So, as my previous post was for the penultimate story of Tom Baker's era of Doctor Who, The Keeper of Traken, I thought I would cover his final story here, which is Logopolis and its one I've done before, so I thought I would update it a bit more.
So, let's take another look at this story 43 years on from its broadcast and see how it fairs...
And yep the usual warning is coming......
SPOILERS ARE AHEAD!!
STORY
So, the story begins with the Doctor deciding to try and fix the
TARDIS's broken chameleon circuit, which he sets about doing by
measuring the exact dimensions of a police telephone box, which the
TARDIS is currently modelled on with the help of his companion and
mathematic genius, Adric (Matthew Waterhouse). Once the Doctor has the
measurements he plans to take them to the planet Logopolis, which is
inhabited by a population of mathematicians who will be able to repair
the Doctor's circuit with their calculations.
In the meantime, an airline stewardess named Tegan Jovanka (Janet
Fielding) stumbles along the TARDIS as her car breaks down she looks to
try and call for help, however instead she enters the TARDIS and get's
lost in its maze of corridors. The Doctor and Adric also soon learn
that the Master (Anthony Ainley) is on their case after escaping from
Traken (in the previous story, The Keeper of Traken) as he has
materialised his TARDIS inside the Doctor's. This causes a strange loop
where the Doctor and Adric keep entering inside the Master's TARDIS
over and over and the Doctor soon decides the best way to banish the
Master would be to flush him out as they land the TARDIS at the bottom
of Thames.
However, the Doctor looks outside and sees the TARDIS has in fact just
landed on a boat by the river but the Doctor soon sees a mysterious
white figure, the Watcher, which the Doctor meets with up, who advises
him to travel to Logopolis as soon as possible. The Doctor and Adric
then set the TARDIS for Logopolis (with the Master's TARDIS now having
dematerialised from the Doctor's) but enroute they discover Tegan
onboard and the Doctor decides she has to come with them.
Once the Doctor, Adric and Tegan arrive on Logopolis, they are met with
by the Monitor (John Fraser) the chief mathematician to whom the Doctor
gives his new dimension calculations for the TARDIS to. However, it is
soon apparent that the Master has arrived on Logopolis also as he kills
several mathematicians, which ends up sabotaging the calculations for
the Doctor's TARDIS, which begins to shrink as a result. This leaves,
Adric and the Monitor to frantically try and work out a solution to
attempt to get the Doctor's TARDIS back to full size.
Meanwhile, the mysterious Watcher figure has brought Nyssa (Sarah
Sutton) to Logopolis, who is an aristocrat from the planet Traken (who
appeared in the previous story TKOT) and she is reunited with Adric and
meets Tegan. The Doctor's TARDIS is eventually restored to full size,
however at this point, the Master reveals himself and he uses a device
to temporarily disable the Logopolitan mathematicians from their
calculations, which soon causes them to erode and turn to dust.
This now has catastrophic consequences for the universe as the
Logopolitans were using their calculations to excise off entropy in the
universe into other universes through the use of charged vaccum
emboitments (CVEs). This now means that the universe could be in danger
of being wiped out unless the Doctor and the Master can find a way to
restore one of the CVEs.
And from here, the Doctor now must pull resources with the Master and
form an uneasy alliance, so they can try and save the universe from
certain destruction.......
THOUGHTS
As a swansong for the Tom Baker era, Logopolis remains a fine
story and a very respectable send-off for the fourth doctor, although it
has to be said its not a classic story by any means, however it still
has plenty going for it. The story also sees the introduction of a new
companion in Tegan Jovanka, who makes for a pretty feisty and
entertaining character, who although she starts off a bit brazen and
annoying at first, she soon mellows a little becomes one of the more
memorable companions of the 1980s.
