The Forest of Fear (100,000 BC Episode 3)

The one where the Doctor is caught planning to murder an injured man...

At the top of this episode the Doctor apologises for getting them all into this mess, claiming it's all his fault. But when you think about it, it's not his fault at all. All he did was go exploring and he was violently abducted and imprisoned. This isn't like his recklessness in the next serial, when they visit Skaro and he purposefully sabotages the TARDIS so that they're forced to explore the alien city. This time he is purely a victim of circumstance and has had little active part to play in getting them into trouble.

Eileen Way, who plays Old Mother, was only 52 when she recorded this serial, but make-up supervisor Elizabeth Blattner does a great job of ageing her up and making her look much older than she is. As she grabs Za's stone and stares impassively into camera we're treated to another example of how director Waris Hussein likes to focus closely on faces to sell the story and dialogue.

And what cracking dialogue this is. Received fan wisdom about these latter three episodes of 100,000 BC claims that they're dull and boring, but that's far from true. Writer Anthony Coburn has given his actors - even the prehistoric ones - some beautiful lines in this story. They're not ugly, grunty lines as one might expect. There's consideration for character in the dialogue for the cave dwellers, and the regulars - especially William Hartnell - get some timeless lines.

For instance, this beauty: "Fear makes companions of all of us, Miss Wright... Fear is with all of us and always will be. Just like that other sensation that lives with it... hope!" It's so good that this line was reused (in slightly mangled form) 51 years later in Listen.

We're soon treated to Susan's second hysterical scream when a pile of twigs moves in the corner of the cave and Old Mother bundles through. Old Mother is a bit of a stick-in-the-mud. She doesn't approve of fire, and doesn't think any tribe leader should discover its secret. She prefers to stay cold and eat raw meat, it seems. But maybe there's more to it than that. Her scenes with Za in The Cave of Skulls hint that she may be Za's mother, as he sneers that she should have died with his father. If that is the case, then the secret of fire is what brought about her partner's demise, so maybe she has a grudge against it because of that? There's more to Coburn's script than people expect.

Characterisation may be basic, but it's there. Take Hur, for example. She really wants to be given to Za; she does not want Horg to give her to the infidel Kal, so she colludes and schemes with Za to make sure he comes out on top. She soothes his ego and boosts his confidence, feeds him ideas and suggestions to push him into succeeding as leader. They make for quite a scheming pair. Just as Hur is the real influence on Za, so Old Mother takes her own initiative to free the strangers. It seems only the women of the tribe are having any impact on proceedings, as the men banter and quarrel.

Meanwhile, in the fearful forest, it's Barbara's time to go into meltdown. And boy, Jacqueline Hill gives it some welly! She collapses into Ian's arms as she realises they are lost and cannot find their way back to the TARDIS. To be honest, she has had a taxing time. Yesterday, she got up in her flat (which may or may not be "littered with stray cats and dogs", according to Ian!), did a full day's teaching, then after work went spying on one of her pupils, got whisked away to another place and time, falling unconscious on the way, then got attacked and captured by a bunch of savage cavemen, before escaping and getting lost in a prehistoric wasteland with an old man who really doesn't seem to give a fig for her. Let's be honest, she deserves to lose it a bit!

"We're never going to get out of this awful place, never, never!" she yelps. More tears, more histrionics, but Ian acts as her rock and soothes and calms her. "Ian, what's happening to us?" she weeps. Ian holds her face close to his to try and talk sense into her, but it's very nearly an amorous embrace too.

The Doctor and Ian argue over who is leader of their little tribe. The Doctor won't follow Ian's orders blindly, but he admitted earlier that Ian was the strongest and might need to defend them. I don't blame Ian for getting frustrated with the old goat, and he makes it clear that if it wasn't for Susan and Barbara, he'd leave the Doctor to make his own way to the Ship. This is not a cohesive group.

"Aren't you a tiresome young man?" growls the Doctor. "And you're a stubborn old man!" retorts Ian. Now, now, boys, focus on the job at hand please...

After another almighty scream from Babs when she spies a dead animal, we get another example of Waris Hussein's wonderful directorial flourish when the wild animal attacks Za. It happens off camera, but the way Hussein shoots it is graphic enough - the camera, acting as the creature's point of view, surges on Za, and we hear growls and snarls as we see Hur's horrified face watch the attack. Then we see the terrified faces of the TARDIS travellers and hear Hur's traumatised moans and screams. We then see Za laced with blood, with huge claw marks across his chest. It's a pretty graphic scene despite us not seeing a single hair of a creature.

Ian, Barbara and Susan help the injured Za while the Doctor stands well back, observing with disdain. This is not a Doctor we recognise today. He is heartless and selfish, referring to the cavemen as savages without logic or reason. But if he'd seen Hur and Za scheming earlier, or could see how Kal is whipping up tension back at the caves, he'd think differently. Barbara says: "You treat everybody and everything as less important than yourself." She's right. In this single episode, the Doctor is perhaps at his most inhuman, malevolent and unfeeling.

Much is made of the moment the Doctor picks up a rock with a view to finishing off Za for good so that they can get on their way back to the Ship, and the look on William Russell's face when he catches the Doctor out is wonderful. Ian Chesterton is definitely appalled by the Doctor's actions, but it's clear William Russell is too!

The episode ends with Kal winning support from the tribe to go after Za, Hur and the strangers, and there's more proof that these so-called savages are more emotionally advanced than the Doctor thinks. It is suggested that Kal murders Old Mother so he can point the finger of blame at Za, and so Old Mother becomes Doctor Who's first ever death.

As the episode ends, a glowering Kal blocks the way back to the TARDIS for our heroes. Impressive chest bared, Jeremy Young certainly gives great glower! Next Episode: The Firemaker, we're told, and we're left to wonder who that'll be. Za or Kal? Or another...?

First broadcast: December 7th, 1963

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: Anthony Coburn writes the Doctor, Ian and Barbara so well here, fleshing out their characters and giving some great moments of tension between the regulars. This may be a story about savages, but Coburn's beautiful writing is overlooked.
The Bad: The pace plods a little in the middle, and once again we get some pretty awful acting from Howard Lang.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆

NEXT TIME: The Firemaker...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: An Unearthly Child (episode 1); The Cave of Skulls (episode 2); The Firemaker (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/2013/03/an-unearthly-child.html

An Unearthly Child is available as part of the Doctor Who - The Beginning box set. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Beginning-Unearthly-Destruction/dp/B000C6EMTC