Welcome
to Phantom Who, a new feature designed to go along with the Earth
Station Who podcast, which I co-host. There I am known as “Dave”
because “Phantom Troublemaker” takes up too much room on the
stationary. Every other week there will be a new podcast discussing
all things Doctor Who, with a central discussion about a particular
story.
For
the first year we are covering regeneration stories. Starting with An
Unearthly Child and wrapping up the current regenerations with
The Eleventh Hour, we’ll be covering the first and last
stories of each of the first eleven Doctors.
The
Doctor spent a good bit of time recovering from a forced regeneration
at the hands of the Time Lords. He was exiled to Earth in his TARDIS,
but wasn’t going anywhere because the dematerialization circuit had
been removed. Those darn Time Lords and their penalties for
renegadism.
While
the Doctor was recovering in the hospital, then taking a shower, then
stealing cloaks, jackets, hats, and cars; there was an invasion going
on. Creepy plastic people were doing creepy things all over the
world. Naturally the Doctor stopped them.
Once
it was all said and done, he agreed to stay on with UNIT as
Scientific Advisor and help Brigadier Lethbridge-Stuart defend the
world from threats both terrestrial and extra-terrestrial. All the
while, though, the renegade Time Lord kept working on repairing his
TARDIS. Eventually he helped his fellow Gallifreyans out of a bind
and they let him fix his craft. The very first thing he did was bop
off to Metebelis 3 and swipe a certain blue crystal…
The
story opens in some kind of weird retreat where former UNIT operative
Mike Yates is investigating… well, weirdness. Our man Yates
has been through an awful lot in the past several months. First he
was kidnapped and brainwashed by a bunch of nutjob eco-terrorists,
then he joined a movement to send Earth back in time to the age of
the dinosaurs to start over again (as one does), then he redeemed
himself but stayed apart from UNIT.
Now
Yates is operating on his own.
He’s
checking out this guy Lupton that looks like a used car salesman and
his little group of buddies. Yates might not be affiliated with UNIT
anymore, but he does still have a good friend who just so happens to
be a reporter – Sarah Jane Smith. Ms. Smith arrives in time to
accompany Yates down to the basement of the retreat and witness one
of the most horrifying things I have ever seen in my life.
Lupton
and his band of lackeys are all sitting in a circle performing what
is quite frankly one of the most hilarious chants I have ever heard.
With each verse the group intones, one of them bangs a gong. My copy
of Planet of the Spiders is perhaps less than legitimate, so
some of the audio was not only bad but slightly overpowering. What I
am saying here is that the gong just about made my ears bleed.
So
the group keeps on chanting, getting more intense as they go on, and
eventually a giant spider starts to materialize in the middle of the
circle. Instead of going, “Oh my gosh it’s a giant spider STOP
CHANTING” , these lunatics just keep going while it fully
appears, skitters around, jumps on Lupton, dissolves into his back,
and then psychically tells him from within his own brain that he
needs to start looking for some blue crystal.
This
scene was one of the most upsetting things I have ever seen in my
life that didn’t involve a brown alien hiding in a closet. I
seriously considered turning Planet of the Spiders off at this
point and opting out of this week’s Earth Station Who. But I
knew there were people counting on me, so I soldiered on.
Yates
and Sarah Jane are rightfully concerned about what they have just
seen. They decide that Sarah Jane needs to go and fetch the Doctor
while Yates stays behind to keep an eye on the insane spider cult.
Meanwhile,
the Doctor and Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge-Stuart are watching a
psychic named Professor Clegg perform mid-level tricks. For some
crazy reason they invite him back to UNIT headquarters where the
Doctor informs Clegg that he knows the man is, in fact, a powerful
psychic and that he is performing these simple tricks as a cover.
Clegg admits to this and the Doctor rewards him by strapping him into
a chair with the blue crystal from Metebelis 3, which shows him a
bunch of giant spiders and gives him a heart attack. I don’t think
the Doctor did it on purpose, but Doctor Three is pretty wily, so you
never know.
