Who do you love? 20: The Myth Makers
A thing to love about The Myth Makers: Contrasts. The story is driven by contrasts. A lot of the humour derives from a juxtaposition of the epic and the banal, sometimes through two opposing characters (Paris reacting against Cassandra), sometimes through a single character reacting to his environment (typically Odysseus). (Vicki gets the best of these lines, of course - “Troilus has been very kind to me and I'm very fond of him and if all you can do is make fun…” as she and Steven are desperately trying to escape the overrun city). And, of course, the grim, bloodthirsty energy of the last episode is a stark contrast to the smart but throwaway verbal humour of the first three.
This is a change from the emphasis of Season 2. Season 2 isn't so much about carefully crafted contrasts as it is about juxapositions, throwing two unrelated things next to each other and seeing what happens. The Tosh/Wiles period at the start of Season 3 is much more consciously put together.
There's also a nice echo of Marco Polo here. For the characters in Marco Polo, their only victory comes from being themselves in circumstances they can't control. The characters in The Myth Makers grimly carry on being themselves in circumstances they can't control, but it doesn't work for them. They're focused on an ultimate victory that they can't achieve carrying on the way they've been. Everyone's unique characteristics are brought to bear on the task of making an unbearable situation last even longer and be even more unbearable. Cassandra, whose gift is for telling the truth, just makes things annoying for everyone else; Paris, who has no gift for fighting is in charge of the war; Odysseus, out of character compared to his portrayal in Homer, keeps trying tactics that don't change things enough to break the logjam. Only the characters that change can possibly come out ahead. The tricksters; the self-transformers; the myth makers.
And of course here it's Odysseus who's empowered by interaction with the Doctor to turn from a frustrated, unsubtle warlord to the trickster that he's remembered as, and it's Odysseus who breaks into the city and wins. Who breaks into the city in a horse that isn't a horse, while the Doctor escapes in his box that isn't a box, leaving behind his princess who isn't a princess.