This is the audio of the almost completely lost serial - The Celestial Toymaker - Only the final episode of 4 - The final Test still survives and thisThis is the audio of the almost completely lost serial - The Celestial Toymaker - Only the final episode of 4 - The final Test still survives and this is because the BBC archived it thinking it was a cricket match due to the title!
1st Doctor Hartnell and companions Dodo & Stephen are drawn into the mysterios dimension of the Celestial Toymaker (Michael Gough) - The Doctor is rendered invisible and forced to play a stratedy game against the Toymaker, whilst Dodo & Stephen have to play a series of games against people trapped in the dimension who have been turned into toys - If they can win their games before the Doctor finishes his they get the TARDIS and are free to go, but if they lose they will be turned into toys and stuck with the Toymaker forever....
I love the Immortal Toymaker, he's an excellent villain - there's no way to defeat him for good and his exceptionally clever making a good aversary for the Doctor. His fantastic dimension of dolls, playing cards and clowns is also wonderfully sinister.
It's quite 'stagey', static and theatrical as Early Who tended to be - and its not very sci-fi (we're not travelling in space or time, but a weird alternate dimension) - It's far more whimsical and fantasy - this might have made an intersting Sapphire & Steel episode. It is however, nicely sinister and creepy. Gough is excellent and from the strenth of this I'm amazed the Toymaker hasn't made more of an appearance in Who. I can't wait for him to turn up in the upcoming special. ...more
I'm not usually a huge fan of early Classic Who - For me it's Tom Baker all the way. But this adventure featuring the 1Is there a Doctor in the horse?
I'm not usually a huge fan of early Classic Who - For me it's Tom Baker all the way. But this adventure featuring the 1st Incarnation - William Hartnell with companions Stephen and Vicki is one of my favourites regardless.
The trio travel in the Tardis and accidentally land in the middle of the Trojan War. The Doctor emerges and is mistaken by the Achilles as Zeus. The Tardis is taken as a war prize by the Trojans and Vicki changes her name to Cressida and falls in love with Trojan prince Troilus.
This ticks a huge number of boxes for me: Dr. Who. Trojan War, Homer, Shakespeare (Troilus and Cressida) and yes there's loads of in jokes like the mention of Aeneas and how that's a whole other story.... which of course ended up being penned by Virgil.
If you like the Trojan War and Dr. Who then this story is pretty much a dream come true and narrator Stephen Thorne does a decent job of keeping it interesting.
On the negatives - Odysseus and Cassandra really come across poorly and don't fit my picture of them - Cassandra is annoying and I hated Odysseus here. However my judgement is based on a wealth of various sources including the Odyssey and this of course is much more narrow in scope - and from the Iliad alone I don't think Odysseus does come across as that heroic.
Stephen and Vicky are fairly useless as companions and indeed the Doctor himself takes a back seat in this one which is far more preoccupied with the Greeks and Trojans. Still being a classics nut that's not too much of a hardship.
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