Golden Sunsets Redux - 60 Years of Memories - Part 4 - 1970

This time I'm focusing on a movie that was musical, educational, entertaining, odd and just a little bit scary...

1970:

The trivia:

• Author Joe Klaas alleged that aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart had actually survived her attempted flight round the world in 1937. Apparently she was captured by the Japanese, rescued and then secretly moved to New Jersey where she married and changed her identity to Irene Craigmile Bolam, a New York banker. Despite no concrete evidence to support his wild claims, the book was only pulled when Bolam sued both Klaas and his publisher.

• When a 45 foot, 8 ton sperm whale washed up on the shores of Florence, Oregon,  the authorities were concerned about the safety of curious onlookers so decided to…blow it up. Oregon Highway Division packed it full of half a ton of dynamite, stood back and…the resulting explosion threw huge chunks of whale carcass over 800 feet away. Thankfully no one was injured but at least one car was crushed as blubber rained from the sky.

• The serving of a daily “tot” of rum was a long standing Royal Navy tradition dating back over 300 years. Originally introduced to help combat scurvy, it soon became a part of naval culture. However concerns about operators of machinery being possibly intoxicated finally led to it being stopped on 31st July 1970. The last day was called "Black Tot Day" and was marked by mock funerals and sailors wearing black armbands. This day is still commemorated by…the consumption of rum.

The memory:

The Phantom Tollbooth

Billed as an "Alphabeautiful, Mathemagical Musical", this film is based on the 1961 children's book of the same name by Norton Juster (which is apparently a modern American classic, although somehow I have never read it). It's predominately famous because it was co-written, produced and directed by animation legend Chuck Jones - the man who was responsible for some of the all-time great Warner Brother "Looney Tunes" featuring Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote. It also featured the absolute cream of animations voice talent. Famous names such as "Man of a Thousand Voices" Mel Blanc (Bugs, Daffy, Sylvester the Cat, Barney Rubble), Daws Butler (Yogi Bear, Fred Flintstone, Huckleberry Hound) Hans Conried (Captain Hook) and June Foray (Rocky the Flying Squirrel and Tweety Pie's owner, Granny). It's also notable as the last animated film by MGM.

It's unlikely many people will have seen this film in recent years  - and even less probably remember it -  so I'm going to go through the story in some fine detail. It'll help when I get to the end, so please indulge me.

Milo (played by Butch Patrick from "The Munsters") lives and goes to school in San Francisco but just seems to dawdle through life not seeing what's around him. Everything is "a big waste of time". Spending another dull afternoon in his apartment on the phone to his friend Ralph, he suddenly notices a huge red and white striped parcel in his bedroom. The label reads "For Milo, who has plenty of time". Opening it up, the parcel transforms into a talking tollbooth and before he knows what is happening, Milo is seated inside a child-sized sports car and told to pick a destination from a map. Selecting "The Castle in the Air" at random, as he drives through the tollbooth Milo finds himself transformed into a cartoon and a swirling coloured vortex deposits him onto a twisting turning road.

He is immediately accosted by Officer Short Shrift, a tiny policeman riding about on one wheel . Shrift is a proto-Judge Dredd - possessing a huge chin with his upper face hidden by a helmet. He is cop, judge and jailer - believes everyone is guilty  until proven innocent - and hands out excessive sentences for minor misdemeanours. Just like Dredd then. 

Thankfully Milo gets away and drives into the town of Expectations, where he meets the unhelpful Whether Man, who never gives a straight answer and hates to make up his mind. Continuing on the same road for what seems like hours, Milo starts to drift asleep and doesn't pay attention as he takes the wrong turn into "The Doldrums". Inside the dank caves live the amoeba-like ghostly Lethargians who never think and are happy doing anything as long as it's...nothing. They convince Milo that he should stay with them and slowly his car sinks into the mass of creatures as their comical grins turn nasty - they want to stop the boy doing anything at all - eating, sleeping or even breathing...

Milo is only saved from this fate by the arrival of Tock the watchdog (who genuinely has a huge pocket watch in his stomach) and the pair are able to escape before a tidal wave of Lethargians engulfs them. Tock explains to Milo that he is in the Kingdom of Wisdom - a land ruled by two warring brothers - King Azaz the Unabridged of Dictionopolis whose believes that words are more important than numbers, and the Mathemagician of Digitopolis, who holds the opposite view. Their refusal to agree on anything has led the kingdom into confusion and there are demons gathering in the Mountains of Ignorance just waiting to pounce.

Driving towards Dictionopolis into the town of Expectations, Milo meets the Whether Man, who never gives a straight answer and hates to make up his mind. Apparently words have lost their meaning. He really gives no clear help before rising off into the sky attached to a number of balloons. They then almost immediately come across the mad Doctor Kakofonous, who loves loud objectionable sounds. While the doctor is distracted by the terrible noise he is making, they sneak out of his larger-on-the-inside caravan and Tock grabs a vial of Laughter tonic.

Finally arriving in the city, they enter the Marketplace of Words. Caught up in a duel between the insectoids The Spelling Bee and The Humbug, which wrecks the market, they end up sentenced to the dungeons for six million years. Inside they find the no-so-wicked Which, Faintly Macabre and she tells Milo the secret history of the kingdom and how the twin princesses Rhyme and Reason were banished to the Castle in the Air after causing the feud between King Azaz and the Mathemagician. 

Summoned to an audience with the monarch, Milo convinces him that Rhyme and Reason can be rescued - and Tock and The Humbug will accompany him. Before he leaves, Azaz gives Milo a huge bag of words which contains all the ideas anyone can think of.

Beginning their quest, the trio follow the road until it is blocked by a stone doorway leading into the Numbers Mine. Above the entrance they spot The Dodecahedron (who wears twelve different faces displaying twelve different emotions). He helps Milo break down the door and inside the mine they finally meet the Mathemagician. It's clear that he is the exact double of King Azaz, just with an opposing opinion. Leading the adventurers to his highly computerised workshop, he reveals that he blames Azaz for nothing making sense anymore but when Milo makes him realise that at least the pair agree to disagree, he sends them on with their journey - but not before giving Milo a magic pencil.

