September 06, 2009

The Glorious Revolution (2009)

The Glorious Revolution is the second Companion Chronicle to feature Jamie McCrimmon. The first was Helicon Prime (2007) which was a futuristic tale which was typically Doctor Who. This story isn’t anything like Helicon Prime but is a more personal story for McCrimmon. The story opens up with an agent of the Celesitial Intervention Agency travel to visit an older Jamie and open his mind to the adventures he had with the Doctor.

I think that Jamie didn’t want the memories he had with the Doctor to stay was quite strange. If someone had hidden some of my memories and then I got a chance to remember them again. The last thing I would allow anyone to do is to take them away. But this wasn’t about changing things back but just about being given the choice. Jamie chose to have his memories taken whereas back in The War Games there was no choice.

Frazer Hines was brilliant in this story. His impersonation of the Second Doctor was one of the highlights. It’s perhaps the best impersonation of the Doctor from a companion that I have heard in this series. We also got to see a more personal side to McCrimmon which I liked. The problem that I had with the character of Jamie he acted like a comedy duo with the Doctor half the time whereas in this story he was at odds for moments of this story.

The story itself is quite a simple one. It wasn’t an alien menace trying to takeover a civilsisation it was just trying to ensure that history went along like it was supposed to. Except that Jamie convinced the King to do different to what he was supposed to and the second half of the story sees the Doctor and co trying to change history back to how it was supposed to happen.

My only issue with it is that I don’t quite see the point of the CIA agent. The whole point of his visit was to uncover the change in history, yet the story saw Jamie change history then it being changed back so there was no purpose in the visitors journey. This is a minor issue though because the story itself is a strong and well structured one. The character of the King was one that was easily manipulated and one that wasn’t all powerful but weak and feeble.

The Glorious Revolution is another enjoyable story. Jonathan Morris (writer) and Nigel Fairs (director) have both done well to create a nice good old fashioned Doctor Who story that actually gave me a history lesson which I wasn’t expecting.

No comments:

Post a Comment