Survival

Chapter the 311th, it was 1989 but the cats were still much better than in 2019.

Plot:

The Doctor takes Ace back to Perivale, but nobody seems to be around. This isn't just because it's a Sunday, but because people are going missing, including some of Ace's old mates. The Doctor investigates some black cats that he spots in the area, buying some cat food from a shop run by Hale and Pace to tempt them out. They are kitlings, psychic creatures that can be used to aid hunters in tracking down prey. Someone mysterious (it's the Master, obvs) is using them to track the Doctor. Ace encounters one of the hunters in a recreation ground - it is a half-human half-Cheetah creature on horseback. It gives chase and when it catches her, it transports Ace and itself to an alien planet. Ace finds her friends Shreela and Midge there with a young lad called Derek. They have all been surviving as best they can there since they were transported; another of Ace's old friends Stevie has been killed. The Doctor is also transported to the planet alongside a keep fit instructor / TA soldier Paterson. At an encampment with many Cheetah people outside, the Doctor is greeted by the Master. He has brought the Doctor there to help him escape. The planet is sentient and alters people the longer they stay there, turning them in to Cheetah people. The Master is already changing. Original settlers on the planet, who bred the kitlings, thought they could control the planet's power but succumbed. The hunters and kitlings can only seem to transport people one way (as the Doctor puts it, they can only return home with their prey). Escaping the Master, the Doctor and Paterson meet up with Ace's party. During a Cheetah person attack, Midge kills a Cheetah person and Ace wounds one. This starts them both on the path to becoming Cheetah people, meaning that they will be able to take people home.

The Master uses Midge to return to Earth, the Doctor and the others use Ace. Shreela and Derek thank Ace and the Doctor and rush off home; Paterson is less grateful and goes off to teach a keep fit class to some teens. There, he finds that the Master and Midge have used the Cheetah planet power to entrance the group of lads he was set to teach. They kill Paterson. The Doctor and Ace track the Master and Midge to Horsenden Hill where the Doctor and Midge race towards each other on motorcycles (it's not clear what this is supposed to achieve). When the bikes collide, Midge is killed but the Doctor is thrown clear. The Master and his gang advance on Ace, who cannot fight without sealing her fate and changing for good. A Cheetah person she had formed a bond with on the planet, Karra, arrives and chases the group off. The Master kills Karra. The Doctor catches up with the Master in Perivale and is transported back to the planet (the Master calls it 'his new home'); the Master is full-on feral now, and their conflict is causing the planet's destruction. The Doctor is also coming under the planet's influence and just stops himself from attacking the Master. Just as the Master is about to strike, the Doctor transports himself back to his home, the TARDIS, leaving the Master behind as the planet dies in flame. The Cheetah people transfer to some other place and the hunt goes on. The Doctor finds Ace, and they walk off towards new adventures, the Doctor making a speech as if he knows this is the end of the last ever episode of the classic series...

Context:

As will be detailed more in the Deeper Thoughts, I was lucky enough to get tickets for The Happiness Patrol BFI event at the end of August 2024 to tie in with the final Sylvester McCoy Blu-ray box set (of season 25, Sylv's second run from 1988, the year before Survival). As soon as I knew I was going to be able to publish my write-up of the event, I knew I'd need a suitable story with which to pair it. There couldn't be anything random (aside from the BBC's Blu-ray release schedule) about which story to pick as I only had one of McCoy's stories left. So, I overrode random selection, and Survival it was. The story was viewed from the Blu-ray disc, all in one go, one evening in early September. I then had to wait another month before I could publish the blog as the one event at the BFI turned into two, and I wanted to write them both up close together (more on that is also outlined in the Deeper Thoughts section below).

Milestone watch: I've been blogging new and classic Doctor Who stories in random order since 2015, and I'm now closing in on the point where I finish everything and catch up with the current stories being broadcast serially. This post marks the completion of another Doctor's entire televisual era, making a total of three Doctors done so far; the seventh Doctor (as portrayed by Sylvester McCoy) follows the recent completion of Paul McGann's eighth Doctor and David Tennant's fourteenth Doctor. Neither of those other two had much in the way of an era, though. Sylv is the first to be completed who had the role over multiple seasons, and I will miss the wee fellow. This post also marks the completion of another season, the 28th out of the total of 40 seasons to date (at the time of writing): classic seasons 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10-12, 14-18, 20, 21, 23-26, and new series 2, 4, 6, 7, 9-11, and 13).

