The Invisible Enemy Part Four

The one where the Nucleus enters the macro universe and begins to incubate...

It's really, really bad, isn't it? That awful prawn costume for the Nucleus is one of the most embarrassing missteps in Doctor Who history, up there alongside Mestor, human Dalek Sec, and the frog universe. It's actually really good as a giant prawn fancy dress outfit - I think anybody wearing that would probably win any crustacean cosplay contest - but as a Doctor Who monster, flood-lit on brilliant white sets, it's simply abominable. John Scott Martin does as much as he can inside the costume to make it fearsome, but a constant quiver and the occasional shuffle do not a Weeping Angel make. At least John Leeson's voice is suitably grim, giving the Nucleus an obsessive, rasping, burbling intensity. If you just listen, it's OK!

It can't even walk. You wouldn't really expect a giant prawn needing to walk, but the script does require it to get from the lab to the spaceship, resulting in comedy scenes of two actors having to support John Scott Martin by each arm/ frond as he shuffles along the Bi-Al corridor, screaming "Hurry! Hurry!" I think I can hear the collective laughter of 8.3 million viewers seeping its way through the soundtrack...

The Invisible Enemy Part Three

The one where the cloned Doctor and Leela go inside the real Doctor's body...

The big problem with this third episode is that it has to stretch a 10-minute time span over a 25-minute period, and the padding shows. The cloned Doctor and Leela only have a lifespan of 10 minutes (and that should really start before they've been injected into the Doctor), but this episode is 25 minutes, so inevitably there's going to be some artistic license employed. Why didn't the writers didn't just say the clones would last 20 minutes instead of 10?

While this episode has little going on, it has an awful lot to look at, with director Derrick Sherwin using the ubiquitous CSO (Colour Separation Overlay) to depict the insides of the Doctor's brain. And for the most part it's hugely successful, adding a suitably fantastical and surreal feel to the Doctor and Leela's journey. Brian Clemett's coloured lighting is fab too.

The Invisible Enemy Part Two

The one where we first meet K-9...

"I'm fighting for my mind," the Doctor confides in Leela, who he managed not to shoot dead after all. The Doctor is in mental turmoil, battling with an alien organism for control of his mind, and it's actually quite heartening to see this most independent of Doctors asking Leela for her help. He seems helpless and afraid, which is unusual for this incarnation. And of course, the ever-faithful Leela is determined to support her mentor in any way she can.

I must confess, I don't really understand the logic of the Nucleus's plan, or "purpose". It seems unnecessarily obsessed with trying to destroy the reject (ie, Leela). Why is it so important to destroy the reject, why not just ignore it, unless it tries to interfere, then destroy it? A lot of energy and time is spent trying to destroy Leela.

The Invisible Enemy Part One

The one where an alien entity possesses the Doctor...

The model work by Ian Scoones and Tony Harding in this episode is so good, a real step up for Doctor Who, which at this point in time was competing with some pretty solid opponents in the form of Gerry Anderson's UFO and Space: 1999. The way Scoones and Harding shoot the spaceship model, especially when it comes in to land on Titan, bursts with confidence and ambition and wouldn't be out of place in an episode of Thunderbirds. It's a pity there's a bit of a wobble sometimes when you see the ship in flight, but you can't have everything!

The visual effects are impressive all round in this episode, including the lightning cloud in space which traps the spaceship, and then the TARDIS. This really looks like Doctor Who has been given a bit more budget to do this, and it's paying dividends because it feels very "space opera" in a Frontier in Space kind of way (but better still).