My Second Doctor Marathon Begins

Last winter I did a First Doctor marathon wherein I watched all the existing episodes of Doctor Who starring William Hartnell as the First Doctor. For the lost stories, I read the Target novelizations. Plus, I read all of the novels and short stories featuring this incarnation of the Time Lord in order of continuity as per the Doctor Who Reference Guide. I did not, however, read any comics, Telos novellas, or any short stories from the Doctor Who Annuals.

I've read a couple of the Doctor Who comics and they just didn't do much for me. Maybe if I engaged with more of them, I'd find a comic that I like but I am not a fan of the medium generally and my dislike of it carried over to Doctor Who. While I have heard good things about the Telos novellas, I only have electronic copies of them and I am not an e-book fan. Reading a short story on the screen I can handle. Beyond that, it's generally just too much. Give it to me on paper, I say! Lastly, I didn't own any of the annuals in any form last winter.

Maybe I'll expand my purview this time around. We'll see.

Anyway,  I began by watching "The Power of the Daleks".

This is one of those missing episodes with only fragments of footage known to exist and so all 6 episodes were animated and paired with the audio which was saved from oblivion. I saw it on the big screen several years back when it was in cinemas for a night to celebrate the episode's release so I had some idea of what to expect.

A few thoughts:

First, the writers and Troughton did a nice job of differentiating him from Hartnell's portrayal of the character. The Second Doctor is more light-hearted with his recorder playing and the way he meanders around the world of the show. I like this as it makes scenes where he is serious stand out in contrast. When he warns people about the Daleks or threatens to prevent someone's evil plans from coming to fruition, these instances have a certain gravitas to them and the Doctor is a bit more imposing since we see him being a bit more playful in other scenes.

This combination reminded me of the Seventh Doctor who would play the spoons and then turn around and threaten the villain as ominously as any incarnation of himself could.

It was neat to see a young, albeit animated, Bernard Archard as Bragen. His sharp features looked exceedingly familiar and I had to finally look him up to find out that he was Marcus Scarman in "The Pyramids of Mars", a wonderful Fourth Doctor adventure.

As for the companions, Ben is a bit too shouty and always wanting to run off somewhere to do something. I suppose this is actually a rather accurate portrayal of young men. Polly wasn't horrible as she had a few scenes where she is helpful rather than just asking men for explanations. But there were still a lot of times where she wasn't too much more than scenery.

It was really funny to see a Dalek serving drinks, something done here 44 years or so before "Victory of the Daleks".

Overall, I liked it. A new Doctor battling the hubris of a scientist as well as the Daleks who tricksied him. Troughton tantalizes as he looks to take the character in a new direction. Plus, there was some great, atmospheric incidental music throughout. A good start to a new era.