Back in January of this year I went to a tech conference in Colorado for the DNN platform, and the conference mascot was a Yeti. Over the course of the conference I wrote this silly song in which the chorus goes, "He's a DNN Yeti, yet he knows he has to keep on his toes before his bug list grows..." As I watched the first two episodes of The Abominable Snowmen this morning, I had that song stuck in my head on a loop. Go figure. As for the story itself, I had my doubts but so far I am enjoying it.

Let's talk about that.

The Abominable Snowmen - Episodes 1 & 2

(TARDIS Data Core recap)

The first thing to know about The Abominable Snowmen is that there isn't any snow. I am sure that wasn't by design, I think they fully expected to go film on location in the Nant Ffrancon mountain pass in North Wales expecting to find plenty of snow, but were stymied by annoyingly nice weather. Ah, well, what can you do?

The second thing to know is that, although the yeti look adorable and cuddly in still pictures, they are still fearsome beasts. More importantly, they aren't really the baddies of the story. They are just the tools of Padmasambhava, a disembodied voice that I presume will turn out to be The Great Intelligence at some point but at this point is simply mysterious and cunning. 

Being another six-parter, the story has a very comfortable slow burn to it. Thus far it does not feel padded at all, rather it is carefully playing out the characters and the locale. There is the Detsen Monastery in the mountains of Tibet, where the Doctor has apparently visited before. The monastery has both monks and warriors in residence, and there is also an English explorer named Travers who is searching for proof of the mysterious yeti. The night before his expedition partner was killed, and upon the Doctor's arrival Travers quickly accuses him of the murder. The monks themselves have also recently lost four of their number to presumed yeti attacks.

Meanwhile, the Abbot is secluded in private meditation where it turns out he is communing with Padmasambhava, the ancient spiritual guide of the monastery. There is a chilling scene in which the hidden voice first speaks calmly and sweetly, and then changes to a much more disturbing and deranged tone when it realizes the Doctor is there and my thwart its plans (whatever they may be).

By the end of the second episode, the Doctor has managed to capture a yeti with the help of the warriors, and has learned that the yeti are not flesh and blood, but are actually robots. They are apparently either powered by or controlled by a large silver sphere plugged into a hidden pouch in their abdomen. As a longtime fan of the movie Phantasm, you can imagine how creeped out I was at the sight of a pyramid of silver spheres, not to mention the later scene where one of the spheres is moving of its own volition. One presumes, though, that it will not sprout spikes and being flying around sucking out brains. But you never know.

I sincerely wish that the first episode still existed on film, if only to see Patrick Troughton's performance as he rummaged around in a large trunk early on looking for a particular artifact. At one point he pulls out a thing that looks like a weird chandelier covered in bells, and he is completely delighted. When Jamie asks if that is the "Holy Ghanta" that he has been searching for, the Doctor replies, "Oh, no, it's just so nice to see this again..." It's just such a perfectly Doctor-ish moment, and I wish I could have seen Patrick Troughton's facial expressions.

Anyway, thus far the story has been mostly setup and character introductions, with a few moment's of action. I am really looking forward to getting into the meat of the story tomorrow. This is good stuff, and exactly the kind of thing that keeps me motivated to get on that treadmill every single day.

STATS:

Doctor(s): Second
Companion(s): Jamie McCrimmon, Victoria Waterfield
Episode(s): The Abominable Snowmen - Episodes 1 & 2
Steps Walked: 6,934 today, 600,205 total
Distance Walked:  3.48 miles today, 285.97 miles total
Weight: 280.08 lbs (five day moving average), net change -27.22 lbs