The War Games
"Well...it is a fact, Jamie, that I do tend to get involved."
In this serial, the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe land in what they believe to be 1917 during the war and are captured. The Doctor is taken aback when they are charged as spies in a lopsided and unfair kangaroo court. Over time, the Doctor realizes something strange is happening and convinces a soldier and a field nurse to help him. Escaping from the war zone, they find themselves in another; a Roman battle. The Doctor discovers in fact the world is a series of recreations of war zones controlled by the military leaders (all sides working in conjunction) but the soldiers are real. In fact, they are all soldiers of wars throughout Earth history, taken from their homes by an alien force. There, they are brainwashed and convinced they are home, fighting the wars they were taken from. The aliens owe much of the plan to The War Chief, a mysterious figure who suspects a connection to the Doctor.
The Doctor, realizing there are pockets of resistance from those who resisted the brainwashing, decides to convince them to ban together. What's more, the Doctor steals the aliens' brainwashing device and starts to work on it, prompting the Doctor to be captured. The War Chief decides he doesn't want to kill the Doctor. It turns out they are both Time Lords, members of a race who have created a stagnant utopia. The War Chief tries to convince the Doctor to help him with his plan but the Doctor becomes a double agent (without telling his friends), initially trapping the newly combined resistance in order to prevent the planet from being wiped out and then freeing them at the right moment. However, the Doctor realizes he doesn't have the power to return everyone home and reluctantly summons the Time Lords. The Doctor reveals he left his home out of boredom and will be punished for stealing the TARDIS. The Time Lords collect the Doctor and his friends but after many escape attempts, Zoe and Jamie are sent home, remembering only their first adventure with the Doctor. The Doctor makes his case that he fights evil his people passively observe and the Time Lords come to a compromise; the Doctor will be allowed to continue this quest but without the ability to time travel and having his form changed. The Doctor is sent plummeting to his new fate.
A 10 parter is always a big ask for a show like this. Doctor Who has a bad habit of really spinning its wheels during stories with characters going back and forth to the same locations. But The War Games is pretty bracing in it's ambition and simply remaining consistently engaging through the entire run, Yes, we due amble around the same few sets but thankfully the characters and the plotting make sure that you mostly don't care. The acting is quite good. Even the War Lord, a stock villain in many respects, feels completely cool (not so much in the "awesome" sense and more in the "doesn't get heated" sense) and measured in a way a lot of the show's villains don't. Despite being at the top of the heap, The War Chief is REALLY the primary antagonist (as well as the system he help set up) and he's not quite as memorable despite his connection to the Doctor and his swinging 60s bachelor look (what am I supposed to read into this).
Now when I say the story doesn't overstay it's welcome, it's definitely a story that could have been helped in being concise. There are a few plot cul de sacs, one character seems to disappear entirely and it probably could have felt even more bracing with a bit of tightening up. But at the same time, I've heard that some find it sags in the middle and while I think that's an argument not without merit compared to the wild first episodes and the enthralling last two, I think like the Invasion, it manages to make it still feel like it is an interesting story throughout. It's decent about hinting at some weirdness but not tipping it's hand too much and before we see a TV screen, it might seem like they are doing a historical again.
As for what the story is saying about war, I feel that it's a pretty broad one; wars are generally started by the people "above" us and while there might be good causes worth dying for, the people sending other people to go die might not have our best interests at heart. It's hardly revolutionary but it also sounds on paper a little more subversive than a lot of the Doctor stories at the time, where the villains were mostly invaders and facists. Keep in mind, despite this, this is not doing a lot of obvious controversial finger pointing in society nor is it even the primary concern. The primary concern seems to be telling an exciting yarn and the messaging, which is actually interesting, is a bit more like window dressing. That sounds like a complaint but I think it's a very strong and smart serial, even if it manages to not go too far from the formula.
That said, the final episodes must have been shockers. Up till this point, Doctor Who was not a lore-heavy series. The Doctor's past is vague but it also never had that kind of fanboy baiting cheekiness of keeping answers tantalizingly out of reach like many "men of mystery characters" (like Wolverine from the X-Men) would be saddled with. It's not a preference to one or the other, it's more the nature of who we interact with those archetypes now. But the last act is swimming with reveals. As the series is being upended, we learn the Doctor's motivations (though I feel we'd get contradictions to specifics later), where he comes from and so on. In keeping with more modern story telling conventions, the Time Lords are treated as a BIG DEAL. The show's biggest deal.
The last act has a little too much running around to no end. I feel like they knew what they wanted to say but it would be over too quick. Despite that, it really makes an impression that the Doctor is so thoroughly cowed, even as he bitches about them under his breath AND to their faces. Still, it's a strong ending; instead of simply beating the War Lord's army, the arc ends with him calling on a great force. We've seen the Doctor make sacrifices but this FEELS different. There's resignation, even though he scrambles to flee. This is the one big gun he had that he never wanted to pull the trigger on. I think that's what makes the last episodes, despite legitimate issues (again, the middle of the last episode is a bit drawn out) so strong. It's a sad goodbye and though it's not Donna Noble-level tragic, there's real sadness known that while these people will remember the Doctor, the actual bonds have been severed. And with that, the Doctors era of monochrome and missing episode comes to an end to make way for a relaunch that really establishes the show's capability to reinvent itself, becoming a mix of Quatermass and The Avengers... at least based on the few episodes I watched and cultural osmosis. I'll take a break to watch something else (I'm thinking the original 70s run of A Ghost Story for Christmas on Shudder), then my adventures with Jon Pertwee begin.
Best cliffhanger: I like the one where they are going to be smooshed in a faux TARDIS. It's a properly odd threat.
Next time:
