Splitting the Party up for No Reason

[00:33]

Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to 500 year diary.

The only Doctor Who podcast that always tries to cover all possibilities to the best of our abilities.

I'm Nathan.

I'm Peter.

I'm Simon, and I'm Todd.

It's the 11th of April 1964.

It's been just over 2 months since the broadcast of Terry Nation's most recent Doctor Who script, and tonight, the 9900000 people who've tuned in will get to see him having another go.

And quite unexpectedly.

Perhaps, it's with a rollicking quest narrative that takes us through a number of exotic and cheaply realised locales before turning into an exciting detective story, set in space New York and featuring a young Fiona Walker.

Is it everything we could have wanted and more?

Let's find out as we discuss?

The keys of mariners.

Now, confession time, who called it the keys of Marinus when you were reading the novelisation when you were 12.

[01:39]

Of course I did.

Yes, I did.

Indeed.

It's on our marine world.

Of course, it's a marine world.

A sea of acid.

I never read the novelisation.

And I came at this one quite late, and I have a confession to make as well, which is I like this much more than the Daleks.

Yes, you're wrong.

Look, I'm prepared to suggest that there are ways in which it's inferior to the Daleks, but I always kind of thought that the big advantage here is that essentially we have a framing story and then 4 stories in the middle.

And so we never get time to get bored.

There's no the ordeal here.

That is true.

But I think some of the characters do undergo great ordeal.

They do.

Barbara and Susan, poor Altos and his legs.

I think whilst that's strength and certainly the strength that I experienced when loving and rereading many times the novelisation, when I did come to watch it, I did discover that in the context of a 1960s, Doctor Who story where there's limited budget and limited sets and the rest of it, you can't do very much with each of those little mini stories.

[02:51]

And so nothing in those little episodes develops properly and the whole thing ends up with a bit of a Scooby-Doo flavour for me me Not a bad thing.

I'm with Nathan on this I've always appreciated the keys to mariners.

I like its light touch.

I like its sense of kind of daring do.

I think it pleased terri nation strengths because what he wants to do is get in, tell a little story and get out and that's what he does with each episode.

He's the master of the set piece.

And so each episode is basically built around one good set piece.

And I think that of the 3 quest style stories that Terry does for the series, this obviously, and then the Chase and then the 1st half of the Dalek master plan, where you're hopping from location to location, I think this is the most successfully realised of them because not only are you just moving from random planet to random planet, but you're moving from continent to continent or country to country on one planet.

And so you're actually seeing something that you rarely get in Doctor Who, which is different facets of the same culture.

[03:51]

Yes, it's refreshing to have a world which does not have one culture and one climate.

So when I initially watched this, I was bitterly disappointed, because it could not be realised in the way that the book could be done, but I absolutely adore it now, even with those limitations.

And putting an 80s child lens onto things, you would have seen movies and stuff that were very action adventure going to places to place.

And so I thought, oh, this is just a series of tropes.

Like, I've commented about that before, but this is the 1st time Doctor Who's really doing that within a story.

So again, Terry's setting the scene for things to come and I don't think it would have been done very much on television, at least in Britain.

So I actually think it's really inventive.

And again, his strength is the fact that, as you mentioned, he's got these set pieces.

Every individual episode has got the challenges to overcome to get to the cliffhanger.

But did he actually sit down and go, okay, now, on my map of this world, I'm going to have this pyramid with this sea of acid and glass.

[04:52]

And then over here, I've got this city that's taken over by these brains that nobody's going to visit, but they're just going to be their own little thing.

And then we've got this jungle that's going to attack you up to the north, and then we've got, like, you know, the ice age, like with furs up here.

They've never really developed, except they've got the people frozen and the tap into the... basically the opening sequence of Game of Thrones.

You're right.

But like, did you sit down and do this whole big map?

We've then got this other city that's so advanced, you know, with phones and whatever, you know, where...

You know what I'm saying?

phones, yes.

But their phones and they don't have an angle in them.

But did he sit down and do that?

No, he didn't.

He wrote episode to episode to episode.

And within the episode, the logic makes sense.

But then when you build it all up, it sort of like does it all gel together as a realistic world that we see in Doctor Who moving forward properly, not.

That's exactly it.

I think we're kind of overstating it by saying different facets of the same culture.

I did not use the word culture.

[05:54]

You get the sense that it's a world.

Like, you know, I mean, remember the world in 1964 is very vastly different.

Well, now in terms of there's no satellite communication.

You know, there are parts of the world still where the indigenous population has not met Europeans yet.

Um, it's not unreasonable to think that the, different economies of the different nations that make up mariners, especially after this debacle where the, the conscience machine obviously had to be dismantled.

It meant that they've all fractured and so they're all, you know, cities.

And they're all fitting for themselves.

No, I think it's fine.

I mean, I don't think that we're even thinking about it.

No, I don't think we're...

No, I've never thought about that either.

And I'm never going to think about it then.

Well, you seem to have a job as a Doctor Who fan is to think about everything.

We seem to have the city of millennia, which has police and guards and prisons and the death penalty and Michigan stuff. coexists on the planet where there's the conscience machine that makes everyone behave themselves.

And giant brains that mesmerise everyone.

I mean, all of it is just absolutely delightfully fun and funny and just terrifically enjoyable.

[06:59]

I wish we had had mentions of how they relate to each other.

Like, you know, maybe, for example, the Morpheton City was in a state of cold war against the city of millennia.

I wish we had had a little idea of how they fitted into it.

But it's not what he's interested in.

No, it's not what they've got time for.

I mean, yeah.

Well, I mean, I mean, he's only barely interested in the relationship between the files and the daleks given, you know.

Well, but we've got to spend time, you know, having that guy die of being next to a drain. and like and like an octopus and all of that sort of thing.

Like, that's what he's interested in.

He's interested in the action he's interested in what the daleks look like.

He's interested in the aesthetics of the files, all of that sort of thing.

All those great things.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, those are all great things.

That's right.

And so here, like we are really leaning into just action and adventure.

Yeah, yeah, just really, but very simple kind of ideas.

The people who write about time suggests that in fact, what's happened is that because the Daleks were successful at realising what Terry had put on the page, he began to overestimate what it was likely to be successful at realising.

[08:15]

And so, I mean, the reason that there is some kind of unity from place to place to place here is mostly we're just reusing design elements.

Well, we reusing a lot of black drapes.

But to be fair, oh, look, because in Marco Polo, they get around that by Barry Newby apparently has like a simple set for the 1st town that they visit.

And then basically his idea was that it's the same set, but they keep making it more elaborate, as they get closer to Peking.

Here, you're talking about completely separate things.

And Ray Kusik says on the short interview on the DVD that basically it was totally unrealistic and unreasonable to be asked to do that and he actually uses the words.

