Season 18 of Doctor Who, airing from 1980 to 1981, was, once again, a time of great change. Douglas Adams had left after just one season as script editor, due to overwork caused by his Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy project blowing up big time. Graham Williams had also chosen to leave as head producer (the then-equivalent of a modern showrunner) after three seasons, finding the job had been more stressful than expected due to budgetary issues. John Nathan-Turner, who'd worked on the show since 1968, was promoted to showrunner and quickly hired Christopher Bidmead as script editor and lead writer. Bidmead was noted as having more knowledge of "proper" science fiction and was tasked with moving the show away from the silliness that had grown unchecked over the preceding few seasons.
Nathan-Turner also decided that the show was in need of a revamp, arguably the most significant since the series had moved into colour production with Season 7 back in 1970. More sophisticated visual effects were employed, thanks to the advent of computer technology and better model shots and prosthetics. It was hardly competing with Star Wars but at least it looked a bit better than what had come before. The title sequence was changed for the first time since Season 12 and the theme music given a somewhat funkier, electronic makeover. The cumulative result was to announce that Doctor Who had moved, very firmly, into the 1980s.
Bidmead and Nathan-Turner were also both keen to refresh the show creatively and in its casting. Lalla Ward had already announced her intention to leave the role of Romana, and Tom Baker had, as usual, played hardball in early-season negotiations and was quite surprised when the production team accepted his departure instead of arguing for him to stay by offering more money. They were also keen to remove K9, feeling his presence made the Doctor too powerful, not to mention making a mockery of the Doctor's strict no weapons policy: he doesn't like carrying guns but having a mobile laser tank trundling around is fine, apparently. These changes also required the introduction of new companions, with the 18-year-old Matthew Waterhouse cast as Adric mid-season and Janet Fielding joining as Tegan in the series finale. There was also an unexpected decision to promote guest star Sarah Sutton to a companion as Nyssa in the finale, resulting in a complete change of TARDIS crew and the most crowded TARDIS since way back in Season 4 (and the TARDIS wouldn't be this crowded for so long again until Series 11 of the new era...though that's a different story), although the full impact of that would not be felt until the following season.
The season launches with The Leisure Hive. The new music and new title sequence immediately impress, but the bemusingly long tracking shot of Brighton Beach that follows feels like the director is trying a bit too hard to make it feel like a different show. The story moves to the planet Argolis, where the survivors of a devastating war have funded reconstruction by turning the planet into a resort. Unfortunately, the odd appeal is now seen as old-hat and the planet teeters on the edge of bankruptcy. A spate of deaths and tensions with the Foamasi, the alien species who won the war with Argolis, intrigue the Doctor into getting involved. It's an odd story - and the first of several through the decade to dwell on capitalist themes - but at least feels fresh and original compared to what has come before, with a couple of refreshing plot twists and some interesting new effects (such as better locking-off technology that means the TARDIS can now materialise whilst the camera is moving). It's also the first story of the season to put Tom Baker in prosthetics, with him having to spend an episode or so aged into a very old man.
This continues in Meglos, where the Doctor's appearance is taken on by a hostile shapechanging cactus alien, and means that Tom Baker has to play both the hero and the villain. Despite complaining about the prosthetics required whenever Meglos changes shape, it's clearly an acting challenge that Baker relishes and he delivers clearly his best performance since at least City of Death here. The story and worldbuilding are quite good with its central story of a planet caught in a battle between reason and superstition, with a splendid array of guest performers. Bill Fraser and Frederick Treves are particularly good and there's a nice returning performance by Jacqueline Hill, here playing the antagonistic Lexa but whom is best-known for playing one of the Doctor's first companions, Barbara, back in Seasons 1 and 2. There are also some very impressive effects shots, at least by contemporary standards.
Full Circle is the first in a trilogy of serials set in E-Space. The TARDIS is sucked through a portal to this other dimension and is unable to escape, leading the Doctor and Romana to try visiting several planets in this new realm. On the first they run afoul of a conflict between the descendants of the crew of a crashed starliner and strange creatures rising from the swamps. This is a somewhat standard Doctor Who story, enlivened by an interesting last-minute plot twist, but its main purpose is to introduce new companion Adric, played by Matthew Waterhouse. Unfortunately Adric comes across as a bit of a wet blanket rather than the roguish "Artful Dodger" the producers had envisaged, but the Marshmen are a visually impressive opponent.
State of Decay, written by Terrance Dicks and held over from prior seasons, is a better story but an incongruous one. It feels like it's straight out of the Hinchcliffe/Holmes era, with a full gothic horror vibe and its premise basically being "the Doctor meets vampires!" Where the serial sings is the tying in of the vampires to the mythology of the Time Lords, and its effective guest cast who get the assignment, which stays just on the right side of camp.
Warriors' Gate is Doctor Who at its flat-out most bananas. Doctor Who always hovers around the edges of being totally surreal, and at rare moments in its history it gives in to the impetus. The last time it went Full Weird was arguably Season 6's The Mind Robber, and it wouldn't even try to match this again until Ghost Light in Season 26. Still, those stories at least had the Doctor and his companions written as normal, dealing with weird events. Warriors' Gate extends its atmosphere of weirdness to the Doctor, Romana and K9, who have poetic turns of dialogue in a story that starts traditional (a ship gets lost in the boundary of E-Space, after losing track of a captive creature who helps guide them) but rapidly takes a turn for the bizarre. Director Paul Joyce imbues the serial with a dreamlike quality, and its minimalism (the serial is mostly shot on greenscreens with only a couple of real sets) contrasts with the extensive and mostly-effective effects work. The bizzarity is not helped by the odd way that Romana and K9 leave the show at the end, with the hint of them going off on their own adventures we never hear about again, at least not on the main show (spinoff media, as usual to the rescue). It's certainly the most unusual-feeling Classic Doctor Who show of them all, and ambitious even if not a full success.
