The Ambassadors of Death Episode 3

The one where Liz drives Bessie in a car chase...

It really is shocking how poor the colourisation of this story is. Fans seemed to be perfectly pleased with the way it looked when the DVD was released in 2012, but watching it now, it truly is appalling. The colours are all over the place, and often just not there at all, and it makes me wish they hadn't bothered and just left it in monochrome. I remember seeing the story on VHS in black and white and it was much moodier that way, especially with Dudley Simpson's tense score.

The second thing that struck me watching episode 3 is the state of Ralph Cornish's shoes. When he climbs up to peer into the Recovery 7 shuttle you can see his brogues caked with mud! This scene was recorded at BBC TV Centre on February 27th, 1970, an entire month after Ronald Allen was on location in Aldershot for the retrieval of Recovery 7, so that's some very diligent adherence to continuity on the production team's part!

The Brigadier, the Doctor and Liz visit Sir James Quinlan to complain about the missing astronauts, and it's here that they finally meet the mysterious cad Carrington - or General Carrington it seems! He is head of the Government's Space Security department, which has taken the Recovery 7 astronauts away right from under UNIT's noses (of course!). It's rather strange that Space Security and Space Control haven't been communicating with each other thus far (the latter being oblivious of the former's existence, it seems), and Carrington's argument that the reason for the deceit is merely "security" is barely convincing.

Carrington attempts to allay UNIT's concern by explaining that the astronauts have been infected with some sort of contagious radiation, and to prevent the population being affected, the three space travellers have been quarantined by Space Security. The Doctor is rightfully unconvinced (surely he'd have knowledge of such a form of radiation?) and demands to see the spacemen for himself.

Meanwhile, the astronauts are transferred by laundry van (latterly baker's van) from one secret laboratory to another secret laboratory (it's not clear why), dumping the bodies of a couple of unwanted heavies in a gravel pit along the way. The hired mercenary behind all this is Reegan, and he's a pretty callous fellow. The scene where the bodies are dumped in the gravel and he pushes an avalanche of stone over the top of them is pretty grim.

It seems the three astronauts are registering with over two million rads of radiation, far higher than human tissue could withstand. But rather than trying to reduce the level of radiation, Reegan and new right-hand man Lennox are told to increase the radiation dose in order for them to survive. Isotopes are sent by courier to help with this task. The three astronauts sent up into space (Lefee, Michaels and Van Lyden) may still be there, and there's a wonderful line from the Doctor which gave me shivers: "I don't know what came down in Recovery 7, but it certainly wasn't human."

The astronauts are quite eerie. They have huge helmet visors, but you struggle to see anything inside. There's certainly no evidence of a face, and you occasionally glimpse a black shape from one side, but the lack of identification of what's within is what makes them spooky. It should be a cracking reveal when they take their helmets off to show us the aliens within!

Just a quick return to Cyril Shaps' Lennox, or should that be Dr Lennox? Reegan refers to him by surname only, but Lennox insists he is a doctor, only for Reegan to remind him that he's been struck off. In just that one exchange we learn something important about Lennox, coupled with the fact he knows Liz from Cambridge. Shaps plays Lennox as an anxious man, someone who's probably been forced into this collaboration by unfortunate circumstance.

When it's assumed that the three human astronauts are still up in space on Mars Probe 7, Cornish wants to relaunch Recovery 7 to get them back, but struggles to secure Quinlan's authorisation. Probably quite rightly, Quinlan points out that the Government can't authorise the expediture without better evidence that the three humans are still up there, but Cornish is having none of it and threatens to tell the press what's going on unless he gets the green light. Erm, ever heard of something called the Official Secrets Act, Ralph? You probably signed it when you got the job!

The cliffhanger is another strong one, featuring one of Doctor Who's rare car chases, with Liz Shaw at the wheel of Bessie being pursued along suburban roads by Reegan's heavies. It's great to see Liz given some juicy material, and even more empowering for Dr Shaw to do her female James Bond routine dressed in a huge floppy white hat, mini shirt and knee-high boots, and with voluminous L'Oreal hair! I'm not sure why she decides to scarper over the muddy rugby pitch, rather than head for the houses on the other side of the road, but she ends up at a raging weir which looks suitably dangerous. After pushing one heavy into the water, Liz is seen to topple over the side herself - cue sting and titles! It's an exhilarating couple of minutes, ending with a surprising cliffhanger (weirhanger?), leaving the viewer desperate to see what happens next.

A side note... Reegan's magically transforming van is something of a mystery. It starts out as a launderer's van with the registration KBF 979H, but according to the DVLA this plate wasn't registered until June 1970 - five months after filming took place! The van changes to a baker's vehicle with the registration YLD 259H, which seems to be a false plate. Later, Reegan's heavies pursue Bessie in a Ford (reg plate CLA 567H), which was logged by the DVLA in October 1969 and was last taxed in 1985. I know this is quite dull, but I just love checking out Doctor Who car registration plates!

First broadcast: April 4th, 1970

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: The scenes on location at Marlow weir, with Caroline John pursued by heavies, are great.
The Bad: Despite the intrigue, the plot remains steadily pedestrian. Something startling needs to happen soon.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆

"Now listen to me" tally: 3
Neck-rub tally: 0

NEXT TIME: Episode 4...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Episode 1; Episode 2; Episode 4; Episode 5; Episode 6; Episode 7

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.com/2014/04/the-ambassadors-of-death.html

The Ambassadors of Death is available on BBC DVD. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Ambassadors-Death-DVD/dp/B008H2JK5Y.