He says he was embarrassed by some of the results.

And there are a lot.

There's a lot of use of black drapes, which is fine.

Having this format means that they can't do the thing which they got so right on the Daleks, which is build a cohesive design world for each of the situations that they're in.

So it sort of irreverts to generic a little bit, which I'm fine with.

[09:17]

But yeah, I understand what he's saying.

But it kind of works in the idea of a cereal, like you are going from place to place.

Each episode set in a different place, basically.

I can absolutely understand that if I was 8 years old in 1964 watching it go out, I would have loved every moment of it.

And it's always hard to view these stories from a, you know, even in the 80s, late 80s when you're seeing them for the 1st time.

But you're having to build a new set every single week.

Yeah, and reuse sets, really, and redress them, you know, whether it be like that corridor with the statute, like that swings around for Barbara and then the other side of that.

Oh my goodness, that sequence with her with the statue with that heart with the hands.

I don't know.

I just sit there every time like when I 1st watched it going, I remember watching a black and white movie which was set in Africa, I think, and it was like Abbott and Lucostello or Tarzan or something and they went to this strange city where if you came out of it, everybody sort of aged death, but they had those sort of statues, you know?

And that was better realised than those hands or the warriors that are just standing there like apparently frozen.

[10:19]

Like, you know, we're not going to put them in anything. just going to be standing there like, oh, the warrior guy like that goes to chop Ian and Barbara again in the screaming jungle. like things that just don't quite work.

I think that Mark Gatis says that his 1st memory of Doctor Who is those frozen nights from the snows of Tesson.

Oh, Peter Davidson, is it?

Yeah, because that's super memorable, isn't it?

Like that's and that's what he's doing here.

Like, it's something that we've thought about and said a lot of times before, that at this point, the individual stories are really a production thing rather than an actual thing because we have individual titles for the episodes.

The story titles don't go out, they're not part of the program.

Stories run into each other on cliffhangers.

Yeah, that's right.

There are cliffhangers in between stories, aren't there?

And so here, we're just doing something slightly different.

It's a series of one episode stories, in a way.

But he's also, like within the 20 episode stories, he has to give us deadly danger.

[11:22]

Like, suddenly you've got a C, but it's of asset, right?

that can kill you.

You've then got like the force field around the TARDIS, which is...

He doesn't do a very good Marcel Marcel impersonation.

Susan just walks in front of them.

If only it had been a Delta and the Bannerman stole one, which had been exploded.

Well, that would have been, well, it could have been so much better.

But, you know, then they go back to Arbitan.

It's like, oh, yes, you can go and get my keys.

Like, nobody thinks to sort of like, you know, punch him out and like we're just going to rack off and forget about your keys and get the force field down.

But, you know, like the tropes, like the morphedon city, like, you know, that whole thing of everything's not what it is.

Like, and I think that's really well done with all the scientific equipment and when it's the handheld stuff when it's like, you know, when it's not good and when it's good, like the cutting between that, I think that's all clever with...

And that's remarkable for the time.

And the point of view stuff where they're talking to camera.

Well they have to do that in order for the scene to be able to keep being recorded, I think.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[12:26]

Within episodes, there are different things and different.

I'm going to say tropes, but different science fiction ideas that he's pulling in.

Like, you know, with the jungle that's screaming and moving and that sort of thing. within all these individual episodes to keep the tension up to keep the thing moving, even if it's not the best realised in certain episodes.

Some are stronger than others.

And it's so lazy to consider a format like this. like within Doctor Who's wider format, to consider an idea of doing this.

It's such lazy criticism to say, oh, it's just lightweight and ephemeral, and, you know, why weren't they doing something else?

You take this and you put it on the big screen 15 years later, and it's Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Yeah, globetrotting with set pieces and fun and tricks and traps and that kind of thing.

Obviously, it's being done in studio D at Lime Grove and they've got limited resources, but that's exactly what they're aiming for.

And I would argue they pull it off pretty well.

I mean, you mentioned Tarzan, Todd.

And, you know, like, I think that Tarzan and Dan Dare and all of those things are what Terry is going from.

We talked about him.

It's the cinema, it's comic books, you know, those are the things that he's inspired by.

[13:31]

It's literature, it's Edgar Rice Burrows, all of that sort of stuff.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, no, it's very boy's own adventure, 100%.

Peter, back to what you're saying, like, as I was saying earlier, and in the last episode, like us taking our senior experience, like Raiders of the Lost Ark, we think we've seen it all before, but this is really the 1st time Doctor Who's doing this and television's doing this.

And I think it does now in hindsight, pull it off quite successfully.

And I prefer it to the Daleks, as, I mean, because of the movement and the pace and I just get into it.

And also the supporting characters, like Sabitha, in particular, and Altos, right?

But Sabita, when she comes in and grows, we don't necessarily see that in the Daleks.

Altos has a very regrettable surname.

Altos.

Altos. and a regrettable costume.

No, it's great.

Oh, it's great, but it's never so much.

It doesn't seem to regret it.

Even when he's in the city, like it's like I'm just going to stay in my little skirt, I'm fine.

My mother was moved on from Bondi Beach for wearing more than that.

[14:34]

Back in the day.

Look, wasn't the sea of acid?

Look, I don't disagree with the fundamentals of what you're saying.

And yes, it is absolutely what Raiders like ends up doing.

I think that's one of the reasons why I was so captivated by the novelisation because from a story point of view, yes, this is exactly what you want to talk to.

But what I find is the result is that I'm not interested in what's happening in each of those episodes enough because I'm not feeling an overarching pull of the narrative.

I know the overarching pull is that they're collecting the various keys.

And, you know, reading it post having seen key to time, you kind of get that all condensed into one story.

But I'm just finding each of those episodes, until really you get to millennia's just not very interesting, particularly specifically the snows of terror and the screaming jungle, whatever the 2nd episode.

Velvet Web.

The velvet web.

I think the velvet web and the city millennia are the best sequences.

It's those other 2 which I think let it down.

How interesting because the 2 middle episodes are my favourites.

I really like the snows of terror.

Because I really like the 1st 2 and the last 2 and I find the screaming jungle probably the one I don't like the most.

[15:38]

Shout out for having 2 episodes that end with of death in the title.

Two episode titles that end with Of Death, Sendence of Death, just tremendous.

If only they were next to each other.

I like the Snows episode.

Barbara is really quite menaced by that guy and like his...

Oh, very rapey.

Yeah, yeah.

But is it the best realised thing with the drawbridge and the guards and all that?

Perhaps not for me, but I still really enjoy it.

I'm not thrown off by the fact that the thing's being made in 964 with a limited budget and they're doing the best they can.

That's not what's throwing me off.

