007 - The Sensorites

Broadcast:

20^th June - 1^st August 1964

Doctor:

William Hartnell

Companions:

Ian, Barbara, Susan

Adversary:

Sensorites

Written by:

Peter R Newman

Director:

Mervyn Pinfield, Frank Cox

Music:

Norman Kay

Script Editor:

David Whitaker

Producer:

Verity Lambert

Average Viewers:

6.92m (7.9, 6.9, 7.4, 5.5, 6.9, 6.9)

Summary: Sensitive telepaths hold humans captive in their space craft while facing conspiracy and ilness on their own planet. There is good and bad on both sides of each problem and the Doctor must resolve it all before he can regain access to his TARDIS

The Sensorites has become a bit of a minor story over the intervening years as very few records remain in the archives and it simply doesn't get talked about. This is evident in the DVD extras (or relative lack thereof) and the brief career of its writer adds to that. It should not be completely overlooked however, as it contains some real quality and valuable points of canon and heritage - It is very possible that we would not have the Ood today if we didn't have the Sensorites first.

Essentially spanning July of 1964, The Sensorites came at a busy time in world history. No single major global incident, but plenty of events around the world that are worth noting. For example, American President Lyndon Johnson introduced the Civil Rights Act which abolishing racial segregation, there were six days of race riots in Harlem, and race riots in Singapore (between ethnic Chinese and Malays) while the Vietnam War was only approach its half way point. Malawi was given independence from the UK (and changed its name from Nyasaland) and former Prime Minister Winston Churchill retired from the House of Commons at the age of 89. In lighter news, the first close-up photographs of the Moon were taken by Ranger 7 - a thousand times clearer than anything ever seen from Earth, the British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch was won by Jim Clark, the Warner Brothers Cartoon Division was shut down, and the Post Office Tower in London was completed - it would not begin operation until October 1965 but would go on to feature heavily in The War Machines in 1966. In music, country singer Jim Reeves died in a small plane crash, the Beatles returned home from America to an estimated crowd of 150,000 people which left 300 injured. At number one were Roy Orbison "It's Over", Animals "House Of The Rising Sun", Rolling Stones "It's All Over Now" and the Beatles's "A Hard Day's Night" began a run of three weeks at the top following the release of their film of the same name. Other films in the cinema included star studded black comedy What A Way To Go! and Seance On A Wet Afternoon which, in retrospect, has a number of elements that take an eerie turn when you think of the Moors Murders that were taking place at the time and searches that followed later (though it would be more than a year before they came to light)

Finally, before the review itself, between the broadcasts of episodes 4 and 5, on the 22nd July future companion Bonnie Langford was born, and on the 25th July straight after episode 5 viewers could see Carole Anee Ford on the Juckbox Jury panel for the third and final time! (It's also worth noting that episode 3 had been deliberately delayed to make way for an extended edition of Grandstand (hence the serial's seven week run when it only had six episodes)

As the first episode opens, we pick up where The Aztecs left off. The TARDIS has landed yet it is still moving. Ian suggests the obvious answer that they are on something but it is Barbara's intuition that presents the more concerning and correct answer that they are [i]in[/i] something. Unlike the previous week's cliffhanger pace (something that would later be referred to as "end of episode acting") as this episode starts a new story the mood feels very subdued and there is an extra scene apparently added to pad out the episode as the travellers pause to recall all the adventures they have had. This gives us a great quote from the Doctor "It all started out as a mild curiosity in a junk-yard and now it's turned out to be quite a... quite a great spirit of adventure, don't you think?" We even get to hear of another adventure that took place before Ian and Barbara joined the TARDIS - meeting Henry VIII and getting sent to the Tower of London (which was fortunate, if not deliberate because that's where the TARDIS was! This has an added sense of relevance following events of The Day Of The Doctor)

