The Real McCoy and the Forgotten (Sacrificial) Lambs

I continue to round up my Timelash II stuff with these bits 'n' bobs about the McCoy years.  There will eventually be separate posts on some of the 'big hitters' left out below.


Paradise Towers

Very Whoish ideas. Lots of clever use of language, from the street names to the slang which incorporates degenerated formal rules, to the Caretaker lingo full of subsections and codes, etc. 

It suffers from 'Mysterious Planet' disease in that the production looks good but nothing looks right.

Mel's apparently monomaniacal fixation upon the swimming pool is decidedly odd.  But, if you approach this as children's television (which is clearly what it thinks it is) then you can enjoy it as a surprisingly sophisticated story about social entropy.

Brings to mind Le Corbusier and his notion of houses as "machines for living in"... which always had a tinge of the authoritarian about it, amidst all the utopianism of early 20th century modernism (which also always had a hidden inner core of mysticism beneath all the pseudo-rational stright lines, etc). The insistence upon a buried notion of virtue (you had to be a certain kind of healthy, high-minded, thin, modern-minded, puritanical person to live in a gleaming white box with glass walls) leads to a kind of disillusion, a bit like the contempt felt by Kroagnon. The modernists (Mies, for example) got chased out by their shadowy reflections in the utopian, mystical, 'modern', puritanical Nazi party and ended up creating gigantic monuments to corporate capitalism in Chicago. The cleaners seem to represent the intersection of these ideas, rounding up the "human garbage", the unwanted elements, the uncontrolled human detritus that ruins the idealistic/totalitarian perfection embodied in the architecture.

I don't like the ending, with all the antagonistic social groups suddenly realising they don't hate each other after all and making friends.  Even the Daily Maily Rezzies turn out to be mostly nice, with only two of them being murdering cannibals.


Delta and the Bannermen

Dispiriting. So ill judged, so clashing that you can't even laugh at it.

Loud, multi-coloured, sequin-covered, self-consciously zany, folksy and naff... yet there is something melancholic, even quietly apocalyptic about watching this.

You are watching Doctor Who die. The show that gave us 'Genesis of the Daleks' is dying. In a puddle of Diet Coke. It's like watching George Orwell being kicked to death by Mr Blobby and the Krankies.

This taste malfunction carries over into the heart of the story itself. It's a story about genocidal racism... set in a holiday camp and starring light entertainers. It's like the Eichmann trial being held in Toys R Us. It's like a bright green water pistol filled with orphans' tears. It's like being murdered by being force-fed party balloons.

My god, it hurts.


The Happiness Patrol

I just love this story. Last time I put it on, I spent the whole 75 minutes giggling, grinning, cheering and clapping like a loon.

This is a liberal attack on Thatcherism as a psycho-cultural style... but it also notices that Thatcherism's rhetoric about personal liberty was pure hypocrisy.

The economics are absent, as they usually are in Who. Terra Alpha is a Stalinist 'paradise', i.e. everyone pretending to be deliriously happy... or pretending that they're pretending... and pretending that everyone else is pretending... while surrounded by corruption, decay and authoritarian brutality. But it's also a capitalist world, with an evil version of Bertie Basset (himself a PR image, an advert, an avatar of a company, a promotor of consumption, the friendly face of capitalism who cheerily encourages your kids to shovel sugary shite into their mouths so his puppetmasters can make a profit) at its core.

The Kandyman is the state torturer of a dictator... but he's also a killer brand, a manifestation of the confected malnutritious psuedo-delights of consumer capitalism reconfigured as a psychopathic sadist... and a tool... and alienated labour (he is the product of the labour of Gilbert M) that confronts his creator as hostile and alien power... and bureaucrat (picks up phone - "Kandyman?")... and parent ("what time do you call this?")... etc.

Like 'The Sun Makers', 'Happiness Patrol' notices the fundamental synergy and compatibility and similarity of Stalinism with 'market Stalinism', of authoritarianism with psuedo-libertarian neoliberalism. Helen A likes Silas P's "enterprise and initiative" as a murderer of dissidents. Thatcher admires the 'law and order' inherent in the criminal attacks (by government or police) upon miners, while always speciously excoriating the "moaning minnies" and preaching personal freedom, i.e. the personal freedom to stamp on the poor and powerless as long as you own the bought virtue that comes with wealth.