It's the way the story unfolds, which is, I just find it a bit tedious.

But I have other observations as well.

I have to say that I like this chasm better than the chasm in episode 6 of the time.

Absolutely not.

The ordeal, the ordeal, chasm.

Wasn't one of the guards just jump straight into it for this one?

Yes, yeah, it's a better chasm than the one that Eldron falls into.

[16:38]

Yes, that's unfortunate.

I was very impressed that they built that rope. bridge. thought that was awesome.

I mean, let's look back a little bit of why this came into existence because we mentioned on the Daleks that obviously they looked ahead to the series. realise what it was going to look like.

That's right. should look more like this.

So they got Terry to not write the red fort anymore.

They ditched the boring stuff, like Master Deluxe or the robots, the hidden planets, beyond the sun, all of those kinds of ideas.

They should have ditched plenty of giants, but somehow that turned up later.

Well no, there was multiple attempts at that.

And then they said to Terry, no, give us more science fiction action adventure.

They realised that that's what the series should be.

So he had successfully reformatted the series in his own image.

He then wrote it quickly but not very quickly.

It wasn't like a last minute thing, and he had to give up writing an episode of Out of the Unknown, which was kind of like the BBC's answer to the outer limits.

[17:40]

He had to get out of his contract on that to have the time to write the keys mariners for them in short order.

So I think what he's done is approach, he's seen what Christopher Barry's done on the Daleks, he's gone, okay, they can put on the screen something that is approaching what I want.

And so he's like, okay, now I'm going to raise the stakes a little bit.

Let's do that every week.

And so he's set them, this design challenge by moving from location to location.

I think that is his job early on in dog two.

It's to push the limit.

I don't think he's just trying to do it to push the designs department's limits.

I think they just think that, you know, they have to assemble and disassemble sets every week anyway.

It's not like they're standing in a studio and they can, you know, film bits of episodes 13 and 5 or on the same night.

We know that.

He does write it promptly.

He writes it in 4 weeks.

So he has 4 weeks after being commissioned.

David Whittaker goes to his home.

They have the little script conferences.

And basically, Terry's come up with the idea of it.

And David Whittaker contributes the middle episode.

Not the writing of them, but the idea is, why don't we do this?

[18:43]

Why don't we do that?

Why don't we do that?

And many of the ideas are from the are inspired by the original pitch document for Doctor Who, that original briefing document that they're sending writers.

So you've got the idea of, you know, that thing where everything's backwards.

So you're guilty until proven innocent.

The idea of the vegetation becoming human and coming to life and being the dominant species.

That's taken from these people.

Terry really does love himself in sentient vegetation.

Yes, he loves the sentient vegetation.

The idea of the city of Morpherton is also a kind of thing that's expressed, it's that, it's basically utilising those ideas that they know they're never going to do a whole story on. enough of an idea there to cover a single episode.

I just love the fact that you've said it as a design challenge.

I can just see a reality show.

Terry Nation's design channel.

I mean, because the whole show is set up to use the same sets over 7 weeks for budgetary reasons, and the reason that we have long stories is a one episode story costs a lot of money, and in fact, we only really land on that in the 21st century is a way of making Doctor Who.

[19:47]

Well, to be fair, though, they always wanted it to be a serial.

They always wanted the cliffhanger thing.

The cliffhanger thing was very important.

So that's why you have multiple episodes.

And 4 was originally what they wanted and then they realised they needed to stretch the speed. because it was too expensive for the sense.

And yet they do a story where there's a different set every week.

Yeah, yeah.

I don't think that Todd's terrination design challenge would have got to a season 2 considering they were gone, great, for Daleks.

Let's see what you can do with the Vord.

If I may observe, though, I think that where the Daleks sets up the series in terms of what the series can be when it's doing its best, I have to say that the other reason I'm not a huge fan of Keys of America, although I did like it more this time than the last time I watched it, which was some years ago.

Um, it sort of pleasantly surprised me.

I thought, oh, this is not as bad as I thought.

But I actually think that there is a lot of evidence and keys of marinace as to when the show is not at its best.

And I think that is a lot of the dialogue, especially in those sequences.

I think you touched on earlier, Todd with Arbitan.

[20:49]

It's basically exposition central.

It is just line of exposition, line of expert, Arbiton explaining the conscience machine.

And it's for something which is an area which you generally associate with being quite stretched and slowed because of, you know, production reasons.

It all kind of happens in a hurry.

They all agree that they're going to go around marinous and collect the remaining keys.

It's all sort of really rushed and really hammy, like, because of the dialogue, and this is in other episodes as well, because a lot of the dialogue is expository.

The actors don't know yet how you deliver those sorts of lines convincingly.

And I actually think, I mean, I know that the Thal's performances are somewhat stylised, but in the other stories we've had to date, the performances are all genuinely very good.

And I would argue that he's a Marin, this is the 1st time that I see some pretty dodgy performances, pretty hammy performances for the 1st time.

Now we can enjoy some of them, but it really is a step down in quality.

Because I actually think the stuff in millennia, which is more like modern television than anything that we've seen so far in either the Daleks or the rest of Keys of Mariners, where you just have sort of a procedural, you know, like a courtroom drama and stuff.

[21:56]

Agatha Christie, really quite a good one.

It's really quite good and people talk normally and there's slightly naturalistic performances.

Yes, and then there are some slightly non-naturalistic forks.

Even though I love Donald Pickering and Fiona Walker to my dying, died days.

They are during the scenery somewhat.

They're tremendous though.

Do you know, I think what you were saying there, Simon, about the fact that there's not a whole lot of dialogue outside of the exposition.

I think that's by order to what's happening because Terry knows he needs to get into a world and out of the world in an episode.

And so he's just, he's just, to coin a phrase, cutting to the chase.

I know, but that is always when the series is not doing its quest. the kind of thing they're avoiding in the darkness.

They may have changed the shape of the series in terms of making it more adventury and a bit more spacy, but they're then kind of starting to do in case of Marin is exactly what Sidney Newman didn't want them to do, which was bug eyed monsters in the form of the brain.

They are actually bug ideas.

And he specifically says no brains in jars.

And we have brains.

[22:57]

But...

Do you think David and Terry had a little laugh about that in his pattern?

No, remember, Sydney, Arthodoxy, he just says to verify, you know, whatever you want.

You know what you're doing.

You obviously know what you're doing.

But the point is that there is a line for me between good Doctor Who and or successful Doctor Who and less successful Doctor Who.

And Keys and Mariners falls on the wrong side of that line because of these kinds of things.

And they are traps that you can fall into.

Maybe when they're doing something in a hurry or not focus in, they're just trying to get it out the door and they're trying to do this.

You need.

I need something more and it's a shame.

I totally hear where you're coming from.

