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Another one from the "Episodes of Doctor Who that aren't on DVD yet" cupboard; and this one's even better than the last one. Although, to be scrupulously fair, I don't think that I could rate Jon Pertwee higher than William Hartnell in the Doctor stakes. Too many of those seventies stories are just that little bit naff. He's bloody awesome, though. Swashbuckly and splendid, and everything you want from a hero. And why in heaven's name do people never wear frilly shirts and velvet jackets on television nowadays? That is the way to dress, people. It's certainly the way that heroes ought to dress. Shirts with splendid cuffs, and jackets that look like pirates might wear them. And capes! More heroes ought to be striding into danger wearing capes. Beats the hell out of jeans and a t-shirt.
"The Mind Of Evil" is an adventure from 1972. It's one that got hit by the BBC's habit of deleting everything in the seventies, although fortunately they only managed to destroy their own copy of it. Still existing, despite the best efforts of the junkers, is a very nice quality black and white edition from somewhere or other, which got released on video back in the nineties. Because they're still hoping to issue it in colour some time, and are presently working on a colour retrieval project, it's not yet been released on DVD. But I've been watching it with the aid of my Plug Your Video Into Your Computer gizmo. Hurrah!
There is nothing about "Mind Of Evil" that isn't wonderful. Literally. Well, okay. Richard Franklin persists in being a bit rubbish, but I overlook that because I really like the character that he plays. Everything else is perfect, though. It's from right smack in the middle of the Third Doctor's exile on Earth, so all the familiar bits and pieces are present. UNIT? Check. Master? Check. Monster bent on world domination and other assorted evils? Check. There's also a helicopter and a motorcycle - the Pertwee Era was obsessed with both - lots of gunfire, action by HAVOC, and a snooty government type for the Doctor to take the mick out of.
It's a great story. The Doctor is present at a demonstration of a new method of dealing with Britain's worst criminal offenders - a machine that sucks evil out of brains, and turns criminals into sweet innocents. This, as nobody but the Doctor seems to realise, soon leads to an evil-eating machine that's brimming with mad, cackling evilness. Since the machine is actually not a machine at all, but an alien beast that feeds on hatred, terror and other such nastinesses, and it's been sold to Britain's prisons by the Master, the scene is very obviously set for chaos and carnage.
There's half a dozen storylines here, making this one of the few six-parters that actually warrant the length - compare and contrast to the drastically overlong "The Time Monster", of similar vintage, for example. Firstly there's the Brigadier and Mike Yates dealing with an international peace conference right on their doorstep (complete with some large scale tampering from the Master and his brainwashed minions). Then there's Mike trying to supervise the destruction of a nuclear-powered chemical missile. There's the Doctor's attempts to deal with the brain-sucking evil machine, which ties in with a riot at the prison where it's located; the Master's plans to capture Mike's missile; the Doctor and the Master's ongoing game of oneupmanship; and the Brigadier's efforts to stay on top of everything. There's hardly a dull moment in all six episodes, the entire cast has plenty to do, and everybody gets to be brilliantly heroic and a bit flashy. It really couldn't get a whole lot better.
Opening title wibbliness.
Evil alien machine of total evil.
Emil Keller, the machine's inventor. Otherwise known as the Master, obviously.
Hello! Michael Sheard, who's done more Doctor Who than practically anybody, tries to help the Doctor get to the bottom of whatever's going on with the machine of evil.
One of the Master's brainwashed minions; in this case one of the Chinese delegates at the ongoing peace conference. Mike Yates memorably refers to her as "quite a dolly", so I may have been lying when I said that this story was completely perfect.
Dolly-minion attempts to murder the American delegate via hypnosis, tied in to his ferocious anti-Chinese paranoia. Thereby making him the first man in history to almost be murdered by the Soup Dragon out of The Clangers.
A large photograph of a missile gives Mike and Benton no end of trouble.
Jo Grant, single-handedly defeating a thousand rioting prisoners.
The Master attempts to feed the Doctor's brainwaves to the evil machine of evil, just to see what happens. Note shirt of ultimate frillage.
Sergeant Benton being all stoic and heroic. And anything else you can think of that rhymes.
Mike Yates being suitably dashing.
The Master clearly very much enjoys towering over people who are tied to chairs.
