Doctor Who:
Four To Doomsday
By Terrance Dudley
“Now listen to me, you
young idiot. You're not so much gullible as idealistic. I suppose it comes from
your deprived delinquent background. Monarch is the greatest being in the known
universe for evil. He will destroy Earth and much more if he's not stopped.”
The newly regenerated
Doctor fresh and renewed after his run in with The Master at Castrovalva appears
to have materialized on a spaceship.
Well things aren’t all that it seems as there are representatives from
different cultures from Earth’s history.
Humans that, most logically, be long dead and definitely shouldn’t be on
a spaceship headed to present day Earth.
Then there is Monarch.
Ruler of the Urbankans and a creature who thinks he is god. Together with his
cohorts Enlightment and Persuasion plans on taking over the Earth. He plans on doing this with a poison that he
has that will kill all life on Earth allowing Monarch to populate the Earth
with his androids and strip it of its minerals for his ship so he can go back
in time to see himself as god . So it’s up to The Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan to
save Earth from invasion and to also prevent a gullible and naive Adric from
making another idiotic decision.
Four to Doomsday is not
one of the better stories in the Fifth Doctor’s era as it could have been
better as the overall plot isn’t bad. I liked the story about Monarch coming to
earth every so many thousands of years to study Earth and to take it over to
strip it of its minerals. That part of
the story isn’t bad and having Bigon as an android with a conscience and able
to think for himself about right and wrong was a pretty decent idea. The overall plot wasn’t really a problem what
was the problem was the execution of it and what happened later.
First off Adric and Tegan
just weren’t as we would know them to be.
Tegan is so much more afraid and nervous and this is coming after an
encounter with The Master. I do not hink
she would have really panicked like that and attempt to fly the TARDIS like she
did. She really flies off the handle and isn’t what she truly is and I feel
that just didn’t work or endear he to fans.
Adric is also way out of
character as he was easily taken in by Monarch.
You would have thought he would be smarter than that. After his time with the Fourth Doctor you
would have thought he would not believe every alien he meets as being friendly
and true to his word. Plus he is very short
tempered and confrontational with the two girls. I bet Tegan felt pretty good knocking him out
when he tried to get the TARDIS key from him.
Four to Doomsday also has
a really dumb moment with The Doctor using the cricket ball in space to give
him momentum to get to the TARDIS. I found this really farfetched even for
Doctor Who and didn’t really believe it could happen. Plus it looks pretty stupid also and the
effect hasn’t aged well either.
Four to Doomsday is not a
bad story to watch per say but it does have some weird moments in it and
characters not really what they should be.
Maybe the fact that it was the first story in the production order might
have something to do with it as the other stories this season were a lot better
in the characterization of the main characters.
Grade C
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