Nightmare of Eden Part One

The one where a spaceship materialises as part of another spaceship...

"By Bob Baker". Whatever happened to his mate, Dave Martin? Baker and Martin were consistently the most imaginative scriptwriters Doctor Who had throughout the 1970s, and certainly the writers with the least regard for the programme's budget. They were fantastic ideas men who let their imaginations run riot on the page, and it was up to the programme makers to translate that imagination into affordable TV drama. Sometimes the boys' ambition outweighed the programme's capabilities, and at other times Doctor Who rose admirably to the demands, but whatever the outcome, Baker and Martin rarely disappointed. Now that Martin is gone (not dead, just gone), I wonder whether Baker can carry on the tradition?

The opening shot is another of Doctor Who's attempts to be Star Wars, with an extravagantly designed spaceship CSO'ing its way through space reminiscent of, but not much like, Star Wars' Tantive IV and Star Destroyer. But then the ship shimmers out of existence, and straightaway Doctor Who has done something different (although it later transpires its jumped into warp-speed, for which we must read light-speed, so perhaps Baker's imagination has wandered somewhat).

We're on the Empress, an interstellar cruise liner taking recreational passengers to the planet Azure. The passengers are dressed like they're in a New Order video, or have been dressed by Andy Warhol, but they all seem chirpy enough, flicking through their brochures and squinting at each other through Buggles sunglasses. On the ship's bridge is Captain Rigg (played by David "Irongron" Daker) and his navigator, Secker, a man who seems inordinately happy. Blissed out, almost. Roger Cann's design for the ship's controls is interesting/ eccentric, with the operator sliding their fingers over unpressable buttons and switches, almost like a fretboard. Not sure I'm convinced by it, but I can't deny it's "interesting"...

Suddenly, as the Empress comes out of warp-speed, it materialises in the same space as another ship in Azure's orbit, and the two collide not by smashing into each other, but by physically combining, or overlapping. It's a fascinating idea. Two separate ships fusing together into one unstable whole, with a matter interface between the two. And all Rigg can say is a rather halfhearted "Oh no."

A disaster has occurred. Cue: TARDIS materialisation. Out steps the Doctor and Romana (and K-9's allowed out this week too). Now, I thought Romana's outfit in The Creature from the Pit was awful, designed more for Mary Tamm than Lalla Ward. But costume designer Rupert Jarvis's effort here takes the gold for sheer awfulness. It looks like a maternity dress, and is such a drab, depressing shade of slate grey which does Ward no favours whatsoever. Romana should be glam, or if not glam like Tamm then elegant and cultured. This makes Romana look like a sack of potatoes and is truly dreadful. In fact, I'm no fan of Jarvis's design for this story at all: the passengers' protective coveralls are awful, the Empress crew's uniforms are bog standard cheap sci-fi, and Tryst and Della's drudgy brown waistcoats are uninspiringly dull. Jarvis also designed costumes for Underworld. 'Nuff said.

Cann's corridors aren't much better either. They're flat and lifeless, substandard corridors from page one of the Sci-Fi Corridor Design Catalogue. There's no imagination or inspiration in their look or colour, there's no texture or decoration, they're just there. Let's stick a few wall lights up and say it's done. If this was a leisure cruiser, wouldn't there be more decoration than this, perhaps paintings on the walls or ornaments dotted about? It's just flat and lifeless.

The Doctor and Romana get involved in the action as quickly as possible, striding onto the bridge asking questions. The Doctor takes control of the room instantly using obfuscation and deception, claiming he's from Galactic Salvage and Insurance and here to help divide the ships. I love how the Doctor wants to paint the division of the ships as an impossibility he can master, while Romana bursts his bubble by translating the job at hand into cold scientific theory. As she states, if something can be done, it can also theoretically be undone, but the Doctor prefers it when it seemed impossible! It sums up the two characters' approach to life wonderfully! He's a fantasist, she's a scientist.

While the Doctor sets about investigating the matter collision, Rigg looks up Galactic Salvage and Insurance on his BBC Micro internet. It tells him that the firm went out of business in 2096 (which is apparently 20 years ago, dating this story to 2116). However, even when confronted with this news, the Doctor doesn't give up his claim to authority. "Galactic went out of business twenty years ago!" accuses Rigg, to which the Doctor hilariously replies: "I wondered why I hadn't been paid!" Genius!

