Doctor Who: The Keys of Marinus

There's nothing silly about the poodle guy in the center!

So this serial is not missing so I don't have to spend three hours looking at stills and reading about the actions of the cast below the stills. That's good. Three hours and a half hours of that weren't very fun. The fact that the episodes were quite good just made it all the more a shame. Can't we get a decent cartoonist to draw what's going on? I think that would be better for viewers, but I'm not part of the production company.

This serial was released between April 11 and May 16, 1964. From what I can gather it's a quest fantasy with every episode being a mini-adventure towards a larger goal. So, it's like most seasons of modern fantasy TV series at some point or another. And it's only six episodes long. Brilliant!

Three hours later...

So... I'm not sure how I felt about this one. It was interesting if not a bit predictable. Basically, the TARDIS appears on this island with a fortress on it. The fortress has no obvious entryways. Instead there's a door... that five people accidentally lean against, thus entering the fortress. In the first ten minutes of the first episode. From there you find out there's this machine that dictates the morality of every being living on Marinus, the planet the Doctor and friends have appeared on. This old man in a robe, Arbitan, guards the machine against the followers of Yartek, a guy who found a way to defy the compulsion of the machine.

The machine has been shut down while Arbitan fixed the machine so even Yartek will be affected. The machine itself is controlled by five keys that have been scattered all over the place. Arbitan forces the Doctor and company to go find the keys and bring them back.

Around the time I heard about the keys, my brain was asking: "Why? What's the point? Isn't it safer to leave the machine OFF so someone doesn't go fiddling with the behavior determined to be "good" according to the machine?  Is someone even being good when they have a MACHINE dictating their behavior?"

Well, regardless of logic, and Arbitan being an idiot. Our heroes put on their non-time-traveling vortex manipulators (NTTVM) and go off to adventure!

And then someone sneaks up behind Arbitan and kills him...

So, each episode from there focuses on the recovery of the four missing keys. They first key belonged to Arbitan.

We proceed to see the rest of Marinus that has:

• Mind controlling snail-people that enslave anyone who gets close to them.
• A jungle of vines that scream and traps invented by one of the good guys.
• A frozen wasteland with a psychopath who steals shamelessly from everyone.
• People who are so mercenary, they kill to get a hold of a priceless artifact despite being members of law enforcement.

I'm beginning to see while Marinus needs a machine to control its people. They're sense of right and wrong is all over the place! Even the good guys are mostly screwed up!

Then again, this is the episode where Barbara picks up a knife off a villain to protect herself and the Doctor... with the Doctor's permission and approval.

I'm liking how incredibly against violence our Doctor is... oh wait, this must be something added with future regenerations. That'll be fun to see!

So, I didn't like this episode so much. I liked the quest format (if it wasn't so dumb). I liked the complete stories in a half hour with an overarching arc. I didn't like the Idiot Balls being passed around. Though Ian saves us all in the end. More and more Ian is reminding me of MY Doctor and The Doctor is reminding me of my Grandpa.

Oh yeah, and Susan screams a lot... or is it some more?

Next time... The Aztecs, the only episode I've seen before. OH! Also! The Doctor has a romance in that one!