Heading towards the Mountains of Ignorance, Milo, Tock and Humbug come across Chroma, who conducts the sunrises and sunsets. When Humbug eggs Milo on to have a go at directing the sunrise, it ends in disaster and the sky becomes a constant battleground between the Sun and the Moon. Running from their mistake they are stopped in their tracks by the Senses Taker, an information obsessed paper pusher who wants to remove all their senses. Tock uses the vial he took from Doctor Dischord to engulf the weasely man in fits of giggles. After all, no one can take away your sense of humour...

Climbing the mountains, they have to face a number of even more bizarre obstacles. Firstly there is the Terrible Trivium - a faceless, bowler hatted man with detached body parts. Then what sounds like a terrible monstrous creature turns out to be just a pathetic ball of fur with a loud voice - the Demon of Insincerity. Finally there is the dim-witted Gelatinous Giant - who is defeated by that unusual bag of ideas and just melts away into sludge.

Almost at the doors of the Castle in the Air, they are blocked by the hordes of the Demons of Ignorance -  which include the Horrible Hopping Hindsight, the Gorgons of Hate, Malice, the Threadbare Excuse and worst of all the Overbearing Know-It-All. Using the magic pencil and the the bag of words together, Milo forces them back, drawing every weapon he needs and loading them with physical words. The demons merge to form a giant monster but the power of the word "Truth" disperses them into their component parts. Sadly Tock's pocket watch is damaged in the battle and Milo has to leave him and Humbug behind.

Ascending the invisible steps to the Castle, Milo finally meets the Princesses and learns they were the ones who sent for him because only a boy that was so bored he would do anything would be able to rescue them. Unable to get down, Milo spies the Whether Man and uses his balloons to get back to his friends, while Rhyme and Reason transform the kingdom back to the beautiful place it once was. Tock is repaired, Officer Shrift now thinks everyone is innocent and the Doctor is  a student of harmony not discord. Even the sky is fixed.

Having saved the day, Milo gets to go home back through the tollbooth, which folds itself up and flies out of the window. With a newfound enjoyment of life and all its little pleasures, Milo discovers that only five minutes has past and Ralph is still on the phone, although... what's  that strange red and white striped box that has just turned up in *his* bedroom?...

As you can tell from the synopsis above, the story is full of irony, double entendre, puns and wordplay. It might be billed as an animated action adventure but it has a hugely educational and moral message. Not only does Milo gain a new love of learning and practically apply the things from school that he previously thought were dull, he also rediscovers a love of life. It's also a commentary on the need for common sense and for rules (without Rhyme or Reason, the Kingdom of Wisdom descends into anarchy) and about learning from ones own mistakes. But it never descends into heavy-handed preaching.

Of course the film can be compared to "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" since both feature a child thrust into a world of absurd logic. The Whether Man's ramblings could be the Cheshire Cat and Officer Short Shrift's extreme justice is similar to that of the Queen of Hearts (although with more jail-time and less head chopping). The film has elements of "The Wizard of Oz", but parts (especially Chroma, the conductor of sunsets) also reminded me of the "Sorcerer's Apprentice" segment. from Disney's "Fantasia".

The animation is a curious mish-mash of styles. There are some classic wonderful Chuck Jones creations with the lead characters and Milo himself has those big eyes from Pepe Le Pew, Elsewhere some of the monsters seem almost half finished - just outlines with no real definition as if  they are not really there. Maybe that was deliberate. The backgrounds are also a mix of detailed buildings, half rendered shapes and abstract squiggles, perhaps representing the fluidity of the Kingdom as it flounders without any rules.

Now you might think that I've got amazing recall about a film I watched as a kid, but the truth is as part of writing this I watched it again for the first time in over thirty years - and I still found it as psychedelic and magical and entertaining as ever.  

The thing is though , I principally remember this film because as much as I enjoyed the inventive animation and the sheer artistry on display, it actually scared me enough to cause a few nights of lost sleep. The Lethargians in the green slime of the region of "The Doldrums"  - those fluid, amorphous shapes that split and reform as they ooze around their domain with a wet sucking sound? - as a child I found them terrifying. Even their song, "Don't Say There's Nothing To Do In the Doldrums" was spooky. Those evil denizens haunted my sleeping hours. I dreamt I was being sucked under the surface, their beady eyes and reedy voices laughing as they piled their sludge on top of me, trapping me forever. I remember waking up with a loud scream - convinced that I was lost in the Doldrums…

Even now all these decades later, if I have strange or unpleasant dreams, I wake myself up by shouting - much to the concern of my ever so patient wife. (oh and trust me, I do dream a *lot* - I should write a book about my weird nocturnal imaginings. The one about the roast chicken god hidden in the air ducts of a train for example…).

At the end of the day it may not be up there with the all time famous animated movies and some might find the moralising message laid on too thick, but you can't fault the imagination of the source material and the wonderful way that Chuck Jones adapted it to the big screen. It's a bit of a lost classic really. The book's author apparently hated it (especially when it was well reviewed) but for me the characters have always been part of a really strong vivid memory, and that's why it deserves a place on this list.

Honourable mentions:

• Sleeping Beauty  - Why is a Disney animated film released in 1959 mentioned in a list covering 1970 ? Well the classic fairy tale was re-released for the first time in this year - and more importantly it’s the first film I can recall going to the cinema to see. Even all these decades later, the memory is still really vivid - I can picture the location, almost recall the feel of the velour seats and the smell of the popcorn but most importantly I remember the fear I felt when faced with Maleficent in her dragon form. The purple and black scales, the glowing green eyes - it’s a beautiful yet menacing design. The rest of the film isn’t too shabby either. Sadly, like so many things from my youth, the cinema in question no longer exists - demolished to make way for flats.

• Barbapapa - Apparently inspired by candy floss ( known as “Barbe a papa” or “daddy’s beard” in France), the literary adventures of this pink blob-like character and his colourful, shape-changing family made regular appearances in my village library - and it’s one of the first series I can remember reading. The books were simple, colourful and slightly strange - perfect fodder for a young child. Four years later there was a TV series, racking up an astonishing 100 five-minute episodes across its two seasons - plus the inevitable BBC hardback annual (a perfect gift for Christmas!). Long after I can no longer remember the actual stories, the character designs have stayed with me. 

