This would be the second invasion underway in 20th Century Tibet.
The first came when the Communist-dominated PRC occupied and annexed the
sovereign nation in 1951. The second is the alien intelligence exerting a
sinister influence over a remote Himalayan monastery. One of its tools happen
to be hairy snow beasts. Fortunately, the Tardis finds its way there in “The
Abominable Snowmen,” a formerly lost six-episode Doctor Who story-arc,
recreated with animation and the original audio track, which releases today on
BluRay.
Initially,
the Second (Patrick Troughton) Doctor is thrilled to back in Tibet. He was there
several hundred years prior, when he accepted one of the Detsen Monastery’s
holy relics for safe keeping, during times of turmoil. The Doctor now hopes to
return it, not knowing these too are times of trial for Detsen, but not because
of the PLA invasion, which goes unmentioned during “Abominable Snowmen,” even
though it was originally produced in 1967.
Unfortunately,
the Doctor receives a rather rude welcome, thanks to English explorer Edward
Travers, who stokes the suspicions of Khrisong, the Tibetan warrior protecting
Detsen, against the Time Lord. Travers, who would return in a later mostly-lost
Doctor Who adventure, mistakenly assumes the Doctor is a reporter or a
rival hoping to exploit or sabotage his search for the Yeti.
Amazingly,
Padmasambhava, the high lama of the monastery remembers the Doctor from his
previous visit. However, the ancient monk is not himself. Something latched onto
Padmasambhava during his astral wanderings and now holds the very senior monk
in thrall. Its chief pawns happen to be the hirsute robotic creatures Travers
reasonably took for Yetis. Whatever they are, they trap the Doctor’s bickering
companions, Jamie and Victoria, in a cave at the end of the first episode.
The
BBC’s penny-wise-pound-foolish tape-wiping practices in the 1960s and 1970s
almost makes a nerd’s head explode. How much revenue have they missed out on by
reusing recycling the tapes of old Doctor Who episodes or their
production of Asimov’s Caves of Steel, starring Peter Cushing? In some
cases, where the audio tracks still exist, they have resurrected missing Doctor
Who episodes through original animation, as they have done for “Abominable Snowmen.”
The original video survives for the second episode, which is included in the
BluRay set, along with black-and-white and color animated recreations of all
six installments. Arguably, the best way to experience the authentic viewing experience
is by selection the black-and-white animation for episodes one and three
through six and the surviving second live-action episode.
Regardless,
it is nice to have a “new” vintage Doctor Who episode back in
circulation, especially since it holds special behind-the-scenes significance, co-starring
Jack Watling, who played Travers in multiple adventures, with his daughter,
Victoria Watling, who portrayed the Doctor’s companion, Victoria Wakefield. The
spartan Tibetan setting looks good both in the surviving episode and the
black-and-white episodes. Admittedly, the big furry Yeti robots look weirdly
cute instead of scary, but they are definitely in keeping with the low-budget
aesthetic of vintage Doctor Who fans know and love.
Sure, there were creepy aliens inside those tin cans, but before Next Gen gave
us the Borg, nothing better represented our fears of technology’s dehumanizing influence
than the Daleks. Fortunately, Doctor Who was there to stop their ambitions for
galactic domination, even when he wasn’t strictly speaking Gallifreyan.
Evidently, the two mid-1960s Doctor Who movies have been somehow retconned into
the extended universe, but they have always been considered canonically suspect,
since their Doctor is an Earthling who actually calls himself “Dr. Who.” On the
plus side, he was played by Peter Cushing and he reliably foiled the Daleks.
Both Amicus Doctor Who films air tonight on TCM, but the second, Gordon Flemyng’s
Daleks: Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. is by far the superior film.
After
saving a foreign planet from the Daleks in the first film, the Doctor touches
down in Swinging Sixties London just long enough to pick up police constable
Tom Campbell after he is knocked cold by a gang of armed robbers. When he comes
too, the Tardis has traveled forward to the year 2150, which much to the Doctor’s
distress, Earth has been temporarily been conquered by the very same Daleks.
It
takes some doing, but the Doctor’s niece Louise and his granddaughter Susan convince
the copper they really have traveled forward in time. Of course, the metal megalomaniacal
Daleks are quite persuasive. Unfortunately, the travelers become barricaded
from the Tardis during a scouting trip, forcing them to take refuge with the
underground human resistance. After the Doctor and Campbell are captured and
escape, the time-travelers will be forced by circumstances to split up, but all
roads seem to lead to a mysterious mine, where the Daleks are implementing their
evil planetary scheme.
The
first Peter Cushing Doctor Who (Doctors Who and the Daleks) movie is
jokier and skews much younger as a result. However, the visual impact of bombed
out London in Earth 2150 is quite striking. Clearly, the look of the post-apocalyptic
city was inspired by scenes of destruction wrought by the Blitz during the
Battle of London, memories of which would have still been vivid for many
viewers in 1966.
The
narrative is also more effectively structured, breaking apart the Doctor and
his companions. The paring of the protective Wyler, a crusty old resistance activist,
with young Susan is especially effective. Ironically, this is something of a case
of necessity being the mother of invention, since illness forced Cushing to
curtail his work on Earth 2150.