The Keeper of Traken is a refreshing change back towards what appears to be normality: the Doctor and Adric, having escaped E-Space, arrive on the planet Traken at the request of its dying Keeper, who feels evil is afoot. However, the Doctor is then framed as being the source of the evil. The serial has a splendid guest cast, with Anthony Ainley being the standout as Tremas, but Sheila Ruskin providing a splendid two-faced performance as the charming-but-deceitful Kassia. Adric's been a bit underwhelming as a companion so far, but he perks up a lot in a double-act with Sarah Sutton's likeable Nyssa, which I suspect played a key role in the decision to bring her back as a companion. The story itself is very solid, mid-to-upper tier Doctor Who, but what perks it up immensely is the ending. Arguably for the very first time, the "normal" way a Doctor Who story is supposed to end gets thrown out of the window by a series of shocking twists, something that feels more like an episode of Buffy or Babylon 5, and the serial itself ends on a hell of a cliffhanger as the Doctor's greatest enemy stages his most impressive comeback to date.
The series finale, Logopolis, written by Christopher Bidmead himself, is one of Doctor Who's better regeneration stories. There's something of the surreal air of Warriors' Gate here, as the story involves the TARDIS materialising around a real police box (so the Doctor can measure it and unjam the chameleon circuit), but this has been predicted, so a trap has been laid for the Doctor which causes an infinite regression of the TARDIS interior. Janet Fielding's Tegan stumbles into the TARDIS in the middle of all this chaos. Meanwhile, a mysterious figure is trying to help the Doctor and his companions towards a terrifying destiny the Doctor has to face head-on, and there's also a bunch of guys who are muttering equations that are preventing the universe from being destroyed. Obviously someone thinks it would be a brilliant idea to try to silence them.
The result is Doctor Who at its most grandiose and epic. For once the fate of the entire universe is at stake and, this not being a near-weekly occurrence as in Modern Who, the stakes feel pretty convincing for once. There's a ticking clock of doom as the Doctor realises his regeneration is coming but he tries to keep a brave face up for his companions. The story is odd, and dense, but also busy with a constantly-evolving plot, changes of scenery and characters coming and going. John Fraser delivers a superb guest performance as the Monitor, and there's a great turn from British character actor Tom Georgeson as a police inspector out of his depth. Janet Fielding also makes a terrific impression as new companion Tegan, even if she takes what's going on a bit more in her stride then you'd expect. Logopolis closes out the epic, immense Tom Baker era (which lasted longer, in episode count at least, then the next five Doctors combined) in appropriately epic style, and welcomes the arrival of Peter Davison as the younger-seeming Fifth Doctor.
As a bonus, at least on the Blu-Ray release of the season, there's also A Girl's Best Friend. This is a one-off TV movie, planned as a backdoor pilot for a show provisionally called K9 & Company. The 50-minute Christmas special sees the return of Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, some five years after she parted company with the Doctor. The Doctor has built a third iteration of K9 and sent him to her to help in her investigations. Sarah soon needs his help as she investigates weird goings-on in her aunt's remote village out in the country. It's a pretty standard story, with traces of The Dæmons and The Stones of Blood (and, more amusingly, vague foreshadowings of the movie Hot Fuzz), though shorter and more focused. Elisabeth Sladen effortlessly slips into the role of Sarah Jane, but here as the heroine and star, and rises to the occasion easily. The guest cast is game and the direction effective. The script is solid enough and this being a slightly more upgraded version of K9 sees him have a little bit more of a personality and sense of humour than his two predecessors. How long the legs would have been on a full series of this is unclear (as K9 basically lasers his way to resolving the story fairly effortlessly), but it does feel like the premise could have led to a full series. Well, I suppose it did when The Sarah Jane Adventures finally debuted in 2007, twenty-six years after this episode aired, but that's another story as well. I will caution that K9 & Company might well have the very worst title sequence and musical score of any television show ever made. It's really something.
The eighteenth season of Doctor Who (****) is a hugely transitional one, with the entire cast and most of the crew changing over its considerable length (it being the longest season between Season 6 and Series 4 of the Modern era). If John Nathan-Turner wanted to put his stamp on the show he succeeded: there's a completely different energy working in this series by the end of the season and, for better or worse, the excesses of the Tom Baker era are slowly ironed out. If Baker was unhappy with many of these changes, it at least seems to galvanise him and he delivers some of his best performances since his Imperial Period (Seasons 12-14), with his performances in The Leisure Hive, Meglos, Warriors' Gate and Logopolis being particularly accomplished. Doctor Who has finally reached the 1980s, properly, and nothing will quite be the same again.
The season is available on DVD and Blu-Ray, as well as streaming on BBC iPlayer in the UK and various services overseas.
- 18.1 - 18.4: The Leisure Hive (***)
- 18.5 - 18.8: Meglos (***½)
- 18.9 - 18.12: Full Circle (***)
- 18.13 - 18.16: State of Decay (***½)
- 18.17 - 18.20: Warriors' Gate (***½)
- 18.21 - 18.24: The Keeper of Traken (****)
- 18.25 - 18.28: Logopolis (****½)
- K9 & Company: A Girl's Best Friend (***½)
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