Revisiting Old Doctor Who: The Five Doctors

[Broomstick]

Let's all sit down and reminisce about vintage Who.

Summary: Time Lords can be utterly corrupt and manipulative bastards. When they want a problem fixed they have no problem calling on their renegades - the Doctor and the Master - to accomplish things they either don't want or can't do themselves. On top of that, when they want to punish something they can be complete and utter ruthless bastards able and willing to condemn the guilty to an eternity of suffering.

What, you were expecting a plot synopsis? We're supposed to be fans here!

Good Stuff: not one but FIVE Doctors! What's not to like about that? Also the return of several companions, some of which haven't been seen for a long time. We get to see some of Gallifrey, which is always interesting, or would be if we actually saw more than three rooms, a hallway, and a suspiciously earth-looking "death zone", at least until the Time Lords start acting like pompous jerks. We also get the Master trying to be a good guy and help the Doctor. The Doctor's disbelief and befuddlement is exceeded only by the Master's own disbelief he has been argued into doing this. Various obstacles are overcome by thinking and not just deus ex machina.

Particularly favorite quotes include (probably somewhat paraphrased):
One of the early Doctors, to the Master: "Regenerated?"
The Master: "Not exactly" Apparently the Master doesn't want to admit to body stealing. Because, you know, people might think badly of him if they knew he was in a stolen body but all that genocide/taking over the universe/plotting to kill people stuff can be overlooked. Then again, Time Lord society isn't that wonderful by human standards, maybe body stealing is worse in their culture than wiping out entire alien species?

Rather than tell Third what his next regeneration looks like Sarah Jane resorts to gestures
Third: "All teeth and curls? I suppose I did, but I haven't yet" Well, that does sort of describe Four. I find it interesting as a portrayal of a time traveler who no doubt has met many people out of proper order, and who has already had three different faces and knows he's going to have more down the line.

And probably the most well known from this story, by the Brigadier in reference to the Doctor: "Splendid chap. All of him."

Incongruities: Waaaaaay back, as far back as the First Doctor and Susan Foreman, we have Gallifrey described as a world with a "burnt orange sky", with "red grass" and trees with "silver leaves". OK. Why does the death zone have green vegetation? Granted, some Gallifreyan vegetation has been reported as green or gold in color, but clearly not all of it.

No, wait I have an explanation!

With a name like "the death zone" you know this is supposed to be an incredibly creepy, scary place. Perhaps it's scary for Gallifreyans to see all that weird green grass and alien earth-type trees? Ooooo - icky green grass!

Here's another one - this is a death zone, which has been sealed for umpteen zillions years by an "impenetrable" forefield and basically abandoned in place. Who is maintaining all the roads we see? Roads in good enough condition for "Bessie" to trundle along with no problem.

No, wait, I have an explanation!

The Gallifreyan roads only appear to be earthly asphalt, it's really a much, much more advanced and durable road bed that just happens to look like earth roads.

The first time I saw this story the time scoop was flat black triangles swooping out of the sky. This time they were these weird swirly cones swooping out of the sky.

No, wait, I have an explanation!

Well, no, actually I don't, not an in-story one at least, but maybe - Oh! Look! MONSTERS! Run!

No, really - clearly there are two different versions out there. I vaguely remember black swoopy triangles from the broadcast back in the 1980's, so I'm guessing some effects were tweaked for the DVD edition.

But the worst of the lot.... if there is a transmat receiver in the Tomb of Rassilon (and there is - that's how the Time Lords arrive at the end of the episode) WHY does anyone have to go through the death zone at all? Oddly enough, this didn't occur to me until after the second time I viewed The Five Doctors.

The actors are getting older, even if Time Lords don't:
Well, by the time they filmed this Hartnell was dead - they went to some effort to cast an actor who resembled him, and both men received credit for playing the Doctor. It's a shame Richard Hurndell is so often overlooked by fans reciting All the Actors Who Have Played the Doctor. Granted, he only had this one outing but he was required to capture another actor's portrayal of an iconic character and he didn't do too bad a job from what little I know of Hartnell's portrayal. There is some archival Hartnell footage used, so although there are "only" five Doctors six men get credit for playing him.

Patrick Troughton was already somewhat rumpled looking and doesn't appear that much changed in the face, but there's gray in his hair that either wasn't there in his run as the Doctor, or didn't show up on the black and white film. Pertwee also didn't look that different in the face, and he had had the most recent run of the three old guys, but his blond hair had gone entirely white. Tom Baker's appearance was footage from an uncompleted episode from his run - funny how whenever the Doctors' selves meet up one of them always seems to get stuck in transit (that happened with the Three Doctors, too, mainly because Hartnell was wheelchair bound at that point and would have had considerable difficulty with the outrageous amount of running required by the Doctor's lifestyle).

