Doctor Who - Time-Flight (Episode 123)

Doctor Who - Time-Flight (Episode 123)
by Ron Jones

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DVD Cover Information

Actor: Janet Fielding, Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton
Director: Ron Jones
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 98 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-11-06
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: BBC Warner

Movie Reviews of Doctor Who - Time-Flight (Episode 123)

Movie Review: "The coherence is breaking up!"
Summary: 2 Stars

I hadn't watched TIME-FLIGHT since my teenage years and I didn't really remember much about it apart from the very low opinion it has amongst Doctor Who fans. Watching this on DVD years later it turns out that the serial is everything I was expecting and more.

TIME-FLIGHT is the story of two British Concordes which accidentally travel 140 million years into the past. In this time zone is a mysterious sorcerer, an old enemy, blobby creatures called Plasmatons and an ancient, powerful extraterrestrial race called the Xeraphin with the whole plot revolving around the age-old struggle between good and evil. If this sounds interesting to you, then you'll no doubt be disappointed by the end result. The serial ends up being a bunch of different bits and pieces thrown together with little in the way of structure or logic to form them into a cohesive whole.

TIME-FLIGHT's first problem is its script. By eleven minutes into the first episode, we're already knee-deep in technobabble; we'll be in over our heads before the final credits roll. This is what people who say they don't like science-fiction probably cannot stand. If one doesn't know the conventions of the genre, one would assume that one lacks the knowledge of science and therefore cannot follow the story for that reason. They don't realize that the screenwriter is just making up all this physics as he goes along.

The script does far too much telling with almost no showing. Characters simply stand around reading plot points to each other. Why, for example, does control of the Xeraphin give the story's bad guy unlimited power? The audience is never given a reason for that; the story simply asserts it. The epic verbal battle between the good Xeraphin and the bad is also poorly illustrated. Philosophers and theologians for centuries have discussed the nature of good and evil; the best on offer here is one guy surrounded by odd special effects shouting (and I paraphrase), "Be good!" at another guy who responds (paraphrasing again), "No, be evil!" (This script is apparently hostile to philosophers in general. There's a bizarre potshot at Bishop Berkeley in episode one which never gets followed up on.)

There's no sense of danger, suspense or drama; the characters simply happily tell the audience when things are going well and then gloomily inform us when things are going badly. Even when actual events occur, they aren't particularly memorable. Fans remember the two stories where Tegan's mind was possessed by the Mara; does anyone similarly look upon TIME-FLIGHT as the gripping story where Nyssa is possessed by the Xeraphin? Does anyone recall that plot-point more than an hour after viewing?

And what is the point of Kalid the sorcerer? I don't want to give away too much (can I really spoil a story from twenty-six years ago?), but does any part of his plan make sense? Why does he chant and cackle and stay in that outfit even when there is no one else around? Amusingly, the first word he states out loud is part of his chant and is a hearty: "Shiraz!" Which I assume that producers were drinking quite a lot of when they came up with these ideas.

Like Peter Davison on the DVD's commentary track, I find myself trying desperately to think of something positive to say. The set of Kalid's inner sanctum is kind of nice looking. I like his giant crystal ball. And the DVD extras are not only the best thing about the purchase, but they're actually good on their own merits.

This disc features a mini-documentary focusing on the companion Tegan. It's mostly built around a single camera interview with Janet Fielding who turns out to give one of the strongest and most interesting takes I've seen an actor give concerning their time on Doctor Who. In just a few sentences she neatly sums up virtually all of the problems that the show displayed during this era.

The DVD commentary track is also worth a listen. Actors Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton and Janet Fielding join script-editor Eric Saward who spends most of his time alternating between profuse apologies and finger-pointing at the rest of the production team. There's not a lot of insight to be gained, but the cast at least make the serial fun to watch by pointing how much they enjoyed working with the other people in the story. Sarah Sutton and Janet Fielding have a lot of fun pointing many of the shortcomings. Peter Davison on numerous occasions points out (correctly) that quite a lot of the problems with how the production visually looks are due to the fact that TIME-FLIGHT was at the end of a season and therefore had almost no money left out of Doctor Who's already minuscule budget.

In Doctor Who serials, when sorrows came, they came not as single flaws but in battalions. TIME-FLIGHT is one of those stories where virtually every aspect of production ends up looking shabby . The script is unsteady, the sets are cheap, and the direction is static and dull. If you plan on watching this, then I suggest taking a page out of the DVD's commentary track participants and plan plenty of breaks and the medicinal use of chocolates or other mood-enhancing substances.

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All Doctor Who - Time-Flight (Episode 123) Movie Reviews

Summary of Doctor Who - Time-Flight (Episode 123)

Time-Flight is the four-episode serial that concluded Peter Davison's first season as the fifth Doctor. Arriving at Heathrow Airport with companions Nyssa (Sarah Sutton) and Tegan (Janet Fielding), still grieving after the death of Adric in "Earthshock" (1982), the Doctor is soon involved in solving the mystery of a Concorde that has literally vanished into thin air. Tracing the lost plane's flight path in a second Concorde, the travelers find themselves flying through a hole in time into the prehistoric past. Here the Master (Anthony Ainley), under the rather camp persona of Kalid (which strangely he maintains even when alone), is planning to harness the power of the currently disembodied alien Xeraphin, who are stranded on Earth. Echoing both the classic 1960 Twilight Zone episode "The Odyssey of Flight 33" and prefiguring Stephen King's chilling The Langoliers (1990), at heart Time-Flight is a reworking of the superior Tom Baker Doctor Who story "City of Death" (1979). Ending on a minor cliffhanger, what makes the story really distinctive is that it was the first drama of any sort to be given permission to film in and around a genuine Concorde. --Gary S. Dalkin

All is not well aboard the TARDIS - in an attempt to cheer up Nyssa and Tegan after the recent death of fellow companion Adric, the Doctor plans a trip back to the year 1851 and a visit to the Great Exhibition in London. However, the journey is unexpectedly interrupted and the TARDIS mysteriously appears in Terminal 1 of Heathrow Airport in modern-day London. At the same time, a routine incoming Concorde flight disappears without a trace... Are the two events connected? A second Concorde, carrying the Doctor, his companions and the TARDIS, is dispatched to follow the same flight path as the missing aircraft in an attempt to discover the fate of the passengers. But when this Concorde arrives back at Heathrow, they discover that things are not quite what they appear to be... What sinister force is behind the kidnapping of the Concorde passengers and crew? Is an ancient malevolent power at work, or something with which the Doctor is much more familiar?

DVD Features:
Audio Commentary
DVD ROM Features
Deleted Scenes
Featurette
Interviews
Outtakes
Photo gallery
Production Notes

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