• Scrooge - There have been a million and one versions of Charles Dickens 1843 classic “A Christmas Carol” - and obviously a certain Muppet one is the best (and I’ll get to that in time) - but for me this is a close second, due to it being family favourite every year when it first started being shown on TV. Albert Finney is old Ebeneezer in an all-singing, all-dancing, all-star spectacular. Director Robert Neame gets the best out of his ensemble and the choreography is second to none - with the stand out being the Oscar-nominated “Thank You Very Much”. The musical has also had a long legacy with no less than five different stage shows starring the likes of Anthony Newley, Tommy Steele and Shane Ritchie. There’s even been a Netflix animated movie as recently as 2022, with the vocal talents of Luke Evans in the starring role. No matter the version, the songs are guaranteed to have me singing along.

• The Goodies - I adore the madcap adventures of Grahame Garden, Tim Brooke-Taylor and Bill Oddie - the trio that “do anything, anytime”. Although the programme debuted in 1970, for me the golden age is really 1972 through to 1975 with episodes such as "Kitten Kong", "The Goodies and the Beanstalk", "Kung-Fu Kapers", "The Movies", "Gunfight at the OK Tearooms" and of course "Puppet Government". It was a travesty that the BBC only ever repeated selected episodes - and then rarely - and only a handful were available to buy on DVD until 2019. Having now watched them all, it’s clear than a few are very much of their time, and occasionally a bit repetitive (how many times did we need Grahame as a mad scientist?).  But in the main they were surreal, topical, absurd and just damn funny. 

• The Adventures of Rupert Bear - Just Raggety. The stuff of nightmares. What were they thinking?...

We're All Stories In the End 11 - Casualties of War

No companions. No memory. No TARDIS. But still the Doctor....

Casualties of War by Steve Emmerson

Eighth Doctor Adventures number: 38

Originally published: September 2000

Companions: None

1918. The world is at war. A terrible raging conflict that has left no one untouched.

In the North Yorkshire village of Hawkswick, it seems that the dead won't stay down. There are reports of horrifically wounded soldiers on manoeuvres in the night. Pets have gone missing, and now livestock is found slaughtered in the fields.

Suspicion naturally falls on nearby Hawkswick Hall, a psychiatric hospital for shell-shocked soldiers, where Private Daniel Corey senses a gathering evil.

As events escalate, a stranger arrives on the scene. Can this Man from the Ministry solve the mystery of Hawkswick? And can Hawkswick solve the mystery that is this Man from the Ministry?.

Another month and another Eighth Doctor novel - and another new setup for our favourite Timelord.

This time he's somehow become an amnesiac with no access to the TARDIS - but you know that really doesn’t matter. Even without his memories, at the core he is still the same person with the same inquisitiveness and passion for the unusual. His personality breaks through and his determination is clear,

Okay so the plot could probably be summarised as "golem-like dead soldier's rising from the mud to attack an innocent village, all under the thrall of an unseen psychic intelligence". So far, so Doctor Who you might think. But the novel's greatest strength is the fact that the story is told in a way that’s just so damn creepy...

There really are some atmospheric and disturbing scenes -

• The Doctor sifting through chucks of dead bodies in the middle of a field.
• The poacher discovering a tree full of the severed heads of dead animals - and then putting a bullet through his own brain when he is surrounded by the walking dead.
• A mute soldier taking out his pain and rage on a humanoid clay figure during a bizarre therapy session.
• Farmer Cromby setting his own barn on fire and watching the blazing bodies of dead soldiers crumble to earth.
• And of course the scenes in the "clay room" where Mary finds a book with Latin text and woodcuts of horrific demons - only for the door to slam shut, trapping her in the darkness and absorbing her into the ooze. It may be a slight cliché, but it's still incredibly effective.

And although the Doctor is front and centre in the story it's actually the supporting characters that really shine here. The intelligent, caring Mary Minnett and the elderly, world weary Constable Briggs are essentially pseudo-companions for the  Doctor and the story is all the better for it.

Mary's playful relationship with the mysterious "Man from the Ministry" builds nicely over the course of the novel and you almost want them to get together - and at one point the Doctor even seems to consider it. Plus while Albert Briggs might be totally out of his comfort zone here, that doesn’t stop his dogged loyalty and the care he has for his little community

If I had criticisms  - well perhaps there were a few too many trips back and forth to Banham's hospital for angry confrontations before its revealed (quite obviously) that he was the villain of the piece.

I did like that Banham used pagan "Dark Forces" to release his patients’ psychic potential and manifest the madness of the Great War - and that it ultimately was too much for him to control. But I could have done without a trip to a metaphysical netherworld where the Doctor used his strength of will to turn said Dark Forces against themselves.

Maybe I'm quibbling. Overall it's a genuinely enjoyable novel that isn’t afraid to examine the horrors of war with some psychological depth, a few good scares and some excellent descriptive prose.

We may not be in the trenches, but you can feel the mud and the stench and the terror.

Sometimes the worst horrors are close to home...

Golden Sunsets Redux - 60 Years of Memories - Part 3 - 1969

 It's time for a visit to the most famous county in children's television...

1969:

The trivia:

• There was a genuine board game called "Chug A Lug" which involved smoking, drinking beer and taking soft drugs. Activities on the cards included composing a poem about birth control, discuss the use of jelly as a lubricant and guessing the bra size of all the girls. Penalties involved running to the off license to get more beer, removing clothing or not being allowed to go to the bathroom.

• Italian company Ledragomma created a toy to allow children to bounce around like kangaroos. With a few tweaks and a name change, when it was launched in Britain the “Space Hopper” became the most popular toy in the country - at its peak selling 200,000 a year. Activities with your Space Hopper included races at Butlins holiday camps, boys holding jousting tournaments (squirting water from washing-up bottles) and girls dressing them up like fat orange dolls. 

• After more than 17 years of investigations, by the time the US Air Force closed "Project Blue Book" it had collected more than 12,000 reports of Unidentified Flying Objects. Sadly the conclusion was that most sightings were due to misidentification of conventional phenomena or aircraft, mass hysteria, hoaxes or “mental illness” - and that there was no evidence to support the existence of UFO's. 