Sarah
Jane shows up after that and tells the Doctor her giant spider story
and he’s all like, “Wow – we just killed this guy with visions
of giant spi… um, I mean, we should go check it out!”
Lupton
has shown up outside of UNIT headquarters – presumably with the
guidance of the… okay, I just can’t sit here all night and think
about the fact that a giant spider is residing inside of Lupton’s
body and communicating with him psychically. So we’re just going to
say Lupton has a Special Friend.
Lupton
has shown up outside of UNIT headquarters – presumably with the
guidance of his Special Friend. He brutally zaps all three of the
guards UNIT has on base with Sith lightning – presumably courtesy
of his Special Friend – and steals the blue crystal from Metebelis
3, which the Doctor and the Brig have just left laying around because
why would you want to secure something that projects images of
Special Friends and gives people heart attacks?
One
of the victims of Lupton’s lightning (great band name) manages to
raise the alarm and the Doctor and UNIT’s remaining forces take off
in pursuit of the larcenous Lupton.
What
follows is the greatest vehicular pursuit scene ever committed to
film.
Lupton
steals the Whomobile and the Doctor follows in a gyrocopter. From
there - you know what? Just watch:
Magnificent. I mean, if it's still there and YouTube didn't yank it.
Despite
the Doctor’s wide range of available vehicles Lupton manages to get
away.
The
Doctor and Sarah Jane go to the retreat to see how their buddy Yates
is faring. He’s still hanging in there but has no further Special
Friend activity to report. Speaking of friends, the Doctor and
company make some new ones in the form of Cho Je and Tommy. Cho Je is
a weird white dude who acts like he is Asian and speaks in proverbs.
He’s second in command at the retreat and has nothing to do with
the creepy spider cult, so he’s pretty much okay. Tommy is
basically Lenny from Of Mice and Men, the famous movie with
Gary Sinise. I think they adapted that into a book, too.
Lupton
is upstairs taking a nap and leaves his blue crystal just laying
around. Maybe that’s one of the mystical properties of the crystal
– it inspires its owner to be careless with it. Tommy swipes the
crystal and slowly becomes smarter. Lupton wakes up and is
transported to Metebelis 3. Sarah Jane – who is often more
adventurous than she is smart – hops undetected through the portal
after Lupton.
For
whatever reason Lupton is long gone when Sarah Jane arrives on the
faraway planet, but she does meet up with a bunch of miserable
locals. They’re miserable with good reason, though. The planet is
ruled by spiders, which the locals call Eight Legs. It’s horrible
and unthinkable and quite frankly I don’t know why the suicide rate
on Metebelis 3 wouldn’t be through the roof. For some reason or
other the human inhabitants hide Sarah Jane from their gross masters.
The
Doctor shows up in the TARDIS and meets up with one of the human
Metebelans, who explains how that planet got so gosh-darned awful.
Way back in the day, a bunch of colonists from Earth crashed on
Metebelis 3. These are the humans. Unfortunately, they had a crap
exterminator and their craft had spiders. The blue crystals on
Metebelis 3 caused the spiders to grow in both size and intellect, so
they enslaved the humans and became rulers. I don’t know why the
humans didn’t grow in size and intellect, but whatever. Maybe they
did. Maybe the original colonists were moronic little people.
Side
Note: No matter how much anybody offers to pay you, or how much fame
they promise, or how much prestige seems to be involved; do not ever,
ever,
under any circumstances agree to be a colonist. Nothing good ever
happens to Earth colonists. Not in movies, not on TV, not in books;
certainly not on Doctor Who.
Every single wretched, subjugated, primitive bunch of losers who are
being used as doormats by some disgusting alien species used to be
colonists from Earth. Don’t do it.
The
Doctor hangs out with the Metebelans for a bit before the Eight Legs
show up and he gets blasted for being dressed too nicely. This was
actually a pretty good tease, as I’m sure viewers watching this for
the first time might think this is the end of Mr. Pertwee’s run and
the start of Mr. Baker’s. The human Metebelans are about to throw
the Time Lord out with the trash when Sarah Jane runs outside and
tells them he’s her friend. They drag the Doctor into one of their
houses where he sleeps for a while so other plot stuff can happen.