First Time Round:

The final Doctor Who story of the classic era, and - even after much experience in using a VCR for the previous four years - I still couldn't capture the whole thing onto a video tape. I was out for the second episode, and the programmed recording didn't work, so I only saw the first and last parts of Survival. I mentally pieced together the action that I'd missed as best I could, but didn't see the story in full until the sell-through VHS came out in October 1995. As the original broadcast was during a period I was most disconnected from Doctor Who news, I did not have any idea that this was going to be the last story for a good while, but I definitely remember picking up on the hopeful yet elegiac tone of the Doctor's final monologue and having some suspicions. The Doctor Who news I did get at the time was from the tabloid press, where a few months earlier in the Summer I'd read a story telling me that Gareth Hale and Norman Pace, UK comedy stars of the time, were going to be appearing in the series; aside from that, everything was a surprise.

Reaction:

There is often mention that Survival anticipated the 2005 series vibe (mainly because it features a housing estate). There's only a very short sequence in the block of flats, though; the rest of the earthbound sequences in the story are set in suburban rather than urban spaces. The decision to set and make this story in contemporary Perivale might have been forced upon the production by the offhand mention of Ace's home town when she was first introduced a couple of years earlier (perhaps producer John Nathan-Turner was working through an alphabetical list of suitable SE locations, the last companion before Ace came from Pease Pottage), but they make the most of it. Doctor Who often makes comparisons between the ordinary and extraordinary, but mostly just in dialogue - Survival makes the counterpoint a key visual feature of the story, cutting back and forth between alien vistas and a recognisable suburbia of convenience stores, milkmen, youth clubs and people washing their cars. It's rare and refreshing to see Doctor Who set in a place that was, not to put too fine a point on it, exactly like where I lived at the time (and no doubt a lot of viewers like me). I'd grown up watching Doctor Who on a street and in a house very similar to those being depicted - the alien was now invading my world. Doctor Who had never done this before (a short sequence where Sarah Jane is dropped off in a suburban street in The Hand of Fear is the only thing that came close); it took them to the very end of the classic series to do it. It's not really been done much since, either (Fear Her is the only example that comes to mind). It gives the story a unique energy and atmosphere, and - although it wasn't planned this way - works as a distillation of Doctor Who, and this era of it in particular, for the series' final outing on TV.

Taking the world of tooth and claw survival represented by the Cheetah planet back to the 1980s London of wannabe yuppies, with Midge's slick 80s suit and motorbike being the most obvious signifiers, highlights the political nature of the story's underlying theme. Thatcherism is being criticised here more precisely than in something seemingly more satirical like The Happiness Patrol (see Deeper Thoughts for more on that story). The Doctor screaming out the same phrase "If we fight like animals, we'll die like animals" in both environments at the climax to underline the parallel is subversive and radical, but wouldn't trouble anyone for whom the theme has whizzed overhead without being caught. They can still enjoy this as an action adventure. That's down to very good writing, script editing and direction. Survival's not quite perfect on that score, but it's tending towards perfection. Like other three-parters of McCoy's tenure, it has a few too many characters - this is most obvious at the start of episode three when, having been returned safely from the alien planet, a few people say happy goodbyes and rush off never to be seen again when there's still a third of the running time left. It's much better managed than in previous years, though; none of these characters had unnecessary subplots cluttering up the narrative, and the other three-part story of the year (Ghost Light, broadcast before but made after Survival) was even tighter. Watching, one just feels in one's bones that these people should be given another year to hone things, as they are so close to getting it 100% right. Alas, it wasn't to be. The significant characters are fully fleshed out anyway, so a little clutter didn't detract.

