Doctor Who: "The Crusade"
There are only two missing episodes from Season Two (it is the shortest season of early Who at 39 episodes, but not really that much shorter than the other Hartnell/Troughton seasons), and if there were to be two missing episodes from this season, we would rather they were from "The Space Museum" or "The Chase". "The Crusade" is a very solid historical and the audio tracks for episodes 2 and 4 unfortunately don't allow us to imagine what is going on as easily as is the case for the missing episodes of the more straightforward Base under Siege story of "The Moonbase". With the "The Reign of Terror" shortly to be released with its two missing episodes, we can hope that "The Crusade" might be revisited. I could certainly do with revisiting it myself. It's a over two years since I saw it and there are a great many potentially ticklish obstacles to be navigated here by the production, although I think on the whole I think there are navigated successfully, although it is a pity that the BBC resorted to blackface. This is very far from the debacle it might have been in less sensitive hands, but I think a second "viewing" is in order with an eye to determine just how orientalist the story is.
I recall a duplicated sheet from second year history with a cartoon of Richard the Lionheart and Saladin shaking hand and a caption declaring that the Third Crusade was a draw. Saladin was "our" kind of "Turk" in popular imagination (mostly it seems owing to Sir Walter Scott), which helps to make the whole production less freighted than it might have been - or might be today. As with "The Aztecs", we get some cod-Shakespearean dialogue, but, with actors as skilled and well-cast as Julian Glover, it works in context and the audience of the time probably would have expected it, being more familiar with that kind of thing than today's. Bill Russell gets to do much the kind of thing that we got to do in The Adventures of Sir Lancelot and Barbara has a meaty subplot. I'd need to see it again to determine just how similar Barbara's predicament here is at one point to her predicament at one point in "The Keys of Marinus".
"The Crusade" has a special place in Doctor Who lore as one of the three DW novels were published in the 1960s. It was Whittaker's most substantial script up to that point so it is perhaps little wonder that he chose it as the one to novelise. I remember my eldest brother returning excitedly from Hewitt's, our local newsagent, to announce that three DW novels were now available. The copy of Doctor Who and the Crusaders, with its wonderful Chris Achilleos cover, might still be in the house in Preston somewhere, along with the other two and some other DW novels I got later. I remember considering it a curious object as a child - pure historicals were something that belonged to a remote age. Sadly I don't think I have ever read it; certainly, if I did, I don't recall anything of it other than its mere existence, but there must be lots of fans (my brother amongst them?) who did need read. Indeed, there must have a number of fans who during the interregnum between 1966 and 1973 came across it in libraries and jumble sales and the bookshelves of their elder siblings. I wonder what they made of it and I wonder how it stands up now.
Now Write On...
I can't see the BBC doing the Levant in the studio these days. But, heck, they could go there on location. What about something set in C9th Baghdad or C12th Alamut? The Doctor and co. turn up at Alamut to consult a rare manuscript in the library The Doctor finds himself investigating a series of murders - in a fortress of assassins. This could be a homage to The Name of the Rose as well as to the richness of Islamic culture. The shadow of orientalism lies heavy, but a writer of sensitivity with knowledge of the period could do something very interesting here I think without falling into those traps.
I recall a duplicated sheet from second year history with a cartoon of Richard the Lionheart and Saladin shaking hand and a caption declaring that the Third Crusade was a draw. Saladin was "our" kind of "Turk" in popular imagination (mostly it seems owing to Sir Walter Scott), which helps to make the whole production less freighted than it might have been - or might be today. As with "The Aztecs", we get some cod-Shakespearean dialogue, but, with actors as skilled and well-cast as Julian Glover, it works in context and the audience of the time probably would have expected it, being more familiar with that kind of thing than today's. Bill Russell gets to do much the kind of thing that we got to do in The Adventures of Sir Lancelot and Barbara has a meaty subplot. I'd need to see it again to determine just how similar Barbara's predicament here is at one point to her predicament at one point in "The Keys of Marinus".
"The Crusade" has a special place in Doctor Who lore as one of the three DW novels were published in the 1960s. It was Whittaker's most substantial script up to that point so it is perhaps little wonder that he chose it as the one to novelise. I remember my eldest brother returning excitedly from Hewitt's, our local newsagent, to announce that three DW novels were now available. The copy of Doctor Who and the Crusaders, with its wonderful Chris Achilleos cover, might still be in the house in Preston somewhere, along with the other two and some other DW novels I got later. I remember considering it a curious object as a child - pure historicals were something that belonged to a remote age. Sadly I don't think I have ever read it; certainly, if I did, I don't recall anything of it other than its mere existence, but there must be lots of fans (my brother amongst them?) who did need read. Indeed, there must have a number of fans who during the interregnum between 1966 and 1973 came across it in libraries and jumble sales and the bookshelves of their elder siblings. I wonder what they made of it and I wonder how it stands up now.
Now Write On...
I can't see the BBC doing the Levant in the studio these days. But, heck, they could go there on location. What about something set in C9th Baghdad or C12th Alamut? The Doctor and co. turn up at Alamut to consult a rare manuscript in the library The Doctor finds himself investigating a series of murders - in a fortress of assassins. This could be a homage to The Name of the Rose as well as to the richness of Islamic culture. The shadow of orientalism lies heavy, but a writer of sensitivity with knowledge of the period could do something very interesting here I think without falling into those traps.