Best of Who: The Second Doctor- A Retrospective

Our personal evaluation of the Doctor's first regeneration, featuring thoughts on Patrick Troughton's incarnation and three of his key adventures.
While the other members of a human excavation team scour an ancient tomb on the planet Telos for their prize, the action of The Tomb of the Cybermen settles for a single, isolated, crucial moment in time. The viewer is presented with a stark contrast to the action sequences to come involving the Doctor's greatest adversaries, instead witnessing a brief exchange between a 500-year old Time Lord and his companion Victoria.

One of the great travesties of this particular era of Doctor Who is that its début tale, The Evil of the Daleks, is currently lost from the archives of the BBC. Were we to still hold that apparently sublime tale in our grasp, then Victoria's moment of sombre contemplation here would be placed into a more empathetic context. This new companion's father was lost just as swiftly as the aforementioned story was in the BBC's wiping run, and she's now naturally feeling an inherent sadness that she and her father can never reunite in this life.

In this case, though, out of death comes new life for the Doctor, as writers Kit Pedler and Gerry Davis confidently establish a quirkier, often more optimistic and courageous incarnation of the character than his predecessor. Patrick Troughton inherits the role perfectly in this minor scene of Tomb, comforting Victoria with a simultaneously sympathetic, personal and logical assertion of familial loss: "That's the point, really- I have to really want to [remember his family], to bring them back in front of my eyes. The rest of the time they...they sleep in my mind and I forget. And so will you. You'll find there's so much else to think about...That's the exciting thing, that nobody in the universe can do what we're doing."

Our Best Of Who Awards feature series will continue on a weekly basis throughout the year leading up to November 23rd, yet on top of that, we can promise an extra series of eleven retrospectives based around each incarnation of the Doctor. Today, it's the turn of Patrick Troughton's comedic, vulnerable and ever-defiant Time Lord to face judgement, as we explore three of his landmark survivng adventures. Here, then, is our retrospective on the Second Doctor in all of its black-and-white glory:

• THE TOMB OF THE CYBERMEN (1967)- A little-known fact for you: The Tomb of the Cybermen is the first surviving full story of the Second Doctor era. Thankfully, it's an absolute treasure, with much of its intense dramatic impact still capable of being fully conveyed to a 2013 audience. This time around, the Cybermen are more clearly defined than their Tenth Planet incarnations, the metallic armour and recognisably robotic voices they now don far more reminiscent of those persistent adversaries we've seen return in Closing Time and Nightmare In Silver. All the same, these iconic villains are not necessarily intended as the star of this beloved adventure. In this reviewer's mind, that accolade should be awarded to the lead cast, whose first surviving appearance does wonders in terms of demonstrating the brewing chemistry between Pat Troughton, Frazer Hines and Deborah Watling. The aforementioned subtle scene of familial discussion between the Doctor and Victoria remains one of the most memorable elements of the story by far, along with the successful reinterpretation of the Cybermen, assured direction and surprisingly laudable special effects. Fans of the show's post-2004 era desiring to delve into a few great classic stories need only start with Tomb, by far one of Doctor Who's greatest voyages into time and space.
• THE MIND ROBBER (1968)- Cut-and-paste storyline premises were by no means an alien concept to the writers of Who during this era or others in the history of the show, with historical tales in particular often bearing uncanny resemblances to one another. Indeed, The Mind Robber has more than a hint of a Celestial Toymaker vibe about it, for better or for worse. Perhaps with the knowledge that the aforementioned material of inspiration has now been virtually fully lost from the BBC archives, this narrative caveat can be forgiven somewhat, yet from what we know the original contained many of the same style of cliffhangers, twists and visual setpieces as this. There's an inevitable disappointment to be found at first with Mind Robber, then, but to its credit, as the story develops its writers at least grow in confidence with utilising fictional characters of folklore and literature as constructs in an ongoing psychological battle of wits. For me, The Mind Robber's success is mostly undone by its over-familiarity. However, as with any Doctor Who yarn, there are plenty of merits to be found, especially once the adventure progresses past its initial state of deja Who!
• THE SEEDS OF DEATH (1969)- This final instalment in our retrospective is neither stellar nor abysmal, rather a simply mediocre outing. Mars' infamous Ice Warriors proved an undisputed hit with viewers upon their première in 1967's The Ice Warriors, so it doesn't come as a massive surprise that this sequel series of episodes cover much the same territory with these latest adversaries. Nor is it particularly shocking that as a result, this adventure as a whole is hardly above average. As ever, Troughton, Hines and Wendy Padbury (Zoe) each have a great time with the content they're offered, although the rest of the supporting cast give rather restrained performances that seem to echo what's come before. For a viewer such as myself who had a ball with Cold War, the slow, clunky movements of the Warriors here aren't treated in a manner which provokes such eerie tension and (sorry) chills as their 2013 revival. The Seeds of Death isn't one of Doctor Who's worst televised outings by any stretch, but equally it's just as distant from the Hall of Fame of its best outings to match. It's neither a wonder nor a dissssssgracccce...

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