And it's a union of displaced/oppressed natives, dissidents, foreigners and striking/demonstrating workers that brings down the government.  Helen loses control of the state, factory by factory.  It ain't quite Leninism for kids... but it's getting there.


The Greatest Show in the Galaxy

As long as you remember to watch it as children's television, 'Greatest Show' is superlative on many levels. Just this simple decision helps you get past the rapping ringmaster without eating your own tongue.

Viewed this way, the clearly non-realist portrayals of Whizzkid, Nord and Cook etc. seem like what they are: deliberate and witty riffs on established stock characters. Cook's gradual self-revelation (from windy, pompous bore to ruthless self-preserving bastard) looks, from this angle, like a swipe at Thatcherism (with colonialism also implicated, via Cook's pith helmet).

Whizzkid is, of course, the archetypal (or should I say stereotypical) dweeby geeko nerdmeister sci-fan fan. But he's also far too kind a picture of fans. He's enthusiastic, optimistic, idealistic, etc. He reflects the awareness of past glories and limited appeal. He's a queasy little joke by the show at its own expense. He's the forerunner of LI'n'DA... though less human and more of a cypher.

The story has cheeky things to say about television itself, and the failure of idealism... "You were a geat clown once... funny, inventive..."... or the failure of the 60s counter-culture, or even the failure of culture itself.

The Circus could be a metaphor for all human cultural endeavours in a world run by people like Cook and presided over by unforgiving, demanding, self-involved, ossified power.  Begun in idealism, hijacked by cynicism, ending in disrepute and cruelty, ravaging the lush world around it. Astonishingly thoughtful and bleak, for a kids's show. And remember that bread and circuses (by which they actually meant things more like races) were what the Roman elitists said were the prime concern of the Roman plebs.

Beautifully directed, especially in Episode 1 during the chase across the sand dunes. Bellboy and Flowerchild, pursued by the white-faced clown in the gliding hearse, with music that's eerily good... at times, reminiscent of Peter Gabriel round about that time.

The junk mail bot is oddly prescient of spam email.

Great cast. Peggy Mount and T. P. McKenna. Ian Reddington and Chris Jury.

Great production design. The Gods of Ragnarok are an unforgettable image. Stone idols, sitting and sitting (as gods tend to do in Doctor Who), reminiscent of the heads on Easter Island.

The gods are clearly the audience, which reveals the inherent theology of all TV shows. Who seems more aware of this than most shows, with almost all its gods being seated voyeurs.

The decision to suddenly make the Doctor one jump ahead in the last episode is misguided. I've no fundamental objection to the cunning, scheming Doctor that sometimes surfaced during this era, but its unecessary in 'Greatest Show' and even disrupts the plot (not that they're paying much attention to making it make any kind of logical sense by that point anyway).

But, when he says he's been fighting the Gods of Ragnarok for millenia, he means it generally. He's always been against immovable, unaccountable, abusive, self-gratifying 'gods'. Against idols. Against the kings and rulers that sit and watch and judge and consume.

All in all, very good indeed - a refeshing leap back into creepiness, surrealism and semiotics for Doctor Who.

One great regret however... imagine this as a TARDIS team: the Doctor, Ace, Mags and Deadbeat. I'm not a crowded-TARDIS advocate, but that's a team I'd have killed for.


Battlefield

Ben A clearly had John Boorman's Excalibur in his head. Shot, acted and scored like that, 'Battlefield' could've gotten away with it and seemed pretty darn good. Sadly, it got shot, acted and scored like a corporate training video. I'm not a Keff-basher particularly, but Wagner he ain't.

Even so, there are some magical moments here and there. Ace being mistaken for the Lady of the Lake, for example. And, as so often in this era, there are superb ideas under a surface mess. The Merlin thing is a wonderful conceit.

Sadly, confusing as it is, this story undermines itself by trying to be too literal and too self-explanatory. It loses any air of mystery and ambiguity.

The worst thing, however, is the painful, self-conscious, overcooked, hectoring right-on-ness of it all. We get an anti-nuke sermon delivered in the crassest, most patronising terms imaginable... with Sylv's purple-faced scenery-chewing at the end being particularly painful... and the worst crime imaginable to Ace is to utter a (clunky and naff) racial slur to her new mate.