Overall, though, the aging of the older actors was much less obvious than Peter Davison's aging in Time Crash. Then again, when the Five Doctors was filmed the entire run of Doctor Who was only 20 years total, and the first actor Hartnell had been replaced by Hurndell. When Davison filmed Time Crash it had been 23 years since he had last appeared as the Doctor on TV, so maybe his more obvious aging isn't so puzzling after all.

Oh, alright, I'll talk about the actual story now...
Actually one of the more coherent story arcs, with none of the "repeat the last five minutes of last week's episode" that prevailed in the old days. Then again, it was conceived as a 90 minute episode rather than split into 30 minute segments. The pacing is more suited to sitting down and watching the whole thing in one go than the more episodic Old Who stories.

Anyhow, I thought they did a pretty good job of handling not only 4 interacting versions of the Doctor, but also the horde of cameos by companions. In addition to pairing each Doctor with at least one companion there were appearances by several others, and they weren't inserted too gratuitously into the story, being images drawn from the Doctor's mind of people he cares about. I liked the use of thinking to get past obstacles, such as the Checkerboard of Zapping Death and the use of patience and pursuing Cybermen to get past the Raston Robot of Death. The Doctors arguing amongst themselves is, as always, one of the more amusing parts of any episode with multiple Doctors.

The companions aren't completely useless idiots, either. The Epic Moment of Awesome, of course, is the Brigadier casually strolling around behind the Master then cold-cocking him with a fist. Lethbridge-Steward may be old enough to be retiring but he's not feeble, that's for sure. Oh, alright, most of them had just walk-on roles this time, but that can't be helped with such a large cast of "extras". Sarah Jane and the Brigadier got trotted out, though it's not Sarah Jane's best episode as far as her character is concerned, and I think this is the only time we see Susan Foreman after season two (but don't quote me on that)

The plot, for once, is fairly straightforward, even if some of the causes of their predicaments are fuzzy at first. It's a straightforward we're dropped in the middle of nowhere and have to get to the tower over there plot, followed by we have to defeat various dangers to get to the Really Important Room, followed by the final puzzle with all the answers we'll ever get.

One of the things that makes Doctor Who so intriguing to me is that the Doctor isn't always a nice chap. Sure, he mistrusts the Master, but the Master really was trying to help (mostly) and didn't even seriously try to kill the Doctor even once. Sure, he was interested in a grab a immortality, but is that surprising from a Time Lord who'd used all his regenerations and took to body-stealing rather than going quietly into the night? What did anyone expect from the Master? The Doctor was pretty harsh with him. The Doctor isn't particularly flattering to himself, the various regenerations insulting each other pretty freely. But that rather pales in comparison to the other Time Lords, doesn't it? The guards don't seem to have an issue with using mind probes on the castellan ("No.... not the MIND PROBE!"). Borusa, who never seemed particularly nasty before even if manipulative (also, apparently, another common Time Lord trait) has gone off the deep end and resorted to kidnapping and letting other people die to show him the way into the Tomb of Rassilon.

But what really shows what sort of assholes the Gallifreyans can be is the "immortality" granted by the Ring of Rassilon. Sure, you'll be immortal - a freaking living carving on the side of Rassilon's tomb for all eternity! And apparently no way to back out of the deal, either. YOU'RE FUCKED! And Rassilon thinks this is completely fucking funny, to lure people through all sorts of hellish ordeals to pluck a ring off his (supposedly) dead finger and wind up trapped forever! Rassilon is a bastard. A sadist. And he's the Great Big Hero of the Time Lords!

Maybe that's what you get when you have a city full of people with multi-thousand year lifespans and nothing really interesting to do: court intrigue that makes the machinations of even the most byzantine of earthly royal courts seem simple and straightforward, and complete bastards who make the Borgias look like saints.

So, when Ten fucks over the Family of Blood much later in the series that's actually Ten getting in touch with his Inner Rassilon to turn immortality into a curse.

I tell ya, with Rassilon brought back to lead the Time Lords in the Last Great Time War that must have been one suckitude of a situation. Well, Ten did call it hell.... no wonder he ran away from home. Of course, the Doctor didn't fall into the trap, and with Master was hogtied on the floor - pity, because if the HAD let him take the ring that might have solved a few future problems, ay? At least until the Time War and their revival of people that would have been better left in tombs.

[Parallax]

Rassilon is often thought of being a bastard, it's not just The Five Doctors.
The later novels, for example, have him betraying Omega directly and without apparent pause. And the whole Time Lord regeneration thing? That was started up by Rassilon but when unleashed, seems outright killed a notable chunk of the Gallifrey population.

[mr friendly guy]

Its triva time.