I understand where you're coming from too, right?

But the fact is we've got 5 different settings or whatever in 6 weeks.

So, you know, he's having to give us a lot of exposition, like the exposition death of that old guy, like DE 302 is he's dying and like 5 minutes earlier, he's perfectly well.

That's the robot Doctor Who you're talking about.

Can't you tell, can't you see the close resemblance to it?

Also that strange figure walking down the laneway in Revolutionary France?

[23:58]

different people, I think.

But also in that episode, like that wonderful, like Barbara's screaming and she's in the net and then the stakes are coming down.

That is so ridiculous.

That's so bad.

But that's it's so bad.

I mean that's what I'm talking about.

Basically, we're going to that whole.

This is why I mentioned the Scooby-Doo thing before.

It's also twee and comic book.

It all becomes a comic book type thing.

Susan is much more hysterical.

Absolutely.

And that's the other observation I was going to make.

Susan.

And I think this is probably one of the reasons she leaves is because by now, even in Marco Polo, she seems to be a sensible person.

I think even in the Daleks, she's a sensible person.

She has, obviously she's frightened at this in front of that, that's correct, but they basically turn her into pathetic in this story.

Well, yes, I will agree with that because I mentioned in the Daleks that she's very proactive in those middle episodes and actually gets things done despite being very frightened.

Whereas here she just breaks down over the screaming jungle within like 30 seconds.

Yeah, I'll give you another example of the dialogue thing I'm talking about.

So the snows of terror episode where you've got Vassor, who, so when the earlier sequence is in the hut where it's just Barbara in him and he's warming her hands in this kind of slightly rapey way.

[25:05]

And the dialogue bit, he's obviously a reasonable actor.

He's doing those sequences really well.

He was Jedakiah and the tomorrow people.

There you go.

Not a series known for its quality actors.

That all for me, again, because it's realistic.

It's a setting, it's dialogue that the actors would be used to delivering that kind of, like a lot of the courtroom stuff.

It's kind of, yeah, I know how to say these kind of like.

Compare that performance with the performance he gives in the 2nd half of the episode where he's basically being forced into the ice tunnels and so on like that, and he's delivering all these terrible words about the demons, whatever they are in the...

And basically, it's chalk and cheese.

Like, it's like they haven't been able to get better performances during that week of rehearsal in terms of, no, no, no, try it like this, try it like that.

Other actors can do that sort of thing later more successfully.

I think that's just generally bad because suddenly a science teacher turns up and this person who is feared by men all over.

That's right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It suddenly just falls to pieces.

Yes, yes, yes.

Because he really liked Barbara and she didn't like him back, emotionally broken.

[26:09]

But further on performances too, I would actually argue that all of the regulars, not just Caroline, but all the regulars with the possible exception of Jacqueline Hill, are not giving brilliant performances here.

I think this is one of William Russell's weakest stories from a performance point of view.

And I certainly want to Caroline Ford's weakest.

Ian's character is like simplified too much in this and he's he's tried to be made too much of a matcho action hero and I don't find him very subtle compared to other performance.

Part of that is because he's moved into the central role for 2.5 episodes and so he's the hero.

And so Terry is writing him as the hero.

Yeah, but whether it's the dialogue, whether it's him, I don't know. not good for him.

His best line is at the very end of the story when he taps Barbara on the shoulder and says, come on, Barbara.

I mean, that's great.

That is a beautiful light.

And there it's like, yes, where's that gone for so many of the other sequences?

I love that he's wearing his Marco Polo.

I love that.

It looks amazing.

But also, I think this is the 1st instance of a companion being taken over.

And so you get William Russell giving his, I'm undermined control.

[27:12]

Oh, I didn't mind that, too, which is really great.

And also, I agree on Carol Anne Ford, but not on William Hartnell.

I think William Hartnell is the very best moment so far come in the city of millennius.

Okay, but in the earlier part of the episode, he's got so many fluffs in that 1st episode.

More than it's like, wow.

Yeah, there are a couple of things in the Daleks, but it was like, whoa, this is the, and for my memory of lines in Marco Polo, There aren't very many flies.

This is when he started there.

Obviously, it's a stretch. to, we're getting towards 26 weeks into the run.

Yeah, and I think we also have to separate the performance that's being given from mistakes on the night.

My favourite one is the one about, you know, how the sea wouldn't be frozen at this temperature besides it's too warm.

I just think that's tremendous.

And also in that opening Tartar scene when he says, okay, let's go outside.

There's clearly been a chunk of dialogue missed because William Russell stands there, obviously thinking, what am I going to do now?

And then says, but doctor, wait a moment.

[28:12]

I'm sure that I saw movement on that screen.

William Hartle written all over his face is like, oh god, that's the piece of dialogue that I've missed.

And he just goes, mm, yes, quite.

Well, yes, let's go outside and sit.

There are a couple of moments where William Russell and Jacqueline Hill are behind.

And you can just see them kind of subtly glance at each other with the dollar.

But that doesn't mean that that Hartnell's bad.

He's still in character.

I will agree.

Like, I mean, I brought up Carol Anne Ford's performance.

But the rest of them I think are all great.

Yes, I think it's amongst their best.

Is this the first time a regular goes on holiday?

Yes.

Okay.

Although Hartnell was sick in an episode or two of Marco Polo, so he's sulking in the tents, sulking in the car.

I might argue that Caroline Ford's quite quizzing at times.

It is that thing.

[29:13]

It's the same thing that you get at the end of Dalek Master Plan where he's back and you think, oh, wow, you're back and you're really great.

Like when he turns up in millennia and just says, I'm going to take control here.

He's totally critulized by his 2 weeks.

Absolutely. 110% enthusiasm, especially that scene where he's playing out how Ian got hit over their head in the roof.

He's obviously relishing that seat.

Whereas, whereas I actually don't miss him for the episodes where he's gone and I don't miss like, um, I don't miss Carol Anne.

She disappears for an episode, does she?

You know, like...

Not completely, but yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I, uh, like I think, I think all of that sort of stuff works.

And because Terry is the pastmaster at splitting the party up for no reason.

He's important.

All of that works tremendously. well.

I think this is sort of on the fun side of things and the, the, the side of things where I can laugh, if not at it, like near it.

[30:15]

And you should be laughing with it, not ass it.

Well, near it, I'm happy with.

And, you know, like I just think there are all sorts of really, really terrific things.

I think, you know, Donald Pickering is just tremendous.

Fiona Walker, my favourite moment, the one moment that had me roaring with laughter was she's crying and Altos and Sabitha and Barbara have been visiting her to sort of question her, and then she's crying, they leave, and then she just sort of turns and smiles with her evil lady pays for her smile. giggle.

And she's just so great.

The bit where they're constantly just blurting out things is hilarious.

