After a lacklustre start, Four to Doomsday seems a decent entry early in the Davidson era. The plot sees the TARDIS land within a mysterious ship with a lot of technology and mystery; originally they had been trying to get to Heathrow to drop Tegan off to catch her flight. While that would have made for quite a boring four episodes, I honestly would have taken it if it got rid of one or more of the assistants, as they mostly feel like they are cluttering up the show, and at least Tegan and Adric actively irritate me. Anyway, it doesn't take long for the Doctor to realise that bad business is afoot, starting a race against time to save Earth.
As this serial settled in, I was quite enjoying it as it felt like there were lots of solid interesting sci-fi ideas and concepts being rolled out, and it did seem more interesting and focused than the serial before. Mostly this was the case, but unfortunately it doesn't bring a lot of things home. Now, having them as ideas and detail is all well and good in and of itself, but it did bother me that the serial clearly had space to fill, but didn't do so with good content. Instead what we got was lots of ethnically diverse dancing which adds nothing that I could see - the nature of it also means that it offers no sincere claim at diversity either (although maybe it did back in those days).
Davidson is better here than in the first serial, but he is playing it safe, not doing anything too colourful or animated - but he is solid. Waterhouse continues to bother me; not sure if it is his performance or his material but he always seems wooden and not offering much to like. He is helped by Fielding, who I found out of place here - the dialogue clunks and she can't make it work. Sutton has a better character and her Nyssa works better with the Doctor than Tegan. The supporting cast here are decent; Johns is good value, and finding Bert Kwouk was a nice surprise in a minor role. Not a great serial though, but decent enough in terms of ideas and events.
As this serial settled in, I was quite enjoying it as it felt like there were lots of solid interesting sci-fi ideas and concepts being rolled out, and it did seem more interesting and focused than the serial before. Mostly this was the case, but unfortunately it doesn't bring a lot of things home. Now, having them as ideas and detail is all well and good in and of itself, but it did bother me that the serial clearly had space to fill, but didn't do so with good content. Instead what we got was lots of ethnically diverse dancing which adds nothing that I could see - the nature of it also means that it offers no sincere claim at diversity either (although maybe it did back in those days).
Davidson is better here than in the first serial, but he is playing it safe, not doing anything too colourful or animated - but he is solid. Waterhouse continues to bother me; not sure if it is his performance or his material but he always seems wooden and not offering much to like. He is helped by Fielding, who I found out of place here - the dialogue clunks and she can't make it work. Sutton has a better character and her Nyssa works better with the Doctor than Tegan. The supporting cast here are decent; Johns is good value, and finding Bert Kwouk was a nice surprise in a minor role. Not a great serial though, but decent enough in terms of ideas and events.