1x5. The Keys of Marinus
Writer: Terry Nation
Director: John Gorrie
Script Editor: David Whitaker
Producers: Verity Lambert & Mervyn Pinfield
Synopsis: Arbitan, the last of a group of elders on the planet
Marinus, traps the TARDIS crew
and forces them to search the planet for the four missing microkeys to
a
machine which once controlled the planet's population but which is now
sought
by the hostile Voords. The Doctor and his companions successfully
retrieve
the keys, but the Voords have taken over Arbitan's facility and the
TARDIS
crew end up destroying the machine, as the Doctor reflects that
humanity
should not be ruled by machines.
Review: "The Keys of Marinus" is an episode perhaps most
remarkable
for its structure. Rather than telling a single story divided into
several
episodes, the script by Terry Nation (making one of only two non-Dalek
contributions
to Doctor Who) instead sends the characters off on four
different
adventures linked only by the idea of searching for the missing keys to
the
Conscience of Marinus. Unfortunately, it doesn't really work: with the
exception
of the murder mystery introduced at the beginning of Episode 5, these
stories
aren't involving enough to leave much of an impression, offering
neither
the imagination and subtext of "The Daleks" nor the sharp
characterizations
of "100,000 B.C." and "Inside the Spaceship."
Part of the problem, I think, is that "The Keys of Marinus" is easily
the
most action-driven of the first season serials thus far. I say this not
because
I'm opposed to action-driven stories per se (though I do think action
is
generally best in small doses, especially in a science fiction show),
but
because the production team understandably has trouble pulling off
convincing
action scenes with their limited resources. This serial is full of
corridor
ambushes, chases through caverns and cities, attacks by murderous
vegetation,
annoying screaming from Susan, and the like, but it's all so obviously
staged
that it's hard to feel any real suspense, even when two possibly
expendable
guest characters accompany the Doctor and his companions on their
searches.
I am perhaps stating the obvious here, but a chase scene, for example,
requires
an effective sense of space. We need to know where the characters are,
how
far they are from their pursuers, and where one location is in relation
to
another. When all we see is actors entering and exiting a series of
sets
that do not even give the illusion of being anywhere near each other
(as
happens in Episode 4), we lose any sense that a real chase is taking
place,
and the whole thing just becomes tedious.
Episodes 3 and 4 are probably the low points of the serial, offering
little
other than a series of shallow, one-dimensional threats that serve only
to
make the characters jump through arbitrary hoops. The trapper in
Episode
4 is kind of creepy, yes, but we learn nothing about who he is or why
he
behaves this way, and the Ice Soldiers and the attacking vegetation
carry
no interest except as obstacles. The city of Morphoton in Episode 2
sort
of works as a microcosm of what Marinus might have been like when the
Conscience
was functioning, showing us a society devoid of strife but completely
under
the domination of three intelligent but unfeeling disembodied brains.
Unfortunately,
too much time is wasted on the illusory idyll that the time travelers
first
encounter upon arriving there, leaving us waiting impatiently for the
inevitable
revelation that Things Are Not What They Seem. For that matter, why
have
it be an illusion at all? The conflict between material prosperity and
free
will would have been even stronger if the rulers had actually provided
for
all the needs of their people and still been unable to offer them
anything
other than a sterile and lifeless existence.
"The Keys of Marinus" does start to display a little more energy when
we
reach the city of Millenius and Ian finds himself falsely accused of
murder.
While this segment doesn't really possess much more depth than anything
else
in this serial, the cast and crew are clearly having fun with the
murder
mystery clichés, such as an incriminating slip of the tongue and
a
courtroom ruse to draw out the real culprit. Easily the best scene in
the
entire serial is the Doctor's Sherlock Holmes-style reconstruction of
the
crime, which William Hartnell delivers with so much zest that I
half-expected
him to announce, "The game is afoot!" The script doesn't really do
anything
with the idea of Millenius' justice system operating on the principle
of
"guilty until proven innocent," but this segment (which comprises all
of
Episode 5 and part of Episode 6) is entertaining enough to get high
marks
from me.
Nation's script achieves mixed results in its conception of Marinus and
the
crisis posed by the Voord attack. I appreciate the notion that human
free
will, even with all its imperfections and cruelties (which are on
promiment
display in each of the situations encountered by the TARDIS crew), is
still
preferable to externally imposed artificial "happiness." This has been
done
with more depth and complexity elsewhere (for a recent example,
consider
the fourth season of Angel),
but to the extent that it's addressed here, it works. And, as has been
observed
elsewhere, the script takes a welcome deviation from sci-fi conventions
by
portraying the planet Marinus as a heterogeneous mix of locations and
cultures,
rather than a single unified society. In a way, however, the different
locations
almost seem too disconnected: you would think that the more
technologically
advanced societies, at least, would be monitoring the situation with
the
Conscience and the Voords, but none of them seem to have been paying
much
attention. For that matter, where did the Voords come from and why do
they
want to take over Marinus? Like so many of the "bad guys" in this
story,
they're evil simply because the script requires it, and no one seems to
have
put any thought into their origins and motivations.
"The Keys of Marinus" is not a total loss: there are some interesting
(if
underdeveloped) ideas, and we also see the TARDIS crew becoming a
closer-knit
and less contentious group of individuals, but too much of it is just a
bland
walkthrough of fantasy-adventure formula. An hour or so of this might
be
okay as an episode of The Lost World. As two hours and
fifteen minutes of Doctor Who, it's not up to par.
Other notes:
- It's getting problematic to reconcile Susan's behavior with the later
mythos
surrounding the Doctor and Gallifrey. Between her claim to have
invented
the term TARDIS, her calling the Doctor "Grandfather," and her general
ineptitude
and tendency towards whining and screaming, it's difficult to see her
as
someone who grew up in a society dominated by the Time Lords.
Rating: ** (out of four)
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