The Reign of Terror

DOCTOR: Paris, eh? A hundred miles or so either way is to be expected. After all, it's only a fraction of the distance we've covered. It's quite accurate, in fact.

DOCTOR: Is there such a need, Citizen Robespierre? Hmm? I mean, what can this reign of terror possibly gain? For every opponent you put to the guillotine, two more will spring up!

(To Robespierre? That's playing with fire...)

IAN: Not Jules Renan, by any chance?

(So much for the no surnames thing, then)

DOCTOR: You should know by now, young lady, that you can't get rid of the old Doctor as easily as that

(Lovely scene)

BARBARA: Yes, he's dressed up as if he was running the revolution! From what I could gather, half the people there take orders from him.
IAN: That sounds like the Doctor, all right. 

• The argument right at the beginning of the story is really quite sweet. The way Ian and Barbara work over the Doctor to get him out of his angry mood and back into the cuddly Doctor who will be dominant from now on. Taking Ian and Barbara for a last (not to mention, first?) drink is a lovely idea. They'd certainly have been the only ever companions to get that privilege! 
  
• Susan refuses to escape! When Susan and Barbara are on the way to have their heads chopped off, Barbara comes up with a plan of escape. Susan decides that she can't be bothered as "my head's splitting!" Yeah, you do realise you're on your way to have it permanently split, don't you? 
• In this house where they've worked out they've landed in the middle of the Reign of Terror, Ian Barbara and Susan find some clothes and just change into them! Now that really is getting into the adventuring spirit. I'm curious about where exactly they got changed, as from the way it's directed it looks like they didn't actually leave that room. 
• It's a tiny part, just one short scene, but I'm not letting Howard Charlton off his performance as "Judge". I'll let him off the way he stares right into the camera, as I can only assume he was told to do that, but really he's terribly awkward. To be fair, he's not alone. James Cairncross puts in a rather bizarre performance as Lemaitre. It's the stagiest, most "look at me, I'm ACTING" performance I've seen in Doctor Who so far. Still, he gets away with it, I think, by sharing most of his time on screen with the Doctor and the comedy jailer. As part of that trio he stands out a bit less than he otherwise would. 
  
• The Reign of Terror is the Doctor's favourite period in human history. What a bloodthirsty Doctor he is! 
• It's hilarious the way the Doctor manages to get to Paris and trick his way into (a show of) authority to get into the prison... only to find out that Ian, Susan and Barbara have all escaped already! 
• Barbara appears to fancy Leon so much that she's angry with Jules for saving Ian's life! That's carrying it a bit far, Barbara. (Yes, yes, I know it's part of all the "tired of all this killing" strand that is picked up later) 
  
• The episode title being flashed up on screen hasn't really caused any problems since the first story, as they usually avoid doing it when actors are on screen, but in the final episode here it's a bit awkward. Ian, Barbara, Jules, the Doctor and Lemaitre all try and stand as still as possible, waiting for "Prisoners of the Conciergerie... by Dennis Spooner" to flash up before they spring back into action. It does look rather silly. 
• The animation is ropey. It does calm down a bit, and their Cybermen efforts are much-improved, but here it's almost a bit hard to watch at times. The super-fast cutting and extreme close-ups of character's mouths and hands and so on is not just annoying anyway, it's so unlike what you'd get in the programme. Still, as it was a first effort it's not too bad.

Verdict

The incidental music is perhaps a little obvious, but I still think it works well at setting the mood of the story. I'd judge it amongst the best scores of the

season. And I'd rank the story as amongst the best of the season. Dennis Spooner hasn't got it quite right yet, but there are certainly a lot of flashes of what's to come. Even a this early stage, this story has a lot more humour in it than Marco Polo and the Aztecs, which is nice to see. The story itself isn't as strong as those two, but anything set in the latter end of the 18th century is going to be good fun, especially with such good sets and costumes. Barbara's resigned now to just "going along with the flow" of history, which does mean that (with this crew) we'll never get the drama of the Aztecs again, but we will certainly get a lot of fun.

 Season One

The first year of Doctor Who is, understandably, very unequal in quality. It may not be an original observation, but the three historicals are the best three

stories and all good fun, while the sci-fi stories are a bit ropier. They all have some good or silly moments. The Keys of Marinus and the Sensorites are a bit of a slog at times, but they both have their own charm which just about pulls them through. They're poor, but far from the worst of what Doctor Who has to offer. The four regulars are never less than great, but by the time of the Reign of Terror they're all so relaxed, so much their characters. They've grown so much over the 42 episodes, and the show has with them. Now with all this confidence... roll on Season Two, one of my very favourites.