Foremost amongst the characters in the guest cast given material with which to shine is Anthony Ainley as the Master. This might not seem that unusual to the uninitiated; he is the lead antagonist and a recurring guest cast member who's worked on the series on and off for a decade, after all. But he's never before been given any kind of motivation, let alone a credible and interesting one as he is here. Ainley's a decent actor, so his performance - putting on an urbane front as he is wrestling with the beast within that threatens to overpower him, then finally giving in to it at the end in a violent tussle, consumed by the urge to destroy the Doctor - is effortlessly the best he gave in the series. It is flights above the panto moustache-twirling he usually had to deliver. Julian Holloway as Patterson is also excellent, paired with the Doctor for most of the running time and providing both comic relief and dramatic complication, while finding a good balance between the two. It's such a fun performance that it's almost a shame he has to die, the script making a sacrifice of a character who on the surface was ruthless but was revealed to be a coward underneath. It's sad to note that the character was running a service of youth outreach of a type that, however bleak the 1980s is painted in Survival, is much less likely to exist in 2024. Midge is perhaps just a smidge under-written meaning that a few of his lines and actions seem difficult for Will Barton playing him to get a handle on, but this is a tiny quibble and it's mostly a good performance. Sophie Aldred gets some interesting material reacting to the attraction of the alien planet as personified in Lisa Bowerman's Cheetah person Karra (though based on writer Rona Munro's comments since, the intended lesbian subtext ended up much toned down from what she had wished).

There's some great dialogue from Munro (and a nice little speech dubbed on the end written by script editor Andrew Cartmel when it was becoming obvious that this would be the last Doctor Who story broadcast for a while) and some strong science-fiction concepts: a planet whose influence starts to change those that stick around on it for too long, with their base instincts to hunt and kill activated and having to be resisted, is an interesting idea for Doctor Who. Watching characters - even, towards the end, the controlled and controlling seventh Doctor - succumbing to this power really upped the thrill factor of the story. Then there's the kitlings, feline carrion that look like black cats who can transport themselves between worlds and form psychic links with the humans that train them; then, there's the conflict being played out on the planet being directly linked to the planet's disintegration; then there's the concept that those turning into Cheetah people can only transport themselves in one direction because they can only return to their home with their captured prey. This creates the drama in the middle episode where everyone is waiting for someone whose home is Earth to change, and therefore offer them all a hope of escape. This volume of integrated and innovative ideas is rare in any Doctor Who, only seen before in Christopher Bailey's Mara stories earlier in the decade. Munro's similar journey into the dark places of the inside is expertly realised by the various creative persons working on the story. Alan Wareing gets great performances and creates some interesting visuals: the Cheetah people's planet is filmed in a quarry like many a Doctor Who planet over the years, but judicious choice of angles and application of video effects make it feel like a truly alien locale.

Also going above and beyond to create atmosphere in the story is composer Dominic Glynn. Just as in the previous year's story The Happiness Patrol (see Deeper Thoughts) Glynn creates the character of an entire planet with his expert application of instruments and motifs; in Survival, a mournful, wailing electric guitar accompanies the scenes on the alien planet, with piano used to underscore scenes in Perivale. Script, direction and music come together for some truly great dramatic moments, my favourite being the scene where Ace - believing the Doctor to be dead - is advanced upon by a group of thugs under the Master's command. She chants to herself that she must not fight (or she'll change into a Cheetah person for good) but still they advance. The only place where the stunt action of the script isn't realised very well is in the sequence immediately before this where the Doctor and Midge collide on motorbikes. It's unnecessary to the plot, and was just a bit too ambitious to be realistically staged. The realisation of the Cheetah people comes in for stick from some, but I think it's perfectly acceptable. The body and costumes are really rather good; the masks slightly less good, but still okay. Not so effective is any attempt to depict a dead cat on screen (they just look cuddly toys), and the animatronic kitling doesn't convince (it looks like an un-cuddly toy). I'm not sure whether they even needed the animatronic version particularly, though perhaps they didn't want to be left wholly at the mercy of the animal performers and their handlers - getting all the footage they needed that way would have been like herding cats, I suppose. 

Connectivity:

My blog post for Survival was originally planned to follow The Curse of Fatal Death which would have neatly meant two stories on the trot featuring the Master as an adversary where he's been genetically cross-spliced with another alien baddie, both followed by a reasonably large gap before the show would be seen on BBC1 again. Alas, the snafu at the BFI (see Deeper Thoughts below for more details) meant the Survival post was delayed a few weeks. Luckily, there's still a connection to highlight between Survival and the story it now comes after on the blog, Real Time: both stories feature an established comedy double-act playing a more dramatic double-act in the story.