The plot of the story is pretty dense and complex but it remains a very
intelligent script written by Christopher Bidmead, who himself was a
former actor, who turned to being a writer and journalist and he wrote
several articles for science journals. Bidmead at the time of this
story was also the show's script editor and in Tom Baker's last season
he certainly helped bring back a bit more credibility to the show after some of the overt humour we had seen during the Graham Williams
produced era of the show, particularly in Tom's previous season (season 17 and his 6th). So overall this is a good story from Bidmead.
PERFORMANCES AND NOTABLE SCENES (Warning: this section may contain spoilers!)
As for the performances, well they are for the most part very good here.
Starting off with Tom Baker, who is great in his final
performance as the fourth doctor and by now he had grown so well into
playing the role that he seemed to have wound himself well and truly up
in the Doctor's own eccentric personality. Although in this story we do
get a more serious Doctor from Tom as he plays him with perhaps a sense
of a man who is aware that the time of his incarnation might be
numbered.
Tom has plenty of good moments in the story that include his first when
he talks to Adric in the cloister room (which is the room containing the
bell that sounds in the event of impending danger) about how the TARDIS
is starting to decay. And the Doctor says to Adric "The second law of
thermodynamics is taking its toll on the old thing. Entropy increases".
And as Adric asks "Entropy increases" the Doctor rambles in reply "Yes,
daily. The more you put things together, the more they keep falling
apart, and that's the essence of the second law of thermodynamics and I
never heard a truer word spoken! Come on".
Then there is the scene where the Doctor tries to flush the Master out
the TARDIS by landing it at the bottom of the Thames river, however they
end up materialising on Cadogan pier in Chelsea (London). And as the
Doctor and Adric step out, the Doc says "Ah. I thought there's be a
perfectly simple explanation!" and Adric offers "Nearly got it right"
but the Doctor says "Nearly, but not quite right. There's something not
quite right about all of this". Then the Doctor sees the Watcher in the
distance on Albert bridge and waves at the Doctor to come up and the
Doctor looks on rather worried saying "Nothing like this has ever
happened before" then he goes off to speak to the Watcher.
Another good scene is when the Master reveals himself on Logopolis and
Nyssa, who has mistaken him for her father (as the Master used Nyssa's
father's body to regenerate) shouts out "Father" only for the Doctor to
tell her "That's not your father. Tremas is dead, murdered by him, the
Master!". And Nyssa looks at the Master coldly and says "You killed my
father??" and the Master tells her "But his body remains useful.
Without it I could not have conquered Logopolis!". However the Doctor
angrily tells the Master "This is not conquest, its devastation!" and
the Master says "Its nothing more than a blanket of silence" and the
Doctor tells him "Which is killing the Logopolitans and turning them to
dust!" and the Master scoffs "You expect me to believe that?" and the
Doctor shouts "YES!!".
Then there is the moment where the Doctor decides to pool resources with
the Master in order to try and save the universe from its possible
destruction at the hands of the entropy caused by the death of the
Logopolitans. And the Doctor tells the Master "We must pool our
resources" and Nyssa interrupts "That creature killed my father!" and
the Doctor annoyed says "I can't choose the company I keep!". So, the
Master smiles and says "An alliance with you, Doctor?" and the Doctor
says "In the circumstances, yes" and the Master tells the Doctor "If we
do cooperate, there will be no question of you ever returning to
Gallifrey" and the Doctor reminds the Master "If we don't cooperate,
there will be no question of Gallifrey!".
Nyssa then objects again to the Doctor "But Doctor!" and the Doctor
interrupts her and says angrily "I've never chosen my own company.
Nyssa, it was you who contacted me and begged me to help you find your
father. Tegan, it's your own curiosity that got you into this. And
Adric, a stowaway!". So after, Adric, Tegan and Nyssa depart in the
TARDIS with the Watcher, the Master approaches the Doctor, he extends
his hand out for him to shake it, saying "Together?" and the Doctor says
"One last hope" and he reluctantly shakes hands with the Master.
