 |
| The Master is feeling the effects of the planet. (Survival Part Two) ©BBC |
What Survival does have time for is a more overtly female approach. Ace gets in touch with her feminine side and feels free as she starts to turn into a Cheetah Person (and the scene in part two, with the red moon reflected in the water, makes this connection clear), rejecting male ideas about what it means to survive. From Karra the Cheetah Person's point of view, it's not about surviving or winning -- it's about the hunt, feeling the blood, satisfying the hunger. But go too far the other way and you run the risk of turning into a Cheetah Person, of giving in to your base urges completely, of fighting with each other even though you're linked somehow with the planet and the fighting causes the planet to disintegrate -- and this risk seems to be heightened if you then turn those Cheetah Person tendencies toward male-dominated activities like war. "If we fight like animals, we die like animals!" the Doctor shouts, refusing to give in (although the sight of the Doctor with cat eyes, as he prepares to kill the Master before he realizes what he's doing, is striking).
All right, so maybe this is taking things a bit too far, but the subtext is clearly there, even if it tends to remain a subtext. But writer Rona Munro (the fourth woman to write for the series, after Barbara Clegg, Paula Woolsey (maybe), and Jane Baker), like all the best writers of the last few years, is using Doctor Who to explore topics that are meaningful to her while wrapping it up in an SF context. The critique about "survival of the fittest" is definitely there, and in fact drives the whole episode. The references to womanhood (the moon bit, the fact that the women turn into cats -- and note how Karra turns back into a human woman when she dies) are also definitely there. Connecting the two themes takes a bit more work on the viewers' side.
But what's wonderful about Survival is that you can do this. The pieces are there for you to interact with. And what better way to explore these ideas of fighting and survival than with the Master? This is probably Anthony Ainley's best performance in the role, and it's easily the best characterization of the character since his return. Instead of giving him elaborate schemes to entrap the Doctor or take over the world, he's redesigned here to be the Doctor's opposite, with no more motivation needed than to use the Doctor to help him escape. And if the Doctor dies or succumbs to the effects of the planet, so be it. This is a Master operating on instinct. The best thing about this is that the Master doesn't end up distorting the story around him; instead he enhances the themes, showing that using the Cheetah powers for selfish reasons is just as bad as giving into them completely.
Survival's an impressively layered story, and its strengths lie in challenging the audience while still providing an entertaining tale. It confidently reasserts the basic principles of the show (as Terrance Dicks might say, "Never cruel or cowardly") and rejects the ideas of every man for himself. It provides a new dimension for the show's ideas about the function of the companion -- no other story yet has brought the companion back to their home just to see what the old gang is up to, but that's a driving force here -- which will become a key part of the 21st-century version. It provides us with reasons to think and reasons to cheer, all in a slick, self-assured package. (And it manages to do this in three episodes, without the feeling that there are necessary explanations omitted in the interests of time.) What better story is there for Doctor Who to bow out on?
 |
| The Doctor and Ace head off to new adventures. (Survival Part Three) ©BBC |
They had an inkling at the time that they weren't going to get a 27th season. The reasons for this are a bit more complicated than you might think -- not only did BBC management not care for Doctor Who, but no one really wanted to produce it either (one of the reasons Nathan-Turner was producer as long as he was is because no one else was willing to be the producer). Then add in the fact that a recent directive decreed that 25% of all BBC output had to be made by outside companies -- a situation which seemed to the BBC to be ideal for Doctor Who but which would take time to work out the details -- and you can see why the wind was blowing against another season of Doctor Who. This is why Survival ends with that lovely little Cartmel-written speech from the Doctor (augmented by Dominic Glynn's gorgeously wistful little tune), because they thought it might be a while before the show was back:
There are worlds out there where the sky is burning, where the sea's asleep, and the rivers dream. People made of smoke, and cities made of song. Somewhere there's danger, somewhere there's injustice, somewhere else the tea's getting cold. Come on, Ace, we've got work to do.It's a shame that they stopped when they did, though. Season 26 has provided us with a run of stories even more confident and ambitious than last season's -- even Battlefield (the worst story of the season, which gives you some idea of how strong this year's stories have been) is full of good ideas and lovely moments, hanging on a narrative framework that's wonderfully overambitious. Obviously the BBC's management weren't too keen on the series (or else they wouldn't have kept scheduling it opposite Coronation Street), and the ratings had been down, but in some ways that didn't matter. John Nathan-Turner and Andrew Cartmel especially seem to have been delighting in telling audacious stories with complicated themes -- confident in the knowledge that they can be more adventurous and outrageous because no one in charge is paying them any attention. (Cartmel once famously said after the fact that his goal as script editor was to bring down the government -- which gives you some idea of the sorts of things he was looking for and the commitment he was willing to give.) They knew their days were numbered, but that didn't dissuade them. It helped that they were aided by Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred, providing us with one of the best Doctors and one of the best companions (respectively) ever -- it's a shame they didn't really get to leave on their own terms. The result was a show that was back on the top of its game and ready to take on the world. It's hardly their fault the world wasn't that interested anymore.158
158 After Survival Part Three I watched the 1990 edition of Search Out Science -- an educational show -- that features the Doctor, Ace, and K-9 (and can be found on the Survival DVD if you're interested). To paraphrase About Time, it's proof, if nothing else, that children still wanted the Doctor around even if no one else did.