The time warrior (1974)

Review
More about Doctor Who
More about this episode

Review

This is a four-part serial, first broadcast between 15 December 1973 - 5th January 1974. A brief and somewhat spoiler-ish summary of the plot: an alien time traveller gets stranded on earth in the Middle Ages, a castle is destroyed and the Doctor finds a new companion.

What we get here is, basically, Doctor Who as Monty Python would have done it - excellent and entertaining dialogue, an absurd story and a medieval world that is sheer caricature.

The good news:

• the larger than life medieval characters are played with such conviction that the whole thing never becomes ridiculous
• robber baron Irongron, his henchman Bloodaxe and Linx the Sontaran are very entertaining villains
• the serial is an excellent start for Sarah-Jane Smith, the Doctor's new companion
• there are many funny moments. For instance, Linx solemnly planting his silly little flag cracks me up every time

The sort of "meh" stuff:

• the camera work, the lighting, the costumes - everything is adequate but nothing is great. Even the special effects could have been better even with the technical means and the money that were available at the time, but the director decided to go for the cheapest approach

The bad news:

• the story doesn't go anywhere. Spoilers ahead - in part one Linx lands on earth and joins forces with Irongron, and in part four he leaves, destroying Irongron's castle in the process. Everything that happens in between is basically filler, and nothing that either the Doctor or Sarah-Jane does has any impact on the outcome
• I may be imagining things, but Pertwee does seem to be phoning in his performance at this point

My verdict:

Forgettable fun.

More about Doctor Who

An introduction:
Doctor Who reviews: introduction

More "nice!" Doctor Who:
Doctor Who reviews: nice!

More Doctor Who with Jon Pertwee:
Doctor Who reviews: 1970-1974

Similar stories:
Doctor Who reviews: time travel

Original version of this review:
08/05/18

More about this episode

Episode guides:
BBC Episode guide

Serial reviews:
Behind the sofa
Outpost Gallifrey

Intro | Previous | Next | Appreciation | Chronology | Themes | DVD releases | DVD appreciation | Links | Menu | Exit | Meta | Talk

With the exceptions listed here, all content © 2008 D9D1E2.COM. Please read the disclaimer, copyright information and terms of use. On this page Transitional HTML 4.01 and CSS 1 are used. If you're seeing this text you either have CSS switched off in your browser, or you're using a browser that can't handle CSS. If you're using an older browser version, you might want to consider upgrading.