Doctor Who - The Five Doctors (DVD)

...BBC's twentieth anniversary special for Doctor Who was the second in a line of occasional stories to feature multiple incarnations of the titular character as played by (for the most part) the original actors, and is certainly the most crowded. Taking place by chance in Peter Davison's tenure as the well-mannered, cricket jersey clad Fifth Doctor, writer Terrence Dicks attempts to craft a meaningful plot to intelligently contrive a reason for five ...
...many of the more forgettable Doctor Who stories, doesn't take itself too seriously, despite Dicks' revelations regarding the history of Gallifrey, the home planet of the Doctor and his race of Time Lords. There are also a couple of unavoidable casting issues that the story has to contend with, most glaringly the absence of the Fourth Doctor from the action due to actor Tom Baker declining to return so soon after leaving the show, and the necessary ... more

The BBC's twentieth anniversary special for Doctor Who was the second in a line of occasional stories to feature multiple incarnations of the titular character as played by (for the most part) the original actors, and is certainly the most crowded. Taking place by chance in Peter Davison's tenure as the well-mannered, cricket jersey clad Fifth Doctor, writer Terrence Dicks attempts to craft a meaningful plot to intelligently contrive a reason for five Doctors, five of their companions and a whole host of famous enemies to appear together on-screen as the BBC had decreed. Understandably, and perhaps inevitably, the result is less than cosmic.

'The Five Doctors' is fundamentally a guilt-free celebration of the programme's illustrious history, which had aired uninterrupted at this point, and an opportunity for self-indulgence. Unlikely crossovers such as this are usually relegated to the realms of speculative fan fiction, so when a long-running franchise takes such a masturbatory leap, the highly anticipated result ('Alien vs. Predator,' Kirk and Picard in 'Star Trek Generations') is bound to be a let-down. To its credit, this episode, like many of the more forgettable Doctor Who stories, doesn't take itself too seriously, despite Dicks' revelations regarding the history of Gallifrey, the home planet of the Doctor and his race of Time Lords. There are also a couple of unavoidable casting issues that the story has to contend with, most glaringly the absence of the Fourth Doctor from the action due to actor Tom Baker declining to return so soon after leaving the show, and the necessary replacement of the late William Hartnell by another actor portraying his First Doctor, namely Richard Hurndall. Many of the Doctor's companions from all incarnations are brought back just for the sake of it, with others (especially those unique to the Tom Baker years) being absent. This leaves Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee as the only bona fide original Doctors to play alongside Davison.

As a fan of the Baker era primarily, most episodes I've seen being from that period, I was understandably disappointed with the lack of the Fourth Doctor or his companions in this story, leaving me without a clear point of reference. This Doctor and his companion Romana do appear very briefly in an early scene, rowing down a river and having a natter in a sequence from the un-broadcast 1979 episode 'Shada,' but the weakest of explanations is provided for their absence from the main plot; the reason seems to be something along the lines of the time scoop malfunctioning for some reason, causing the shadowy figure responsible to slam his fist on the equipment in frustration, and for the Fourth Doctor's limbo state to be squeezed desperately into a few lines of dialogue concerning the danger it poses for Doctor number five. Or something like that. More amusing is the promotional photo-shoot that saw this episode's Four Doctors (Hurndall, Troughton, Pertwee and Davison) posing around the wax dummy of the Fourth Doctor borrowed from Tussaud's Doctor Who exhibit.

The premise of 'The Five Doctors' is that someone or something has scooped (or attempted to scoop) each of the Doctor's incarnations from different points in space and time, as well as a select few of their companions. They have all been deposited in different parts of a grim region that they all soon realise is the infamous Death Zone on Gallifrey, their only hope of returning home or getting to the bottom of all this being a treacherous journey to the fabled Tomb of Rassilon. Each of the Doctors, and those they travel with, are initially dumped in random parts of the wasteland, meeting up at different times and opting to take different routes to the imposing tower, each littered with their old enemies. The presence of bumbling Cybermen, a token Dalek and even a Yeti for the hardcore fans all seem quite arbitrary to the larger plot, and are clearly just a chance to pay homage. More interesting is Anthony Ainley as the Master, a pantomime-like villain whom the Third Doctor even describes as 'my best enemy,' but who is at least integral to the mission, and whose mischievous nature keeps the viewer guessing throughout. The Time Lords also feature prominently as expected, allowing for further exploration of their government and society.