• Meanwhile there was some small event about man landing on the Moon. It didn't get much news coverage...

The memory:

Chigley

Yes it's the third of the "Trumptonshire" trilogy after "Camberwick Green" and "Trumpton". This is the one that people remember because of *that* train song...

God how I loved all three of these stop-motion series as a child. Apart from "Playschool", they are probably my earliest memory of children's television. There's just something so quintessentially British about the little lives of all those characters, each with their own song and their own idiosyncrasies. All three shows have their own singular joys. The Trumpton fire brigade - who never get to put out a real fire. The characters rising out of the music box at the start of "Camberwick Green". The soldiers at Pippin Fort. 

But it was the sight of Brackett (no first name sadly) plodding endlessly down the bizarre, modern art covered, corridors of Winkstead Hall in search of Lord Bellborough (who was usually to be found next to a telephone, the annoying old duffer !)  that was always my favourite.

It's difficult to accurately date when I first watched Gordon Murray's era defining programmes. They were all shown so often that the repeats blur into one.  What's odd though is that I don't have any memories of thinking "Oh I've seen this one before". There is just a haze of happy memories punctuated by Brian Cant's wonderful narration. I do know that when I first went to school I used to come home for lunch sometimes and more often than not there would be an episode to watch as I ate my cheese sandwiches or beans on toast. What also made "Chigley" rather unique was that it featured guest appearances of characters from the other earlier shows. It was probably my first experience of a franchise crossover, and there was always a surge of excitement when someone like Captain Flack and his brigade put in an appearance.

Chigley was described as an industrial hamlet and it certainly was a hive of activity, with a lively wharf, family run pottery and Mr. Cresswell's biscuit factory all within a short distance of each other. Unlike the other two series, there wasn't really a hub (such as the town square) and the action moved between locations as the story dictated. What you could always guarantee was that there would be a need for a train journey and dear old Lord Bellborough would rush to put on his overalls and get Bessie out of her shed and chuffing along the tracks as quickly as possible - all to the strains of "time goes by when you're the driver of a train". He'd rope long suffering Brackett into things too, although he never seemed to do much. 

Lord B obviously had a lot of time on his hands as he didn't need much of an excuse to turn train driver (no Lady Bellborough to keep him busy I guess). Not only that but he also operated the vintage Dutch organ for the dancers at the end of the day jamboree outside the biscuit factory. Why was it such an elaborate musical device? Where did the ladies in their odd costumes come from ? (none are shown working at the factory). Why did they feel the need to celebrate their daily freedom from biscuit servitude with a polka?  No idea. Perhaps his lordship was secretly an eccentric tyrant who insisted that the workers that used his land jigged about for his sadistic pleasure. We'll never know...

Actually another thing that didn't bother the child me watching, but becomes obvious when viewed through adult eyes, is that the biscuit factory is bigger on the inside. There's just a small entrance, conveyor belt and van parking area outside, yet within there is a vast automated production line, churning out biscuits by the thousand. Perhaps most of it is underground. No wonder the workers couldn't wait for the six o'clock whistle. 

All of this nicely illustrates one of the key things about the "Trumptonshire Trilogy" - the idea of the old ways living alongside the new. The wharf and the biscuit factory, steam trains and cars, Windy Miller and Farmer Jonathan Bell - everyone gets along and has a place to fit in. It's an idyllic world drawn from multiple eras of British society.

 "Chigley" and its stablemates were a huge influence on a generation of children who grew up to be musicians, programme makers and creators in later life. Surreal rock / folk band "Half Man Half Biscuit" released "Time Flies By" and "Trumpton Riots". Lyrics in one of the songs by "Oasis" obliquely referenced faithful retainer Brackett. In Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon's seminal comic book "Preacher", one depraved character sings the familiar train song as he rides naked on a bicycle - as you do. If you are 40+ years old, those images and tunes are woven tightly into your DNA.

With DVD's the default home entertainment media of choice in the early 2000s, I ended up buying a whole host of children's favourites on shiny disc. The "Trumptonshire Trilogy" was one of the first. 36 episodes of pure bliss which took me back to a time when kids TV didn't have to be about high octane action or another way of selling innocent little cherubs the latest over-priced tat - just slices of life in a quaint English county (although that one about Windy Miller getting drunk on cider....hmmm...). Maybe I'll get to show "Chigley" to my grandchildren one day  - at which point they will probably complain about its lack of 3D virtual reality interaction or some such nonsense.

I'll close off this memory with the sheer brilliance that is the Trumptonshire homage from seminal cop drama "Life On Mars". If only they could have stretched to Gene Hunt chasing down some "nonces" on a train...

Honourable mentions:

• A Feast Unknown

For most of my life I’ve loved the “pulp” heroes of the early 20th Century. Doc Savage, The Shadow, The Avenger, The Spider and many other characters beginning with “The”. Even though their original adventures were published long before I was born, as we will see, these heroes will feature large in other posts in this personal history. Science fiction author Philip Jose Farmer was also a huge fan - so much so that, even before he got to write his own Doc Savage novel, he included versions of some pulp characters in his “Wold Newton” stories. “A Feast Unknown” (and its two sequels) are slightly adjacent to that - but ’Lord Grandrith’ and ‘Doc Caliban’ are clearly Tarzan and Savage. Incredibly strong, virtually immortal, yet sexually dysfunctional, this ‘pulp erotic horror’ novel sees the two initially at loggerheads but ultimately on the same side against the evil of ‘The Nine’. But this is not before they (obviously) fight each other - with the twist being that they grapple nude while each sporting massive erections! Needless to say I’d never read a book like it!

• Pot Black

I didn't become aware of this seminal snooker tournament until I was probably around nine or ten, but the first competition was shown in 1969, hence why it's included here. Created by then BBC2 controller David Attenborough (yes that one) to make the most of the fledgling channels colour transmissions, it ran for an amazing 17 year and helped transform snooker from a minority interest into one of the most popular sports in the UK. My Dad was a huge snooker fan and the combination of  having only one television and the show being on in the winter months meant that we often watched as a family. The soothing tones of commentator Ted Lowe and the simplicity of the format (even if playing is definitely a test of real skill) resulted in me soon enjoying it as much as Dad did (one of the very few sports I can say that about). Plus of course the programme introduced the wider world to a raft of memorable players, such as Ray Reardon, Dennis Taylor, Steve Davis, Jimmy White, Cliff Thorburn, Alex Higgins...the list goes on and on.