The Master: "Not exactly" Apparently the Master doesn't want to admit to body stealing. Because, you know, people might think badly of him if they knew he was in a stolen body but all that genocide/taking over the universe/plotting to kill people stuff can be overlooked. Then again, Time Lord society isn't that wonderful by human standards, maybe body stealing is worse in their culture than wiping out entire alien species?

It might also simply be admitting to weakness. That is his own body has already failed and he had to take a non time lord body, which presumably can't regenerate. Of course the Doctor might be able to stop him from stealing the body in the future if he had this piece of information. That of course depends on whether its one of these fixed points in time or some such technobabble.

No, really - clearly there are two different versions out there. I vaguely remember black swoopy triangles from the broadcast back in the 1980's, so I'm guessing some effects were tweaked for the DVD edition.

Some DVDs allow you the option of watching the original footage as well, or the one with newer special effects instead. I can't recall if the Five Doctors allowed you to do this.

Well, by the time they filmed this Hartnell was dead - they went to some effort to cast an actor who resembled him, and both men received credit for playing the Doctor. It's a shame Richard Hurndell is so often overlooked by fans reciting All the Actors Who Have Played the Doctor. Granted, he only had this one outing but he was required to capture another actor's portrayal of an iconic character and he didn't do too bad a job from what little I know of Hartnell's portrayal. There is some archival Hartnell footage used, so although there are "only" five Doctors six men get credit for playing him

The archival footage at the start was taken from "The Dalek Invasion of Earth," the ending scene where he leaves Susan to stay on Earth.

Tom Baker's appearance was footage from an uncompleted episode from his run - funny how whenever the Doctors' selves meet up one of them always seems to get stuck in transit (that happened with the Three Doctors, too, mainly because Hartnell was wheelchair bound at that point and would have had considerable difficulty with the outrageous amount of running required by the Doctor's lifestyle).

Baker's scene was taken from the what was then incomplete story - Shada. Years later he would narrate a VHS version where he fills in the unfilmed scenes with dialogue. I think years later they had Paul McGann narrating the story on audio, presumably in the manner one would retell past events.

[The Romulan Republic]

Rassilon is often thought of being a bastard, it's not just The Five Doctors.
The later novels, for example, have him betraying Omega directly and without apparent pause. And the whole Time Lord regeneration thing? That was started up by Rassilon but when unleashed, seems outright killed a notable chunk of the Gallifrey population.

All of which pales compared to what an utter cock he was in The End of Time.

[mr friendly guy]

Interestingly when Rassilon was mentioned earlier, it was in the context of a historical figure. Strictly speaking I don't recall the Doctor criticising or praising him aside from being the one to create the Eye of Harmony. I don't even recall him being mentioned in the Three Doctors, even though his contemporary Omega appeared as the villain.

He was mentioned in the Deadly Assassin and also in State of Decay, this time in a more positive light, since he had protected the universe from the Vampires of E-space. Granted he almost had to commit genocide to do it (only the Great Vampire was left in TV series, but his race made a reappearance in the novels), but they were the bad guys. So it was ok. Jokes aside, they were supposed to be a great threat (they even mentioned their plans in the state of decay) and had to be stopped. But the only way Rassilon could do it in an era where they were still in the process of mastering time travel was to use Bow Ships. Which tended to kill them.

It wasn't until the Five Doctors that some doubt was cast onto his character, culminating with his eternal punishment BS. Although it did serve a function. It got rid of some tyrants and power hungry Time Lords from their society. In the novels his potrayal just got worse, until finally we see him willing to end time in the new series.

[Bedlam]

Baker's scene was taken from the what was then incomplete story - Shada. Years later he would narrate a VHS version where he fills in the unfilmed scenes with dialogue. I think years later they had Paul McGann narrating the story on audio, presumably in the manner one would retell past events.

Actually they did it as a full drama of the whole story with a few changes from the original script. I think they ran with the time scoop messing up the time line so that Baker's doctor never actually did the things he was going to do in Shada and McGann had to drag Romana and K-9 from presidenting Gallifrey to go through the story again.

[Hillary]

Rassilon is often thought of being a bastard, it's not just The Five Doctors.
The later novels, for example, have him betraying Omega directly and without apparent pause. And the whole Time Lord regeneration thing? That was started up by Rassilon but when unleashed, seems outright killed a notable chunk of the Gallifrey population.

I've noticed you talk about the novels in previous threads as well. I thought these were not canon. I'm happy to be corrected though.

5 Doctors - I haven't seen this since it was first shown on TV in this country. As far as I can remember, it was shown as a single one-off episode.

[mr friendly guy]

I asked BBC about whether the novels, audios spin off material are canon (this was prior to the new series), and they said it can be if you want it to. In other words, they don't give a shit if its canon or not. Generally if can go from the assumption that
a) show is canon ie DW (classic and new), Sarah Jane adventures, Torchwood, animated features etc.
b) sourcebooks eg annuals etc are almost as good as a) unless it contradicts it
c) references from sourcebooks material to other spin off material is below b) but most probably good as canon.