And last of all is the scene where the Doctor (SPOILER!!!) manages to
finally foil the Master's evil plans at a cost of his own life as he
falls from the Antenna of the Pharos project to the ground where his
surrounded by his companions. And the Doctor thinks of his old
companions and enemies throughout his 4th incarnation and he then looks
up at his friends and says his last words "Its the end, but the moment
has been prepared for..." and we then see the Watcher walk towards the
Doctor and merge with him, which sees the Doctor begin to regenerate.
Matthew Waterhouse next up does fairly well in his role as Adric
although it has to be said he never really looks that comfortable
onscreen as he spends alot of time fidgeting about not knowing what to
do with his hands!
And Matthew has some good moments here and there although I will only
mention a couple such as the scene where the Doctor is detained by a
police detective (Tom Georgeson) after they find the miniaturised
corpses of Tegan's aunt and a policeman. So the Doctor calls out for
Adric to devise a ruse so he can get away from the police and in the
scene Adric spots a bike and he uses it to pretend he has fallen off
it. And Adric yells "Help me! Help me, please! Quickly! Help!!" and
the Doctor then flees to the TARDIS and as the policemen approach Adric,
he pushes the bicycle into them and he runs into the TARDIS too.
And once they are back in the TARDIS, they both notice the police box
that was previously inside the control room has gone and Adric says "The
box has gone!" and the Doctor suggests "It could be anywhere in the
TARDIS!" and Adric asks "Battlestations?" and the Doctor replies
"Absolutely!".
Then there is the scene where Adric reunites with Nyssa on Logopolis,
who calls out to him "Adric!" and Adric smiles and greets her "Nyssa!"
and rushes up to her "How did you get here?" and Nyssa tells him "A
friend of the Doctor's brought me here. He's here somewhere". Then
Adric and the Monitor both watch as the TARDIS begins to shrink and
Adric asks "What's the matter?" and the Monitor says "Transfer
instability. It may only be temporary". But the TARDIS continues to
shrink and Adric says "Something's wrong!" and the Monitor says "Yes,
you're right" and Adric asks "Can't you do something?!" but the Monitor
is lost for an answer "I don't understand. I simply don't
understand!". And as the TARDIS shrinks even more, Adric looks in
horror and says "But the Doctor's in there!".
Next is Janet Fielding, who is pretty good in her debut
role as the airline stewardess, Tegan Jovanka, who ends up getting lost
in the TARDIS, mistaking it for a real police telephone box before she
meets the Doctor and Adric.
And Janet has a few scenes worth a mention such as her first one where
Tegan get's in her car, wearing her stewardess uniform, along with her
Aunt Vanessa (Dolore Whiteman). And in the scene, Tegan's Aunt can't
get the car started, so Tegan tells her "Okay, Aunty Vanessa, let's go.
More choke. Easy on the throttle as you turn her over" and Aunt Vanessa
tells her "While I do that, dear, I wonder if you'd mind shutting the
front door!" and we see Tegan's house front door is left open. And
after Tegan comes back to the car, having closed the door, she swaps
seats and get's in the driving seat instead and manages to start the car
first time and she smiles at her Aunt and says "I've got the knack!".
And just as Tegan is about to drive she goes through her little airline
stewardess speech as if speaking to passengers onboard a flight "Ladies
and gentlemen. Although the fasten seatbelt sign is now off, we suggest
that you keep your seatbelt fastened when seated. If necessary, you may
move about the cabin. Smoking is now permitted!".
Then there is the scene where atfer Tegan has continually wandered
hopelessly around the TARDIS's maze of corridors she finally ends up in
the main console room to see the Doctor and Adric, who both look on in
surprise. And Tegan angrily says to them "I demand to see whoever's in
charge of this ship!!" leaving the Doctor and Adric speechless. Tegan
then angrily says to the Doctor "You can take me right back where you
found me, Doctor whoever you are! My aunt's waiting in the car to take
me to the airport!". This then sparks the Doctor's interest as he asks
"You're aunt? Woman in the white hat, red sports car?" and Tegan asks
"You've seen her?" and the Doctor plays it down and says "Well, a little
of her!".