•  Tommy by The Who

The classic rock concept album and the story of pinball savant / spiritual leader Tommy Walker has arguably become part of the UK’s musical DNA, influencing generations of artists. I think it was my brother who first got hold of a copy of the double LP sometime around 1981 and drove our parents mad by basically playing it to death. I don’t think I had much choice except to become a fan - although that was really cemented when I discovered the 1975 film directed by Ken Russell and the ‘deaf, dumb and blind kid’ became visual . Obviously “Pinball Wizard “ is the track everyone knows, but other clear standouts are “Acid Queen”, “Cousin Kevin” and “We’re Not Gonna Take It”. Then again, controversially, - even though others think it redundant and even repetitive - I have a real soft spot for the 10 minute opus that is “Underture”.

• The Italian Job

Iconic: adjective: widely known and acknowledged especially for distinctive excellence. It’s a word that’s vastly overused nowadays. But it rightly and justly can be applied to this famous heist caper. Occasionally in movies all the elements of cast, crew, plot, action, music, etc. come together to create something really, really special. There's no point me going through all the moments that have become embedded in British society in the years since. Images and phrases that are cult symbols - that some youngsters will know without even being aware of their origins. After it's release there were obvious talks of sequels and many, many ideas about how they would get out of that literal cliffhanger ending (in 2008, the Royal Society of Chemistry even held a competition for a solution). There was that unnecessary remake in 2003 (and why does Mark Wahlberg have a hand in so many bad versions of my favourite films?). I'll stick with the original thank you very much - I love everything about it. A bona fide classic.

We're All Stories In The End 10 - Camera Obscura

Sometimes novels pose more questions than they answer. But sometimes that's a good thing...

Camera Obscura by Lloyd Rose

Eighth Doctor Adventures number: 59

Originally published: August 2002

Companions: Fitz and Anji

The Doctor sat alone and listened to the beat of his remaining heart. He had never got used to it. He never would. The single sound where a double should be. What was this new code hammering through his body? What did it mean? Mortal. No, he'd always known he could die. Not mortal. Damaged. Crippled. Through his shirt, his fingers sought the thick ridge of his scar. Human...

The Doctor's second heart was taken from his body — for his own good, he was told. Removed by his sometime ally, sometime rival, the mysterious time-traveller Sabbath. Now, as a new danger menaces reality, the Doctor finds himself working with Sabbath again. 

From a seance in Victorian London to a wild pursuit on Dartmoor, the Doctor and his companions work frantically to unravel the mystery of this latest threat to Time... Before Time itself unravels..

This month we are back in the world of the Eighth Doctor - and you may recall that when I read "Anachrophobia", there were a couple of things I found slightly confusing: Why did the Doctor only have one heart ? Who was Mistletoe ? (okay yes I've figured it out now) - and entering this book, it’s the same conundrum - what happened in Spain? Why are the Time Lords gone ?

But this time, I'm not frustrated by gaps in my knowledge of the back-story - because when a book is *this* good, you just jump into the hansom cab and hang on !

Sure, it's a Victorian era setting - we've been here before in "Talons of Weng Chiang" and "All Consuming Fire" to name just two. The thing is, despite their veneer of moralistic values and gleaming Crystal Palaces, the old Victorians liked a bit of the grotesque - and we get that here with an under-society of madhouses, seances, freaks, dodgy magicians and carnival sideshows.

It’s a London that oozes atmosphere - full of drugs, dirt, disease, dismemberment and death. All this plus a man split into eight parts and a misshapen time-twisted monster with a mouth in his eye, a rose bush for a leg and a toaster on his back. Something to give even Morbius a run for his money. Lovely !

Given the period, Lloyd Rose obviously can't resist some Conan Doyle homage's, but I don't blame her. The Doctor's desperate escape across Dartmoor is exhilarating stuff even if there is a strong whiff of a certain hound on the breeze - and when you have an antagonist as interesting as Sabbath there are bound to be comparisons to a certain foe of the master detective.

But actually, forget Moriarty (or the Master for that matter), Sabbath is probably closest to Mycroft Holmes - the Doctor's intellectual equal (at the very least), but someone who  looks at things from a different more... singular viewpoint.

Clearly, both see themselves as THE protector of Time - and the other as a dangerous meddling fool. Forced to work together, they disapprove of each other's choices -  and some of the most enjoyable exchanges are where they argue points of intellectual morality (usually in front of a roaring fire). That and a great joke with a whoopee cushion!

I may not know much about Sabbath's history at this point - but I definitely know that I want to read more. In fact the race to recover a defective time machine with the power to destroy the entire fabric of time and space is almost secondary to the relationships between the various rich characters - and for once I'm glad. 

The Doctor's interactions with the exhibition freaks, the weird Chiltern family and even the untrustworthy Scale are all brilliantly realised. Equally the Doctor's emotional journey is there for all to experience. We've rarely seen him this vulnerable, this cranky - or this desperate.

In between the clever dialogue (and some damn good cliff-hangers) there are lovely little touches - paragraphs that brought a big grin to my face:

The TARDIS entranceway being cloaked in an illusion of darkness  - that prevents the console room from being seen from outside - is a loving nod to the constraints of the classic series. The way the Doctor describes time as a musical score with infinite possible ornamentations is just glorious - as is Sabbath listing all the ways that the Doctor is "plucked out of trouble at the last minute". It's true, in his presence the odds DO collapse. Oh, and lets not forget the fun with the tennis ball at the very end!

But as much as this is a novel about the Doctor - it's not about the Doctor being in control. He's swept along from one crisis to the next - often suffering immense gruesome harm in the process. I totally get the conceit that while Sabbath has his other heart, the Doctor is effectively immortal, but did he really have to go through quite so much to prove it ? At various times he has his chest crushed, his remaining heart stabbed, his face sliced open and is bashed up and down on the floor like a rag doll! Okay so he's allowed time to recover, but its still a bit much.

