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

Change, My Dear. And It Seems Not A Moment Too Soon.

Jan 23 2018
Change, My Dear. And It Seems Not A Moment Too Soon.

Wow, forty days went by quickly. Considering I spent over two months each with the First, Second, and Third Doctors, and a full three months with the Fourth, it seems like Five came and went at blinding speed. It will only get worse from here, Six should only take me about three weeks. In any case, as of this morning I have finished the Peter Davison era and am now tumbling into Colin Baker's. I also woke up fat this morning, which was a bit frustrating, so it seems like getting below 240 is going to be a real battle. Which I guess is fine, but I have become just competitive enough to want to cross that next milestone.  Time will tell.

So let's talk about Peter Davison's last day as the Doctor.

The Caves of Androzani - Parts 3 & 4

(TARDIS Data Core recap)

The Doctor and Peri are both afflicted with toxemia from being exposed to the raw source of the wonder drug everybody is fighting over. There is an antidote, but it requires a quest into the deepest part of the caves where there is little or no oxygen in order to harvest the milk from a queen bat, because of course. Meanwhile there are lots of twists and turns and double-crosses, and along the way basically everybody dies. I mean, seriously, it's a complete bloodbath, exactly the kind of thing that made Tegan leave at the end of the last story and exactly the kind of thing for which Peri is completely unprepared.

In the end the Doctor is able to get a small quantity of the magical queen bat milk, enough to cure Peri but not enough to cure himself. He regenerates, hallucinating visions of all of his past companions (to the point where Matthew Waterhouse and Sarah Sutton got special contracts for what amounted to a couple of two-second head-only cameos, and writer Johnny Byrne got paid royalty fees for Nyssa's appearance).

Interestingly, the implication from the cliffhanger at the end of the third episode is that the Doctor spends the entire fourth episode holding back his regeneration, not unlike the Tenth and Twelfth Doctors do at the end of their respective eras.

Also interestingly, with the way the story plays out it is clear that the Doctor himself had no positive influence whatsoever on the outcome of events. Arguably everything would have turned out better if he had never shown up. It is a surprisingly nihilistic turn of events very unlike the series norm.

Also also interestingly, this is the very first time in the show's history where, following the regeneration, the new Doctor gets a line of dialog. That became the norm in the modern series, but here it is for the first time. Peri has no idea what is going on, the Doctor regenerates, and the new Doctor seems positively sinister and dismissive when he sits up - first berating and taunting Peri as she stutters in confusion ("That's three 'I's in one breath, makes you sound a rather egotistical young lady..."), and then, in response to Peri asking what has happened, he darkly states, "Change, my dear. And it seems not a moment too soon."

The Fifth Doctor era was generally more cerebral and tilted towards hard science fiction and away from the action and comedy beats of his immediate predecessor. I appreciate that quite a bit, and genuinely like the more high-concept stories like Castrovalva and Kinda / Snakedance. The missteps were few and far between, with clunkers such as Warriors of the Deep a rarity.

Behind the scenes, though, the die had already been cast. Peter Davison got out at just the right time, and left on a very high note. It's kind of all downhill from here for the classic era.

STATS:

Doctor(s): Fifth, Sixth
Companion(s): Peri
Episode(s): The Caves of Androzani - Parts 3 & 4
Steps Walked: 7,664 today, 2,203,350 total
Distance Walked: 4.40 miles today, 1,132.40 miles total
Weight: 245.54 lbs (five day moving average), net change -61.76 lbs


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