Deeper Thoughts:

From Black Cats to Pink Ladies: Part 1 of The Happiness Patrol BFI events write-up, Q3 2024. In an inadvertent first, the humble little Happiness Patrol (as we will see, felt by many to be an unloved tale) is the only Doctor Who story ever to have two BFI events to tie in with its release on Blu-ray. On August 31st, the plan was that the new special edition of the story made for the Blu-ray would be shown along with the usual panels, quiz, etc. I was the most relaxed I'd ever been attending a screening that final morning of August 2024, because I had no travelling to do. I'd stayed over in London the night before (the Better Half had met up with friends for an event at the Royal Festival Hall on the Friday night, so we booked the evening in a hotel on the South Bank and enjoyed a London mini-break). I was able to meet long-term fan friend David for a leisurely breakfast, then amble over to the BFI to meet the others (Chris, Alan, Scott) at the BFI. Maybe this was why I wasn't particularly put out when they started showing the wrong version of The Happiness Patrol on the big screen. Before that, when we were settled in the auditorium of NFT1, things had started as usual: hosts Justin Johnson and Dick Fiddy walked out on stage, and lots of people took photos including yours truly. "I don't know," said Johnson "How many Dick pics do you need?!" They started with a round-up of social media comments with someone online suggesting that everyone should be wearing pink to attend as was done for the Barbie movie screenings in cinemas in 2023. "Most of our audience look more like Oppenheimer," said Fiddy drily.

There was then the usual quiz; one of the prizes was a self-assembly Kandyman action figure (i.e. a bag of Liquorice Allsorts); nobody could answer the question of whom Sylvester McCoy played in fan video The Zero Imperative, so they gave Sylv himself the prize as he at least could remember he played a Doctor, if not the Doctor (it was Doctor Colin Dove, fact fans). After that, the first interviewee asked up to the stage was Pete McTighe, one of the major creative forces behind the Blu-ray range, who had been instrumental in creating the special edition of The Happiness Patrol. The aim of this first interview - unfortunately, as it turned out - was to talk up this new edition to whet the appetites of the assembled about what they were about to see. McTighe commended the creativity and persistence of everyone involved in the original production, in front of and behind the cameras (his mention of Sheila Hancock's performance as Helen A got a big round of applause). His idea was that the special edition would help the original production out with some effects that they wouldn't have had the time or money to create, to help in world building. McTighe had access to over 60 hours of footage, not all but some of which is on the Blu-ray in its raw form. A lot of the material that was cut for time has been reintroduced, meaning each of the three episodes is now at least 30 minutes long. Some restructuring of scenes has also been done, particularly in the first episode, which reportedly makes the story flow and feel different. McTighe talked about extending the sequence of the Kandyman's death, and jokingly apologised for the spoiler. Johnson asked if anyone in the audience had never seen the story before, and a couple of hands did go up. McTighe was due to be back on stage later to talk more about the special edition once we'd all seen it, but that was destined not to happen.

(L to R) Johnson, Fiddy, McTighe

After McTighe left the stage, a statement from Happiness Patrol's writer Graeme Curry's family was read out. They were in the audience, but probably thought they would be too emotional to make the statement in person on stage; it brought a tear to the eye. Curry died in 2019, and it seems that for most of the time after his only Doctor Who story's broadcast until 2019, he only heard negative things about the story, though in later years he did become aware that it had a few fans out there. It is a shame that he didn't live to see how well the story he wrote, as broadcast in 1988 and without any further changes, went down with the audience at the BFI in August 2024. For that was the version that was shown. It was clear from the first scene after the credits that something was up; if the idea of the special edition was to add effects shots to better build the world of Terra Alpha, then one would expect to open with something a bit grander than how the original version started. After a few more minutes, the picture froze and the lights came up. Johnson came on stage and explained that the wrong version had been sent, and we were watching the standard version of the story. They were looking at a way to rectify the situation, but it seemed unlikely that they could get the correct version to the BFI now before the allotted slot for the day's event ran out. He apologised again before going offstage, but said "This is what the BBC sent - to throw them under the bus"! The first episode then resumed, and was followed by the second, again as broadcast in 1988. You can find my write up of the story for the blog here, but I have to note that I was much more positive watching the story in the BFI than I was back in 2018.

