Part three isn't really too terrible either. High praise, I know, but the stuff with Organon trying to break the newly-created wall down, and Lady Adrasta trying really very hard to kill the creature, is quite enjoyable. And I find I don't even mind the creature itself, other than the ludicrous pseudopods that someone's decided to attach to the thing. It does look awfully padded in places though; the Doctor's attempts to communicate go on far too long (complete with some incredibly rude-looking interactions with the creature), and the group of bandits continue to be both annoying and a bit boring. That last bit's not strictly padding, since the plot needs them to take the communication device to the creature, but it's not a very engaging scene.
It is nice how things come together by the end of part three (although, how
did the Doctor break down the barrier that the creature created? The given reason feels awfully facetious...) and there's something compelling about watching Lady Adrasta's carefully constructed house of cards collapsing around her -- Myra Frances continues to impress. It's a weird cliffhanger, though, that wants us to care about her fate more than the Doctor's; why they didn't stop thirty seconds sooner, with Adrasta threatening the Doctor's life, is beyond me.
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Erato uses Lady Adrasta's larynx to communicate. (The Creature
from the Pit Part Four) ©BBC |
No, the real problems set in with part four. The natural conclusion of this story happens at about 8 minutes in; Adrasta has been killed, the creature (who's really a Tythonian ambassador named Erato) has been set free, and it looks like things are going to be all right for Chloris. But there're still 12 whole minutes to fill, so we get a bunch of padding with Lady Adrasta's right-hand woman Karela stealing a bit of Erato's spaceship and negotiating with the bandits, followed by some truly bizarre bits involving a neutron star being flung at Chloris and an aluminium shell being able to reduce its gravitational pull long enough to be redirected. It feels like pure padding; worse, it feels like stupid padding at odds with the rest of the story. We couldn't even get some extended characterization scenes or a palace coup or something; just nonsense about missile-like stars instead. It seems pretty clear that
The Creature from the Pit's poor reputation rests squarely on the last half of part four, and everything else that goes wrong is just fuel for that particular fire.
Because the thing is, until the second ending tacked onto part four, this story isn't that bad. There are some questionable decisions, to be sure (why do the production team want to keep making gigantic monsters? Do they keep thinking, "this time it'll work"?), but the thing holds together better than you might have heard. Making Erato not automatically a villain is a good move, and Myra Frances and Geoffrey Bayldon both light up the screen. If there's a plotting problem beyond the ending, it's that it's occasionally too straight-forward; for instance, the bandits bring the communicator to Erato because the plot needs Erato to start speaking rather than for any other reason. This, combined with all the other problems mentioned, does mean that
The Creature from the Pit isn't an underrated gem or anything like that, but it is rather better than you may have heard; there's enough here to keep you entertained despite these issues.