Over
on the Eight Legs’ side of Metebelis 3 Lupton is getting in over
his head. It turns out his Special Friend is a bit of a rabble rouser
and is plotting against the current Queen of the Eight Legs. Also,
there is a mysterious Great One somewhere on the planet that all of
the Eight Legs hold in pretty high regard. All of the Eight Legs want
Lupton’s blue crystal and he does his best to hide the fact that he
no longer has it, but he is a terrible liar. The Queen tells him had
better go and find it or they’re going to do something to him that
is even worse than having a giant Special Friend inhabiting his body.
I can’t imagine.
Now
that all of that is out of the way the Doctor can wake up again,
which he does by way of sitting bolt upright and saying, “Wakey,
wakey; eggs and bacey!”. This might be my favorite moment in Doctor
Who ever. Unfortunately Sarah Jane managed to get herself
captured while the Doctor was napping, so he sets off for Eight Leg
City (or whatever) to rescue her. Naturally he is captured. The Eight
Legs roll him up in what looks like a sleeping bag made of old man
beard but is clearly supposed to be spider webs. They stick him in a
cell with Sarah Jane and a guy who looks like he could have provided
the beard. He wasn’t comical at all, but for some reason he
reminded me of the crazy old man chained up in the dungeon from that
movie I can’t remember right now.
The
Doctor spends about five minutes fascinated by the cell and the
sleeping bags before he gets bored and uses his sonic screwdriver to
escape. I often wonder if the Doctor intentionally lets himself gets
captured. Maybe he is a jail cell enthusiast.
Anyway,
the Doctor escapes and as he leaves the cell turns around and looks
at Sarah Jane like he just remembered she was there.
“Oh,
yeah… um, just sit tight. I’ll be back… sometime.”
It’s
probably for the best that he left her in what basically amounts to
the Eight Legs’ kitchen, as he is off to see the Great One. If you
haven’t guessed, the Great One is a spider the size of a freaking
house. The Doctor finds her deep within some caves that are just
chock full of blue crystals. She tells him that she needs the one he
stole and he points out that you couldn’t swing a dead cat on
Metebelis 3 without hitting a whole bunch of blue crystals. The Great
One gets all irritated and tells the Doctor that his blue crystal is
THE Blue Crystal and it will give her super Eight Leg powers so she
can conquer the universe or something. The Doctor has serious
problems with people who want to conquer the universe and tells the
massive arachnid no way.
The
next scene manages to be extremely silly, very disturbing, and hugely
effective all at the same time. The Great One uses her psychic powers
to take control of the Doctor’s body and make him march in a circle
while she laughs like a lunatic. It’s silly because Jon Pertwee
might just chew a little bit of scenery and the Great One looks like
the big, fake spider it is. It’s disturbing because we rarely see
the Doctor lose any real control and certainly don’t see him
entirely helpless in such a way (and also because it’s a giant
spider doing it). It’s effective because it shows not only that the
Doctor can be harmed in the worst way he can imagine, but also that
maybe he has grown a bit too long in the tooth in this incarnation
and isn’t quite as spry as he once was.
The
Doctor is terribly upset by this and takes off, presumably to follow
the Great One’s orders to fetch the Blue Crystal. He stops by Eight
Leg City to pick up Sarah Jane and they take the first TARDIS back to
Earth.
Once
there, they meet up with Yates and Tommy and have Cho Je take them to
the man in charge of the retreat place. It turns out he’s a Time
Lord. In fact, he used to live on a hill behind the Doctor’s house
and was something of a mentor and inspiration to him. He left
Gallifrey under different circumstances than the Doctor and
regenerated to live on Earth.
While
all of this is going on, Tommy is outside guarding the door. Lupton’s
goons show up – now each with a Special Friend – and demand that
he let them in. Tommy is the bravest of the brave and won’t budge,
so they blast him with Sith lightning. Tommy writhes in pain and…
Totally
recovers! Lupton’s men rush him and he totally whoops them. I think
he even chokeslammed one of them.