You know, some day I would love to discover just why he's so incapable of killing Mike Yates. Not that I'm complaining, obviously. I'd just like to know. The degree of smirking that goes on in this scene, on both sides, demands explanation.
The Brigadier adopts a cunning disguise in order to quell a prison riot. (Another one. They rioted again after Jo defeated them).
Roger Delgado being utterly wonderful in every way.
Jon Pertwee, likewise.
The Doctor and assorted bits of UNIT, apparently quite sure that they'll be safe hovering six feet above a self-destructing nuclear missile with a chemical warhead. This is the sort of blind optimism that made Britain great, you know. ;)
Well gosh, is the Master escaping again? I never would have foreseen that.
Time for a cup of tea before the end credits.
I love "The Mind Of Evil". I love that the evil monster of the week is essentially a high concept table; I love how brilliantly dashing and entertainingly wicked the Master is; I love Jon Pertwee's shirts... It's all good, basically. Oh, one last screencap, just for general culty fun:
Barnham, the criminal mastermind who had his evilness sucked out at the beginning by the machine. He's played by Neil McCarthy, who is not as famous as he should be for also playing this fellow here:
This is Calibos from Clash Of The Titans (the proper version, from 1981). I say not as famous as he should be, because he did get just ever so slightly upstaged by the make-up. That is him under there somewhere, though. You can just about see him, if you squint.
A point of no great importance I suppose, but then that's the sort of information in which I specialise. Call it a compulsion. Or stupidity. That would also probably cover it.
"The Mind Of Evil" is an adventure from 1972. It's one that got hit by the BBC's habit of deleting everything in the seventies, although fortunately they only managed to destroy their own copy of it. Still existing, despite the best efforts of the junkers, is a very nice quality black and white edition from somewhere or other, which got released on video back in the nineties. Because they're still hoping to issue it in colour some time, and are presently working on a colour retrieval project, it's not yet been released on DVD. But I've been watching it with the aid of my Plug Your Video Into Your Computer gizmo. Hurrah!
There is nothing about "Mind Of Evil" that isn't wonderful. Literally. Well, okay. Richard Franklin persists in being a bit rubbish, but I overlook that because I really like the character that he plays. Everything else is perfect, though. It's from right smack in the middle of the Third Doctor's exile on Earth, so all the familiar bits and pieces are present. UNIT? Check. Master? Check. Monster bent on world domination and other assorted evils? Check. There's also a helicopter and a motorcycle - the Pertwee Era was obsessed with both - lots of gunfire, action by HAVOC, and a snooty government type for the Doctor to take the mick out of.
It's a great story. The Doctor is present at a demonstration of a new method of dealing with Britain's worst criminal offenders - a machine that sucks evil out of brains, and turns criminals into sweet innocents. This, as nobody but the Doctor seems to realise, soon leads to an evil-eating machine that's brimming with mad, cackling evilness. Since the machine is actually not a machine at all, but an alien beast that feeds on hatred, terror and other such nastinesses, and it's been sold to Britain's prisons by the Master, the scene is very obviously set for chaos and carnage.
There's half a dozen storylines here, making this one of the few six-parters that actually warrant the length - compare and contrast to the drastically overlong "The Time Monster", of similar vintage, for example. Firstly there's the Brigadier and Mike Yates dealing with an international peace conference right on their doorstep (complete with some large scale tampering from the Master and his brainwashed minions). Then there's Mike trying to supervise the destruction of a nuclear-powered chemical missile. There's the Doctor's attempts to deal with the brain-sucking evil machine, which ties in with a riot at the prison where it's located; the Master's plans to capture Mike's missile; the Doctor and the Master's ongoing game of oneupmanship; and the Brigadier's efforts to stay on top of everything. There's hardly a dull moment in all six episodes, the entire cast has plenty to do, and everybody gets to be brilliantly heroic and a bit flashy. It really couldn't get a whole lot better.
Opening title wibbliness.
Evil alien machine of total evil.
Emil Keller, the machine's inventor. Otherwise known as the Master, obviously.
Hello! Michael Sheard, who's done more Doctor Who than practically anybody, tries to help the Doctor get to the bottom of whatever's going on with the machine of evil.
One of the Master's brainwashed minions; in this case one of the Chinese delegates at the ongoing peace conference. Mike Yates memorably refers to her as "quite a dolly", so I may have been lying when I said that this story was completely perfect.
