Review Of All Six Episodes - Major Spoilers
I once had a conversation with a friend that involved DOCTOR WHO
" Jon Pertwee . His doctor was a master of disguise "
" He was ? " which was news to me
" Yeah I remember one episode he disguised himself as a milkman to break in to a base "
" Oh " I replied " That was the green death the one with the giant maggots "
The conversation did conjure up that the programme does leave a lasting impression on people . Viewers who saw a story from 20 years earlier will recall quite vividly and clearly scenes even though the intricate details will be forgotten along with the wider details The Green Death is perhaps the archetypal story from the Pertwee era along with The Sea Devils and Planet Of The Spiders , though it must be remembered that the third Doctor was never a master of disguise
The story gets off to a great start where a miner rushes along an underground tunnel his fear plain to see . The Pertwee era was excellent at pulling an audience in to the story right from the very first scene . What it wasn't so good at was creating a well structured cohesive story and sometimes The Green Death shows this in an obvious way . By the midway point of episode two we think the green slime produced by Global Chemicals is the focus of the story an episode later it's the giant maggots and by episode five it's BOSS the supercomputer who is now the main threat in the story . It also suffers from these little gaps in logic that will always plague the problem such as BOSS putting his conditioned workers in to a trance thereby allowing to the Doctor to race in to Global Chemicals to save the situation
Director Michael E Briant is slightly uneven and shows that the budget may have suddenly run out . We get some rather poor and obvious CSO including scenes that are supposed to be on location but are patently obvious created in a studio with back projection . Anyone remember the camp jockey from HARRY ENFIELD AND CHUMS ? It looks similar to that and just as funny too , even though it's not supposed to be . That said some of the directing is outstanding especially the scenes where the Doctor where the Doctor dehypnotizes people with the Metabalis crystal and where Stevens finally overcomes his conditioning by BOSS
The Green Death also marks the final appearance of Katy Manning as Jo Grant who even today remains a fondly remembered companion . . The third Doctor and Jo had a wonderful on screen chemistry and like the ninth Doctor and Rose there's always a feeling amongst the viewer that there's a kind of unrequited love that the Doctor has for his pretty blonde companion . This is emphasised at the end of the story where Jo announces her engagement to Cliff Jones . Unlike NuWho there's no violins and 20 manipulative minutes of tears and gnashing of teeth . The Doctor quietly leaves the engagement party and drives off in to the sunset . Say what you like about the new series but we'll never see such subtle and understated scenes in the show again .
And so ended season ten of DOCTOR WHO . It may not have been the best season of the show at that point but was probably the one that had the most variety mixing different styles such as epic space opera , nostalgia , whimsy and topical concerns such as war and pollution . It also achieved high and consistent ratings and is fondly remembered by people of a certain age who were enthralled by Pertwee's Doctor every Saturday afternoon