The rest you should be decided on to how neatly they fit into DW chronology, ie are there any obvious contradictions etc.

[Eternal_Freedom]

In fairness to Rassilon, his eternal punishment crap was intended to stop tyrants from ruling Galifrey eternally. Which is a good thing methinks.

And the second Doctor elaborates to the Brigadier about the different stories about Rassilon, about the official history of him as a great builder etc, and the unofficial tales of him being a sadistic bastard who built the Death zone (in company with other Time Lords to be fair) and pulled species to fight wars for their amusement. eventually the Time Lords grew disgusted by him and rebelled, locking him away as he was immortal.

Of course, it's quite possible neither of those versions is accurate. The official version treats him as a legend who founded their society, and leave him at that. The unofficial version might take advantage of his reputation to blame him for all the early Time Lord's misdeeds, like the Death Zone.

[Stark]

Of course the novels aren't 'canon', since BBC doesn't care. Parallax just read them, so other people don't have to.

That said, treating some Peel fanfic from the back of a shitty reference book as anything like canon WHEN IT HAS A NON CANON DISCLAIMER is pretty fucking dumb.

[NecronLord]

Who is maintaining all the roads we see? Roads in good enough condition for "Bessie" to trundle along with no problem.

The Raston Warrior Robot also does a side-line as the Raston Roadworks Robot.

[NecronLord]

I asked BBC about whether the novels, audios spin off material are canon (this was prior to the new series), and they said it can be if you want it to. In other words, they don't give a shit if its canon or not. Generally if can go from the assumption that
a) show is canon ie DW (classic and new), Sarah Jane adventures, Torchwood, animated features etc.
b) sourcebooks eg annuals etc are almost as good as a) unless it contradicts it
c) references from sourcebooks material to other spin off material is below b) but most probably good as canon.

The rest you should be decided on to how neatly they fit into DW chronology, ie are there any obvious contradictions etc.

I'd also add the various audio adventures actually broadcast on BBC Radio just below the top tier there.

[Broomstick]

Who is maintaining all the roads we see? Roads in good enough condition for "Bessie" to trundle along with no problem.

The Raston Warrior Robot also does a side-line as the Raston Roadworks Robot.

^ Oh, I like that! You get a No-Prize!

[NecronLord]

Well, why do you think its cave had silver ropes in it? It teleports around, but it needs those for marking off the parts of the road it's working on.

To be a little more serious, on this:

But the worst of the lot.... if there is a transmat receiver in the Tomb of Rassilon (and there is - that's how the Time Lords arrive at the end of the episode) WHY does anyone have to go through the death zone at all? Oddly enough, this didn't occur to me until after the second time I viewed The Five Doctors.

Isn't there a throwaway line about the three Doctors who're in there turning it back on? It's a while since I've seen it, but I got the impression that it had been used by the Time Lords who'd entombed Rassilon in the first place to get out.

EDIT: From a transcript:

2nd DOCTOR: (Talking into the screen) We've reached the Tower, we're all safe, the barriers are down and the TARDIS is here. And I say - we've made the most extraordinary discovery

It's not explicit, but I think the idea was that at that point it became possible for Borusa to teleport in.

[Broomstick]

There might have been - the problem with throwaway lines is that sometimes the viewer fails to catch them.

[NecronLord]

Quite so. They really should have made a bigger deal with that, I'd say, given that it was sorta important to the plot.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Well the Death Zone had a powerful force field surrounding it. Most likely that is what blocked them from transmatting straight there.

Alternatively, is it not possible that the Time Lords simply did not know about the Tomb transmat? They haven't been there for millions if not tens of millions of years depending on what version of events you listen to, I doubt the detailed plans still exist. Espcially as knowledge from that time is forbidden (the "Black Scrolls of Rassilon" that Borusa destroyed).

[Broomstick]

I'm willing to bet that the black scrolls that burned weren't the real deal, or at least weren't the originals - forbidden knowledge that juicy always seems to survive.

[Eternal_Freedom]

At any rate, I think the transmat is most likely a combination of the forcefield and the Time Lords not knowing about the transmat in the Tomb.

[Patrick Degan]

According to Shannon Sullivan's A Brief History Of Time website, Geoffrey Bayldon had been under consideration for the First Doctor along with Richard Hurndall but was rejected because of the sense that he would have been recognised too much for his multiyear role in the childrens' programme Catweazle to just slip into the part. Personally, though, I've always thought Bayldon would have been the far better choice. Bayldon bore more of a resemblance to William Hartnell than Richard Hurndall did and I think he would have made a reasonable job on the voice as well.