All that and he travels to the land of the dead (or maybe it's" hell") to strike a bargain with the avatar of Death herself. This is a sidestep into unexpected territory for sure, but it's so beautifully written that it's forgiven. The section where, in order to continue his descent, the Doctor gradually strips himself of his clothes, his body, his strength and finally his heart - is just marvellous.

Can you tell I loved this book ? I hope so. It's one of those novels you want to show to people and shout "Here ! Read this bit! It's brilliant isn't it ?".

So more from Lloyd Rose please. More Sabbath. And more Eighth Doctor novels that are this enjoyable.

Golden Sunsets Redux - 60 Years of Memories - Part 2 - 1968

Yes I'm cheating again - in that I'm actually going to cover several things at once which are all related to the film that came out in this year. It (and the franchise it spawned) had such a huge impact on me when I was very young that there was no way it could be missed out.

1968:

The trivia:

• Operation "Wandering Soul" was a US initiative during the Vietnam War which had recordings of Americans pretending to be ghosts played through the jungle at night. The idea was that it would demoralise the opposing Viet Cong so they would go home. Needless to say, results were mixed.

• The famous US comedy sketch show "Laugh-in" correctly predicted that Ronald Reagan would be President in 1988 (although he began his first term in 1980) and that the Berlin Wall would fall in 1989. However their prediction that the wall would be replaced by a moat full of alligators has not yet occurred.

• "Night of the Living Dead" is a public domain film because when the name was changed from "Night of the Flesh Eaters", the distributors accidentally removed the copyright indication. This means that there are hundreds of different releases available on home formats.

• When an astrologer gave the same horoscope reading to all who applied - that of France's worst mass murder - 94% found the reading to accurately fit their life.

The memory:

Planet of the Apes

How can you cover the sheer cultural impact of the "Apes" franchise in just a few paragraphs? I'm not sure I even want to try. All I know is that viewing that first film started a life-long love affair with everything to do with this future world that stretched out across the years and into every story since (yes even the Tim Burton "re-imagining" will get a mention).

My parents were big fans of the old-school "Epics" - tales from history with gigantic casts and hugely impressive set pieces. Classics such as "The Ten Commandments", "El Cid", "Spartacus", "Lawrence of Arabia" and naturally the daddy of them all, "Ben-Hur". I grew up with these films. By the time "Planet of the Apes" turned up on our small TV screen (and I was old enough to be allowed to watch it) I was well aware who Charlton Heston was. I recognised that chiselled jaw, that muscular frame - his sheer screen presence. He was one of my favourite actors (if a child can be said to have such a thing). Plus this was science fiction - *my* genre - and it featured talking apes! How could I not love it immediately? Sure the deeper allegorical elements of the story and what it said about the horrors of war and the fear of mankind engineering it's own destruction were lost on me - I was too young - but hey - talking apes !

By today's standards the ape prosthetics look primitive and obvious, but back then the masks and costumes given to the various simian "castes" succeeded in not only making talking gorillas and orangutans seem possible, they allowed the actors behind the foam rubber to imbue the apes with real personality. Of course it's boosted enormously by a stunning central performance from the wonderful Roddy McDowall as chimpanzee archaeologist Cornelius. He was such an inquisitive, peaceful and believable character, I wanted him to be my friend.

The makeup and sets and acting might help convince you that this alien world is real and the film is a terrific action piece (Chuck gets lots of opportunities to flex his muscles), but it has a compelling mystery at it's heart - how did this strange place come to exist? Sitting here in the 21st Century we know that the shocking answer to that is behind probably one of the most famous images on celluloid.

 "The word "iconic" is definitely overused nowadays, but that picture is probably one of the most deserving of that appellation. It's such a WOW! moment, I think I nearly fell off the sofa. If the previous 100-odd minutes hadn't already made me a fan, that pull back and reveal in the closing seconds sealed the deal. I'd never seen a film before that pulled off such an amazing twist - and it would be a long time before something would hit me with such force again ("The Empire Strikes Back" maybe?).

After that, I lapped up each of the "Apes" sequels as each one made an appearance on my TV screen. "Beneath" was a solid continuation (particularly as they enticed Mr. Heston back for a supporting role). A hell of a downbeat ending though. I think my only minor problem with it at the time was that I could tell it wasn't the same actor beneath Cornelius' mask (Roddy McDowall was too busy). I shouldn't have worried though because Roddy was the star of the show in the loose trilogy of the next three - "Escape", "Conquest" and "Battle". I devoured each one.

By the time 1974 came round, the UK was in the grip of full on Ape-mania. This was spearheaded (for me at least) by the release of Marvel UK's "Planet of the Apes" weekly comic which reprinted the adaptation and new stories from the US publication. Comics and 'Planet of the Apes' - what could be better?! Couple this with the transmission of the new 14-part television series and I was in seventh heaven. Okay so the characters were different. Cornelius was replaced by Galen, but it was still Roddy under the rubber. At the same time newsagents started to stock the collectable bubble gum cards that featured images from the show. British kids went mad for these and there was a huge trade in "swapsies" in my school playground. Not only did you get a still taken from an episode, the backs of the cards joined up to form nine different puzzle images! I tried so hard to collect the whole set, probably driving my parents to distraction, but I never did manage it.

Another piece of "Apes" merchandise that I have vivid memories of from 1974 is the board game. The basic premise was "be the last free human". Players took it in turn to roll two die. One was the number of spaces you could move your piece on the board, the other the number of spaces you got to move any one else's piece. The idea was to force your opponents cut-out onto one of the four "captured" spaces - and then the fun began.

In the centre of the board was a constructed cardboard "cage" protected by two swing "doors", which in turn were supported by a plastic lever connected to a round device. The captured player was stood on the top of the cage and the plastic dial turned. Random chance meant that one turn of the dial could release the lever and condemn the player to the pit - they were out of the game - or nothing happened and the hapless human was safe for another few rounds until they ended up on a "captured" space again. Hours of fun for all the family.

