press

Fashionably late capitalism

four to doomsday

33

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Enlightenment and Persuasion have walked in on the Doctor and his friends.  They now look human.  A man and a woman, created from a sketch Tegan drew.  Pale, impassive, handsome, impeccably-groomed people in clothes that Tegan thought fashionable.  They look like she modelled them on First Class passengers on Concorde.  The Jet Set. 

Persuasion hands round drinks.  Nothing more persuasive than that.

Enlightenment is explaining her transformation from frog to aspirational 80s princess.  She speaks in cut-glass vowels and icicle consonants.

“We enjoy the most advanced technology in the universe,” she claims, her voice suffused with nonchalant arrogance.

She was kissed by technology.

“The dominant emotion on planet Earth is fear,” says Persuasion suavely.  Yes, that’s always how the ‘natives’ look to the ‘explorers’.  Fearful little things.  “When last we were there, our reception was hostile.”

Tegan, a woman from a nation built on the destruction and subjugation of ‘natives’ by ‘explorers’, is not fooled.

“Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me,” she sneers.

“Well, we must read your history books,” says the Doctor.  There is no better way to learn about the mindset of the rulers of any civilisation than to read their official history books.  You can read a lot between the lines.

“You will be welcome to do so,” says Enlightenment, “but first it will be necessary for me to instruct you in our computer languages.”

There is, it goes without saying, no conceivable possibility than a non-Urbankan might already have the ability to read Urbankan books.

“One couldn’t wish for a more enchanting teacher,” says the Doctor.  He almost seems to be flirting with her.

“A very elevated one,” adds Persuasion, regarding this insolent bug with lofty amusement.

“Enlightenment,” says the Doctor.

“Minister of Enlightenment,” Persuasion corrects him.  Just so you know where you stand.

“Yes, of course,” replies the Doctor, his eyes icy with contemptuous understanding, “And you must be Minister of Persuasion.”

Of course, every ‘civilised’ nation that ever set about conquering the ‘primitives’ always thought themselves superior, always thought they were bringing the benefits of their ‘advancement’, always said they were helping the child-races to grow… or at least to stop being a hindrance in lands they were too inferior to use properly.

And such ‘civilised’ nations always aimed for ‘hearts and minds’, always brought their greater ‘wisdom’ with them as a justification and a gift, holding it before them as they invaded and conquered and slaughtered and enslaved. 

And they always needed – need – their Ministers of Enlightenment.  And Persuasion.…

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Nice Guy, Nasty Cosmos

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The great Timelash II rehash finally hobbles to a close.  Here’s the last roundup.  Seasons 19-21.

Castrovalva

This is a story, like ‘Logopolis’, that achieves greatness despite its many flaws. Flaws first:

“Take your hands off me – this is an official uniform!” and “We’re perfectly harmless, unfortunately!”

Seriously… who the hell talks like that? I can forgive “I know so little about telebiogenesis” because Nyssa is an alien scientist child prodigy aristocrat. But Tegan is supposed to be a down-to-earth working woman. And, on that subject, it becomes abundantly clear during this story that the programme makers aren’t going to exploit the contrast between the two characters’ backgrounds and attitudes for interesting dramatic conflict. Nor are they going to milk the business of the Master inhabiting Nyssa’s father’s body for dramatic potential either… though, to her great credit, Sarah Sutton is still trying to use her face to express anguish at the Master’s appearance.

Ainley, it need hardly be said, excels as the delightful Portreeve (channelling Olivier to the point that it becomes beside-the-point that it’s always obvious who he is) but suddenly goes crap when called upon to play an obtuse, snarling Dick Dastardly. At times, when playing the Master at the end, Ainley moves and looks like no-one other than Groucho Marx (my second favourite Marx, as it happens… but there’s a time and place for everything). As in ‘Logopolis’, we needed a better villain. It seems hardly credible that a dunce like this Master could devise a trap of such subtlety and beauty as Castrovalva, let alone characters like Ruther and Mergrave. (One can only assume that they come as much from Adric as from his captor.) Ironically enough, we’re meant to be wrong-footed into suspecting Shardovan of villainy… because he’s a villain stereotype in black clothes and a black moustache.

The first two episodes are a bit of a trudge. There are lots of good bits, but they could easily be condensed into one episode. Again, Bidmead makes the TARDIS into an almost metaphysical space, a peculiar and vaguely-sinister labyrinth with healing rooms that smell of roses, rooms that can be ‘deleted’ as though the whole structure exists as data on a hard drive, rooms that seem to have been placed in the Doctor’s way by the TARDIS itself (to help provide him with a new identity) and medicine chests with Alice in Wonderland-style bottles inside marked ‘The Potion’, ‘The Ointment’ and ‘The Solution’. “Ah my little friend… if only you were!” Gorgeous.

Sadly, the business with the TARDIS being sent back to the hydrogen inrush is a bit of a mcguffin… and, again, as in ‘Logopolis’, Bidmead feels the need to have characters naming and explaining this story’s Big Theme to each other… just in case we miss it when it pops up. Having said that, the business with the Index File being listed in the Index File under Index File is very clever, both conceptually and linguistically. But the second half of Episode Two, featuring Tegan and Nyssa slowly carrying a box through a (admittedly beautiful) forest, is possibly the most boring thing ever committed to film.…

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