Doctor Who/Recap/S19/E02 Four to Doomsday: Difference between revisions

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In the end, the Doctor sets Adric straight and then goes flying around in space without a space suit, but WITH the help of a cricket ball and The Power Of Physics, and rescues the TARDIS. Then he randomly throws an incredibly deadly poison at Monarch, which doesn't kill him... but instead [[Incredible Shrinking Man|shrinks him]]. Yeah. And the robots announce that they're going off to find their own planet and "start again."
In the end, the Doctor sets Adric straight and then goes flying around in space without a space suit, but WITH the help of a cricket ball and The Power Of Physics, and rescues the TARDIS. Then he randomly throws an incredibly deadly poison at Monarch, which doesn't kill him... but instead [[Incredible Shrinking Man|shrinks him]]. Yeah. And the robots announce that they're going off to find their own planet and "start again."


Everyone leaves, and Nyssa conveniently collapses at literally the last second because she originally wasn't written in the next episode. <ref>In fact, if it wasn't for Davison's intervention, Nyssa would've been dropped as a companion altogether. Her sudden collapse is actually the basis of the Big Finish audio story [[Big Finish Doctor Who/Recap/026 Primeval|Primeval]]</ref>
Everyone leaves, and Nyssa conveniently collapses at literally the last second because she originally wasn't written in the next episode.<ref>In fact, if it wasn't for Davison's intervention, Nyssa would've been dropped as a companion altogether. Her sudden collapse is actually the basis of the Big Finish audio story [[Big Finish Doctor Who/Recap/026 Primeval|Primeval]]</ref>


=== Tropes ===
== Tropes ==


* [[Affably Evil]]: Monarch, who carries a pleasant and civilized demeanor (which unfortunately wins over Adric for most of the last two episodes).
* [[Affably Evil]]: Monarch, who carries a pleasant and civilized demeanor (which unfortunately wins over Adric for most of the last two episodes).
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* [[Doomy Dooms of Doom]]
* [[Doomy Dooms of Doom]]
* [[Frogs and Toads]]
* [[Frogs and Toads]]
* [[Horrible Judge of Character]]: Contrary to popular belief, this is the only story where Adric ''actually'' sides with the villain (his ploys in "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S18 E4 State of Decay|State of Decay]]", and "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S19 E3 Kinda|Kinda]]" were attempts at being a [[Fake Defector]] that wound up falling flat, and in "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S19 E1 Castrovalva|Castrovalva]]" he was being made to work for the Master against his will), but only because he thinks that Monarch's intentions are legit benevolent.
* [[Horrible Judge of Character]]: Contrary to popular belief, this is the only story where Adric ''actually'' sides with the villain (his ploys in "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S18/E04 State of Decay|State of Decay]]", and "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S19/E03 Kinda|Kinda]]" were attempts at being a [[Fake Defector]] that wound up falling flat, and in "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S19/E01 Castrovalva|Castrovalva]]" he was being made to work for the Master against his will), but only because he thinks that Monarch's intentions are legit benevolent.
* [[Improvised Microgravity Maneuvering]]
* [[Improvised Microgravity Maneuvering]]
* [[Kneel Before Zod]]
* [[Kneel Before Zod]]
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* [[Ridiculously-Human Robots]]
* [[Ridiculously-Human Robots]]
* [[Slouch of Villainy]]: Monarch is content to let his ministers do all the bad stuff.
* [[Slouch of Villainy]]: Monarch is content to let his ministers do all the bad stuff.
* [[Space Is Cold]]: Wearing just an air-helmet, the Doctor explains that he can survive about five minutes in open space. Vacuum is apparently not a problem for his exposed skin; the time-limiting factor is explicitly named as the intense ''cold''.
* [[Space Is Cold]]: Wearing just an air-helmet, the Doctor explains that he can survive about five minutes in open space. Vacuum is apparently not a problem for his exposed skin; the time-limiting factor is explicitly named as the intense ''cold''.
* [[Suddenly Always Knew That]]: Good thing Tegan fluently speaks a 40,000 year old dialect of a random [[Australian Aborigines|Indigenous Australian]] language! (There are thousands of such languages, most of which wouldn't have existed by Tegan's time--and meanwhile, linguists in the rest of the world are having a tough enough time reconstructing Proto-Indo-European, which is a mere 10,000 years old.)
* [[Suddenly Always Knew That]]: Good thing Tegan fluently speaks a 40,000 year old dialect of a random [[Australian Aborigines|Indigenous Australian]] language! (There are thousands of such languages, most of which wouldn't have existed by Tegan's time—and meanwhile, linguists in the rest of the world are having a tough enough time reconstructing Proto-Indo-European, which is a mere 10,000 years old.)
* [[Surveillance Drone]]: The Monopticon
* [[Surveillance Drone]]: The Monopticon
* [[The Voiceless]]: Princess Villagra, who took a vow of silence.
* [[The Voiceless]]: Princess Villagra, who took a vow of silence.

Latest revision as of 00:58, 29 June 2016
Now listen to me, you young idiot--you’re not so much gullible as idealistic. I suppose it comes from your deprived, delinquent background.
—The Doctor pwns Adric

In this, Peter Davison's first filmed story[1] as the Doctor, the Doctor, in the first of his continuing attempts to bring Tegan back home. He gets the date and time exactly right... but is four light-days off, location-wise (so, somewhere in the Oort cloud). Oops. Instead, the Doctor and his companions land on a huge spaceship crewed by the delusional Monarch and his lackeys, the Ministers of Persuasion and Enlightenment. These three Urbankans, or frog-like aliens, travel in the company of four groups of humans:

Monarch wishes to go back in time before the Big Bang to watch himself creating the universe, take over the Earth with those groups of humans in charge... and jack the TARDIS as his own ride for personal enjoyment (shooting for the moon, this one is). Adric shows excellent character judgment and begins sucking up to this raving mad frog alien while Nyssa is taken to be turned into an android (much like every single other human taken by the Urbankans). Adric also shows incredibly misogynistic behaviour, proclaiming that Tegan is "a woman" and wouldn't understand the complicated math behind anything, while simultaneously proclaiming Nyssa an exception because she's "a girl."

Meanwhile, Tegan, who was entrusted with the TARDIS key, ends up losing her cool and desperately attempts to hijack the TARDIS for a ride back to Earth, only to land it outside the spaceship instead.

In the end, the Doctor sets Adric straight and then goes flying around in space without a space suit, but WITH the help of a cricket ball and The Power Of Physics, and rescues the TARDIS. Then he randomly throws an incredibly deadly poison at Monarch, which doesn't kill him... but instead shrinks him. Yeah. And the robots announce that they're going off to find their own planet and "start again."

Everyone leaves, and Nyssa conveniently collapses at literally the last second because she originally wasn't written in the next episode.[2]

Tropes

  1. ↑ His early stories were filmed out of order, as was fairly common for Who.
  2. ↑ In fact, if it wasn't for Davison's intervention, Nyssa would've been dropped as a companion altogether. Her sudden collapse is actually the basis of the Big Finish audio story Primeval
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