Lastly there is the scene where the Doctor having sent Adric, Tegan and
Nyssa off with the Watcher in the Doctor's TARDIS, we see Tegan come
back out the TARDIS as she wants to find the Doctor to take her back
home. And Adric protests to her "Look, we all want to help the Doctor,
but we've got to do as he says!" but Tegan tells him "Listen. The
Doctor's my ticket back to London airport, so I'm going after him!" and
as Tegan is about to go, Adric calls out "Tegan!" but she turns to Adric
and says "Have a nice trip!" and heads off.
Sarah Sutton is also pretty good (and looks rather cute in that
outfit of hers!) as Nyssa, the young aristocrat from the planet Traken,
who's father Tremas, was killed by the Master, who inhabits his body.
And Sarah's most notable scene comes when the Watcher having taken Adric
and Nyssa out of time and space itself on the TARDIS, Adric get's back
to the control room with Nyssa and sets the TARDIS co-ordinates for the
Pharos project on Earth. And Nyssa in the scene, flicks a switch that
brings on a displays of a cluster of stars on the monitor screen and
Nyssa says "Adric, the scanner" and Adric looks at it and says "The
whole universe. Of course. We're beyond space and time!". And after
they spot Earth on the scanner, Nyssa looks closer at it and suddenly
becomes a little emotional and tells Adric "Adric I can't see Traken".
And Adric has a look to see and says "Traken should be..." and Nyssa
continues "I can't even see Metulla Orionsis. The Master killed my
stepmother, and then my father, and now the world that I grew up in,
blotted out forever!".
Then we have Anthony Ainley, who made his debut here as the
Master, although he previously appeared as Tremas in the story prior to
this one, "The Keeper of Traken". And it has to be said that Ainley
really seems to enjoy hamming things up here in his role as the Master
as he always plays the Master with a rather cheesy evil grin on his face
and has him often laugh out loud! Despite this though I've always
quite enjoyed Ainley's portrayal of the Master even if it can be a bit
pantomine-esque and his debut here is still fairly solid.
And Ainley has his share of good moments too that include the scene
where we finally see the Master in person on Logopolis (prior to that we
just hear him do a lot of wicked laughter off camera!) just after the
TARDIS has shrink, as a result of the Master killing a few of the
Logopolitans, it sabotaged the dimensional calculations for the TARDIS's
restructuring. And in the scene as we see some of the Logopolitans
carry the TARDIS off to the central register to try and restore it, we
see the Master hiding in one of the doorways and he laughs saying "At
last, Doctor. At last I've cut you down to size!".
Then there is the scene where Nyssa first meets the Master on Logopolis
and she thinks he is still her father, Tremas. And Nyssa says to the
Master "But what is this mission of yours, father? You're so changed by
it. You look younger, but so cold!". And the Master says to her
"Logopolis is a cold place. A cold, high place overlooking the universe.
It holds a single great secret, Nyssa, which you and I must discover
together!". And in the scene, the Master tells Nyssa she should return
to the Doctor and Nyssa says "Father, I don't want to be parted from
you" and the Master says to her "No need to, my dear. Here, wear this"
and he givs Nyssa a gold bracelet to wear, which he places on her
wrist. And the Master tells Nyssa "It will keep us in mind of one
another. Remember to tell no one that you've seen me, yet!".
And lastly there is the scene where the Master and the Doctor, having
pooled their resources to try and activate the one last remaining CVE at
the Pharos project (which would in effect save the universe from being
wiped out due to the catastrophic effects of entropy caused by the
destruction of Logopolis).
However in the scene, the Master plans to blackmail the universe by
controlling the CVE and threatening to deactivate it unless they bend to
his demands. And in the scene the Master tells the Doctor "And now I
think it's time for you to go and explain the presence of your friends.
