Doctor Who Season 2 - in review
Season 1
Doctor Who's second season was a time of both consolidation and change for the show, which by 1965 was firmly cemented in the Saturday teatime viewing schedule a new episode every week for 10 months of the year. During nine adventures told over 39 episodes, season two saw the start of what has since become a well established tradition of cast change, as the Doctor's beloved granddaughter Susan left to start a new life with David Campbell on 22nd century Earth, while schoolteachers Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright later returned to their home in London 1965, their places aboard the TARDIS taken by futuristic orphan Vicki and space pilot Steven Taylor.
This is a lovely era of the show, it really is. The cast, writers and production team were now well settled in, telling wonderfully varied stories still early enough in the show's run to feel fresh and ambitious rather than formulaic. With each adventure written to follow on from the last as one long ongoing story, a story more focused on character than on plot, there is a sense of continuity and development that feels almost modern, albeit distinctly 1960s in style and delivery, and I've tried to capture that in these reviews, delving into the characters, their experiences and evolving dynamics.
Doctor Who fans often tell new viewers to pick and choose which serials to watch, blithely claiming that it is okay to jump in anywhere and to skip around at random, and to be sure that is one way of becoming familiar with the show and getting a taste for the different eras...but any show is best experienced in order, and classic Doctor Who is no different, the First Doctor era in particular. Watching these early seasons in order is the only way to truly get to know these characters and the ongoing story of their adventures together, and my shift in focus on this review project reflects that. When I began this project I was content to skip from era to era as the fancy struck me, but my relationship with the show and its characters has changed a lot since then, and now that I know them so well and have grown to love them so much, I want to really do them justice. The only way to do that is to do a proper review job, start to finish, in order - two seasons down, only a couple of dozen still to go...
2.01 Planet of Giants
2.02 The Dalek Invasion of Earth
2.03 The Rescue
2.04 The Romans
2.05 The Web Planet
2.06 The Crusade
2.07 The Space Museum
2.08 The Chase
2.09 The Time Meddler
Doctor Who's second season was a time of both consolidation and change for the show, which by 1965 was firmly cemented in the Saturday teatime viewing schedule a new episode every week for 10 months of the year. During nine adventures told over 39 episodes, season two saw the start of what has since become a well established tradition of cast change, as the Doctor's beloved granddaughter Susan left to start a new life with David Campbell on 22nd century Earth, while schoolteachers Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright later returned to their home in London 1965, their places aboard the TARDIS taken by futuristic orphan Vicki and space pilot Steven Taylor.
This is a lovely era of the show, it really is. The cast, writers and production team were now well settled in, telling wonderfully varied stories still early enough in the show's run to feel fresh and ambitious rather than formulaic. With each adventure written to follow on from the last as one long ongoing story, a story more focused on character than on plot, there is a sense of continuity and development that feels almost modern, albeit distinctly 1960s in style and delivery, and I've tried to capture that in these reviews, delving into the characters, their experiences and evolving dynamics.
Doctor Who fans often tell new viewers to pick and choose which serials to watch, blithely claiming that it is okay to jump in anywhere and to skip around at random, and to be sure that is one way of becoming familiar with the show and getting a taste for the different eras...but any show is best experienced in order, and classic Doctor Who is no different, the First Doctor era in particular. Watching these early seasons in order is the only way to truly get to know these characters and the ongoing story of their adventures together, and my shift in focus on this review project reflects that. When I began this project I was content to skip from era to era as the fancy struck me, but my relationship with the show and its characters has changed a lot since then, and now that I know them so well and have grown to love them so much, I want to really do them justice. The only way to do that is to do a proper review job, start to finish, in order - two seasons down, only a couple of dozen still to go...
2.01 Planet of Giants
2.02 The Dalek Invasion of Earth
2.03 The Rescue
2.04 The Romans
2.05 The Web Planet
2.06 The Crusade
2.07 The Space Museum
2.08 The Chase
2.09 The Time Meddler