The Underwater Menace Episode 2

The one where the Doctor realises Zaroff is a complete fruit loop...

Oh joy! The Underwater Menace episode 2 is the earliest surviving episode of Patrick Troughton's era, and so finally I can watch as well as listen! And what an absolute revelation Troughton is now that he can actually be seen! He had the most amazing face, so expressive and lived-in, and capable of interpreting entire scripts without a word. And the depth in his performance is astounding, and a lasting lesson in the art of the thespian for generations to come.

Troughton is a physical performer, but I don't necessarily mean in the action-packed, corridor-running way. I mean he's always doing something, and that something could be fiddling with a prop, or a revealing facial expression. You can see everything the Doctor is thinking behind Troughton's eyes, he's truly living the character. Troughton's not playing the Doctor; he is the Doctor.

It's in the way he mooches around the lab table and quietly pockets the pliers; it's how he surreptitiously makes his way to the control panel and cuts the electricity supply cables behind his back; it's in how he intently listens and watches the dialogue between Zaroff and Damon. Troughton makes the Doctor an artful manipulator, using a facade of innocence and naivety to hide his true guile. The entire scene in Zaroff's lab between Troughton, Joseph Furst and Colin Jeavons is a masterclass in three very different takes on performance - Furst is theatrical and pronounced; Jeavons is more traditional but weighted with a knowing edge; while Troughton is running rings round them both by hardly doing a thing. His screen presence is intoxicating. You can't tear your eyes from him, even when he's not doing anything.

The way the Doctor coaxes the truth out of Zaroff is both clever and amusing, with Troughton's delivery reigning supreme. He gently establishes that Zaroff may be a genius, but he's also a megalomaniac, with his aim to blow up the entire world an expression of "the scientist's dream of supreme power". Eat your heart out, Davros - Professor Zaroff is up there in the Complete and Utter Fruitcake stakes!

Now that we can see Patrick Troughton, his artfulness can truly shine. All Troughton episodes should be recovered forthwith, because, as was proved with the recovery of The Enemy of the World too, his Doctor can only be fully appreciated with the visuals intact.

The other members of the TARDIS team suffer somewhat in this episode, especially Polly, who achieves next to nothing after escaping from Damon's surgery with Ara's help. That's literally all that happens to her, and it's not much more thrilling for Ben and Jamie. As soon as I heard they were being sent down the mines, I knew their story strand would be the dullest, and I was right. Mine tunnels and caves are never interesting (see The Monster of Peladon for incontrovertible proof), and although the boys very quickly befriend two rebels - Jacko and Sean - and tag along in their escape attempt, it ultimately leads to minimal excitement or plot progression. Jamie's tumble down the cliffside, and subsequent rescue, is all padding, and it degenerates into something of a Lads' Runaround. Paul Anil's performance has a lot to be desired, but these scenes do lead to a rather amusing exchange where Jamie and Jacko split from Ben and Sean, the former pair choosing to "take the high road" - 13 years before future Doctor Who writer Don Houghton created the Scottish soap opera Take the High Road for STV!

The Atlanteans are a somewhat camp bunch too. They sport outrageously bushy eyebrows and wear skimpy outfits, including the dreaded flip-flops and a range in head wear verging on the clownish. They'd go down a storm on Ladies' Day at Ascot. I think costume designer Sandra Reid let herself go a bit crazy for this serial after the relatively sober design demands of her previous three stories!

I'm not sure if I like Dudley Simpson's electronic organ score. On the one hand it somehow seems to fit, but on the other hand it's also really obtrusive, parping and buzzing its way along with the action. In some ways it's quite ahead of its time with its synth undertones, but perhaps a little more subtlety might have been employed in its application. As it is, it's an interesting but arresting experiment in scoring an already quite colourful adventure.

While most of the performances are fine (very, in Troughton's case), there are some technical and scripted issues. When the Doctor demonstrates the exploding Earth (ie, earthenware pot) to Ramo, we're supposed to believe it explodes through the effect of super-heated steam, but it's all ruined when we can plainly see the electrical wires. Then there's the perennial writers' annoyance where Damon refers to Polly as "the girl", but can find it in himself to call the Doctor "Doctor". Because Polly is a young female, she's automatically not worth recognising by name. This awfully sexist trend echoes down through the decades right into the mid to late 1980s, and I really, really hate it. It's so lazy - all the writer and/ or script editor needed to do was change "the girl" for a character's actual name.

I'll end by returning to Troughton's stellar performance, that bit at the end where he's trying to convince King Thous that Zaroff is a ne'er-do-well. "The Professor's as mad as a hatter... Completely!" he insists, then knocks his skull and cups his ear... "No answer! Sad."

The Doctor speaks like a President Trump tweet, decades before the real-life madman came to power.

First broadcast: January 21st, 1967

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: Patrick Troughton. He's amazing in this episode.
The Bad: Polly's subplot totally collapses, and Ben and Jamie's is on an inexorable slide downwards too.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★★★☆☆

NEXT TIME: Episode 3...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Episode 1; Episode 3; Episode 4

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/2013/12/the-underwater-menace.html

The Underwater Menace is available on BBC DVD. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Underwater-Menace-DVD/dp/B00URM3EWW