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| The Doctor and Salosian rebel Ky (Garrick Hagon) make a discovery in one of Solos's many disused mines. |
6 episodes. Running Time: Approx. 146 minutes. Written by: Bob Baker, Dave Martin. Directed by: Christopher Barry. Produced by: Barry Letts.
THE PLOT:
In the distant future, the world of Solos is under the control of the Earth Empire. Though a barren and primitive planet with an atmosphere poisonous to humans, Solos is also rich in the fuel source thaesium. Based at the orbital Skybase One, the Marshal (Paul Whitsun-Jones) has made it his life's work to change the atmosphere so that it is breathable, but the experiments he has authorized with Professor Jaeger (George Pravda) have given rise to strange mutations among the natives.
The Doctor and Jo arrive with a box from the Time Lords. But they've come at a particularly chaotic moment. An Earth Administrator (Geoffrey Palmer) intends to grant Solos its independence, destroying the Marshal's career in the process. But when he begins to make his official announcement, the Marshal takes advantage of the chaos created by Solosian rebel Ky (Garrick Hagon) to assassinate the man, blaming it on the Solosians.
Soon the Doctor and Jo find themselves on the run from the Marshal's men. But in the heart of the disused mines infested by the transformed mutants, the Doctor makes a startling discovery...
CHARACTERS:
The Doctor: Pertwee finds a few good moments, such as his indignation at Professor Jaeger's experiments resulting in "genocide as a side effect." For the most part, however, he's just going through the motions. His first scene features what I believe is his first botched delivery, as he repeats a line twice in order to get on script. Given that another actor does the same a few episodes later, I'm inclined to lay blame at director Christopher Barry rather than at the actors themselves.
Jo Grant: As I've noted in the last two reviews, Season 9 has been very good to the character of Jo Grant, who has been compassionate, resourceful, and quick-thinking. Until The Mutants, that is. This story reduces her to "generic companion" status. She exists for two reasons: to receive exposition from either the Doctor or Ky, and to be put in jeopardy so that the Doctor or Ky can rescue her. Even Katy Manning's chemistry with Pertwee doesn't provide the same lift as the season's previous stories, as the script unwisely separates them for most of the running time.
The Marshal: Paul Whitsun-Jones's Marshal initially seems to just be a "Pompous Bureaucrat," motivated by worries about his career and his future back on Earth should his mission to Solos end in failure. On first viewing, I remember spending the first few episodes wondering when the real villain would show up. Nope, the Marshal is it... which honestly might have worked, had the script played up how his position made him a serious threat despite him being just a dull little man at heart. But the story plays out as if the Marshal is inherently intimidating, which just isn't the case. Credit to Paul Whitsun-Jones, though, who gives his all to make this weakly written character register.
THOUGHTS:
The Mutants is the first Pertwee story that I'd actually describe as "bad." The script is both clichéd and very silly - which wouldn't be a problem, if it didn't take itself so extraordinarily seriously. It's also heavily padded, stretched like taffy to fill six episodes with a tale that would have felt minor and unexciting at four.
Pertwee and Manning find a few moments, particularly when they're on screen together - but they're separated early on and spend most of the rest of the serial in separate strands, with neither performer finding much chemistry with the guest stars they're paired with. This contributes to them giving their weakest performances of the season, and I'd wager also their weakest of their series tenure.
Guest characters are poorly written and thinly motivated. Guards Stubbs and Cotton help the Doctor escape in Episode Two, but I'm honestly not sure why. Native leader Varan (James Mellor) is introduced as the Marshal's ally and Ky as his enemy. But by the middle of the story, Varan is enraged at the Marshal (which at least does make sense in context), while Ky has been defanged thanks to becoming Jo's protector... and, other than getting some extra padding in, I'm honestly not sure why these two couldn't have been combined into a single character, which might also have helped to give that character an actual arc.
There are some moments that are downright bizarre. In Episode Four, Ky leads Jo and the guards to the "safety" of Varan's camp. When it's pointed out that Varan would probably as soon kill them all, Ky insists that he can deal with the man. If he ever had a plan, we don't see it. Varan doesn't even let Ky get a word in before taking all of them prisoner, while the motivation for them separating from the Doctor appears to be to get into danger again to keep the story from ending early.
The unfortunate part is that there are good ideas in the script. The early episodes, in particular, draw parallels between Earth's occupation of Solos and British colonialism. The administrator makes a pompous speech about how the Solosians are "partners" with Earth, but everyone knows who "the overlords" are. Jaeger smirks to the Doctor that the planet no longer belongs to the Salosians, but is now the property of the humans. In case anyone missed the parallels, the Administrator's phrasing of Earth's decision to grant independence to Solos is pretty blunt: "We can no longer afford an empire." This at a time when the existence of the British Empire was still very much in living memory. This in a story from 1972, when the British Empire was still very much in living memory.
I will give the visual effects credit for ambition. There's a scene featuring a hull breach on the space station, with objects and even one character sucked out into space. Several scenes occur in a cave suffused with radiation, with the actors overplaying their way through various greenscreen effects. The effects aren't remotely convincing; coupled with overlighting and plastic-looking monster suits, it adds to the story being one that looks genuinely cheap. But the attempt itself is worth noting.
OVERALL:
The Mutants is a bad story, but there is something vaguely charming about it. It's mostly pretty boring - but when it's not boring, it's unintentionally quite funny.
It's as if someone threw into a pot all the silliest recurring elements of "Classic Who," and this was the stew that resulted: The caves with the obvious CSO effects, complete with border lines surrounding Pertwee and his co-star... The over-dramatic deliveries of the supporting actors... The space station with the big airport-like directional signs that has less security than a neighborhood convenience store... Pertwee and Manning, both seeming mostly bored... and the overly grave dialogue, most of it delivered with utmost seriousness. If you were to throw together a Bingo card for bad Doctor Who tropes, this story would just about fill every box.
Bizarrely, it's that very quality that makes it watchable in spite of itself. I won't defend The Mutants, but I don't hate it, either. It may be bad - but it's a comfortable sort of bad.
Overall Rating: 3/10.
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