The second Doctor, portrayed by the wonderful Patrick Troughton! The Galactic hobo, energetic, eccentric, this was a Doctor who was much more of a clown, with this added energy came a new dimension to Doctor Who, suddenly the doctor could get more involved in the action, he could run, he could jump, he could... Stop and play cards in the street.
Tomb Of The Cybermen, one of my all-time favourites sees the Doctor, Jamie and Vicky visit Telos, the second home of the now extinct Cybermen (their first home world being Mondas, which the first Doctor destroyed). They come across an archaeological group, trying to find some evidence of what caused the Cybermen to die out but what they find is that the cybermen never died out, they just formed a plan and waited for people intelligent enough to stumble across their tombs. I won’t spoil the true intentions of the Cybermen for those who haven’t seen it, but it’s certainly worth a watch, especially as it’s not exactly humans Vs. Cybermen…
So what do I love about this episode? Pretty much everything! I love the design of the Cybermen, the freaky letterbox mouths, they are distinctively creepy, even by my standards (regular readers will know I’m a horror film fan!). I love the Cybermats, if you don’t know what they are think of what you’d get if a rat became a cyber-rat… The sets are well done and are unusually convincing for the era and the budget they were on!
Ordinarily I would say that there is no way on Earth you can miss this one, go out and buy it now! But this episode is not as simple as that, this episode is one of the many which were partly or completely wiped, there is an audiobook available and the DVD with missing episodes replaced by animated ones is being released in August of this year, so look out for that.
What can I tell you about this episode, again staring the Doctor, Jamie and Vicky this time arriving in the distant future. Since this DVD is released in a matter of months I’ll spoil very little for you, but I will say they are very soon set upon by creatures awakened from the Ice, the Ice Warriors. Armed and dangerous the doctor must try to prevent the machinery falling into the hands of the Ice Warriors.
So what do I love about this episode? The Ice Warriors! The look of them is so cool, they really are pretty freaky, the way they talk, the way their mouths don’t sync up with the words they speak, it just adds to their creepy effect. The acting in this episode if just fantastic, especially from Vicky...
This episode is one of the first I saw from the second Doctor’s era, and is one of my all-time favourites. It begins at the end of the last adventure, a volcano is going of and lava is spilling over the land. Seeing this the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe get into the TARDIS and attempt to take off, but the mechanism jams and they are unable to leave. Panicking Jamie reminds the Doctor of an emergency unit the TARDIS has, the Doctor doesn’t want to use it, because “It removes the TARDIS from time and space!” Jamie forces the Doctor to use it, and soon they arrive… nowhere. Where they are lured outside away from the TARDIS and begin an adventure to get back to it and to reality.
It’s so creative! The forest of words, robots, Rapunzel, Medusa, the riddles all gets a place in this episode, I find it so creative it’s really fun, so fun I once took a day of school to watch it! (I’m that much of a Geek!). The sets might not be perfect, but they’re fun, and the clockwork solders really do send a slight shiver down my spine!