Like, it's really just so fun and so enjoyable.

Also, her and Donald Pickering share the same performance traits.

So I'm thinking in the faceless ones when Donald Pickering's going to inject Victor Winding, whatever he plays, Spencer, and he's sort of doing the whole sort of Betty Davis, you know, with the syringe.

[31:16]

Of course, when Fiona Walker, as Cara comes to the door and Susan is held prisoner, she opens the door and looks at her and then brandishes her gun menacingly.

I love this I mean, he's tremendous in this, and there's that great scene where you actually realise that he must be the missing villain where he and the doctor say, oh, you know, under other circumstances, we could have been friends or something, and he kind of go, oh, yeah, it's okay.

And then, of course, he, for some reason, decided to don a suspicious black hood in order to go.

I wanted to go in, whereas he could have just drawn.

He could have just walked in.

Speaking of the Scooby-Doo aspects. of the script, even with the doctor walking up to him and whisking the mask off.

It's like, phew.

So good. all the time. all the time.

Yeah, so that summarises, I think.

But these are...

No, they're just wonderful things.

No, they're not.

They are examples of what Sidney Newman was not wanting.

And, you know, verity was not wanting them out.

[32:17]

You know, the Daleks, she's right.

Daleks are not bug-eyed monsters.

And everything has a motivation in that story.

Whereas here, we've reverted to a boy's own adventure, a comic book.

I felt like I was kind of watching a version of a choose your own adventure book.

I might...

Yeah, it is a bit like that, isn't it?

Yeah, but I just think that makes it shallow.

And for me, Doctor Who was always, I like Doctor Who rather than everything else because Doctor Who had greater depth grader kind of, there was more there.

But do we do that very often?

Does this choose your own adventure style thing?

Well, no, no.

I mean, I think we do a bit.

And I think probably saying that the Daleks, there's more there there.

There's not that much more there.

There's a lot more like that.

There's a lot more there.

Do you know what I mean?

Like we're walking through a swamp, we're being attacked by a drain.

No, but you're talking about the incidents.

You see, I'm talking about the world that has been built.

That's right.

They are the least parts.

They are the, where it's just much more to it, whereas, I mean, teas and marinace is basically, but that is basically that.

Exactly.

[33:17]

Keys of Marinus is just stuff that happens.

And I don't care about it.

Simon, you use the word shallow.

I would say I appreciate where you're coming from.

I don't think it's shallow.

I think it's efficient.

And I think that's why they went to Terry Nation because they said we want the, you know, this came from the...

No, they went to Terry Nation because they realised that his vision of the show was the one that they were going to go with.

But also this plays to his strengths.

He will get in there.

He will sketch a world briefly with characters and some good expositionary dialogue and then get out.

They went, no one is better than Terry Nation at this.

And can I just say that obviously the production team absolutely rated everything that he did.

It's not like he disappointed them in any way.

You know, in just a couple of months when they're preparing the season 2 document.

David Whittaker will be talking very seriously about making Terry Nation. the head writer.

Obviously, this didn't happen because Terry didn't particularly want to do it and he was busy with other things and they couldn't afford that.

And then Dennis Spooner comes.

That's right.

But they wanted they wanted what he could bring to the program.

They rated what he was delivering.

Yeah, of course.

[34:17]

And, you know, and and a time when they're desperate to get the scripts that they need because very few people get the show that they're making.

I can absolutely understand it.

I'm not saying the termination's about it all.

I'm just saying that in this instance of it, unlike what we see in the Daleks, which, as I sort of touched on in that episode, that there is a lot of redrafts, whether it's Donald Cotton, or Chris Barry, they were all saying, oh, this isn't quite working there, there's a lot more time there.

One of the things Keys of Marinus is lacking are a couple more drafts, I think.

I think that would have maybe tightened it up.

It would have probably relieved it of some of the perfunctory expository dialogue that I was kind of, which kind of just keeps coming at you.

I think it would have softened all that.

I just think it's a victim of it being churned out.

It's not churned out. it's just written.

I think there's a big problem with the framing story, actually.

And although I like the interiors of the building and I like the exploration of the island that the conscience is on, I don't think that the actual thing about the conscience makes any sense.

[35:17]

It's very morally dubious, but it's also all of that exposition doesn't go anywhere.

Do you know what I mean?

Like, basically it's a big thing and you need to stick the keys in it, and then it'll explode.

And then the doctor will say, actually, it was all a bad idea to begin with.

But it's not meant to explode, though.

No, no, no, but it kind of bears no relationship to anything else that's happening anywhere else in the story.

In the sense that in a more modern story, everything would be working towards one end or there would be some kind of thematic unity to the thing.

And I'm not objecting to the absence of that at all, because that's not what we're going for.

It's one of those things where, like, the basic idea of the conscience must have been super important, but then we write the story and it turns out it actually has no bearing on anything else at all and we could have lost it, but that was our animating basic idea.

Well, what's going to happen when they put the keys in and it actually did work?

It's going to stop people being evil, Lesley.

[36:18]

Yeah.

And is this too controllable?

Because, no, the vaard, the alien vaard wanted to use the machine for their own purpose.

Yes.

To control everyone.

But they found a way of resisting machines. they kind of resisting why they became, why they're able to commit crimes and that kind of thing.

That's right.

And so basically, that's right.

Arbiten has reconfigured the machine.

So even the board will be will succumb to...

How are the people pretty bad?

millennia or the morpho brain still exists, how are they going to feel if this sort of goes over the whole planet?

Do you know what I mean?

Like, there's no real logic behind it.

No.

Right?

When you start to think about it.

There's 2 things on that.

I'm going to push back a little bit on what you said, Nathan, about there not being really any overarching unity of theme because I think the city of millennia is that theme.

Millennius, obviously, when the conscience's influence was dissipated over marinace.

Everyone was left to fend for themselves.

And so what you got in the city of millennia was they had to create their own laws from scratch, which is why everything is in reverse.

Your guilty into your proven innocent.

The execution is handed down unless the defence can come forward with a very convincing argument why it shouldn't take place.

[37:23]

I think that is intentional.

I think he has extrapolated that from what the wider situation is.

Yes, and maybe morpheton too, that the brains are more for to know controlling people because that because they now can.

Yes, well, maybe because people were used to being controlled.

That's form of mind controller conscience.

So the morpho- brains, God.

The morphic brain just...

Yeah, but the thing is, then the snow to terror and the screaming jungle episodes are separate to everything else. there's no one there. the city of millennius knows the importance of the key.

They know that Arbiton has left it there and it's very important.

Even the city of Morpherton.

They don't know the importance of the key.

Sabitha just proclaims she wants it as her most desired thing and she gets it.

They don't seem to have any idea what the hell it is.