It's all very banal and hypocritical (as is the Doctor's queasy pacifism) - especially since two of Our Heroes in this story are military people, and the cutesy happy ending depends upon people (other than the morally-superior, disapproving Doc, natch) fighting and killing and dying.


Survival

It's really quite astonishing how 'Survival' feels like the last part of a trilogy dealing with 'social Darwinism' but also with free market values and female experience in a male dominated world (which are related issues). And I think the much-maligned "if we fight like animals!" scene is much better than the anti-nuke foaming in 'Battlefield' precisely because it has an awareness of its own potential for ridiculousness. It even switches to a comic mode the second time McCoy shouts his credo. The vertiginousness of this is quite dizzying.

This is one of the few stories to dwell on the feminine principle, exploring female solidarity, female vs male forms of agression, etc. (People always forget about 'Brain of Morbius' in this context.) Moreover, it has a female 'companion' who is as far as female companions ever get from being there for males to gaze at (pardon my half-remembered feminist film criticism) because her own gaze comes under her control and becomes a weapon. The fierce, amoral, female monster character Kara is skewered by the Master (who's even dressed like some patrician Victorian dandy/Dracula) and, instead of this being a restoration of male order, it is an obscene tragedy. We're a long way even from seeing 'femininity' restored in Helen A by the death of her pet.

It's notable how deliberately jumbled the masculine and feminine becomes. You have Ace at the end, almost surrounded by young males, obviously about to be attacked by representatives of the Master/Midge's new order - which strongly suggests a ruthlessly literal version of the kill-or-be-killed 80s political/economic ideology - and yet the power that has infused them comes from a world that embodies aggression in a natural form via intensely female symbols.

The Master has never been more hateful than he is here, where he starts embodying patriarchy and ideological Thatcherism.

They do overegg the spelling out of the theme a bit. I snark at 'The Daemons' for doing that, and even tick at Bidmead for it, so if I don't acknowledge the same problem in 'Survival' then I'm a rotten old hypocrite.

Getting into a Lava

Posting this for something to do.  It's a tweaked version of something I originally wrote for Shockeye's Kitchen.  It's been rewritten to be more politically correct.


Several of the characters in 'Planet of Fire' are orphans (either literally or figuratively). Turlough and Malkon are literal orphans. You can look at the Sarns as the orphans of the vanished Trion colony. Peri also seems like an orphan in some ways. Her father is absent (dead?). She tells her stepfather Howard of her plan to travel to Morocco but doesn’t appear to have any plans to tell her mother about it. She goes to Howard for support and money, not to her mother. But Howard is too close to Peri’s age to properly serve as a father figure. Moreover, Peri seems attracted to him; she flirts with him by talking about "the God of love and fertility" and obliquely refers to the fact that he goes around displaying his washboard. Her decision to bunk off to North Africa with a couple of guys she’s just met is obviously a bid for Howard’s attention. Feverish after her brush with death, Peri has an intense dream about Howard abandoning her – a dream so powerful that it causes Kamelion to adopt Howard’s form.

(BTW, I dunno where this thing about Howard abusing her came from but there's precisely zilch in the televised story that either suggests or supports that reading.)

Talking of Kamelion, he’s actually a kind of nexus where the story’s themes meet.

He’s another orphan. Like the ancient artefacts that Howard and Curt dredge up from the sea, like the crumbling buildings and technology of the Trion colony on Sarn, Kamelion is an artefact left behind by a decaying civilisation riven with internal conflict. Kamelion is being torn apart from within by conflicting influences and allegiances… just like Turlough and Malkon. Just as Turlough fights his inner tendencies towards cowardice and selfishness, just as Malkon fights the orthodox conditioning of Timanov, so Kamelion fights his connection to the Master. Kamelion’s inner struggle takes the outer form of a literal struggle for identity, for form.

The fractured families depicted in the story mirror the fractured social connections. Sarn is a decayed Trion colony. The planet’s society and geology are both running amok because the Trions are no longer there to control either. The Trions used technology to control the volcano and siphon off the power of the numismaton gas (just like all colonial masters, their primary interest was in the theft of natural resources). Without this control the volcano becomes periodically unstable and the Sarns use myth to explain it. Sarn was a convenient place for the Trions to dump their unwanted elements (like Australia for the British Empire). Religion was probably used by the Trions from the outset. The tales of Logar took on their own life in the ruins left by the Trion withdrawal, much as Roman religious practices degenerated into new cults once the legions departed Britain. The Sarn legends of Logar, the Chosen Ones and the Outsiders are corrupted memories of Trion activity – vulcanology, arriving spaceships, etc. 'Planet of Fire' depicts religion as a degeneration of rational understanding, a sign of cultural decline and a force for social control.

