My mind boggles to even say this, but as of today I have walked over two million steps on the treadmill since starting this ridiculous project. How wild is that? No joke, in the past ten months I have walked the equivalent of going from my house to Hartford, Connecticut (where a winter storm is about to dump twelve inches of snow overnight, brr!) Just typing that has made me tired, I think I might go take a nap.

But first, let's talk about today's story.

Earthshock - Parts 1 & 2

(TARDIS Data Core recap)

I am sure you will be shocked to hear that Wesley Crusher Adric is an annoying little prick in the first part of this story. He's all "everybody picks on me and makes fun of me, and I don't know whyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!!!", to which the Doctor does not reply, "...because you are an annoying little prick." Instead, the Doctor lands the TARDIS inside of a cave system on Earth c.2526 and decides to take a stroll by himself rather than punching Adric in the face. Tegan and Nyssa follow the Doctor out and for some reason beg him to come back and be nice to Adric, who has stayed behind in order to show off his Mathematical Excellence by plotting a course back to E-Space even though he totally doesn't even really want to go back there. He just wants to stomp around and be all pouty.

Fortunately, out in the caves there are a couple of androids running around murdering humans and protecting a hidden hatch. Well, I mean, not fortunate for said murdered humans, but at least fortunate for us viewers who desperately want to see anything besides teenage angst. As per usual, the Doctor and friends get blamed initially for all the murdering. Then there is a big firefight between the humans and the androids. Then there is a time bomb that, in a shocking twist, turns out to have been set by CYBERMEN!!!

Of course the Doctor does a Very Clever Thing to disarm the bomb, then tracks the signal controlling the bomb to a location in deep space, and follows said signal to a freighter. Unfortunately, there are several murdered humans there as well, and the Doctor and Adric get captured and blamed for said murdering. As per usual.

Oh, in the first episode there are also a bunch of dinosaur fossils, which leads to a discussion about the Extinction Level Event that wiped out the dinosaurs, which couldn't possibly be foreshadowing at all. (It totally is.)

I snark a lot, mostly because I hate Adric with a passion and can hardly wait until tomorrow when he dies (SPOILER ALERT). That being said, this is a rock-solid story with plenty of good non-Adric stuff going on. At the time it first aired, they managed to keep the Cyberman involvement completely under wraps so that the big reveal at the end of episode one would be a real shocker. At that point it had been seven years since their last appearance in Revenge of the Cybermen, so nobody saw it coming. This particular story also saw the highest overall ratings for Doctor Who during the 1980's John Nathan Turner era.

Tomorrow, then, is the big day. I can hardly wait to unwrap my present!

STATS:

Doctor(s): Fifth
Companion(s): Adric, Tegan, Nyssa
Episode(s): Earthshock - Parts 1 & 2
Steps Walked: 7,480 today, 2,003,563 total
Distance Walked: 4.10 miles today, 1,022.23 miles total
Weight: 246.62 lbs (five day moving average), net change -60.68 lbs