Horse of Destruction (The Myth Makers Episode 4)

The one where the Doctor loses a companion, gains another and nurses a third...

I find it really poor when Doctor Who introduces a new companion immediately after the previous one has left. It just feels too neat and convenient to be real. The 1970s were the worst culprit, introducing Jo just after Liz left, and Sarah Jane just after Jo left, and Romana just after Leela left. At least in the Hartnell era (and the 1980s, to be fair) there were often overlaps with the characters so that it happened more organically. Steven shared screen time with Ian and Barbara, Dodo with Ben and Polly, and in Horse of Destruction, we're introduced to Katarina before Vicki has left.

It's still a bit convenient though, and it would have been so much better if Donald Cotton had written Katarina into The Myth Makers before episode 4. As a handmaiden of Cassandra, there's plenty of opportunity to have her hanging around, and she could've been given more of a reason to be there rather than the slightly forced presence here.

After three episodes of tongue-in-cheek comedy and spills, Horse of Destruction is actually quite straight. Cotton eschews the comedy for incident, and the sound of Troy being raided by the Greeks is impressive. People scream and run and die - Priam and Paris are killed - and there's a real sense of danger in the final scenes as the Doctor is reunited with his friends and the TARDIS.

"Where have you been all this time?" asks the Doctor of Vicki, which is odd as he previously had no idea that she'd ever left the TARDIS. In the kerfuffle that we can hear on the soundtrack, there seems little to no time at all for Vicki to tell the Doctor how she feels about Troilus, and her intention to stay behind in Ancient Greece and live with him. We're deprived of a scene in which the Doctor (and Steven) say goodbye to Vicki, just as we weren't privy to the Doctor and Vicki saying farewell to Ian and Barbara. Come to think of it, the Doctor cannot bring himself to face Susan when he forces her to leave the TARDIS either... I see a theme developing here, where the Doctor doesn't like goodbyes (he does say a proper goodbye to Steven in The Savages, but again, is deprived of one with Dodo in The War Machines. Interesting, isn't it?).

It's hard to work out what happens when all you have is a tinny audio recording, but at some point Steven injures his shoulder, so much so that he has trouble walking alone and needs the Doctor and Katarina's help getting inside the TARDIS. Once inside he becomes feverish, asking after Vicki, and the Doctor tells him she is safe, and that staying behind is what she wanted. How he knows this I don't know, but Vicki's (very sudden) departure is sad. She was a great character, a chirpy young girl with adventure and spirit who didn't have the handicap of being the Doctor's granddaughter. The Doctor and Vicki bonded instantly - the chemistry between Hartnell and O'Brien right from the off in Desperate Measures is obvious - and the two were like partners in crime for much of her time aboard the TARDIS. Vicki brought a mischievous warmth out of the Doctor which would make Season 2 a much lighter, freer run of stories, after the earnestness of Season 1. In my mind, Vicki is a key companion in the Doctor's development as a character, and it's a shame so few people recognise this.

Vicki opts to stay behind in Greece with her lover Troilus. Of course, seeing as she now has the name Cressida, this opens a whole new barrel of snakes. Troilus and Cressida do not form part of Greek mythology, and Cressida was actually the invention of Italian writer Giovanni Boccaccio in his 14th century poem Il Filostrato (although Boccaccio bases his Cressida on Briseida in 12th century French poet Benoit de Sainte-Maure's Roman de Troie). Other authors have helped shape the character of Cressida over the centuries, including Geoffrey Chaucer, Robert Henryson and, of course, William Shakespeare, whose 1602 play sees her handed to the Greeks in exchange for a Trojan prisoner of war. In the Greek camp, Troilus spies Greek warrior Diomedes flirting with Cressida, which is interesting, as Cotton has Steven pretending to be "Diomede" in The Myth Makers (it's all very muddled because there are four characters called Diomede in Greek mythology, all of them women, whereas Diomedes (with an 's') is a Greek warrior, and probably the character Cotton intended.

Anyway, enough muddled history. Vicki and Troilus intend to help rebuild Troy by teaming up with Aeneas, who Troilus claims is his cousin, but is actually his second cousin, but let's not get into that now. As Cressida was not a real character in Greek mythology, her fate is more elusive. It's a criticism of most tellings of the Troilus and Cressida story that as soon as she betrays Troilus for Diomedes, she has fulfilled her purpose and she is no longer mentioned (as with Shakespeare, Chaucer and Boccaccio, for instance). However, I looked into what happens to Cressida in other fictional depictions, and it's not great news for Vicki - Henryson has her contract leprosy, while Christa Wolf's 1983 novel Cassandra sees her become a slave to Agamemnon and Achilles. Abandoned by Diomedes, thrown into slavery and dying of leprosy - farewell, my dear Vicki...

The episode ends with Steven in dire need of drugs for his shoulder, and the Doctor with an unexpected new travelling companion in the form of Katarina, who believes herself to be dead. "This is not Troy," says the handmaiden of the TARDIS. "This is not even the world. This is the journey through the beyond." The Doctor does little to put her right as he is too troubled by Steven's illness and the sudden loss of Vicki (remember, he's barely seen her at all since he left the TARDIS in episode 1 to ask Achilles and Hector where they'd landed).

When Katarina calls the Doctor a "great god", he tells her to call him Doctor. "As you wish, Doc," replies the Trojan girl, to which the Doctor mutters: "I am not a Doc. I am not a god. Oh, my dear Vicki, I hope you'll be alright."

Somehow, I don't think she will be.

Overall, The Myth Makers is an uneven beast. It's silly but also funny, it's comical but also witty. Writer Donald Cotton has his tongue in his cheek for three-quarters of the story, then affects a u-turn in style for episode 4, which is pretty grim and serious. Some characters are meant to be amusing (basically all of the Trojans), others are merely avatars for dialogue and exposition (Odysseus and Achilles). There are pockets of more interesting characterisation, such as the underused Menelaus, but all in all, Cotton wasn't going for depth, he was going for entertainment value. The Myth Makers is certainly that, and especially any scene with Cassandra in it, but feels like it could have been better and is less than the sum of its parts.

First broadcast: November 6th, 1965

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: The epic scale of the sacking of Troy certainly sounds impressive on audio, and provides a startling gear shift from comedy to tragedy.
The Bad: Vicki's departure feels rushed.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★★★☆☆ (story average: 7.0 out of 10)

NEXT TIME: The Nightmare Begins...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Temple of Secrets (episode 1); Small Prophet, Quick Return (episode 2); Death of a Spy (episode 3)

Find out birth/death dates, career information, and facts and trivia about this story's cast and crew at the Doctor Who Cast & Crew site: http://doctorwhocastandcrew.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/the-myth-makers.html

The soundtrack to The Myth Makers is available on CD. Find it on Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Original-Television-Soundtrack/dp/0563477776/