In fact, they say the morpho brains fail to recognise its significance.

Yeah, I mean, they sent these keys out so that they would be distributed around the planet, right?

Then in the snows of terror episode, like it's trapped within a block of ice. block of ice.

But you can conveniently turn a tap.

Yes, that's not that difficult.

But you need to get it out of there because that's where I put my keys when I get home.

[38:25]

But, you know, there's a get out of jail free card.

Like, we're going to be able to get it out of there, but why is it in the 1st place who actually put it there and then constructed that to make sure that we could get to it in episode 5 and all 4 or whatever and release it?

you know?

So I think this is what we're sort of coming to is the fact that, you know, I've often said that a Love Doctor 2 story is written in a hurry, like Talons of Wayne Chihang, Arken Space, and so on, are some of the best the shows ever produced.

Seats of Doom.

Seats of Doom.

Then there are other instances where the rushed ones aren't so good.

And this isn't rushed, per se, but I do think not enough thought has gone into everything that you're just saying.

Like, why, especially because Terry was wanting the vaud to be the next Daleks, he wanted them to be a kind of a monster, even though they're not really monsters, they're just men in suits with strange helmets.

Yeah, and they get referred to as men.

Exactly, yes, yes.

Guy, I don't know why Yartek doesn't take his helmet off to when he's disguising himself as Arbiton.

And why they fall for that?

And why are they...

Because he's some strange radiational disease?

Oh, that's British.

Oh, Sabiza, they're going, you don't sound anything like my father.

[39:26]

Maybe the city of Morford and she thought, no, but I can imagine.

I mean, he turns into the chase.

But why aren't the Vaud pursuing them to each of the cases?

They arrive.

They kill Arbitan?

Oh yes, that would have improved at no end.

But no, no, but you can imagine.

But there's a certain, I mean, it's kind of separate.

You've got this archie thing.

It's kind of like the fact that the black and white Guardians only appear in the beginning of the rival separation, at the end of I'm getting back.

It's literally the same decision.

Yeah, and I think it's a good thing in the context of the key to time where the decision is we're going to have the shadow and the shadow is sitting there, he's found the 6th segment and he's just waiting for the doctor to bring the other 5 with him.

And so that way we don't have all of that sort of framing story, ruining androids of Tara or power of crawl.

Oh, improving power.

So I'm glad that they're not pursuing him.

I think that what Terry's doing is just the minimum possible amount of work to motivate a story where they go from place to place to place, because the TARDIS can't be controlled, we have the travel dials, which you kind of think are kind of unnecessary given that we have a TARDIS with us.

[40:34]

But at this point...

Clearly, clearly the precedent for the liberator teleport bracelets.

Yeah, and also the best moment in the 1st episode.

When the doctors are saying, if you think I'm going to go in one of those glass submersibles, you've got another idea.

Upton shows in the Travadile, he shuts down Ian immediately and says, oh, no, there's quite a good age travel.

Shut up.

And again, you know, we talked about keeping people away from the TARDIS, and you'll notice very carefully that Arbitanic agrees to switch off the force field the moment that they leave.

Yeah, yeah.

So that he's... good thing he got over to that console and pulled the button before he was stabbed.

That's right.

There's a lot of stabbing.

There's a lot.

Excluding the one.

I wonder if they were on the ABC since the list.

I just like the one that falls down into the wall.

Yeah, that's a bit of a strange cutaway.

He's very thin, almost two-dimensional.

I'll thin that way.

But there also seems to be one that accidentally stabs himself at some point, isn't there?

There's one that's been...

There is a childlike part of me that really loves that structure.

[41:36]

Just a part of you. that loves to choose your own adventure kind of stuff.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But also the fact that, you know, we've spoken previously about the way that episodic television, shapes, series. characters, kind of picks, they're going on holidays, that kind of thing.

I love that that's worked into the story where the doctor goes 2 stops ahead to the last one, like they do in the keys of time where the shadows they're waiting for them.

But then they're all going to be there in episode three, but then they decide that, oh, Barbara might have gone ahead, so you 2 go ahead to the next one.

And so it sort of splits up the parties and puts interesting combinations together.

I'm here for that.

Oh, no, that was good.

No, no, that's amongst the best thing.

And in some respects, I prefer, I mean, what they do here to have Hartnell have 2 weeks off is in some respects more elegant than Barbara staying on the spaceship in the sense rights.

Or, well, I suppose them having a single scene where they're on film, like, um, Caroline Ford has in as...

Ran of terror for William Russell.

I'm not sure which I prefer.

But yeah, no, it is all of that is all elegantly done.

[42:36]

It's all great, fabulous.

I just think they needed to go through it again.

I think another draft would absolutely...

I'm fairly happy with the draft that we've got though.

And also there are, as I touched on before, Heart will basically kicking off episode one, not obviously being not particularly all there in his lines, but there's also a lot more production hiccoughs than you get in other stories thus far.

I mean, I know William Russell rips a bit of the cave wall off in the ordeal when probably, you know, with the poly star. comes off on Barbara's hand, which they expertly get rid of, but there's all sorts of clubs.

Like, obviously, when they're wandering around the pyramid before they actually get inside it, There's one bit where I think the doctor's fallen through.

And it's quite clear that this tiny little bit of pyramid side set is then being reused for Ian and Barbara to come on and stop and go, who was that?

That was a scream.

Well, you actually see them.

Yeah, they're supposed to be on the other side of the period, but obviously they're running into the same little bit of set that Hartman was in.

And it's like there's more of that kind of stuff in this story than we've had in the series today.

[43:39]

I mean, so many of those things can be put down to not necessarily, you know, the director's got it wrong, but like the PA got it wrong on the floor.

They just queued someone a little bit late, you're a little bit too early.

So I think a certain amount of that is outside people's control.

But we talked about this kind of thing before, and when it's a Warris Hussein or a Chris Barry or a Douglas Campfield in charge, those things don't happen.

Who directed this?

John Gory.

And so we never hear from again.

No, no, we do.

Yeah, no, he does an episode of Marco Polo.

Oh, he does episode four, the one that's the one that we don't have Telesnaps for.

That's right.

Yes, the wall of lies.

Well, we don't we can't comment on the directorial quality of that episode.

I suspect it would have been handled better because again, back to that thing of it being in a familiar surrounds of what is effectively in historical drama.

Yes.

I think, though, they're not able to make much corridor.

Obviously, you know.

No, I know the reason for it, but I'm just observing that some directors, for whatever reason, are capable of avoiding that more so than others. talked about that.

Let's take that direct example.

You have Chris Barry shooting those extended corridors in the Dalek city.

[44:42]

And the forced perspective is correctly framed.

With the photographs, right?