The Doctor has discovered that somebody on the ship is smuggling the highly addictive drug vraxoin, a narcotic that was thought to have been wiped out when an entire planet was incinerated in order to destroy the source. That source is a fungus used to manufacture XYP aka vraxoin. "I've seen whole communities, whole planets destroyed by this," says the Doctor solemnly. "It induces a kind of warm complacency and a total apathy. Until it wears off, that is, and soon you're dead." It's quite an eye-opener that Doctor Who has a story about drugs in 1979. It's a very bold and brave thing to do, to put narcotics at the heart of a family TV show, and I'm immeasurably glad the script (and particularly Tom Baker) doesn't make light of it. Baker is commendably understated here, and the Doctor plainly concerned. Well done, Doctor Who!

Meanwhile, Romana has met a crazy zoologist in the lounge, played with an unfathomable dodgy accent by Lewis Fiander. Is it German, is it Dutch, is it something else entirely? I think it's supposed to be a mutated amalgam of many different accents, something which might happen through intergalactic globalisation by the 22nd century. I commend the attempt for realism, Lewis. I just don't think you're doing a very good job of it because you just sound silly. Coupled with his eccentric facial tics, he's playing Tryst as if he's in a Children's Film Foundation runaround.

Tryst has with him a CET machine (Continuous Event Transmuter), which is basically an electronic zoo. He gathers flora and fauna from different planets and captures them under the guise of preservation in his CET machine. He is trying to catalogue every living creature in the galaxy, like Light from Ghost Light but with spectacles, and captures entire landscapes as electromagnetic signals which are then stored in event crystals inside the machine, which can then "project" the landscapes. It's a lot like the miniscope seen in Carnival of Monsters fused with the technology of Gallifrey's timescoop (The Five Doctors), but the idea it leaves huge bald patches on the planets it takes from is horrific.

The Doctor isn't too impressed by it either, and promises to "have a word" with Tryst about his machine in due course. His description of the CET machine conserving endangered species "in the same way a jam maker conserves raspberries" is sobering. The Doctor will not let this one go, particularly as he was so appalled by Vorg's miniscope, which was actually outlawed following a concerted campaign by the Doctor.

Romana is also concerned about the CET machine, fearing that the instability aboard the Empress caused by the matter interface will destabilise it. The dial on the machine shows that it has captured samples from the planets Zil, Vij, Darp, Luan, Brus, Ranx, Gidi and Eden (it's a good job they all have short names because there's certainly no space on the dial for Raxacoricofallapatorius!), but what's that Romana sees within the Eden projection? It's a truly eerie moment when the camera slowly closes in on a pair of eyes staring back out of the undergrowth. There's something in the picture (echoes of M R James's The Mezzotint)!

When Romana chats with Della it quickly becomes obvious that the crewmember that Tryst's expedition lost is the man in the projection. Della does not refer to the crewmember's gender, but does confirm they were "more than friends". Interestingly, Romana makes the automatic assumption her lover was a man, perhaps because she's just seen what looks like a man in the projection, but I find it intriguing that Della didn't say "he" at first.

Later, Romana is stung by a particularly badly realised flying insect which bites her after emerging from the Eden projection. It's just a white blobby video effect and I'm convinced the production team could have come up with something better. It's really rubbish!

Drug addict Secker wanders blissfully into the highly dangerous matter interface and seems to get mauled by a ferocious creature, coming back out with his face scarred and sustaining life-threatening injuries. Indeed, he subsequently dies on the operating table (and Joan Stribling's make-up is gruesomely realistic). Has a live sample escaped from Tryst's CET machine? Surely not if they're crystal recordings...?

Nightmare of Eden part 1 is bracingly good. It's written and paced well, and has some searingly creative ideas going on, such as two spaceships colliding into one, drug smuggling, and the wonder that is the CET machine (unexpectedly similar in concept to Scaroth's holographic projector in City of Death). But what happens at the end is bruisingly poor. K-9 cuts a lozenge-shaped hole in the wall at a spot where you can quite plainly see someone's had a go before (this is obviously not the first take). And when Rigg and the Doctor remove the panel, out pops a big old monster. Now, I can see the cliffhanger potential in it (and in that sense, it works), but what is the creature doing standing behind a sealed wall waiting to jump out like it's on Celebrity Squares? We don't get a proper view of the monster before the credits roll, but initial impressions tell me not to expect too much. After all, we've got Rupert Jarvis designing costumes this week...

First broadcast: November 24th, 1979

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: Bob Baker's imagination is on fire, and the inclusion of drugs in the story is a brave move for Doctor Who.
The Bad: Yet again, Romana's outfit. But this time, it's no worse than anybody else's.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★★★☆☆

"Would you like a jelly baby?" tally: 20

NEXT TIME: Part Two...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Part Two; Part Three; Part Four

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: https://doctorwhocastandcrew.blogspot.com/2014/08/nightmare-of-eden.html

Nightmare of Eden is available on BBC DVD. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Nightmare-Eden-DVD/dp/B0074GPF26