10x2. Carnival of Monsters
Writer: Robert Holmes
Director: Barry Letts
Script Editor: Terrance Dicks
Producer: Barry Letts
Synopsis: The Doctor and Jo
arrive on board a long-lost ocean liner, the S.S. Bernice, that is contained
inside a "Miniscope," where a miniaturized assortment of species are
kept for entertainment purposes by two Lurmans, Vorg and Shirna. The
Lurmans have brought their act to Inter Minor, a planet in the midst of
political strife due to reforms enacted by its President. The Doctor
and Jo face perils both within the miniscope, where the suspcious Bernice crew are re-living the same
few events over and over again and where dangerous monsters are on the
loose, and without, as the xenophobic Interians consider whether to
destroy the Miniscope and the scheming Kallik manipulates the situation
to plot an overthrow of the government.
Review: I liked "Carnival of
Monsters" a lot, though I should add the caveat that I am probably
incapable of disliking a script that includes the line, "One has no
wish to be devoured by alien monstrosities, even in the cause of
political progress." Fortunately, this is no guilty pleasure but a
much-needed rebound after the jaw-dropping badness of "The Time
Monster" and the disappointing mediocrity of "The Three Doctors."
Robert Holmes, proving that he's much better when he's not writing
about Autons, shows why he would eventually be considered one of the
series' best scribes, delivering the most delightfully loopy script
since "The Mind Robber" and showing that light satire can work in the Doctor Who format.
A large part of what makes "Carnival" so memorable is the
characterization of Vorg and Shirna. Vorg is the sort of character that
we kind of like even though we know we shouldn't. He's a professional
entertainer with a decidedly roguish sensibility -- he's not overtly
malicious, but he's perfectly willing to lie and cheat his way through
situations and he's mostly indifferent to the lives of those inside his
Miniscope. Shirna is more ethical, urging him not to let the situation
get out of hand and showing more concern about the danger posed by the
Drashigs. Another reviewer commented on the slightly Douglas
Adams-esque feel to the serial, and this is certainly evident when Zorg
claims to have a permit from the Interian President Zarb -- in fact,
it's from a professional wrestler named Zarb that they had met on their
travels. The flamboyant pair are a perfect comedic contrast to the
uptight, xenophobic Interians, and the scene in which Shirna does a
dance routine and they ask the Interians if they found it entertaining,
receiving a rather direct "No" in response, is laugh-out-loud funny.
This light approach serves the material well, in that the point being
made about the reactionary Kallik and the way the Interians seem to
have enslaved their "functionaries" is rather obvious and might have
become merely heavy-handed if played completely straight.
With so much going on at once, the Doctor and Jo are just two of many
principal players in this story. (In fact, a first-time viewer must
have been left wondering for a while what the two threads -- the Doctor
and Jo on
the ocean liner, and the conflict on Inter Minor -- had to do with each
other, as the nature of the Miniscope isn't fully revealed for at least
the first fifteen or twenty minutes.) Jo will never be Liz Shaw, but I
must say I've warmed up to the duo at this point. Jon Pertwee and Katy
Manning are adept at pulling off glib exchanges like "That's
impossible!" "But what if you're wrong, Doctor?" "That's impossible,
too!", and the writers have wisely let Jo become more competent and
resourceful over time. (In this serial, it's most visible when she
purloins a set of skeleton keys to help them escape after being locked
up as stowaways.) Pertwee also continues to prove skilled at evoking
the Doctor's humanitarian tendencies, proclaiming that he helped
institute an intergalactic ban of Miniscopes and leaving no doubt about
his opinion of
Zorg. The crew of the Bernice
are, I suspect, deliberately stereotypical -- the no-nonsense naval
officer, the busy captain, the crusty old major and his daughter, etc.
This
might be a problem in another context, but it works here since they're
always being manipulated by Zorg anyway, and the script effectively
sets up a running gag about Jo being locked up until the captain's
ready to see her.
"Carnival of Monsters" is also full of subtext for pretentious
reviewers like
myself to dissect. Holmes is clearly up to something by giving Zorg the
power to manipulate his captives' emotions at will (just as writers do
to their characters) and by having him proclaim that the Drashigs are
the children's favorite because they're so violent. I'll grant that
it's possible that he's actually satirizing Doctor Who itself here, in which
case the Doctor's condemnation of Zorg and comparison of the Miniscope
to a zoo might be meant not only to echo the complaints about the
program's violence but to indict television entertainment in general as
voyeuristic. On balance, though, I think his intention is probably the
opposite. That is, he's arguing that entertainment like Doctor Who is only a problem when
there's an amoral hack like Zorg in charge. After all, if Zorg is
analagous to a TV writer, then surely he's only analogous to a very bad
one, since the actions of those under his control make no logical sense
-- at one point the Bernice
crew go from preparing to shoot the Doctor to walking away to have
dinner for no apparent reason, because Zorg is demonstrating the
Scope's powers to the Interians. I think the "message," then, is simply
that one should have a proper and responsible understanding of the
difference between fictional
violence and violence against real people, something which Zorg clearly
lacks and which one might argue some of the stuffier critics of Doctor Who also lacked, albeit in
opposite ways. Postmodernists reading this would probably observe that
of course everyone in "Carnival of Monsters" is, in fact, a fictional
character -- I'll concede the point, but I really don't think Holmes
intended to focus on that. (Nor, tempting as it is, would I subscribe
to the idea that Holmes foresaw the emergence of reality TV.)
Whatever point is being made here, the fact that the script weaves
together so many disparate elements into a coherent whole that offers
up so many intriguing interpretations is reason enough to praise it.
With the TARDIS restored to full function at the end of "The Three
Doctors," the Doctor's return to his wandering ways kicks off in
first-rate form here. This is the best Pertwee serial since "Inferno,"
and with only eight more serials to go, I'm just hoping the rest of his
era manages to maintain this level of quality.
Other notes:
- I think there's a continuity flub when the Bernice, which supposedly
disappeared in 1926, is said to have vanished "about forty years ago."
If, as most seem to agree, the UNIT era takes place in the late '70s
and/or early '80s, that's really stretching the definition of "about."
Rating: **** (out of four)