"Since my father’s time," Timanov tells Malkon, "unbelievers have been put to the flames." So human sacrifice is a relatively recent development, a response to the increasing instability of the planet. Timanov doesn’t just burn unbelievers because he’s a mean old religious zealot; he does it because he believes that Logar must be appeased. Timanov explicitly blames the unbelievers for the degradation of their society into "a primitive settlement on the verge of extinction." This is a convenient diagnosis for an embattled leader: every oligarchy (or, in this case, theocracy) likes to use dissenting groups as scapegoats. Social order is maintained by saying that heresy is the cause of strife. The social crisis caused by the fall of the Trion colonial civilisation is blamed on the whims of a supernatural being, as are the caprices of the volcano. As Howard pointed out (though he was talking about Eros not Logar): "the personification of natural forces in an anthropomorphic deity." Social forces too.

'Planet of Fire' is bursting with references to religion. Sorasta seems to be named after Zoroasta, the founder of Zoroastrianism. The Doctor makes a crack about the Master wanting "to be born again". The flame that purifies, the flame that does not burn… both refer back to the Old Testament. In one of his few impressive moments, Anthony Ainley seems to be taking the piss out of American televangelists – note the wonderful body language accompanying the "Wretched citizens of Sarn!" speech. For the most part, however, the references centre on Judaism. The mountain upon which the Sarns live is reminiscent of Mount Zion, especially when you consider the resemblance of ‘Zion’ to ‘Trion’. The Doctor, when planning the evacuation of the Sarns, says "we’ve a full scale exodus to arrange".

And then you have the Misos Triangle, a symbol made up of two overlapping equilateral triangles. Rearrange it slightly (and hollow out one of the triangles) and you’ve got a star of David.

Who exactly are these "very special people" who were persecuted by the Trions? Were they criminals, dissidents or a religious/ethnic minority?  Perhaps the Misos Triangle can be seen as an echo of the Nazis forcing the Jews to wear yellow stars. If so, the transportation of the Trion "undesirables" recalls the lunatic scheme (briefly considered by the Nazis) to deport Jews to Madagascar. At the end of the story, the Sarns are a colonised people without a homeland, a race of refugees. If the Trion exiles were the Jews, the Sarns seem to have become the Palestinians... except that the Sarns don't seem interested in continuing to crush, exploit and humiliate them.

 

Peter Wyngarde portrays Timanov with dignity and sincerity which emphasises his contradictory qualities. His desire to kill the heretics seems at once a matter of convenience and conviction. Timanov’s belief is sincere but his motives are often far from pure. Timanov uses his ability to improvise with religious explanations for his own political advantage. He is not above bullying Malkon to retain his influence, even though his affection for the boy is obviously genuine. He interprets Logar according to his own wishes. Interestingly, Malkon learns this trick and turns it back on his teacher, aborting a burning because he claims that "by sending us the Outsider, Logar has shown his favour".

In the end, Timanov chooses to die rather than accept the new reality that dawns for his people. ‘Logar’ removes his helmet to reveal a heretic underneath. The irony is bitter and Amyand’s compassion is moving. But Timanov cannot relinquish his delusions or his power. He prefers to die; a gesture that mixes the noble with the cowardly.

I also really like Turlough’s leaving scene. Turlough is visibly shamefaced, stricken by the Doctor’s coolness. The Doctor is sceptical about Turlough’s motives. "Better to go back while you’re a bit of a hero, eh?" he suggests.

This is exactly the kind of homecoming that the Doctor refused in 'The Five Doctors'.

For all that, 'Planet of Fire' is undeniably marred by moments of inexcusable gormlessness. For example: if Kamelion/Master isn’t hurt by a kick in the shins, how can it/he be knocked out by a bit of falling masonry? The clanging sound you hear isn’t just the brick hitting Kamelion’s bonce, it’s also the sound of some very basic plot logic being carelessly flung by the wayside.