The main reason this episode fails is due to the weak and almost childish plot, full of illogical holes once the final twists are over and done with, and amounting to little more than a dungeon adventure with repetitive and incompetent adversaries. The Doctors themselves hold their own, each seeming true to their era of the series from Hurndall's imitation of Hartnell's kindly old man to Pertwee's action hero and Davison's thoughtful pacifist, but none of the companions does anything other than act moronic and gullible, even those with more experience like Sarah Jane Smith. The First Doctor's granddaughter Susan is the worst offender, inexplicably showing up nineteen years on from her last appearance and then spraining her ankle so she has to remain behind in the TARDIS for the duration. There are a few scenes that work well, particularly Pertwee and Sarah's confrontation with a new enemy in the form of the sinister lightning-quick Raston Warrior Robot (which may look stupid, but felt like a serious threat), and the antagonistic dialogue between Pertwee and Troughton's Doctors, who presumably crossed swords in the earlier 'The Three Doctors' but don't get enough scenes here to amount to anything more than an amusing couple of insults. The rest of the banter between Doctors is truly awful and even cringe-worthy in places, the relentless gags and puns along the lines of 'be you later' (they don't actually use this one, but they're all just as bad) making for a very weak reunion scene. There's even a use of the 'Doctor'/'Who?' joke.

There's a conflict of interests here, between this story standing alone as a tribute episode and being part of the 1983 season, as the new viewer is dropped into the Fifth Doctor's situation with no idea who his companions are, or even, as was the case when I watched it, whether the bloke sitting on the grass getting high on ions was just a random native of whichever Earth-like planet the TARDIS had landed on this time, or a regular character. Much of this story takes place outdoors, and thankfully the quality of the camerawork has improved since the Tom Baker era to the point that location shooting isn't noticeably worse than the results achieved in a studio (think of the drop in picture quality whenever Basil Fawlty went outside his hotel). Unfortunately, the alien vistas aren't particularly convincing as anything other than rural England, the Death Zone itself being a fairly amicable set of country lanes that even serve Jon Pertwee's vintage car before it's struck dead with one of the ominous lightning bolts that prove so threatening for several minutes before never being seen again. Of course, there's the ever-present danger of falling off a reasonably steep grassy bank. In terms of the notorious special effects, there's very little use of such visuals apart from the floating funnel that scoops up the Doctors, which looks quite good (I believe it's a more recent re-mastering rather than the original effect however), and a few ray gun blasts that are so small on-screen as to be acceptable.

The first Doctor Who episode to be released on DVD, 'The Five Doctors' is a fairly effective celebration of the series that does about as much as can be expected within the defined guidelines. If Tom Baker's Doctor and his companion (probably his one-time-wife Romana) had been present, the plot would be even more stretched and farcical than it is already, and it wouldn't have made for a suitable exit for the character. Long-time fans will benefit a little more from the subtle references and in-jokes that it's obvious are being made between the lines even though I don't fully understand them, and as an opportunity to get the different Doctors on screen at the same time, however pointless and wasted it may be, it was a nice idea. Not being familiar with the early William Hartnell episodes I can't say whether Richard Hurndall does a fair impersonation, but the teaser of the original actor's memorable closing monologue from 'The Dalek Invasion of Earth' is a thoughtful tribute in itself, and a great way to launch into the opening credits. After the series was cancelled in 1989, anniversary episodes and one-off specials tended to be parodies or otherwise comic interpretations of the series, which proved more entertaining. With the revised series now having completed its third year, and appearances already ticked off for Sarah Jane and her stupid robot dog, it remains to be seen whether the surviving actors will feature in a contrived 'The Fourth to Tenth Doctors' reunion story, with Tom Baker's place being taken by that bloke who does his voice in whatever that impressions show is, because Tom can't be bothered to attend.

I certainly hope not. 

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