Doctor Who - Beneath The Surface (Doctor Who And The Silurians / The Sea Devils / Warriors Of The Deep)
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Movie Reviews of Doctor Who - Beneath The Surface (Doctor Who And The Silurians / The Sea Devils / Warriors Of The Deep)
Movie Review: The aliens were here first
Summary: 5 Stars
Several times on the bonus material for "Doctor Who and the Silurians", then-script editor Terrance Dicks explains the origins for that story's eponymous villain. With the Doctor exiled to Earth and the TARDIS disabled, Dicks was told by one of his writers that the show was now limited to just two story types: alien invasion, and mad scientist. Realizing he was painted into a corner, Dicks decided to invert the scenario by commissioning an alien invasion from a species that was already on Earth before man rose to prominence.
Thus was born the Silurians, the memorable (and mis-named) villains that recurred on "Doctor Who" enough times to fill out their own box set. The opening story, from 1970, is the longest and most intriguing: a team of scientists in the caves under Derbyshire inadvertently awaken a hibernating reptilian species that had been asleep for tens of millions of years. First in secret and then in the open, the Silurians attack not only the scientists but then all of mankind. From a low-key opening episode, the stakes escalate until the world is threatened by an Ebola-type virus in part six.
"Silurians" was Malcolm Hulke's first solo contribution to the series (he'd previously co-authored two Second Doctor episodes) and he became a mainstay of the Third Doctor's run on the show. DVD extra features are strong: the deepest audio commentary booth to date (seven show contributors rotate in and out) provides tons of insights; guest actor Geoffrey Palmer narrates a terrific documentary that compares the relatively gentle pace of the 1970 serial to today's more condensed and frenetic adventures. This choice of narrator is brilliant, to coin a phrase: not only did Palmer guest-star in a recent new "Who" episode, but his son also directed four episodes last season.
The second story, "The Sea Devils", is Hulke's sequel to the earlier story, featuring the inadvertent revival of a marine cousin to the Silurians. This is a far more action packed episode: the Doctor and the Master have a lengthy swordfight in episode two, and the cooperation of the Royal Navy leads to several land and sea combat sequences in the closing installments. There's a submarine subplot, and two comedy sequences that have since been duplicated in new "Who": the Master captivated by a children's television programme, and the Doctor and Jo staging a lengthy mime sequence through a plate-glass window.
The "Sea Devils" bonus features are highlighted by an unusual commentary booth: Dicks, producer Barry Letts, and show director Michael Briant exchange the usual compliments and potshots, but this time they're joined by Andrew Cartmel, the show-runner for "Doctor Who"'s final three seasons. Cartmel's run was characterized by tight internal continuity and very little navel-gazing into the series' past: to have him discuss a story nearly 20 years before his time gives fascinating insight into the type of "Who" he later chose to produce.
The final DVD, "Warriors of the Deep", comes from much later in series history (it opens the Fifth Doctor's final season in 1984) and has aged the least gracefully of the three stories. This time, there's no debate on whether or not the Silurians and Sea Devils can co-exist with the human upstarts, they're just out on a highly effective seek-and-destroy mission. There's hardly a smile to be had in 90 minutes, and the only survivor among the large guest cast does so impliedly and offscreen. Ingrid Pitt, the queen of horror flicks, has a thankless small role which doesn't allow her to exchange so much as a word of dialogue with the Doctor; her exit from the show was later derided by writer Johnny Byrne on an Internet newsgroup as "the mother of all drop-kicks".
The extras for "Warriors" are perhaps harsher than they need to be. Everyone involved in production -- director, writer, actors, visual effects designer -- shows up to get their kicks in. "Warriors" was one of my first stories as a young fan in 1984 and I'm sorry to see the story hasn't matched my memories; however, having everyone involved throw stones at it 25 years later is perhaps a bit much.
On the whole, though, the box-set features the entire Silurians/Sea Devils running story, with two classic Doctors and a boatload of moral dilemmas. Even if the best material comes at the beginning of the set, it's still a fascinating release.
Movie Review: Okay stories, but a must have for collectors
Summary: 2 Stars
These were not my favourite stories from the Doctor Who series, the Silurians and Sea Devils are the typical low budget hokey nemisis to Doctor's 3 and 5, but I'm still glad to add them to my dvd collection. Can't wait for the coming story arcs in August involving Tom Baker and Louise Jameson as the Doctor and Leela, and hopefully they'll come out with the 13 part "Trial of a Timelord" starring the notorious Colin Baker as Doctor #6 in the coming years. Movie Review: "These creatures aren't just animals, they're an alien life form, as intelligent as we are."
Summary: 5 Stars
Doctor Who can be a pretty deep show sometimes. And that goes for the three stories in this aptly named box-set both in the usual figurative sense and quite literally as well. That is, the unifying element in "Doctor Who and the Silurians" (1970), "The Sea Devils" (1972), and "Warriors of the Deep" (1984) is one of the most creatively imaginative set of antagonists the show has seen in its long history, and they antagonize from the depths of the earth and sea. The eponymous Silurians, that is, along with their equally eponymous semi-aquatic branch, the Sea Devils--a highly advanced and civilized race of reptilians that evolved on Earth long before we did, went into suspended animation underground and undersea to weather what they predicted to be a global catastrophe, and then overslept a bit until the technological advances of the mammalian hominids who evolved in their absence awoke them again. All three times they seek to retake the planet that once was theirs, each time the Doctor tries to broker a peaceful compromise between the two feuding sets of Earthlings, and each time mutual suspicion, xenophobia, and itchy trigger fingers prevail over the Doctor's voice of reason and compromise. Each story too invokes this complicated moral dilemma with cold war allegorical overtones within the confines of a thoroughly enjoyable science fiction thriller.