Dolly-minion attempts to murder the American delegate via hypnosis, tied in to his ferocious anti-Chinese paranoia. Thereby making him the first man in history to almost be murdered by the Soup Dragon out of The Clangers.
A large photograph of a missile gives Mike and Benton no end of trouble.
Jo Grant, single-handedly defeating a thousand rioting prisoners.
The Master attempts to feed the Doctor's brainwaves to the evil machine of evil, just to see what happens. Note shirt of ultimate frillage.
Sergeant Benton being all stoic and heroic. And anything else you can think of that rhymes.
Mike Yates being suitably dashing.
The Master clearly very much enjoys towering over people who are tied to chairs.
You know, some day I would love to discover just why he's so incapable of killing Mike Yates. Not that I'm complaining, obviously. I'd just like to know. The degree of smirking that goes on in this scene, on both sides, demands explanation.
The Brigadier adopts a cunning disguise in order to quell a prison riot. (Another one. They rioted again after Jo defeated them).
Roger Delgado being utterly wonderful in every way.
Jon Pertwee, likewise.
The Doctor and assorted bits of UNIT, apparently quite sure that they'll be safe hovering six feet above a self-destructing nuclear missile with a chemical warhead. This is the sort of blind optimism that made Britain great, you know. ;)
Well gosh, is the Master escaping again? I never would have foreseen that.
Time for a cup of tea before the end credits.
I love "The Mind Of Evil". I love that the evil monster of the week is essentially a high concept table; I love how brilliantly dashing and entertainingly wicked the Master is; I love Jon Pertwee's shirts... It's all good, basically. Oh, one last screencap, just for general culty fun:
Barnham, the criminal mastermind who had his evilness sucked out at the beginning by the machine. He's played by Neil McCarthy, who is not as famous as he should be for also playing this fellow here:
This is Calibos from Clash Of The Titans (the proper version, from 1981). I say not as famous as he should be, because he did get just ever so slightly upstaged by the make-up. That is him under there somewhere, though. You can just about see him, if you squint.
A point of no great importance I suppose, but then that's the sort of information in which I specialise. Call it a compulsion. Or stupidity. That would also probably cover it.
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Now to ask my fellow Queen/Doctor Who fan to reccomend the best Doctors so I can go down HMV!!
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How do you feel about black and white TV? I ask because the best place to start really would be the Beginnings set, which is the three first ever adventures. These are "An Unearthly Child", which introduces the Doctor and the TARDIS; "The Daleks", which introduces the Cybermen (sorry, couldn't resist); and "Inside The Spaceship", which is mental. They had to do a low budget story after blowing all their money on the Dalek adventure, basically. Sixties Who is often experimental. They were learning how to do things, and doing stuff that had never been done before on television. It's well worth watching, but I guess not if you find black and white stuff a chore. I know some people do.
The Beginnings box set is around twelve half hour episodes, and is currently going for £5 used on Amazon, so it might be a good experiment!
Another good place to start would be the Pertwee years. That's when the show went into colour, and was sort of a reboot in a way. His first adventure, "Spearhead From Space", is a good example of seventies Who. One of the most popular Pertwee adventures, "The Daemons", has just been released. It features the Master, and a lot of boys' own gallivanting about the place wearing dodgy seventies clothing. I posted a review of it on here somewhere, but goodness knows where.
Anyway, if black and white doesn't put you off, you can't go wrong with William Hartnell. He's excellent. Sadly not much of Patrick Troughton's tenure survives. Jon Pertwee is always fun, but do be aware that there will be giant cardboard monsters to contend with. Again, that bothers some people. Tom Baker is fondly remembered by everybody who isn't me. I'm not very good at recommending his stories accordingly. Peter Davison is awesome, but hampered by no budget and a borderline insane producer. His final story, "Caves Of Androzani", is terrific though, and most people also like "Kinda" and especially "Earthshock". Poor Colin Baker barely got a chance, as the BBC was trying to kill off the show the whole time he was on; and then Sylvester McCoy suffered from much the same. Then there's Paul McGann, who made a film in 1996. It was terrible, he was brilliant. I really couldn't recommend it to anybody, though...
I don't think I'm being much help. :D
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Thanks, I will start with The Beginnings. Sounds sensible!