The wonderful Barbara Shelley is wasted - they really should have scrubbed Amyand and given all his lines to Sorasta. Having a prominent older female character might also have made the whole thing slightly less intensely gay (though that isn't a problem in itself).

And I’m still puzzled as to why the Trions took it into their heads to imprison Turlough in a public school. That is real judicial sadism if you ask me.

The element that fails most completely is the Master. The necessity of including him hamstrings Grimwade’s script. Grimwade does his best… the idea of an incapacitated Master using Kamelion as an avatar is a fundamentally good one, but it should have been because the Master was once again in a regeneration crisis, withered and decaying. The Doctor’s glib remark about the Master wanting to be "born again" would take on new pertinence. But, as it is, we get Mini Master. To put it bluntly, the whole thing sucks. For a start, why didn’t the Tissue Compression Eliminator turn him into a dead Action Man like everybody else?

The reduced Master’s threats to Peri, as she glares down at him from on high, are absurd. Is even the Master mad enough to threaten somebody 15 times taller than him? Luckily for him, Peri succumbs to a fit of sneezing and is unable to splat him with her shoe, which is clearly her intention.

(It is, of course, a well known fact that women are always seized by sneezing fits whenever they encounter small, scampering mammals… I’m surprised Peri didn’t leap onto a stool, scream "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeek!" and try to swat the Master with a broom.)

The image of a young woman, chasing a 4 inch high man, declaring "There you are!" in a dominatrix voice and trying to squash him with her shoe is a sad commentary on the vagaries of 80s Doctor Who and the dubious subconscious desires of Peter Grimwade.

"There you are!"

Freud would’ve had a field day. "So," I imagine Freud saying as he gazes across at Grimwade, lying on the couch, "you fantasize about being chased and tvatted with shoes by gigantic vimmen, jah? Hmmm, interesting… vell, you know, many men who call zemselves ‘Master’ turn out to be neurotic about being too small…"

Oh well, sometimes a Tissue Compression Eliminator is just a Tissue Compression Eliminator.

One problem for this story (as it has been for several good stories) is that there are no monsters. There’s no indelible image of evil; no Emperor Dalek, no half-mutated Keeler, no bitchy trampoline. This is because 'Planet of Fire' isn’t about evil or monstrousness. It’s about abandonment, delusion, disillusion, social strife, cultural degeneration and scepticism versus faith. At it’s heart, it’s a serious, earnest and thoughtful story. Which is why the Master, parachuted into it, sticks out like a (very small) spare prick at an orgy.

Oh. Yes. One more thing.  I'm a socialist, which - as far as I'm concerned - entails feminism as a baseline requirement.  I try to be as much of a feminist as a man can be.  But there are limits to how much control the intellect (still less the political conscience) can exercise over the inner beast. Nicola Bryant in a bikini? Well, it's needless, exploitative, gratuitous, a perfect example of the 'male gaze' in the framing of a shot (despite being directed by a woman)... but all that being granted, I don't exactly dread the scenes in question and avert my pious eyes.

No.  No picture.

Three Act Tragedy

And so it came to pass that Series 3 ended with a trilogy.  And Jack looked upon the trilogy.  And Jack saw that it was... umm... er...


'Utopia'

Good stuff; the Master's return at the end is the least of it.  We have to put up with some of the obligatory "gee, aren't humans just neat?!" stuff from the Doctor, but it passes soon enough. Yana is a touching, melancholic figure. Chantho is one of my favourite characters in all Who. The scene where the Doctor and Jack finally discuss Jack's immortality is beautifully scripted and acted. The desolated conglomeration is beautiful.

The whole set up is pregnant with intricate, sombre, uncomfortable implications. At the end of everything, with even the galaxies disappearing... amidst a wasteland, haunted by a dead city and one lone survivor (who still clings to her obsolete cultural norms)... amidst all these things, there are two groups of humans... the unreasoningly fierce and cruel "futurekind", with their gnashing sharp teeth, their flaming torches and their mindless desire to destroy... and the refugees who huddle together for warmth; who value family and friendship; who have created structure and purpose out of bits of scrap, food and dreams of impossible deliverance... and the Futurekind want to smash these aspirations for no real reason, while the refugees keep building even as they near the point of maximum entropy.

