Watching Classic Who: The Tomb of the Cybermen
I managed to watch the Second Doctor serial The Tomb of the Cybermen this week.
The once-feared Cybermen have disappeared without trace from the universe then an expedition from Earth arrives on Telos, the home world of the Cybermen, to try to discover exactly what has become of the silver giants. Shortly thereafter the Doctor, Jamie and Victoria join the archaeological party that's exploring, and then the first mysterious death occurs. The group of archaeologists find themsleves stranded on Telos after their rocket is sabotaged and it quickly becomes clear that the Cybermen may not be as 'dead' as was first thought as beneath the planet's surface, there lie giant ice-tombs which hold the last remains of the Cybermen in a frozen sleep. And someone is working to re-activate them from their slumber.
This story was my first with the Second Doctor's companion Victoria - it was recommended to me by biichan after I read her lovely Martha/Victoria fic.
And I have to say that initially Victoria didn't make that big an impression as she seemed a bit scream-y sometimes, but later she was prepared to stand up to the captain of the rocket when he was being a pain, and to Kaftan, one of the two people who thought bringing back the Cybermen was a good thing...
I noted that Two and Jamie were very touchy-feely with each other, which made me snigger rather a lot - that's what I get for noting the story that Frazer Hines and Patrick Troughton deliberately played their interactions as gay.
I have to say that I don't find the Cybermen in this story at all scary. They are far too clearly just men in funny silver suits - they're difficult to understand as well. I've no idea what technology was used to create their voices but it failed miserably in making them sound even remotely menacing. I'd definitely sooner meet a Classic Who Cyberman than a New Who one ! And the Cybermats were very "meh" !
However, I'm really coming to understand the adoration that some of my FList has for the Second Doctor - even though this story's not that brilliant for the most part, Patrick Troughton's Second Doctor is by turns sarcastic, intelligent, playful and even occasionally belligerent. His oft-quoted speech to Victoria about his family "sleeping in his mind" is even more lovely in its context (even though I didn't know precisely what had happened to Victoria's father until I hit Wiki this morning). The bit where he checks the level of Kleig's insanity made me laugh out loud, but my favourite Doctor line was definitely: "Keeping my eyes open and my mouth shut!" in response to Kleig's question about how the Doctor managed to work out the logical sequence for opening the hatch that leads down into the Tombs...
The once-feared Cybermen have disappeared without trace from the universe then an expedition from Earth arrives on Telos, the home world of the Cybermen, to try to discover exactly what has become of the silver giants. Shortly thereafter the Doctor, Jamie and Victoria join the archaeological party that's exploring, and then the first mysterious death occurs. The group of archaeologists find themsleves stranded on Telos after their rocket is sabotaged and it quickly becomes clear that the Cybermen may not be as 'dead' as was first thought as beneath the planet's surface, there lie giant ice-tombs which hold the last remains of the Cybermen in a frozen sleep. And someone is working to re-activate them from their slumber.
This story was my first with the Second Doctor's companion Victoria - it was recommended to me by biichan after I read her lovely Martha/Victoria fic.
And I have to say that initially Victoria didn't make that big an impression as she seemed a bit scream-y sometimes, but later she was prepared to stand up to the captain of the rocket when he was being a pain, and to Kaftan, one of the two people who thought bringing back the Cybermen was a good thing...
I noted that Two and Jamie were very touchy-feely with each other, which made me snigger rather a lot - that's what I get for noting the story that Frazer Hines and Patrick Troughton deliberately played their interactions as gay.
I have to say that I don't find the Cybermen in this story at all scary. They are far too clearly just men in funny silver suits - they're difficult to understand as well. I've no idea what technology was used to create their voices but it failed miserably in making them sound even remotely menacing. I'd definitely sooner meet a Classic Who Cyberman than a New Who one ! And the Cybermats were very "meh" !
However, I'm really coming to understand the adoration that some of my FList has for the Second Doctor - even though this story's not that brilliant for the most part, Patrick Troughton's Second Doctor is by turns sarcastic, intelligent, playful and even occasionally belligerent. His oft-quoted speech to Victoria about his family "sleeping in his mind" is even more lovely in its context (even though I didn't know precisely what had happened to Victoria's father until I hit Wiki this morning). The bit where he checks the level of Kleig's insanity made me laugh out loud, but my favourite Doctor line was definitely: "Keeping my eyes open and my mouth shut!" in response to Kleig's question about how the Doctor managed to work out the logical sequence for opening the hatch that leads down into the Tombs...