The tenth story in the extended companion chronicles series sees Mike Yates tell his story of an adventure he had with the Third Doctor. Mike Yates was played by Richard Franklin between 1971 and 1974. In the end his character had a nervous breakdown and had to go off to a retreat. This sort of character development was unusual in Classic Doctor Who. This story is the first story to come from Scott Handcock who according to Wikipedia was a production runner of Doctor Who Confidential. This story seems to be set in the present as the dialogue seems to indicate that he has left UNIT and so has the Brigadier.
The first thing that I like about this story is Franklin himself. When the voice is right then the story could be the phonebook and it would still be interested. Franklin gives a nice straight forward performance and he manages to get the right tones for Jo, The Brigadier and the Doctor. He opted to go for tones instead of doing impersonations that very rarely work in these stories. He also managed to bring back that thing which was obvious on the TV and that was the relationship between Jo and Mike. It was obvious to everyone that they had feelings and at the end you felt sad that they never got together and Jo went off with that Welsh Hippie. The story itself is quite a good one, UNIT are trying to solve what the cause is of these freak cold snaps that can turn a public area like Hyde Park into a ice rink killing everyone. The character of Diamond Jack was well written and what I liked most was that he had a past to him that almost made you feel sorry for him because he had been exiled to Earth (like the Doctor) and had his mind erased which was quite horrific. I quite like the idea that there are different version of Jack. The first is the form that he takes now so that he can blend in with everyone and then there is his true form which seems to be a springy monster and then there is the card which has his memories on it and what he is really like. Why the people who exiled him to earth don’t just destroy it is a mystery to me and that’s my only problem with this story. The final scene which was set on the walkway between the towers on Tower Bridge was really really dramatic and had me gripped all the way, it shows what can be achieved with this range that doesn’t always happen. The cliffhanger was a nice one which is another area that other companion chronicles has because whilst it can be difficult to create an effective cliffhanger its something that needs to be really thought about for it to work.
Richard Franklin was very good as mentioned as Mike Yates. Yates isn’t the a character I would have thought off for a companion story but I am glad someone did because it gave Franklin to show us what Yates would be like now. Hopefully they will ask Franklin to do more stories not just in this series but in the main one. Michael Chance was very good as Diamond Jack and he gave the character a very clear aura of menace about him and the fact that he had the power to kill people in a truly horrific way whenever he wanted. You felt his desperation and sadness in certain scenes which made it difficult to know whether you were supposed to hate him or like him.
Scott Handcock has written a good story for his debut. It was a nice gentle paced story that accelerated when it needed to. The back story behind Diamond Jack was a very good creative move and added some tension in the latter scenes that I really enjoyed. Nigel Fairs was very good as the director. Fairs has directed several of these stories and is really good at keeping the pace and the story going. His previous story was The Transit of Venus which is one of the best stories of the season and perhaps in the entire series.
The first thing that I like about this story is Franklin himself. When the voice is right then the story could be the phonebook and it would still be interested. Franklin gives a nice straight forward performance and he manages to get the right tones for Jo, The Brigadier and the Doctor. He opted to go for tones instead of doing impersonations that very rarely work in these stories. He also managed to bring back that thing which was obvious on the TV and that was the relationship between Jo and Mike. It was obvious to everyone that they had feelings and at the end you felt sad that they never got together and Jo went off with that Welsh Hippie. The story itself is quite a good one, UNIT are trying to solve what the cause is of these freak cold snaps that can turn a public area like Hyde Park into a ice rink killing everyone. The character of Diamond Jack was well written and what I liked most was that he had a past to him that almost made you feel sorry for him because he had been exiled to Earth (like the Doctor) and had his mind erased which was quite horrific. I quite like the idea that there are different version of Jack. The first is the form that he takes now so that he can blend in with everyone and then there is his true form which seems to be a springy monster and then there is the card which has his memories on it and what he is really like. Why the people who exiled him to earth don’t just destroy it is a mystery to me and that’s my only problem with this story. The final scene which was set on the walkway between the towers on Tower Bridge was really really dramatic and had me gripped all the way, it shows what can be achieved with this range that doesn’t always happen. The cliffhanger was a nice one which is another area that other companion chronicles has because whilst it can be difficult to create an effective cliffhanger its something that needs to be really thought about for it to work.
Richard Franklin was very good as mentioned as Mike Yates. Yates isn’t the a character I would have thought off for a companion story but I am glad someone did because it gave Franklin to show us what Yates would be like now. Hopefully they will ask Franklin to do more stories not just in this series but in the main one. Michael Chance was very good as Diamond Jack and he gave the character a very clear aura of menace about him and the fact that he had the power to kill people in a truly horrific way whenever he wanted. You felt his desperation and sadness in certain scenes which made it difficult to know whether you were supposed to hate him or like him.
Scott Handcock has written a good story for his debut. It was a nice gentle paced story that accelerated when it needed to. The back story behind Diamond Jack was a very good creative move and added some tension in the latter scenes that I really enjoyed. Nigel Fairs was very good as the director. Fairs has directed several of these stories and is really good at keeping the pace and the story going. His previous story was The Transit of Venus which is one of the best stories of the season and perhaps in the entire series.
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