Revisiting Old Doctor Who: Snakedance

[Broomstick]

Snakedance
(Back to screaming companions)

Yes, I watched four classic Who this weekend (and the fifth season of Dexter but that's totally off topic). In addition to the 2011 Christmas special. I'm Who'd out for awhile.

Anyhow - this was another Not My Favorite Episode. It dragged. It featured far too much screaming from women, for reasons that occasionally struck me as gratuitous. I really hated the young prince Federator's son Lon. There as something about him that made him look like an over made up tart, effeminate (in a bad way), and just... bleh. I don't know if it was youth or the part, but I don't think it was the actor because I really like the guy (Martin Clunes) in Doc Martin. Nyssa's donning a new bit of costume and trying to get the Doctor to notice is just... ridiculous. Both the costume bit and trying to get to the Doctor notice, because if there's one thing consistent over the years, it's that the Doctor doesn't get certain things, and fashion is one of them. This reaches a peak with Six, but there were signs of that long before Five.

I actually found parts of this one boring. I actually fell asleep during episode three. Far too many static scenes, repetitions of Old Man sitting staring into the camera, and so on. I didn't care for the psychic stuff - it had been done better in the past.

I think the best bits were that the blue pentagonal crystals actually did glow, and the scene with the funhouse mirrors.

I'm also wondering if the wicker chair in Teegan's bed room appeared as a prop in later Who, as it seems familiar. I view it as a bad sign when the freakin' chair in the background is more engaging than what's happening in the foreground.

[mr friendly guy]

This episode was ok, but again not my favourite. Peter Davison was a decent actor, but some of the material he had to work with didn't seem as great as during the Pertwee or Tom Baker era. This again was not the best story and Lon was just weird. I didn't realise at the time, but he was Martin Clunes which I liked from Doc Martin.