Time and the Rani was the first story to feature Sylvester McCoy after Colin Baker had been unceremoniously sacked and refused to record a regeneration sequence. Unusually (at that time) there is a pre-title sequence which sees the TARDIS crash land on Lakertya, the Rani walks in and the creature with her turns over the Doctor and ‘he’ regenerates into McCoy. It’s perhaps the most ill conceived sequence in Doctor Who. Why they couldn’t have thought of something better is beyond me. They could have done a sequence where the Doctor has his back to the screen and there is a power surge in the console and it affects the Doctor and forces him to regenerate. That’s a much better idea that sadly came 23 years too late. Unfortunately the TARDIS scene pretty much sets the stall out for this story and it’s not good.
There are good things about this story. It’s good to have Kate O’Mara back as the Rani because I think that O’Mara is a very good actress. She was the best thing about Mark of the Rani and that was because of the chemistry she had with Anthony Ainley. If it wasn’t Kate O’Mara playing this role it would have been just a normal mad scientist character trying to do some dastardly deed and this would have been an average story. O’Mara spends a large chunk of this story pretending to be Mel. Every time I watched this I kept wondering to myself…why? As much as I like the Rani and Kate O’Mara, unfortunately she is wasted in this story.
There is a lot of bad things about Time and the Rani. First of all are the Lakertyrans who look awful and unfortunately don’t do much of any interest in this story. I also found McCoy’s performance to be more suitable for pantomime. There is a history of the Doctor being a bit odd shortly after his regeneration but McCoy’s performance was just too silly for my liking. Thankfully after this story his eccentricity gets pulled in and we get the McCoy performance like in Remembrance of the Daleks. This isnt McCoy’s fault because there was no discipline in the story. No one knew what McCoy’s Doctor was going to be like and as a result we get a loose version of the character.
The story was written by Pip and Jane Baker. They wrote Mark of the Rani and I really liked that as I think its one of Colin Baker’s best stories. Then they wrote Terror of the Vervoids for the Trial of a Timelord series which was probably one the better stories of that series but was not as good as Mark. This story unfortunately suffers from uncertainty in that the Bakers didn’t even know who was going to play the Doctor. They do a good job in their 1987 novelisation of this story by explaining what caused the regeneration. It was a case of ‘tumultuous buffeting’ which was a wonderful term.
Time and the Rani deserves its placing in fans opinions. A lot of stories from the classic series that were not held in high esteem but over the years and especially when released on DVD would be looked at differently. Unfortunately this rule doesn’t always apply. Time and the Rani is a terrible story that suffers from a clear direction setting. With the show surviving from the Michael Grade axe and being placed opposite Coronation Street, this story should have been better. Pip and Jane Baker should have made the Doctor darker (even if they didn’t know who the actor was) and perhaps this story might have been better.
There are good things about this story. It’s good to have Kate O’Mara back as the Rani because I think that O’Mara is a very good actress. She was the best thing about Mark of the Rani and that was because of the chemistry she had with Anthony Ainley. If it wasn’t Kate O’Mara playing this role it would have been just a normal mad scientist character trying to do some dastardly deed and this would have been an average story. O’Mara spends a large chunk of this story pretending to be Mel. Every time I watched this I kept wondering to myself…why? As much as I like the Rani and Kate O’Mara, unfortunately she is wasted in this story.
There is a lot of bad things about Time and the Rani. First of all are the Lakertyrans who look awful and unfortunately don’t do much of any interest in this story. I also found McCoy’s performance to be more suitable for pantomime. There is a history of the Doctor being a bit odd shortly after his regeneration but McCoy’s performance was just too silly for my liking. Thankfully after this story his eccentricity gets pulled in and we get the McCoy performance like in Remembrance of the Daleks. This isnt McCoy’s fault because there was no discipline in the story. No one knew what McCoy’s Doctor was going to be like and as a result we get a loose version of the character.
The story was written by Pip and Jane Baker. They wrote Mark of the Rani and I really liked that as I think its one of Colin Baker’s best stories. Then they wrote Terror of the Vervoids for the Trial of a Timelord series which was probably one the better stories of that series but was not as good as Mark. This story unfortunately suffers from uncertainty in that the Bakers didn’t even know who was going to play the Doctor. They do a good job in their 1987 novelisation of this story by explaining what caused the regeneration. It was a case of ‘tumultuous buffeting’ which was a wonderful term.
Time and the Rani deserves its placing in fans opinions. A lot of stories from the classic series that were not held in high esteem but over the years and especially when released on DVD would be looked at differently. Unfortunately this rule doesn’t always apply. Time and the Rani is a terrible story that suffers from a clear direction setting. With the show surviving from the Michael Grade axe and being placed opposite Coronation Street, this story should have been better. Pip and Jane Baker should have made the Doctor darker (even if they didn’t know who the actor was) and perhaps this story might have been better.
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