There's quite a hubbub outside" and the Doctor says "You're quite
right. One mistake now could ruin everything" and the Master tells him
"I know that, Doctor, and it could happen so easily". And the Doctor,
suspiciously asks "What do you mean?" and the Master says "The universe
is hanging on a thread. A single recursive pulse down that cable and the
CVE would close forever. Even a humble assistant could do it!" and the
Doctor looks shocked and says "You're mad!".
So, the Master then plays a recorded message of his blackmail to the
universe over the Antenna control room's speaker system, leaving the
Doctor appalled and he says to him "Blackmail" and the Master says "No,
Doctor, I'm merely reporting the state of affairs. I have it in my power
now to save them or destroy them!". And the Doctor looks at the Master
in disgust and tells him "You're utterly mad!!" and the Master holds
his gun up to him and warns "Back, Doctor. The proceedings must not be
interrupted!" and he looks at the control room and laughs to himself
"It's mine. The CVE. It's all mine!".
And last of all is, John Fraser, who is very good in his role as the chief mathematician on Logopolis, the Monitor.
But to save time I will just mention one of Fraser's scenes as the
Monitor and its the one where the Master turns on a device that acts as a
sound canceller that temporarily will disable the Logopolitans from
their calculations, however this leads to disastrous consequences. And
in the scene, the Monitor warns the Master "You're destroying
everything! It may already be too late!" and the Master says "You
exaggerate, Monitor. Logopolis is not the universe" and the Monitor
shouts back "But it is! Logopolis is the keystone. If you destroy
Logopolis, you unravel the whole causal nexus!".
And the Master says to the others "I can demonstrate the continued
functioning of Logopolis from here. This device only creates temporary
silence and can be switched off!" as he switches off the device but
there is nothing but silence. And as they run outside they see the
Logopolitans having indeed decayed to dust and the Monitor dispairs "You
will hear nothing. Local disruption of structure is now irreversible.
Logopolis is dead!".
DIRECTOR AND MUSIC
As for the direction, Peter Grimwade does a fine job here with
the story as he paces it out at a nice leisurely speed and it rarely
ever lags and he also allows for the injection of some fun into the
story with the arrival of Tegan and the Doctor and Adric trying to flush
out the Master from the TARDIS. Grimwade himself was already a member
of the show's production crew prior to becoming a director of several
serials (including "Earthshock" during the Peter Davison era) and so it remains that this is easily one of his better directorial efforts for the show.
Lastly we move onto the music score, which is by Paddy Kingsland,
who was around that time already a member of the BBC Radiophonic
workshop and he has prior to writing scores for Doctor Who also did the
music score for the sci-fi radio show "The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the
Galaxy". Kingsland would also go on to score other TV shows in the
future such as Michael Palin's "Around the world in 80 days".
As for Paddy's actual score here, its actually not too bad and it is
purely electronic synthesizer based (although I think it does feature a
guitar in there somewhere!) as were all the other scores were
during the 1980's era of the show. The score however is not that
memorable in itself and it is better served simply to listen to while
watching the story rather listen to it by itself as an isolated
soundtrack but it is still fit for purpose and is pretty decent.
FLAWS (Warning: this section may also contain spoilers!)
Now flaws....does Logopolis have some??? Yes it does have some albeit nothing too drastic.
And to kick off it has to be said that with this story, Christopher Bidmead's
script is at times just a bit too convoluted to follow as the whole plot
can be quite difficult to follow. And even though its an enjoyable
story for adults I could easily see it quickly being a bore for children
as it would most likely just confuse them!
As for one of the big plotholes of the story, the biggest one for me was
the Master's ignorance as to what the consequences would be if he
tampered with the operation of Logopolis, as it really never occurs to
him by doing this that he would potentially cause irriversible damange
to the universe! Yet the Master in the scene where he enables his
signal cancelling device at the central register on Logopolis, he is
totally oblivious to the results it will have, yet even the Doctor is
aware! It makes you think at times, the Master really isn't as bright
as he would like to make himself out to be!