Back
in the room, we see that Tommy gave the Blue Crystal to the Doctor’s
mentor. As soon as this is revealed Sarah Jane goes all nuts and
starts talking in a spider voice, demanding that they give her the
Blue Crystal. Instead, the Doctor grabs the Crystal and uses it to
release his companion from the Eight Leg Queen’s control.
By
this time Lupton’s goons have overpowered Tommy and they burst into
the room and blast Yates and the Doctor’s mentor. The Doctor uses
the crystal to free them from the control of the Special Friends and
they just sort of wander off.
Yates
and Tommy both turn out to be okay. The Doctor’s mentor – who is
visibly failing – says that Tommy survived due to his innocence and
Yates’ compassion allowed him to live through the lightning blast.
The mentor, on the other hand, has to regenerate. He explains that
Cho Je is merely a projection of his own mind and then morphs into
him. This bothered me because I liked the old guy and found Cho Je
really irritating. Whatever.
The
newly regenerated mentor helps the Doctor realize that his arrogance
and thieving ways (which they describe as “thirst for knowledge”
so as not to make him sound like too much of a jerk) caused
all of these problems and that he must face his fear and return the
Blue Crystal to the Great One.
The
Doctor tells Sarah Jane and Yates goodbye and says he may not see
them again, but that this is the only way. He gets in the TARDIS and
returns to the caves of Metebelis 3.
Once
inside, the Great One explains to the Doctor that the web she sits in
is an extension of her own mind and that once he places the Blue
Crystal in the center she will have infinite psychic power. The
Doctor warns her against this, once again proving himself to be the
ultimate humanitarian. He always gives the villains a chance to stop
before it’s too late. But the Great One orders him to place the
Blue Crystal in the web.
The
Great One experiences a brief moment of universal awareness before
the Blue Crystal overloads her psychic web, destroying her and
killing the rest of the Eight Legs. The Doctor is hit by the
resulting blast of radiation and barely manages to make it back to
the TARDIS.
Back
on Earth in UNIT headquarters, the Brigadier and Sarah Jane Smith are
discussing the Doctor when a familiar wheezing sound fades in. The
TARDIS appears in the corner of the laboratory and the Doctor
stumbles out, clearly ailing.
“I
got lost in the Time Vortex… the TARDIS brought me home…”
And
then the Time Lord fell to the floor. The Brigadier looks on as a
weeping Sarah Jane cradles the Doctor’s head. She looks up at the
Brig and says he is dead, but then Cho Je appears, floating above the
floor. He tells them the Doctor is just mostly dead and that
it is time for him to regenerate. The Brigadier says, “Not again,”
which was hilarious and not just a little insensitive. And then,
right before everybody’s eyes, the Doctor’s face morphed into a
newer, younger visage.
Notes:
-Despite
all the time and effort they spent developing Mike Yates, this was
his last appearance on Doctor Who
until The Five Doctors.
I like Yates a lot and would have been happy to get more of him.
-It
occurred to me while writing about this story that out of all the
Doctors, Doctor Three is the one that we have the best representation
of how long he actually lasted story-wise. Since he did not have
access to the TARDIS’ time/space travel functions it means there is
significantly less possibility for adventures we have not witnessed.
With any of the other Doctors there is almost no limit to the number
of adventures that could take place between the televised stories.
Jon Pertwee’s Doctor only had access to a functioning TARDIS for a
short time and we witnessed most of that time period. I wonder how
this has been worked with in the novels and comics and whatnot.
-This
is the first time the process of Time Lord regeneration was
explained. The Doctor’s mentor says that once a Time Lord’s body
becomes too old or fragile they can generate a new one.
-Pertwee's
death scene was fantastic - Elizabeth Sladen's performance was great
and sold it in a way that no amount of acting from Pertwee could
have.
Come
back next time for Robot, which is the next story in the
series and the first full story for Tom Baker, the fourth Doctor!
I’ve seen it a couple of times before, but I’m excited to revisit
it with a critic’s eye. Tom Baker is My Doctor, so it’s going to
be interesting to see just how impartially I can judge what I
remember being some pretty shoddy special effects at the end.
-Phantom
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