Curiously, while this discussion is going on we again see the TARDIS console room from an unusual angle. The doors are in the background and to the right. The reason for this becomes clear once the doors are opened and director Mervyn Pinfield gets creative and adventurous. For the first and only time during the classic era of Doctor Who, the camera follows the travellers through the doors to reveal the relatively confined spaceship in which they have landed! There is then a shot following Susan back to lock the TARDIS doors. It is worth noting that Mervyn Pinfield wasn't just the director of The Sensorites but was permanently acting as Associate Producer - a role which it seems was created to support the young Verity Lambert and give the show greater credibility than might otherwise have been likely under the corporation's first female producer. Once Lambert proved to be perfectly competent in her own right, Pinfield was only really needed as technical advisor, an area in which he was quite the expert. As a result, The Sensorites is really quite strong despite or perhaps thanks to its complexities

The Sensorites also benefited from three episodes being made in Television Centre which again allowed for more spacious sets and better lighting and camera equipment. The first two episodes in particular were filmed on a single composite set, that of the spaceship - the first spaceship to appear on Doctor Who and the first case of "confined base under attack" which would become a familiar theme, though here it is only used as one third of the story. Indeed, there are several layers to The Sensorites. We are introduced initially to the humans on the spaceship who are trapped and held captive by the Sensorites. We meet the Sensorites, the show's first clear departure from humanoid aliens (excluding the Dalek creatures who were never really seen), then progress to their planet and learn of political subterfuge and mysterious illness that both threaten the species. Finally there is the presence of an apparent monster that turns out to be delusional human soldiers fighting a war than is long over. Despite all this and the Doctor's eventual involvement in resolving it all the story appears to be over barely five minutes into the first episode... the crewmen on board the ship are all dead and their watches indicate they have been for some time (as explained in a fluffed line from the Doctor "These are the non-winding time {type}. The movement of the wrist recharges the spring inside for 24 hours") and the Doctor is all set to leave. Of course, that would not be much of a story and so at that moment one of the crew starts to wake up from what was in fact some form of deep stasis. We soon see a mysterious hand removing the lock from the TARDIS door, thus forcing the Doctor to get involved (as had happened in the previous three adventures) This close-up shot provides two further problems however. Firstly, we had previously seen how close the TARDIS was to the main action, practically just out of shot, yet nobody noticed the saboteur and frankly there was nowhere for him to have come from or escape to. Secondly, when two Sensorites approach the ship there is a distinct sound that one of the crew say they always hear when they are about to be boarded, yet the saboteur arrived silently (it's also worth noting, and glossing over, that any sound coming from the Sensorite's craft would not have been heard in space anyway) There are further curiosities in the first episode... Barbara and Susan are sent to fetch water from a clearly marked cupboard but don't see it and instead go through a big door which is operated by a sensor like those seen on Skaro (in The Daleks) yet Susan seems surprised by its operation despite knowing how to activate it! Despite all this, the action plays out nicely and there is a sudden rush of action and dramatic music culminating in a great cliffhanger as a Sensorite stands outside the ship with his hands almost clawing at the window and the Doctor calling Ian "Cheston" in the panic!

Such drama is not sadly lost in the reprise that opens episode two. A different Actor is playing the Sensorite and doesn't put his hands to the window, so he's just stood there looking like an idiot and the Doctor says "Chesterton" correctly, thus demonstrating that the previous utterance was a slip on Hartnell's part (having made the previous time/type slip, stumbled on the word "curiosity" and said "Solution" instead of "puzzle" it had not been a good day). The second episode passes with little incident apart from one Sensorite standing on the other's foot and a very major wall wobble! One narrative point of note however, the Doctor starts to become angry and when told that he is in no position to make threads he declares "I don't make threats, but I do keep promises and I promise you I will cause more trouble than you bargained for" It's an aggression that grows into the third episode as he even has an argument with Susan who has suddenly taken on a teenage strop! She has found the ability to communicate telepathically with the Sensorites and wishes to help them in return for the TARDIS lock. As part of a wider bargain, Barbara is to remain on the ship while the others all go down to the planet, at which point Ian remarks how he doesn't like them splitting up because it always leads to trouble! And so, just nine minutes into the episode Barbara is out of the story and won't return until episode six... it was Jaqueline Hill's turn to take a two week holiday!