(L to R) Fiddy, Mansfield, Fifi

I could probably do some clever-clever remarks at this juncture about the people in the audience - like the populace of Terra Alpha - being scared to seem unhappy, but they reacted honestly and warmly to what they were seeing, even though it wasn't what they were expecting. I was swept along too: it's a funny script and elicited many big laughs from the crowd; in character and out, McCoy and Aldred are a fun duo to spend time with; all that material that was cut makes it rattle along at a fair old clip; the music and the visualisation of the Kandyman and Fifi are superlative. Talking of the latter, Fifi was the next guest invited onto the stage after the end of the second episode. Well, strictly speaking it was Stephen Mansfield, creature creator and puppeteer, who with Susan Moore built some of the nasties of the McCoy era including Helen A's pet. Johnson and Fiddy, coming back on with a 'show must go on' attitude, talked about a routine disappearance style punishment for whoever it was at the BBC that had screwed up, and then invited Mansfield onto the stage. With him came something balanced on a dais and hidden under a cloth (and it was fairly easy to guess what). Mansfield talked about the particular position he was put in doing his puppetry work to bring Fifi to life on set, which was mostly on the floor sticking his hand up between Sheila Hancock's legs. His journey to restoring Fifi started when rummaging in a props lockup (which also contained puppets from 1980s satire show Spitting Image and the Destroyer from Doctor Who story Battlefield whose latex had "gone crispy"). He saw Fifi looking forlorn, its expression almost "imploring" him, so decided to return the puppet to its former glory. The air bladder control that made the eyes move still works, and - once Fifi had been revealed with a theatrical flourish - this was demonstrated on stage.

Fifi

The final episode was shown next, followed by some clips from the Value Added Material of the Blu-ray set; there was the set's trailer, an excerpt from Looking For Dursley (a documentary about Remembrance of the Daleks guest star Dursley McLinden), and a section from Googlebox style extra Behind the Sofa with various Who luminaries commenting on The Happiness Patrol. It all looks great, as usual. Once that was done, the main panel came out - it was the largest I've seen at a BFI Doctor Who event for some time with five people involved in the production coming up on stage for Q&A: director Chris Clough, Script Editor Andrew Cartmel, main guest star Sheila Hancock, who played Helen A, and stars Sophie Aldred and Sylvester McCoy. Hancock was the biggest draw, and did dominate a little bit, but it was a lively panel in general, and everyone got a chance to shine. Hancock made it clear up front that she hadn't understood what was going on in the plot at all, but thought that it was an explosion of creativity, extolling the virtues of the effects, costumes, and make up. "You were good too, darling," she added to Sylv. She could see that it was a story with a moral, and that it did "sum up a dreadful period" of 1980s Thatcherism, but "I never followed the plot ... those little people, who the hell were they?". This instigated the first of many moments through the remainder of the event where Cartmel explained aspects of the story to Hancock. Later on, she queried what the point of the man wandering around with the harmonica was, and it's a good question to be fair. Early on, Cartmel highlighted how good the music - including the harmonica - was, and namechecked composer Dominic Glynn. Sticking with the musical theme, McCoy in typical self-deprecating style said that his "one talent" was playing the spoons, as he does to accompany the harmonica playing in one scene.

Sylv makes an entrance

When asked what he'd made of watching a story he performed in at a much younger age, McCoy said he was asking himself all the way through "Who is that chap, I recognise him?". There was a lively discussion amongst the panel members about the campness of the story, with many putting forward the view that underneath the trappings there was a lot of darkness, while others nonetheless thought it was "ultra camp, though" with the "pink TARDIS" being a giveaway. Cartmel explained that what might not come across is that the Doctor and Ace have landed in the "bad part of town" where infrastructure was crumbling but had facades erected to mask this, as in parts of "New Orleans or Venice". Clough outlined that they had filmed scenes with the cameras tilted to give a film noir effect, but once they fell behind schedule that was abandoned. The soundbites started to come so thick and fast that I didn't always have time to scribble down who said what. Aldred said that you can "Thank Chris [Clough]" for her performances throughout the series, new and old, as "He cast me", "So he's to blame," added someone - probably Sylv. Cartmel talked about Bassetts (the company in the UK famous for their liquorice sweets) getting upset about the potential breach of copyright that the Kandyman represented. "Who could have seen that coming?!" joked someone. "Ronnie Fraser was off the booze at that time" (that must have been Hancock); "You're obsessed by bike leathers"; "We are a cultured country"; "Nadine Dorries!". The story was initially seen as one that was badly received, but Cartmel thought that had changed of late, with it being embraced by a younger generation; "Well, they like sweets" said one wag. Someone, probably Clough, felt nostalgic at the wrong files being delivered to the BFI; it put him in mind of many a BBC cock-up he'd experienced in years gone by.

