Serial F is very good, and although everyone except Susan has plenty to do, it's still very much Barbara's story. There's a good range of extras on the DVD as well, although the commentaries are very sparse - probably because this early in the range they hadn't quite figured out the best way of doing them. My personal favourite is John Ringham and Walter Randall's reunion for "Making Cocoa", featuring South Park style cartoon representations of Tlotoxl and Tonila (and this is one my children love to watch repeatedly). "Designing the Aztecs" (an interview with Barry Newbery) and "Restoring the Aztecs" (which does what it says on the tin) each offered interesting insights and provided me with extra stuff to spice up my reviews, as did "Remembering the Aztecs", though to a lesser extent. Ringham is a particularly fun interviewee, very much larger than life - just like Tlotoxl, but without the whole blood sacrifice bit (so far as I can tell). I also enjoyed the Blue Peter extract for nostalgia, but the TARDIS-Cam feature left me headscratching as ever - one day I'll find out what they're for. There's no "Coming Soon" on this disk, which disappointed my son, but overall a very good selection.
Behind the Scenes, part 1: Doctor Who Writer
I've praised John Lucarotti at times, and also criticised him; but on the whole his two serials to date have been successful. He was a writer who enjoyed travel, and the idea for serial F came from what he learned of the Aztecs while living in Mexico. He apparently wrote his scripts on a boat in Majorca, which sounds like an excellent way of avoiding distractions.
While filming for serial F was taking place, script editor David Whitaker was already making plans for the second year of the program. In an attempt to avoid some of the script crises that dogged the first year, he decided that there should be one lead writer for the future-based stories - Terry Nation, of course - and one for the historicals. Lucarotti seems like the most likely candidate for this post.
These are the only authors to write more than two stories in the Hartnell era, other than script editors David Whitaker and Dennis Spooner. To my eyes, they have very different strengths. Nation is best at fast-paced adventure plots, painting the setting and characters in broad brushstrokes and using them to keep things moving forward. For Lucarotti, the story comes out of the characters and their interactions. I can enjoy both styles, when done well; but it is Lucarotti's I get the most out of rewatching.
The Aztecs is the best-loved pure historical story according to the Mighty 200, eight places ahead of Marco Polo and more popular than any Harnell story except for three featuring Daleks and one featuring Cybermen. Both of these historicals rate even higher with Gallifrey Base voters: they are the two most popular Hartnell stories after Nation and Dennis Spooner's The Daleks' Masterplan, this time Mexico coming in second to Cathay; and Lucarotti's third story, The Massacre, comes in third, though that was heavily revised by the script editor. The DWM poll just has the first pseudohistorical, Spooner's The Time Meddler, in between.
All of which is my long-winded way of saying that Lucarotti was certainly getting something right - for modern audiences. The contemporary ratings show that while viewing figures remain consistent with those towards the end of the previous serial they never pick up, and the audience appreciation index also tails off (which was true for Marco Polo as well). Nation's AIs, in contrast, stay high throughout. Both writers were successful but perhaps, ironically, Lucarotti was the man most ahead of his time...
Rating:
Single Sitting: 8.5/10.
Episodic: 8.5/10.
DWM Mighty 200: 65.39%, 57th.
2011 Gallifrey Base Non-Dynamic Rankings: 8.43, 21st out of 222.
Next Time:
Straight on to the next televised serial (for a change), with Strangers in Space.
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