This is 'Gridlock' part II... but it's less comfortable than 'Gridlock'.  More bleak.  More gloomy.  More fully liberal.  Hence, more reactionary.

The faith of the refugees is in a better world, like the faith of the gridlockers... but they refugees have given it a name that has political rather than religious associations. 'Utopia' is usually thought of now as representing some age-old impossible dream of social perfection and total human equality.  In the mainstream discourse, to be Utopian is to share the putative mistakes and delusions of the founders of the 20th century totalitarians. Lenin wanted to make a paradise; that's why he ended up making Hell on Earth. (This isn't my view, by the way. It is as simplistic and ahistorical as it is popular.)

'Utopia' is one of those stories that I love despite the fact that it's highly open to a reactionary reading (like 'Frontios' for example, with which it shares some ideas).

In 'Utopia', the supposed dual nature of humanity is externalised in the form of two seperate tribes (who fight for no reason, as tribes always do in this view of the world), one of which is 'civilised' and one of which is 'barbarous' for no real reason. There is no reconciling this 'clash of civilisations'. The nice people, who are associated in the text with science, technology, modernity, family life, democracy (via the concept of Utopia itself), must fight and/or escape the barbarians (with their medieval ways)... or be destroyed.

In the end, they simply have to leave the Futurekind behind (to die) as they blast off in search of Utopia. At least this story holds out some hope that Utopia (i.e. some form of social/political optimum) might be reachable... an avenue of hope that 'The Last of the Time Lords' closes decisively and brutally.

It isn't hard to see what all this points to. RTD is far too influenced by the Dawkins/Hitchens/Hari axis-of-liberal-culturalism for my liking.

But ambiguity isn't a bad thing per se. This story is very interesting and rich, so (as with 'Midnight' next season) the fact that it carries connotations that I find open to a reactionary political interpretation doesn't spoil my enjoyment.

In the end, the greatness of the story lies in the perfection of its construction. Every time I watch it I find myself wondering how it's possible to create a script that functions with such clockwork perfection without also creating something that ever feels mechanical. It has a organic feel to it. Every event grows from the events before. Every character moment similarly. Casual lines of dialogue kickstart psychological chain reactions that result in major plot eruptions.

It's a thing of beauty. It's very apt (on several levels) that the major emblem of the story should be a watch. A watch symbolises time. And structure. And technology. And the human desire to control the universe into which we're born. And it also stands as a pretty good metaphor (precise yet graceful) for the workings of the plot itself.


'The Sound of Drums' / 'Last of the Time Lords'

I still feel very ambivalent about these episodes. I've never really been able to resolve my feelings about them. This is a deeply mythological story which also expresses a great many political ideas. The Master in ‘Sound of Drums’ / ‘Last of the Time Lords’ is not just the Anti-Christ, bringing the tribulation and controlling mankind through their own follies, he is also a Blairesque opportunist who flashes his fake smile at the TV while using the state apparatus to arrest innocent people and scheme for war.

Trouble is, it's also highly steeped in both genre/cult mediocrity and self-referential/reverential Whoness. And the political notions are incoherent and self-contradictory.

The episodes hint at issues to do with propaganda, media manipulation etc. (even down to the Master commenting approvingly on the Teletubbies having TVs in their bellies). Are we to interpret the Archangel network as an expression of how modern technological media functions as a tool of power? How our media has now burrowed deep into us and become part of our being... this is psychologically true, and is on the brink of becoming physically/biologically true. A meshing of man and media/machine is a future dream/nightmare that many Who monsters express, not least the Toclafane.

Okay... but it essentially boils down to brainwashing, or rather hypnotism... which makes it hard to read the story as being an attack on the system itself, or even a reactionary whinge about stupid, ignorant voters giving their assent to dodgy characters (which would at least link up thematically with the Utopia thing).

But in this story, the system is usurped by a man who murders the real politicians... and he hasn't secured the consent of the electorate, just hypnotised them! Seems to me, everyone is let off the hook... despite some potential which we glimpse in the Cabinet session scene (a scene that seems all the more pointed in these days of the ConDem Coalition). It's all very well for Martha's dad to shout accusations at people on the streets... but even this scene, which potentially could've been extremely powerful and edgey, is rendered essentially meaningless. People voted for the bad guys that take away innocent people in unmarked vans... because they were brainwashed. So... what? This story seems to determined to assert that we're all guilty while also absolving us.