What unfolds on the planet is an interesting mix, as previous mentioned, including a play on the short-sighted and often xenophobic view that all [insert racial type of choice here] look alike. The evil plotting Sensorite, who's identity I will let you discover for yourself, uses the fact that all Sensorites essentially look alike to usurp power. In reality, all the masks were individually made and there are clear variations in body shape of the actors portraying Sensorites but they are all dressed identically except for those in power who wear sashes or armbands to denote their rank. It seems in many areas that writer Peter R Newman drew on his experiences during the Second World War when he was in Burma - as Toby Hadoke's investigative feature on the DVD explains, drawing parallels between this and his other work. The Sensorites have no eyelids and Carol has explain about them, this gives them a slight Asian look and may even be a variation on the fact that most Asians don't have double-eyelids like westerners. Susan makes fun of their almost flipper like feet, giggling at the thought them running and the Doctor tells her off and explains that they were in fact quite mobile. But Newman also takes time to create a sense of reality and feasibility in these aliens and their world, talking about culture and classes as well as having them question where the human heart is positioned and whether it is central like their own or to one side or the other. He also explains that they have different sensitivities to light and sound (or at least voices) - the Doctor realises that unlike human eyes, Sensorites have pupils that contract in dark light making them even more blind and vulnerable which leads on to their fear of the dark and in particular the apparent monsters in the caves of the aqueduct. On that note, it's worth mentioning that the Doctor was attacked and clearly clawed by this monster, which seems less plausible as the truth of the matter unfolds.

Mervyn Pinfield had a preference for recording episodes straight through in one take without breaks or film inserts. This was possible because of his experience making dramas that were broadcast live like a play rather than being recorded. This wasn't entirely unusual at the time and it was common practice to halt recording as little as possible because editing video tape was very costly (the tape was literally cut and joined like film which restricted its reuse and tapes were very expensive) but it is worth noting that episode 2 to 5 were all planned to be single take recordings. It's not made clear on the DVD whether this actually happened but it is likely and the added pressure on the actors seems present in an unusually high number of line fluffs and stumbles including several from Carole Anne Ford who had previously been very solid and two from Sensorites that are rather painful: "Here is the...[two second pause]... antidote", "I heard them over t...over t, t, talking", "I wonder where they're up t, where they've gone to", "Where did you (r)ecei... receive this?", "Then we can both guide, guide them both out."

As stated at the start, there are several points of canon and lore laid out during The Sensorites. It is the first time we see aliens with more depth than simply an evil to over come and the Doctor is drawn into areas not directly affecting him. The series has it's first ever spaceship model shot, rather a good one compared with some later ones that were shot on video! Susan points out that "Grandfather and I are not from Earth" and gives the first description of their own planet "At night the skies are burnt orange and the leaves on the trees are bright silver", though it would still be a further decade before their home planet was named! The Doctor states his distaste in guns when presented with one (though the device he is given had previously been seen in less violent tool-like use, rather like the sonic screwdrive when it was later introduced) "I have never liked weapons at any time. However, they are handy little things". Speaking of handy things, the Doctor is seen wearing spectacles as an indication of being clever for the first time, on a number of occasions

Despite all the new and creative elements (including a rare montage sequence as the Doctor devises a cure), there are a number of repeated details. For example Newman also seems to have been influenced by The Daleks which was broadcast during the period in which he wrote The Sensorites and the production subtitles point out a number of similarities; a false message is written under force, Ian in incapacitated (and spends most of episode 4 out of action), cave scenes following an aqueduct... so although the whole story works well and feels quite fresh, it could arguably be described a rather derivative.

In the final scene as the TARDIS departs we get a reaffirmation regarding the ships flight "This old ship of mine seems to be an aimless thing" yet, when Ian implies that the Doctor doesn't know where he's going it rather puts the Doctor's nose out of joint and he declares that he will leave them at the very next place in which they arrive... Meanwhile, Susan expresses a desire to settle and find somewhere she fits in... a bit of a prophetically gloomy end that leaves you fearful for the shows, or at least the characters' future... despite this, I really enjoy The Sensorites and gave it a total of 79% (which is the highest so far beating The Daleks due to its flabby middle episodes and dubious music)