Another issue I had with the story was the silly scene where the Doctor
and Adric decide to try and flush out the Master's TARDIS from the
TARDIS by materialising it underwater in the Thames. I mean its a
pretty stupid idea and ultimately it never works because the Doctor
lands the TARDIS on a pier instead! Also the Master could have easily
dematerialised his TARDIS before the Doctor even managed to try the
manouvere in the first place.
Then there are one or two continuity issues in the story itself with the
main one being the scene where Adric creates a diversion so the Doctor
can escape from the police, who have detained him, so Adric uses a
nearby bike to pretend he has fallen off it and he lies down on the wet
grass and when he get's up, his outfit is all damp and a bit muddy at
the back. However once we cut to the Doctor and Adric back in the
TARDIS we can see that Adric's outfit is now completely clean and there
is no damp or mud on it at all! So its a pretty silly continuity error
that obviously went unmissed.
There are also one or two laughable moments in the story too, such as
the one where we see the Monitor lead the Doctor and the others through
the corridors of the office on Logopolis, where we see the Logopolitans
seated at work. However as the Monitor goes through the next door we
see a cardboard cutout of the previous room, which evidently exposes the
show's rather modest budget at the time!
And then there is the laughable moment near the end where the Doctor
tries to make his way out onto the Pharos project's radio antenna
walkway but the Master has activated the dish, which makes the walkway
start to spin around and leave the Doctor clinging on for dear life.
However in this scene we can also see another cardboard cutout of the
Master in the background as the Doctor desparately tries to cling on to
the walkway and again it just looks as fake as anything and laughable!
Then there is the whole concept of the Watcher in the story, which
is a strange one in itself as we later discover that
(SPOILER!!!!!!!!!!!) the Watcher was in fact the Doctor all along. Now
that would suggest to me that if you hold to the theory in the Jon
Pertwee story "The Three Doctors" if the Doctor's other selves co-exist
together at the same time then this would transgress the first law of
time itself. So this means that yet again, the first law of time here
had indeed been transgressed once more, and you also never get to the
find out just where did the Watcher come from and who, if at all, sent
him???
And last of all is the Tom Baker's final scene where we see him lying on the ground after his fall from the radar dish scaffolding in his dying moments, as his companions gather around him. However, it has to be said, the way in which the Doctor has fallen down, he looks like he has been tucked up into bed as he lies in a nice comfy position rather than stay on his side or something. So, in the end, it looks like he just had a leisurely fall instead of a fatal one, which makes it look all the more silly.
And further to this, one last note on the final scene, what really annoys me about the end of the story is the sloppy direction choice of having witnessed Tom Baker regenerate into Peter Davison, we then see Peter Davison, as the 5th Doctor, just sudddenly sit up and look at everyone. It just always really struck me as a poor way to end the serial and a bit too jarring to have the newly regenerated Doctor pop up as if he just got out of bed! So, yeah, I was never keen on this story's ending.
Anyway that's it for the flaws.
SUM UP
So, to sum it all up, "Logopolis" is an enjoyable and worthy send-off
for Tom Baker as the Doctor, even if the story itself isn't a classic, it still has plenty to commend it with its intelligent (albeit
overly complex) script, fairly solid performances and decent direction.
The story however is of course a bit too complex at times to follow
with its convoluted plotlines and the story isn't really a classic as
such and yes arguably, Tom Baker could have recieved a better send-off
than this one.
However despite these flaws, "Logopolis" is still well worth a look and
as far as swansong stories, it does nothing to disgrace the Tom Baker
era and it sees one of the show's most popular incarnations get a decent
finale.
So, I will rate Logopolis
8.5 out of 10
So, that's it for now and I will be back soon with another post hopefully before the month is over.
Until then its bye for now!