There is a determination in this story to acknowledge that people get deeply hurt by violence, tyranny, etc... there is an attempt at showing emotional trauma... there is an attempt to show people profoundly changed by long, hard struggles... there is a depiction of emotional/physical domination (especially with Lucy)... and an attempt to depict such emotional/physical cruelty as having sources beyond pure evil. However, people also behave in ways that are as convenient in plot terms as they are inexplicable and unbelievable. And there is a great big cheaty Reset button which sets everything right... except that it doesn't because, for some reason, some people don't get time reversed and have to live with their pain. Which seems a bit confused.

The Master is shown as a sort of wounded, vicious, sniggering, narcissistic baby... his triumph is the triumph of madness and delusion superimposed on reality by power. Yet John Simm plays him, at least for large sections of the time, as just an irritating pratt. And much of his immaturity is expressed in pointless villain posturing and/or equally pointless continuity references.

The cliffhanger to 'Sound of Drums' is a summation of the Master's malicious madness, a vision of the apocalypse reiterated in terms of technological alienation, a savage swipe at the dark inner sociopathy of necon messianism, etc... but its also a tired, wheezing genre cliche... not to mention the exact same mechanical-monsters-swoop-down-from-the-skies-and-kill-people-for-no-apparent-reason scenario as we got at the same point in Season 2 (still, at least this is only the second time we get it... I'm looking at you, 'The Stolen Earth').

And the dark heart of the story is the business of the Toclafane being the humans of the future. This continues the pessimistic, arguably reactionary message of 'Utopia'. Attempt to reach Utopia (the word carries unavoidable political connotations, even without the concentration of the rest of the story on politics) and you end up with tyranny, totalitarianism and mass murder under the auspices of a mad, opportunistic demagogue. Humans, in this view, are inherently savage creatures that will become sadistic monsters if just given the right push by the right kind of lunatic... and don't such ruthless loonies always tempt "us" with the promise of Utopia? This is political philosophy as practiced by Andrew Marr or Jeremy Vine. It's a perfect expression of 'original sin' as a political concept, of the idea that "we" are in some way collectively responsible as a species for tyranny and destructiveness.  It's as mainstream as it is cretinous.  As orthodox as it is ahistorical.  As thoroughly a foundation of liberalism as it is of elitism, authoritarianism, neoconism and even fascism.

This is why the sniping at the politicians and the Americans is so unsatisfying... because it's hypocritical.  We're obviously supposed to despise the sharp-suited politicos and the hubristic US Prez for their arrogance and untrustworthiness... and yet the story that lampoons and slaughters them backs a view of people and society (the classical liberal view of individualism = freedom / collectivism = destined to end in tears) that has just as much contempt for ordinary people.  Beneath all the superficial rhapsodising of humanity, the best they can do it find a saviour to pray for. 

Yes, the people of Earth find their 'better' side and express it... through the very technology that enslaved them and turned the future humans into the Toclafane. So, is technology our salvation or our damnation? I suppose it depends what we do with it. But we can't choose what to do with it if we're brainwashed, can we? Is this story about political opportunism and public gullibility (hence Utopia leading to Toclafane evil and the Master's dictatorship)? Then why is the brainwashing needed in the first place? The Archangel network business really does balls things up.  It even ballses up the reactionary interpretation!

Also, the Christianity of the thing becomes smothering. The Master must be defeated, and we get there via prayer, resurrection and forgiveness. It's recast in technobabble... but it's still evidently prayer, resurrection and forgiveness. The Doctor's hubristic and morally meaningless decision to forgive on behalf of others is exactly the same as Christ's. So, pray to the saviour and he will rise to save you from your misery, misery that stems from your own sheeplike haplessness in the face of power... and/or your guilt in bringing that misery upon yourself (we haven't quite worked out if you're guilty or innocent yet - see above)... and he will then make everything better and forgive your oppressor on your behalf, despite himself being deeply culpable in your suffering.

So, we're all guilty... and we're all innocent... collectivism (i.e. Utopia) leads to Hell... but collectivism (i.e. prayer) also leads to salvation... and we're all forgiven, whoever we are and whatever we did...

In the end, this trilogy is cast as a 'three act tragedy'.  The greatest tragedy, however, is that it could've been so good if the writer had only worked out what he was trying to say.