(L to R) Johnson, Clough, Cartmel, Hancock, Aldred, McCoy

A good-natured disagreement occurred between Cartmel and Johnson; the latter had an interesting fact written down on a card that The Happiness Patrol was the last Doctor Who story made wholly in studio until 2024's Boom, but Cartmel thought that Ghost Light also qualified. Ghost Light, as the obsessive fans in the audience (guilty as charged) knew, featured some establishing shots taken on location during the production of Survival. A question about making guest casts feel comfortable elicited a standard response from Sophie about Sylv being a good company leader, but Hancock bristled a bit about the suggestion that it was good to make things 'fun'. "Are you a killjoy?" asked someone whom I again did not have the chance to record, such was the speed at which the comments were coming. Hancock explained that after working long and hard on productions, she never liked it when the uninitiated said that "'It must be such fun.' Fun? This is my job, it's not a hobby!" Cartmel revealed that, although he and Curry had had Thatcher in mind as the template for Helen A, they had not passed this on to Hancock, who had come to it naturally in reaction to the script. When McCoy was talking about being told about the cancellation of Doctor Who, Hancock enquired whether more had been made after Happiness Patrol and was told that there had been another year of stories. "So, it wasn't this one that finished you off?" she asked, sounding a little relieved. McCoy shared something that I've never heard him say before, that a 1963 speech by the then UK leader of the opposition Harold Wilson led to the creation of Doctor Who, as the BBC were then inspired to make a scientific show. It's completely untrue, alas: this was the famous 'White Heat of Technology' speech that Wilson gave at his party conference; online sources differ as to whether it was presented in early October or late September, but either way Doctor Who was late on its development and had started production by then.

Towards the end, the panel took a more serious turn with a discussion about how Doctor Who was rated in the 1980s. Aldred and McCoy showed their usual positivity; when asked what was their personal legacy from Doctor Who, McCoy talked about how its allowed him to travel all over the world; Aldred answered " A pension" to laughs and added, hugging McCoy, "And a brilliant friend" to cheers. Clough, though, talked with maybe even a tinge of bitterness about the "career killer" that was having Doctor Who on one's CV. Everyone agreed that show business is a very snobby business, and Hancock pointed out that it wasn't just Doctor Who but all TV that tended to be looked down on, citing people referring to her late, great husband John Thaw dismissively as "a telly actor". All seemed to agree that - though TV without any purpose "disappears into the ether and is just bubblegum" - the best TV has messages within it. This was what drew McCoy to Doctor Who as a viewer in the 1960s. Clough talked with passion about his work on Brookside in the 1980s up to 2024's impactful Mr Bates vs The Post Office, which he produced. Whether he would add The Happiness Patrol to such an illustrious list was not made clear, but clearly it has a message and speaks to people. The event wound up and we left the auditorium for the BFI bar. I discussed the story with one of my viewing buddies Chris, who is a little more difficult to please than me. It became instantly clear that the issues I'd noted when I blogged the story are definitely there. As Sheila Hancock instinctively noticed, there is no real reason to include the pipe people or the harmonica player in proceedings, and there's many other examples along those lines. The story clearly has an effect on the audience despite these problems, though. Perhaps it isn't necessary for something to be coherent to be meaningful?

I wondered whether the special edition would have uncovered a more integrated narrative to back up the story's great premise, but assumed I would have to wait until the Blu-ray was released to find out. An email sent a week after the event would prove that assumption to be wrong... 

(With thanks to Scott and Alan for some of the BFI pictures.)

In Summary:

Ultimately it wasn't the end, but - if it had been - it would have been a great story to go out on.