The Tenth Planet Episode 3

The one where General Cutler risks the future of Earth to save his son...

Can I just say, before we start, seeing as he's the first person we see in episode 3, a big "Woof!" to the actor playing the radar technician, Christopher Matthews. That's all.

Right, where are we? Ah yes, there's hundreds of Cyber-ships on their way from Mondas to Earth, so what better time for the Doctor to suddenly, without warning or due cause, faint. In the real world, of course, William Hartnell was not a well man, and although his performances in preceding stories such as The Smugglers and The War Machines were as good as ever, they had been recorded during the summer of 1966, when Hartnell was obviously feeling better. By the time recording for Season 4 resumed for The Tenth Planet in mid-September, Hartnell was noticeably frailer and his performance was suffering. Something had to be done, so the Doctor's role was greatly reduced for this story, and on August 6th, 1966, it was announced to the media that Hartnell would be leaving Doctor Who.

We should take a moment here to think about how William Hartnell will have been feeling at this time. He loved Doctor Who. He loved being Doctor Who. So to find himself having to leave the show he loved, the role he adored, after three years of solid active involvement, through ill-health, must have been extremely upsetting. We get to see a little of this in Mark Gatiss's loving 2013 drama An Adventure in Space and Time. So when, on Monday, September 26th, Hartnell sent a telegram to the production office to say he wasn't well enough to record that week's episode (reportedly bronchitis), I imagine that as well as being ill, perhaps he was also feeling afraid - afraid of letting go, afraid of leaving the one thing in life that kept him going. I find it heart-breaking to think what it must have been like for him over the summer and autumn of 1966: as well as the stability of his world giving way beneath him, he was also growing frailer. William Hartnell was a proud man, and everything he was going through at this time, he must have felt very keenly.

And so the Doctor is absent from episode 3 (Gordon Craig stood in as a body double), which has added poignancy as episode 3 is the last of the Hartnell era to survive. His last regular episode, episode 4, is missing from the archives. The last thing William Hartnell says visually as the Doctor during his era is: "I think you underestimate the Cybermen, General". Wise words indeed.

As a result of the Doctor's absence, a lot of what he might have said gets passed to Ben, who seems remarkably clued up on the Doctor's theories. The Doctor must have passed on a lot of knowledge before passing out! It's a shame some of the more intelligent lines passed from the Doctor couldn't be handed to Polly too, but then that's how "The Girl" got treated back in the 1960s! Polly is largely reduced to making coffee in this episode, although that does still afford her the chance to try and get Dr Barclay on their side.

There's a nice shift in focus onto Barclay for this episode, which affords David Dodimead the chance to bring a little nuance to his performance. Barclay is a man with a conscience and he finds it difficult to stand by and let the warmongering Cutler fire the Z-Bomb at Mondas. He is torn between obeying orders and doing what he thinks is right, but luckily Polly manages to persuade him to do the right thing in the end, and he helps Ben to infiltrate the reactor room.

Cutler is the real enemy in this story, in my mind. The Cybermen, as cold, heartless, emotionless and unfeeling as they are, aren't exactly evil. They're just doing what they think is right to try and save their homeworld. Their methods might be questionable, but when all is said and done, who can blame them? Conversely, General Cutler is risking the future of his entire species just to try and save his own son, who is floating around in space, directly in the firing line of the Z-Bomb. Cutler seems hellbent on destroying Mondas with the Z-Bomb, regardless of the fact it may well result in a massive loss of life on Earth, and affect the growth of vegetation for years to come. Nothing matters to him apart from his son's safety. "It's a risk we'll have to take," he insists. He's mad.

Ben gets to be a Gold Member of the Doctor Who Companion Club by getting to crawl along a ventilation shaft. Quite why civilian scientist Barclay should have had a hand in designing Snowcap Base is unclear (and only one part of it, not all of it!), but I'm not sure the architects were wise to let him, because it appears the ventilation shaft that leads from the staff dormitories runs directly into the nuclear rocket silo. I really wouldn't want to be sleeping on top of that bunk bed every night! Nevertheless, 5ft 6in sailor Ben is the right size to crawl along what is one of the roomiest ventilation shafts I've ever seen, taking him to the rocket silo in an effort to sabotage the launch.

When deranged Cutler spots what he's up to, he hurls Ben backwards over a handrail to a fair drop below, rendering him unconscious. It's a pretty violent thing for him to do, and reflects just how fanatical he's become by this point. Cutler is far from a sympathetic character, and Robert Beatty doesn't really give us much chance to feel sorry for him either, so as a viewer I don't excuse anything he says or does just because he's worried about his son. He's just a monster.

The Cybermen try to infiltrate the base a second time by landing another ship on the Antarctic surface and marching toward Snowcap, but they are quickly and all too easily wiped out by Cutler's men using the previous Cybermen's ray guns on them. Down they go like bowling alley skittles, except for one Cyberman who scarpers full-speed at the back of the shot! I love that Cyberman; I hope he goes on to greater things.

A tedious countdown brings us to the episode 3 cliffhanger, with some snazzy numbers superimposed over the characters' faces. I love how almost every single technician loosens his collar nervously as the camera pans across the room. I can just imagine director Derek Martinus telling them to "look nervous; loosen your collar or something", and so they all just did exactly the same thing!

Oh, and one last thing. That Wigner chap. I can't take him seriously at all, because all I see is the drunken chef Kurt from Fawlty Towers!

First broadcast: October 22nd, 1966

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: It's nice to have Polly have a role to play in convincing Barclay to do the right thing (although this is tempered somewhat by her dedication to coffee-making).
The Bad: The Doctor's gone AWOL, the Cybermen are wiped out far too easily, Ben's sabotage effort is scuppered... This is a prime example of a writer treading water.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆

NEXT TIME: Episode 4...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Episode 1; Episode 2; Episode 4

Find out birth/death dates, career information, and facts and trivia about this story's cast and crew at the Doctor Who Cast & Crew site: http://doctorwhocastandcrew.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/the-tenth-planet.html

The Tenth Planet is available on BBC DVD. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Tenth-Planet-DVD/dp/B00EF1I85Y