One fat geek's SUCCESSFUL attempt to regenerate into a not-so-fat geek by watching the entirety of Doctor Who while walking on a treadmill

I am He and He is Me

Aug 16 2017
I am He and He is Me

After missing my treadmill session yesterday, I was bound and determined to get it in today. I barely managed it between my main work shift and a working dinner tonight (poor me, I had to go to a fantastical catered dinner with amazing food and live entertainment at the Bellagio, I am sure you are weeping for my plight). That being said, I am truly on my last legs right now. But as I said, I did manage to watch the first two episodes of the very excellent The Three Doctors.

Let's talk about that.

The Three Doctors - Episodes 1 & 2

(TARDIS Data Core recap)

Where to even start with this amazing story? For Christmas of 1972 the BBC celebrated the start of the tenth season of Doctor Who by crafting a story in which all three Doctors appear together. Sadly, because of poor health William Hartnell was limited to filming just a few lines of dialog for each episode. Even though he was confined to a chair (in-story his Doctor was trapped inside a time eddy and unable to physically join his two later incarnations), he was still given his moments to shine in the story. 

The moments with the Second Doctor interacting with the Brigadier and with Sergeant Benton are just pure gold. As per usual, Nicholas Courtney is priceless as the straight man remaining both incredulous and unflappable as he is confronted with the Doctor's previous incarnation. I have readily admitted many times that the Second Doctor is my Doctor, and so I was delighted to have him back again (if only for a very short time). After so many years of stories set with UNIT, the first episode finally gives Sergeant Benton his "it's bigger on the inside" moment as he steps inside the TARDIS for the first time, and then in the second episode the Brigadier gets his own moment as well. Both scenes are instant classics.

Best of all, this is actually a very clever and engaging story to boot. The danger would always be for the anniversary episode to become overstuffed with cameos and winking references to past adventures, but that never really happens here. This is very clearly the Third Doctor's story and Jo Grant is the companion, and that's that. With some kind of strange faster-than-light energy source seeking out the Doctor and endangering the source of the Time Lords' power, the Doctor is cast into a mission to discover the source of the anti-matter disturbance emanating from a black hole. By the end of the second episode the true nemesis Omega has only been briefly glimpsed, the Third Doctor and Jo have been transported through to the other side of the black hole, and in the closing moments pretty much all of UNIT is teleported away along with the Second Doctor. 

My sole criticism of the story so far is that there is a weird bit of padding in the second episode where a secondary character decides to try to escape Omega's lair. He spends about ninety seconds of screen time running around different corridors being blocked at every turn before he eventually ends up right back where he started.  It was a strange little scene that did nothing for plot and truly seemed to exist only to burn up some running time. Other than that, though, I just love this story so much. Of course, it is also one of only two Third Doctor stories that I had already seen previously, so that might color my perceptions a bit. Watching this again is like returning to an old friend, on several levels. As a tenth anniversary special it just hits me in the feels in all the right places.

I am really looking forward to watching the second half of the story tomorrow afternoon.

STATS:

Doctor(s): First, Second, Third
Companion(s): Jo Grant, Lethbridge-Stewart
Episode(s): The Three Doctors - Episodes 1 & 2
Steps Walked: 7,554 today, 1,136,052 total
Distance Walked: 3.97 miles today, 559.53 miles total
Weight: 264.00 lbs (five day moving average), net change -43.30 lbs


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