There are only four episodes that I have, so this isn't going to be a long series.
The second on is The Devil of Winterborne. Mark Gatiss returns to write this episode, and even returns to play a character (no, not the same character, that would be hard). We are at Winterborne, a school for male children. At least there are three of them, all just turning eighteen, and there is one teacher and a headmaster. Yeah, we aren't dealing with a huge cast here. But we are dealing with devils, homosexuals and people who stutter. A sensitive portrayal? Well, it could be worse, but definitely wouldn't be done that way these days.
This story works so much better than the previous one. There's one clear storyline, deaths with weird overtones, and we get a simple thread to follow. Some minor sideplots, but basically one story. However, the audio doesn't continue to make friends here. Music overwhelms a lot of scenes, and when there is dialogue there is also a lot of natural sounds (eg footsteps) that can easily wipe out what people are saying. Still, far better.
And hey, Peter Davison is in this, as you would tell if you saw the cover (which is just his face over swirly lines). We also get Geoffrey Beevers (he's a doctor, and he wants his sausages!), Terry Molloy and a group of young actors playing the young men and doing a great job at it.
However... I'm still not sure what the point of the P.R.O.B.E. taskforce is. It's kinda UNIT-lite, but this is supposed to be in the Doctor Who universe because this is Liz Shaw, so why not just have UNIT? Or, given the rather prosaic nature of events, just the normal police even. Let's get some really weird things happening and actually make Dr Shaw use her scientific abilities!
No comments:
Post a Comment