So you've got the right angle on them to make them look good, whereas the way that they're shot, you don't really believe that those extensions along the base of the period.

They're bad, though.

They're bad.

They're bad.

You forgive them because you know what it is.

It's like seeing a theatre set.

That's when it is like a theatre setting.

Well, you know, part of the reason that they're bad is that they're framed incorrectly and you can see the base.

Yeah, you can see.

I think you would have struggled.

But also the camera angle needs to be, it's more about the not seeing the base. about the camera angle matching the angle that you're getting in the photograph, the photograph, and it doesn't too often.

Nathan, if they had to frame that out, I can assure you, I would have 100% believed.

They were on an island on the planet now.

But you get that, but then you get episode 2 with all of the handheld stuff and Barbara looking at them very cleverly done.

I'm not saying there's not good stuff there.

I'm just observing that the that overall quality, whatever it's quality control, whatever you want to call the talk about is lower than in the Daleks.

[45:46]

And from what I can see of it, Marco Polo.

And certainly the Aztecs have come.

And having to do different sets every single week, having to write people out.

Like, you know, Terry's great at doing all the individual stuff that makes sense.

But then the whole world building, which we basically discuss doesn't quite hold together.

But at the moment, you're just watching it week to week in 1964.

It's the demands of the production as well, necessarily by the fact that you've got a location where you have a mini adventure.

You've got lots of people moving around and running around.

And so the capacity for things like that, you know, queueing people too early, people walking into scenes early, increases because you're not in a room with people sitting there talking to each other.

Yeah.

Whenever I come back to this, I still enjoy it every single time, unlike a few other stories, which I won't mention, ahead.

Just mention it.

No, no, no.

So when was the last time you watched the Senza, right?

That's a good question.

[46:47]

It could well be last century.

That's how long I have not seen that.

That's how long the sense rights is.

It just feels that love.

I would like to point out the weird and wonderful aspects of Terry's writing.

People sort of treat him as being a bit sort of utilitarian, a bit like functional in his writing, but Nathan's talked on our late 7 podcast, Maximum Power.

Look it up.

It's great.

Um, about Weird Blake 7.

You know, episodes like the web, where you sort of go to these outlandish worlds, which kind of diminutive creatures.

And yeah, it's nothing which is really steeped in what we know.

I think Kismarinus gives us a real, really nice glimpse of things like that, and especially the 2nd episode, the morpho brains, are really like they're grotesque things, and they are brains in jars with ice stalks, and they speak like this.

And that is a weird and wonderful combination.

And I think other things in the episode, the same as that.

Simon, you mentioned earlier, the cut and reverses, where you're seeing, you know, the, the love of things and then the author side.

[47:50]

That's really well done and it's a very nice idea, which is well realised.

And when they go into the laboratory, and obviously they don't want to build an entire laboratory, so it's all done from the perspective of being the shabby version, there's something very wonderful and meta about the idea of William Hartnell picking up a chipped old mug and going, oh, yeah, I think this is, you know, I could be very happy here with all this advanced equipment.

That's a wonderful image and we don't sort of give it the credit for how interesting that is.

In fact, it's extremely unusual for what we see on screen. not to be what's happening in classic Doctor Who.

Yep.

It's probably this and then Mind Warp.

You know what I mean?

You know, that is really, really quite unusual.

And I also think that the idea, the idea that plants sped up, behave like animals, I think, is a really interesting idea that they do throw away on this sort of single episode thing.

[48:50]

I think that's really good.

Well, we come back to it in Seeds of Doom.

We do.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

But I think that's really strong.

I think that might be the weakest of the episodes, but I don't hate it.

It comes back to the plant things in the chase.

Yeah, yeah.

Planet of the darker plants.

Yes, but the interesting thing is what I was saying.

Unlike the Varga plants, so who are that are kind of animal plants and the seats of doom kind of thing as well.

It's a special, whatever it is, whatever force field thing that Edmund Warwick has set up has essentially accelerated time.

The water droplet dripping on a rock takes a 1000 years to start creating an indentation.

You know, what if we sped that up so it happened in a day rather than a 1000 years?

And that's what you're talking about, a place, like the way plants will gradually pull walls down, a ruined building, and the vines will gradually pull walls down.

What if that happened over the course of?

Yeah, where plants just grow and pull a bit.

Exactly.

It's more like an acceleration of time.

Yeah, well, that's another one of those wonderful terry nation, clean, beautiful exchange.

He calls it the tempo of time. as a kid. go, yeah, yeah, I get that.

That would have been a better episode type.

[49:51]

The tempo of time.

That's in other words, wonderful, clean little terry nation things where, you know, he calls it the tempo of destruction, which is just, you know, as a kid, you would watch that going, yeah, I get this and understanding what it is.

It's a great science fiction idea.

Was that one of the chapter titles and the novelisation?

Is that a strange historical curio that sometimes in doctor you have eras meeting eras and you think, well, I didn't expect that to happen.

So it was Graham Williams returning to write the nightmare fair for the important season 23.

It's John Lucarotti coming back for the 1st Tom Baker season to sort of do the early version of the Outer Space.

And it's Philip Hinchcliffe having novelized Seeds of Doom and Masking and Drago going, what's next and being handed the keys?

mariners.

Yes, exactly.

Can you do that?

Yes, he did that.

Yeah, yeah.

Wow.

And he's a very he's a very good novelisation writer.

They're the only 3 he did, isn't it?

He makes the mistake of cutting heaps of Amelia Ducart out of the seeds of doom.

Yes, which is unnaturally thin for a 6 pass story. is immaterial.

[50:55]

In the past, when we've talked about the advantages of the classic series over the new series where you can spend 7 episodes, getting to know a bunch of people, except you almost never do, you...

Yeah, yeah.

That was so nice.

And and even the fact that the Vord, uh, that yeah, Tech leader of the alien Vord knows that they're in love with one another, you know, like and I think that's really great.

I love them saying goodbye and caring about where they're going next.

You know, now they're going to set up.

There's a version of dogs who out there with Ian and Barbara and their assistants, Altos and Sabitha, which is great.

It's great.

Like they say we're going to miss them because they've really been part of the show.

They're being the last month or so.

Yeah, yeah.

They should be considered companions in the same vein as Katerina and Sarah Kingdom.

Yeah, because they don't go in the TARDIS, but they go in what we're using as the time.

But also they're collected like companions are collected.

Like we go to a place and meet and they're giving a goodbye and they're giving.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[51:56]

They're like mini companions, but that is the thing.

I mean, I think it happens a lot more than you think.

You know, you get to know some of the files.

You know, you certainly get to know some of the characters in, you know, Jenny and Tyler and all that sort of in Dala Invasion of Earth.

And certainly by the time you get to the Pertwear, that's when you really are getting to know the the guest guest characters.