After the TV series was cancelled (before resolving its storyline), 1975 treated us "Apes" fans to animated simians in the form of "Return to the Planet of the Apes". I'm a little vague time-wise on this one as I know I saw the cartoon when I was a child, but I can't be sure exactly when. What I do recall is that it was pretty enjoyable - especially if you watched it every week, as the plot played out across all thirteen episodes. It was also quite different from the films and the live-action TV version. Although the astronaut premise was the same, the ape society was more technologically advanced with cars and their own movies and television channels (resulting in some groan-worthy puns such as "William Apespeare" and "The Apefather". Much later I learned that this was more in line with the original Pierre Boulle novel.

The animation style was pretty basic with limited movement, but the backgrounds were very detailed thanks to the efforts of veteran artist Doug Wildey (another name that I didn't come to know until over a decade later). Sadly it too was cancelled before it's time and the reign of the Apes appeared to be over, apart from a comics series I don't even remember seeing on sale in the early 1990s. Still, it had been a good run.

Of course a really good idea never stays dead for long - not in the 21st Century's nostalgia obsessed, franchise driven society (and yes I am aware of the conflict in that sentence given that this is a nostalgic look back at a decades-spanning franchise) and 2001 gave us Tim Burton's rebooted take on the saga. It was a bit of a poisoned chalice to be fair, having been in development hell for decades and then rushed into production. But even being generous and allowing for all that I've only every watched it twice and that's more than enough. Wooden human characters you don't care about, played by actors who aren't up to the job (Wahlberg vs Heston? Don't make me laugh!) Bloody Helena Bonham-Carter. Oh and let's not forget *that* ending? What were they thinking?!  Is there anything positive I can say about this travesty?....errrr....um.....the makeup is pretty good? Tim Roth is not bad as a pantomime-ish villain? Thank god they never got to make a sequel? I like to think of it as expensive bad fan-fiction - in the canon of the Apes, it doesn't count.

Thankfully in the years since we've had a large number of high quality comics from BOOM! Studios - they even did a crossover with the original Star Trek crew called "The Primate Directive" - plus not one, but *four* incredibly good and very successful "prequel" movies, with more to follow I'm sure, These really have struck the right chord, which thankfully invokes the spirit of the originals while carving their own path - even if part of me still misses the mellifluous voice of Roddy McDowall. The profile of the "Apes" is at it's highest for decades, my interest in undimmed and I eagerly look forward to each new instalment. Long may they continue. For a franchise that's past it's own half century, it still has interesting and relevant things to say about society and mankind and the way we treat each other and the creatures we share this planet with.

"Planet of the Apes" influenced not just me as a little boy, but generations of film lovers, writers, directors, makeup artists, special effects wizards, cinematographers - the list goes on. It's been copied, parodied, blazed it's way across every type of entertainment media (I didn't even mention the vinyl records and video games) and has crossed into mainstream popular culture. Oh and let's not forget, there are not many movies that have spawned two of the most quoted phrases in cinema history.

I'll end this piece with one of my favourite of the "homages" to the majesty of the "Apes" series - it's "The Simpsons" with their very own musical version. starring Troy McClure (you may remember him from such films as "The Erotic Adventures of Hercules" or "Lead Paint: Delicious But Deadly")...

"Oooo, Oooo....Doctor Zaius,,,"

Honourable mentions:

• Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey 

Few series have successfully merged science fiction and fantasy quite like the 'Dragonriders of Pern' sequence. The tales of far future colonists reduced to a feudal existence, their telepathic dragons who can fly 'between' and the fight against the all-consuming 'Thread' started here and I was fully invested from page one. The characters (both human and dragon) are vivid, the world-building is exquisite and as a young reader I devoured the first six books in quick succession, with the revelations of the colonists origins and the SF elements introduced carefully and naturally. After McCaffery's death in 2011 the stories have been continued by her children - jumping backwards and forwards in the chronology to fill in the gaps. The latter books are good, but none made quite the same impression as this first story of Lessa and her dragon Ramoth.                    

• Fantastic Voyage

No, not the famous 1966 film about scientists shrunk inside a human body, but the far less well-known Filmation cartoon. It takes the basic concepts and that's about it, instead spinning bizarre 30 minutes tales of eye-patch wearing Commander Jonathan Kidd and his colleagues in the C.M.D.F. (Combined Miniature Defense Force). Across it's mere 17 episodes they faced evil wizards, rampaging toys, bratty children and criminal masterminds. I'll be honest, having seen it again recently, it's not great - but as a child I was captivated by Guru, "master of mysterious powers", the classic designs of the 'Voyager' ship and the shrinking machine - and the brilliant opening title sequence that explains everything you need to know in a mere 70 seconds...

• Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

If it hadn't been the year of the Apes, then this classic film would have had the top spot for sure. I adore every single thing about it  - the songs, the production design, the supporting actors (Lionel Jeffries! James Robertson Justice!) and of course that central performance from Dick Van Dyke. The man is a marvel and in a career full of enormous highs, this is my all-time favourite. Plus of course the Child Catcher has become a thing of nightmares embedded in our collective consciousness. It didn't make lots of money on it's original release, the critics have always been a bit sniffy about it and many people prefer 1964's "Mary Poppins". But they are all wrong. Force me to make a choice and I'll pick "Me Ol' Bamboo" as the best song (which according to Van Dyke was the most difficult dancing act he ever undertook) - but they are all marvellous. I fell in love with the film as a child and that love has endured the decades and always will.

• The Banana Splits / Arabian Knights

Even though there were only ever 31 episodes made, this show seemed to be on permanently when I was a child, especially in the school summer holidays. I loved the theme song (All together now... "one banana, two banana, three banana four..."). I liked the zany costumes of Fleegle, Bingo, Drooper and Snorky. I enjoyed their zany antics and watching them zooming around in the Banana Buggies. But if I'm being truthful, I really came for the cartoon inserts. Less so "The Three Musketeers", but definitely for the ten minutes of fantasy with the "Arabian Knights". Ask me to explain the plot of any of the adventures of Prince Turhan, Princess Nida, Fariik the Magician, Raseem the Strong, shape changing Bez ("Size...of an elephant!") and of course the whirling donkey Zazuum and I'd draw a blank, but I have really fond memories nonetheless. 