Each also has its own particularities too, of course. "Doctor Who and the Silurians" gets the whole concept going and is the strongest of the three storywise. Only the second story of the third Doctor's tenure (as expertly played by Jon Pertwee), it also starts establishing several key motifs of that era, including the Earthbound Doctor's characteristically eccentric vintage car. "The Sea Devils" takes the concept two years later and jazzes it up with more action and greater scale while complicating matters with the presence of the Doctor's Time Lord nemesis, the Master, who seeks to foment strife and discord quite as much as the Doctor seeks to defuse it. All of this has the slight drawback of simplifying the story to a slight degree, but the overall result is a delightfully quintessential sample of the Pertwee era. "Warriors of the Deep" attempts more than a decade later to update the concept and develop it further--a valiant attempt that due to a few errors of judgment as well as circumstances beyond anyone's control ends up falling far short. This is definitely the weakest link of the three, but it has some redeeming qualities (the model work and set design for the Silurian submarine and Sea Devil hibernation chamber are superb, for instance) and in any case it's one of those the fans love to hate, which is a distinction of sorts anyway.
Extras are never the deal-breaker with me (I consider them indeed extra), but the ones on these discs deserve special mention. The "Silurians" includes "What Lies Beneath", a highly informative and interesting look at the social history underlying the story as well as an examination of the manner in which it met the expectations of its time and addressed issues of immediate concern, considerably deepening the contemporary viewer's appreciation of this classic in the process. There is also an intriguing behind-the-scenes take on the extremely experimental music featured in the two Pertwee stories--Doctor Who was pioneering the real future sound of London, playing with bizarre soundscapes and electronic harmonies way ahead of its time. For its part, "Warriors" includes "The Depths" wherein everybody from the writer and the key actors onwards has a good time ripping on this poor beleaguered tale--most extras include nothing but hype and hyperbole, only the Doctor Who crew has the guts to reflect at length on their own fumbles and have a good laugh doing so.
In any case, this is overall a fine DVD set of classic Doctor Who storylines scattered in time but highlighting one of the show's more inventive concepts together with its later permutations. And for the obsessive-compulsive fans such as myself, each of the three stories is in a separate, self-contained case so that they can be taken out of the box and placed in chronological order with one's other Doctor Who DVDs if one so chooses. Getting them together as a set is still the more convenient and frugal option, of course, unless one has a particular interest in only one of the three. In that case, they can be purchased singly as well:
1. Doctor Who and the Silurians (Episode 52)
2. Doctor Who - The Sea Devils (Episode 62)
3. Doctor Who: Warriors of the Deep (Story # 131)
Movie Review: Classic Who
Summary: 5 Stars
This box set contains 2 classic 3rd Doctor storys-Doctor Who And The Silurians and The Sea Devils and The not so good 5th Doctor story Warriors of The Deep.
I always loved The Silurian story from Jon Pertwees first season of Doctor Who.Its 7 episode long and it does not bore at all and Jon Pertwee shines in this story. Jon has always been my favorite of all The Doctors.
The Sea Devils is another great story from Jon Pertwees time and it also features The Master played by the excellent Roger Delgado.
Warriors of The Deep is got to be the weakest in this box set.I did not think Warriors was as good as The Silurians and The Sea Devils.But still it has some good moments.Loved the closing line "There Should of Been another way"
All in all a pretty good box set.Hopefull The BBC will do more box sets.Love to have The Espace Trilogy and The Black Gurdian Trilogy on DVD.
Movie Review: Brought down by Warriors
Summary: 3 Stars
This would be a perfect DVD boxset were it not for the awful Warriors of the Deep. Although my favourite Who stories are mostly on the comedy side of things, I do like the dramatic ones as well, and Silurians highlights everything good about Pertwee's first season.
Individual rankings:
The Silurians- 5 stars
The Sea Devils- 4 stars
Warriors of the Deep- 1 star.
On average is 3.33 stars, hence the rating. The Silurians feels like you've been through a war, roughly three hour epic of a species that came here on the earth first, and now want to claim the earth for themselves. Unlike later stories like Curse of Fenric where they basically hit you over the head with what they want you to believe, this one is more up for debate, and you can basically think what you want to think. And people credit Spearhead with the most iconic Pertwee image of mannequin's coming to life, but the image of people dying from the Silurian virus all over London sticks even more in my mind. It's a disease that is seemingly unstoppable...
The Sea Devils is a good escapist adventure, but it gets knocked down a star for basically being a remake of the same adventure. It's done well, with the Doctor-Master rivalry making for some good moments, and again, it's a good epic that sticks in your mind, but it feels a bit too much like a retread to give it 5 stars.
Warriors of the Deep is just plain annoying. It's one thing to not judge Doctor Who by it's budget limitations, but it's another when the character of the monster is really brought down. The slowed-down speech of the Silurians and the Sea Devils alone grate on the nerves. It takes forever to get into the story, the first episode feeling more like two hours rather than twenty five minutes. Tegan and Turlough may as well be any other companion, and the storyline. Not to mention trying to make the Fifth Doctor way too moralistic with him condenming the human base for trying to destroy the Silurians and Sea Devils (when they've destroyed half their crew) It worked in Silurians and Sea Devils because you could genuinely believe there was a chance to share the earth, but not in this atmosphere. The only thing that serial got right was the classic line "There should've been another way." Too right.
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