You think Greg and Petra.

Greg and Petra.

Exactly.

And I would like to praise Catherine Schofield, who plays Sabitha and Robin Phillips, who plays Altos, because I think they do, there's not much there on the page, but they do, they do a lot to sort of bring those characters to life and make them loveable regular parts of the team.

They're doing what William Russell and Jackie Hill are doing in the early days when there's not much there yet.

Yeah, she recognised that the key is just slightly smaller.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, she does.

Because she's comparing them when she puts them on a necklace around her neck.

And I actually thought that that was pretty good too, because I haven't rewatched this a bunch of times.

Like this time I was just absolutely delighted by Ian's solution of putting the fake the counterfeit key, which was clearly introduced for that purpose.

[53:01]

Yeah, law of conservation of information.

One for stuff.

It's like Sarah Jane not liking ginger pop.

You know, like it will just come back and be important at the end of the story.

She also hates brandy, the picky.

I think Robin Phillips is great in that scene in episode 2 where he's staring down the camera when Barbara just realised that they know it hasn't worked on her.

He's like, aren't you feeling well?

I shall take you to our position.

Well, she does she does lose it then and goes smash, smash, smash.

He was gay in real life. and he was gay.

Really?

Probably appreciated having his thighs robbed by William Russell.

But he served as the artistic director of Canada Stratford Festival from 1970 to 1980. and was apparently very well recognised for his artistic contribution.

He received the order of Canada for it.

So he emigrates to Canada, obviously.

He was Canadian.

Oh, he was okay.

I believe he was.

[54:01]

I believe he was.

So he turns into more of a kind of an artistic director and so on rather than an actor.

Yes, and when I was reading his obituary, which I think he only died in like 2021 or something, I died quite recently, and they had a very handsome photo of him from like 1977, still a very good looking man, sort of, you know, 15 years later.

And so, yeah, I'm very well disposed towards him.

And I think he's a companion that we could have had.

You know, he's a Stephen Taylor.

He's someone if William Russell had decided he was summarily leaving.

He absolutely would have been aboard that time.

Yes, he would have in contract roulette, yes.

Yeah, so Caroline Ford was leaving.

We could have had some beef.

I had Yartek.

I would also like to talk about George Caluras just before we finished because he was the first, I think, star get for the series.

I thought Mark Eden was.

No, I mean, he had a good profile as dramatic actor, but George Clurris was a star.

So George Cluras had started off with Austin Wells Mercury players.

He is in Citizen K. and won an award for it.

Yeah, yeah.

And so obviously, I mean, I don't know what had happened in the meantime.

[55:05]

I think I think you've just proved everything I've been saying for the last hour, which is the fact that even great actors can struggle when the material is one dimension.

Are you telling me that there's a version of Keyzamarinus out there, directed by Orson Wells, that was fantastic.

Quite probably, yes.

I'm sure it would have been interesting Well, that's all the time we have this week.

We'll be back next week.

The 500 year diary's second visit to a dialect controlled 22nd century Earth in the Dalek invasion of Earth.

Again.

In the meantime, you can find us wherever you get your podcasts, and you can keep up with us on our website, 500yeardiary.com, where you'll find our social media links as well as links to all of our other podcasts, including the entirety of flights or entirety, which comprises every episode of our 4 Doctor Who podcasts.

[56:18]

Until next time, remember that the successful criminals are the ones who don't blurt out admissions of guilt whenever they're slightly startled.

But you couldn't have known.

Thank you very much for listening and good night.

Good night.

Bye bye.

See you soon.

That was 500 year diary, starring Todd Bealby, Nathan Bottomley, Peter Griffiths, and Simon Moore.

The theme was composed by Cameron Lamb.

This episode, splitting the party up for no reason, was recorded on the 24th of May 2026 and released on the 23rd of August.

This was our 3rd take on the Keys of Mariner since 2014, and next week will be our 3rd take on the Dalek invasion of Earth.

So if anyone out there has any plans at all to make new Doctor Who episodes for us to talk about anytime soon, please let us know right away.

[57:30]

We have to talk about this.

We must talk about this.

Simon and I have special history with Fiona Walker and Donald Picknick.

Separately, though.

Well, no, together.

No, no, no, no.

It was Wanda Ventham and Donald Pickering.

Oh, yes.

Sorry.

Yes separately.

We have special history with them because we spent an afternoon and evening with Donald Pickering and with Fiona Walker back in the 90s when I was interviewing them for Doctor Who magazine.

Simon came along, basically because he should have come along.

Yes, notionally as the photographer.

And they were both so utterly delightful.

Oh, such great company. so much fun to spend time with.

And so every time I see them on screen.

I mean, obviously in Sylvan Nemesis, particularly in Time and the Rhiny, because they have slightly bigger roles.

But in these, just seeing them on screen takes me to such a happy place because they were so beautiful to hang out with.

Yes.

And that's right, because we we shouted them after we watched Sylvan Nemesis with Fiona, Walker, Gerard Murphy.

[58:31]

Gerard Murphy.

We took them to dinner.

I think it was Kettner's, wasn't it?

And yeah, it was, and then, of course, the conversation continues and the alcohol flowed.

Yeah.

No, but Fiona bit, she's exactly funny, but the thing is, her accent is exactly the same.

Like, this is incredibly plumbing.

Like I got I got to the venue because we went to an edit suite to watch the video and I was waiting in the foyer and I think you'd gone to the loo or something and this woman arrived.

This did quite diminutive, like fierce looking woman.

It's like, hello, I'm here to see Peter.

That's fantastic.

She was so indiscreet.

She was talking about she was talking about Dolores Gray, who played Mrs. Remington.

She said, her face had to be wound up every morning.

And then, of course, a year later, we went and had a lovely pavla lunch with the divine Wanda Ventham and Donald Pickering, who are lifelong friends, and, of course, appeared in Doctor Who together a number of times.

And that was just an amazing afternoon.

We laughed like dreams the entire time.

[59:33]

I think Donald was very fond of us, which was great.

We were very fond of him.

And he was a mentor.

And just in the background, while we were conducting this interview, wandered through Roger, Roger Hammond, who plays the doctor in Modern Undead, not the actual doctor, but the doctor at the school, in Modern Undead, and who just lived sort of locally in the village.

And so it just became this kind of like, you know, who else are we going to attract?

Is Edmund Warwick going to share?

Yes.

Throughout that.

I just wanted to be Donald Pickering when I grew up.

You know, it was just that kind of being kind of wit.

At least incredible stories about, you know, his risqué language when he was at home when he was visiting with Wanda Ventham and her 12 year old son would always be listening at the door with his ears flapping and of course we know that is Benedict Cumberbatch.

I mean, he's tremendous in this.