Thursday, 30 January 2014

Season 22 - Patrick Troughton and Colin Baker - 'The Two Doctors'




The Two Doctors saw the return of Patrick Troughton and Frazer Hines to reprise their roles as the second Doctor and his companion Jamie McCrimmon alongside Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant as Peri Brown. In this episode the Sixth Doctor has a vision of his previous self being put to death at the hands of a Sontaran so Peri and her Doctor home in on Patrick Troughton’s whereabouts and race to save his life? 

The Episode is partially based in a very 80s Neon and chrome space station and partially based in a grand manor house estate in Spain where Dastari and Chessene (a genetically enhanced Androgum) are conducting time experiments with the help of the Sontarans which are threatening the very fabric of time itself. It’s always fun to see a Doctor interact with himself and this is the third time that Patrick Troughton returned to his role for a one off episode so it must have been very exciting for the audience at the time who had seen him interact with all of the other Doctors in turn. However there isn’t actually a lot of interaction between the Two Doctors in this episode at all something I was really quite disappointed about. 


For a large part of the episode Patrick Troughton is a prisoner of Dastari and his cronies and when he is eventually set free he has been injected with cells from the hideous Androgum Shockeye so he is hardly himself. Even though I didn’t get to see the witty exchanges that I wanted from these two doctors it was quite amusing watching Two take on the traits of the androgums, and he really looked like he was enjoying himself as he shovelled piles of food into his mouth.

One of the very real downsides of this episode was the fact that neither the characters or the writers seemed to be 100% sure of what direction the story was taking, in fact several of the characters including Dasteri have several changes of heart throughout the episode which lead to some slightly confusing story tangents including the stabbing of a very pompous man named Oscar that the sixth Doctor has gotten to know since his arrival in Spain. 

Jamie played the part of the parent, it seemed as he followed after the Sixth Doctor and Peri who it appears are still at war with one another even after 3 serials.  All he really wanted was to find his Doctor and get back in the Tardis and away from this place. I feel that Frazer Hines slipped back into his old character very well, dreadful accent, kilt and all. 

All in all I would say the true highlight of this episode is the remarkable nature of Peri’s cleavage. Her assets manage to steal the show almost every time she is on screen and they have the unparalleled ability to stay in her top regardless of what kind of running, climbing or crawling she has to undertake. 


All in all we give this episode a 2.5/5

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