Doctor Who:
State of Decay
By Terrance Dicks
“Hence it is the directive
of Rassilon that any Time Lord who comes upon this enemy of our people and of
all living things, shall use all his efforts to destroy him, even at the cost
of his own life.”
Still trapped in E- Space
the TARDIS materializes on an unknown planet that seems to be like medieval
times back on Earth. There on the planet
the local villagers fear The Three Who Rule.
The Three Who Rule have banned all technology and all learning and
anyone caught doing it will be put to death.
The villagers are also in fear of their sons being picked in the
selection and sent to the castle where they are sacrificed are drained of blood
to feed the Three Who Rule but more importantly the Great Vampire living below
the castle.
The Doctor tells Romana
that it is the responsibility of every Time Lord to destroy vampires but more
importantly The Great Vampire. The only
way to kill the Great One is with a bowship and there are none around. With the help of the villagers and some
ingenuity to use the castle as a bowship it is up to The Doctor to save Romana
and Adric from the vampires and to destroy the ancient enemy of Rassilon and
the Time Lords the Great Vampire once and for all.
Edward and Bella, Sookie
and Bill and other sappy vampire couples are second rate compared to Zargo and
Camilla. Zargo and Camilla along with
Aukon is Doctor Who’s one true vampire couple. Long before the Matt Smith story
“The Vampires of Venice” this classic story by long time Who scribe and fan
favorite Terrance Dicks actually boasts human vampires and a really cool
castle.
The State of Decay is the
second part of The E- Space Trilogy and heralded by some to be the best story
of the three. I tend to agree. Some may say that State of Decay is downright
scary and has a creepy feel to it. For
example when Romana cuts her finger while clanking glasses with The Doctor the
look on Camilla’s face is downright creepy as you know she wants to suck up
that blood. The atmosphere of this episode really makes it one of those stories
that you tend to remember long after watching it.
It is also a very
interesting story in the fact that Terrance Dicks delves us into more Timelord
history and their involvement in a war with the Great Vampire. Yes it seems the Timelords were a warmonger
race well before they fought in the Time War.
But it is also great to see the Doctor scared as he is reading the
history of the Timelords involvement with the vampires that you tend to get
scared yourself. It is just a classic
scene finding out more about the history of the Time Lords. Imagine how the Doctor must feel like knowing
it is his solemn duty as a Timelord to eradicate the universe of vampires and
he happens upon the king of all vampires who happens to be feeding off an IV of
blood that Arkon has gathered from sacrificing the villagers.
My fond recollection of
watching this story is mainly that the Doctor is fighting vampires and a return
to the gothic feel Tom Bakers earlier stories had. A group of three vampires that is in a word
very odd and very scary. One hell bent
on terrorizing the villagers and the other two who seem to be living an
extremely bizarre love life. Plus it
also has a great story of the villagers rising up against their oppressors and
winning their freedom. That formula was
a staple of most Doctor Who stories but mainly from the Jon Pertwee era where
Terrance Dicks did most of his writing for the show but it was good to see that
in a Tom Baker story.
Doctor Who didn’t do
vampires very often if at all and when they did way back in 1980 with a story
Terrance Dicks wrote back in 1977 they succeeded in giving us and Season 18 a
wonderful and scary story. Imagine
opening up the fuel tanks and seeing it filled with blood. Really chilling and cool at the same
time. The gothic feel to this story
helps with the horror story feel to State of Decay. State of Decay is a wonderful story that gets
lost in the shuffle when talking about the best stories of the Tom Baker era
and this one should be right up there.
Grade B +
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