Terror of the Autons Episode Four

The one where the Master teams up with the Doctor to defeat the terror of the Autons...

In the past three episodes alone, the Master has tried to kill the Doctor at least four times - first by rigging a volatiser trap in the radio telescope, then by hiding a bomb inside a UNIT crate, then by trying to blow him up with a grenade held by Phillips, and then by using a sentient trimphone cord. So when the Master suddenly appears in the Doctor's lab (what was he doing up the spiral staircase?), pointing a weapon right at him, you expect him to be able to see his threat through.

But oh no, like so many arch-villains in adventure fiction, he has too much to say for himself and ends up missing the easiest opportunity for killing the Doctor he's yet had. All he had to do is point and shoot, but his urgency to get back to the bus at the quarry means he loses all reason and instead orders the Doctor to drive him there in Bessie! I find it hard to believe the Master doesn't really mean to kill the Doctor, because he's tried in four pretty uncompromising ways already. If this is all just a game to the two of them (as has been suggested in some quarters of fandom), then the Master doesn't mean the game to last very long!

Terror of the Autons Episode Three

The one where the Autons distribute deadly daffodils...

The opening sequence, with the Doctor and Jo fleeing from the Auton policemen in "some sort of a quarry" as Jo puts it, is very well-staged stuff. I find the Auton trying to get out of the jammed police car door quite unsettling as it struggles away, then calmly opens fire with its hand gun. I really think these Auton faces are scarier than the previous ones, which is a change of opinion for me this time around as I always used to prefer the Spearhead mannequin ones. As terrifying as the shop window dummies are, I find these blank-faced "template" Autons even eerier.

These Autons are relentless, pursuing the Doctor and Jo with determined aggression, firing at them as they run, and firing at Yates in the faithful UNIT Austin car! When Yates drives the Auton over the cliff, Terry Walsh's stunt fall is sustained and impressive, and the most terrifying thing is when the Auton reaches the bottom of the slope, it just gets straight back up and starts scrambling its way back to the top! There's no tense pause at the bottom as it lies still, then bursts into life. Director Barry Letts opts to show how completely unstoppable the Autons are by allowing no time for doubt. This thing will just keep on coming for you!

Terror of the Autons Episode Two

The one where the Doctor gets mobbed at the circus...

Colour Separation Overlay - or CSO, or Chromakey, or blue/ yellow/ green screen - was an exciting new toy in the early 1970s, and producer Barry Letts was determined to capitalise on its benefits. For instance, you had the advantage of placing your characters into any scene or situation imaginable, without needing the budget to film at the real location or build an entire set. It was the CGI of the 70s.

Sadly, CSO hasn't aged well, and when it's not done particularly well, the effect is simply awful. You get that distracting halo effect around people's hair, or what's called "fringing", like you'd see in the old TV adverts for Ready Brek. The jarring effect of CSO would have been greatly reduced on the black and white TV sets of the early 1970s, which is what the majority of British households had at the time, but 50 years later, when cleaned up and presented on sparkling DVD, the effect remains poor.

Terror of the Autons Episode One

The one where the Doctor gets a new assistant, UNIT gets a new captain, and the world gets a new enemy...

Season 8 explodes onto the screen with some gorgeous bright pink graphics in the title sequence, which seems to change in subtle ways with every passing serial. This new adventure opens at a circus, complete with elephants, lions and clowns, as well as a rotund proprietor called Luigi Rossini (or should that be Lew Russell?) who is astonished when he witnesses a horsebox materialise out of thin air. Rather intriguingly, it materialises with that familiar sound of a TARDIS arriving...

"I am usually referred to as the Master... universally," purrs the black-clad occupant. Yes, it's the Master, making his official debut (it's debatable whether we've already seen earlier iterations of him). Roger Delgado makes an impressive debut: still and confident, those steely brown eyes boring into his victims with utter contempt. He can even click his fingers while wearing black leather gloves!

Inferno Episode 7

The one where the end of our world is averted...

It's the season finale! The titles make it feel even more eventful, thanks to the red hot volcanic explosions and spewing seas of lava. But the action cuts abruptly to the quiet of the "real world" workshop, where the Doctor lies unconscious on the ground, having returned from the apocalyptic parallel Earth. The reprise is the last we see of the alternative universe characters, our final sight of them cowering from an encroaching wave of volcanic lava. Make no mistake, Elizabeth Shaw, the Brigade Leader, Greg Sutton and Dr Petra Williams are dead, and that's a pretty bleak (if inevitable) twist. Inferno certainly pulls no punches.

The frustrating thing here is that the viewers know what calamity awaits the "real world" unless Stahlman slows down (or halts) the drilling, but the Doctor is unconscious in some kind of coma, and so unable to warn anybody. This leads to several more minutes of people trying in vain to warn Stahlman themselves, but it seems the professor just isn't listening to reason. Olaf Pooley gets to do some "proper" acting once again after a couple of weeks bound in Scooby-Doo make-up, although the part is essentially just him saying "no, leave me alone, I know what I'm doing" over and over again. It's interesting that the Earth seems to be communicating with him in some way, calling him almost, but this is never properly picked up on (probably rightly so).

Inferno Episode 6

The one where the end of the world really is nigh...

There's an awful lot of jargon at the start of this episode as everybody tries to work out how to get out of the Brigade Leader's office and power up the Doctor's TARDIS console. Words like coolant, master switch and relay circuits are bandied about like the viewer either understands or cares, making for quite a dull start to proceedings. Despite the overarching atmosphere of imminent destruction throughout the episode (in fact, the whole story), conversations about electronic circuitry and CO2 do nothing to quicken the pace.

Outside, a special lens filter is used to make it look like it's extremely hot, giving me flashbacks to the British summer of 2018, when poking so much of a toe outdoors resulted in second-degree burns. The filter is very effective, although makes the picture quite muzzy, and the production team don't always remember to apply it, such as when everybody arrives at the nuclear switch room in Bessie.