Golden Sunsets Redux - 60 Years of Memories - Part 1 - 1967

Way back in the mists of 2017, I started a series of posts designed to celebrate the first 50 years of my life and the things from each year that had been important to me. The problem is, I never finished it. I never even came close. 

It petered out in 2019 at post 32 (1998) - way past my fiftieth birthday - and I'll be honest it's always annoyed me that something so personal and that I spent so much time on was left incomplete.

So with my *60th* birthday just two years away, I've decided to resurrect "Golden Sunsets" and expand it to 60 posts. Between now and - lets say the end of 2027 - I'm going to re-post the previous entries -  with a few tweaks and updates - and finish things off . I reckon that's one new bit of writing every few weeks, which should be do-able.

Let's see how I get on! Without further ado, we are going back to the 'Summer of Love'...

1967:

The trivia:

• According to Article VIII of the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, you can be arrested for a crime committed anywhere in the known universe. The United States and Russia also signed a declaration agreeing not to nuke the Moon.

• On 3rd September, Sweden switched to driving on the right side of the road - an event known as "H-Day". Only essential traffic was allowed and everything stopped at 4:50 AM for 10 minutes, then resumed on the right side at 5:00 AM. In cities the traffic ban lasted for hours so that intersections could be reconfigured, new bus stops unveiled, etc. Railways and the metro system in Stockholm did not switch to the new rule and continued to drive on the left.

• In January, the Beatles recorded a 14-minute avant-garde piece, "Carnival of Light", containing distorted, echo-laden sounds of percussion, keyboards, guitar and vocals. It received its only public airing at the 'Million Volt Light and Sound Rave' held at the Roundhouse venue in London. The track remains unreleased to this day.

• Fuelled by the rise in Spiritualism, the Parker Brother board game "Ouija" sold two million copies in one year - more than "Monopoly". It was marketed as a pleasant game for 8 years and upwards...

• In September, the burning body of tramp Robert Francis Bailey was found in a derelict house in Kennington, London. A blue flame was clearly seen emanating from a slit in his stomach by emergency services that attended the scene - even though his clothes were intact and unaffected by the fire. In later years I will become fascinated with these cases of 'Spontaneous Human Combustion'...

The memory:

KerPlunk

It's a bit of an odd one to start off with, but I wanted to reflect  something appropriate from my first few years on the planet. Of course my recall of those early days is hazy - to be honest it's probably non-existent - and there is no way that I could have played this most famous of games when I was less than twelve months old. But it first came out in 1967 and it's my list, so...

It doesn't matter how much technology we have at our finger tips, what realistic virtual worlds we can plug ourselves into - there is nothing quite so satisfying as watching your younger brother simply pulling on a plastic stick and seeing all the marbles clatter noisily to the ground (well into a plastic tray). It's a perfect example of onomatopoeia - the sound of the marbles is the name of the game!

In summary "KerPlunk" was meant to be a game of skill and hand-eye coordination. Inside the bright blue box you got a yellow plastic tube, thirty thin sticks and thirty-two coloured marbles. Plus a base with numbers on it. You had to insert the sticks through the tiny holes in the yellow tube to form a web of plastic. Then you poured the marbles in at the top. Players then took it in turns to remove one stick without letting any of the marbles fall through. If they did, that player collects them. Once the last marble had fallen, everybody counted up their marbles and the person with the fewest was the winner. You needed a steady hand as you slowly (or quickly) pulled out your stick !

In reality it's not so much skill that was needed as the ability to learn a bit of spatial reasoning  - as you tried to figure out which sticks were holding up which marbles - plus quite a lot of luck. It was a game simple enough for small children to understand yet still fun for those a bit older - until I guess they progressed onto more challenging versions of the concept, such as "Jenga".

The version pictured above is the same as the one we had at home and I remember playing endlessly with my family and friends. I think we first got the game as a present on November 5th - otherwise known in the UK as 'Guy Fawkes Night' or 'Bonfire Night'. Yes, I am aware that November 5th is traditionally the night for fireworks, but in our house, we were usually given the choice of having a few meagre whizz bangs and some sparklers (that would last 15 minutes tops) or a board game of some kind (which we got to enjoy all year). Probably two out of three times we'd pick the game - so we got to play "Haunted House" or "Escape From Colditz" or "Sorry". All classics of the age.

"KerPlunk" is one of those games which never seems to go away. My own children had a set and my younger sisters children have played the same wonderful game (although she was never as mad about it as I was). There have been endless variations in style and colour over the decades - one with a "golden ball" which affects your total score, a 'Toy Story' inspired version using that film's Little Green Men instead of marbles and  even "KerPlunk 2" which apparently has coloured marbles, lights and sounds and a spiral ramp. That feels like sacrilege to me ! 

Although it's not the favourite game from my childhood (I'll come to that I'm sure), it's certainly near the top. Now who's turn is it next?...

Honourable mentions:

Again, all of these things debuted in 1967, even if I did not come across them until much later.

• In Like Flint

He's the super-spy who gets all the girls. The man with all the gadgets and the lethal moves to match. He's name is Jam.....Derek Flint ? Yes, while Mr. Bond may have all the box-office, my heart belongs to James Coburn's super-smooth agent of Z.O.W.I.E (Zonal Organization World Intelligence Espionage). This film (and it's predecessor "Our Man Flint") may be a more comedic take on the 007 franchise, but it's fully aware of it's own ridiculousness and all the better for it. Coburn has always been  one of the coolest actors on screen and with Flint he's in his element. I loved the films from the moment I first saw them and that has only grown over the years. Flints influence continued long after his two outings left the cinema - from the distinctive presidential hotline ringtone being used in both "Hudson Hawk" and "Austin Powers", to the name of the most famous bad guy in "Die Hard" - Hans Gruber. 

• The Prisoner

Another spy, but one very, very different from Mr Derek Flint. What can I really add to the thousands of words written about Patrick McGoohan's secret agent and the physical and psychological experiences he is put through as a resident of "The Village"? Just to say that I was addicted from the first moment of that iconic theme music and opening sequence. I've been to the real village of Portmerion. I've walked on those sands and imagined the Rover balloon coming after me. Daring, surreal, confusing - championing the rights of individuals  ("I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered! My life is my own.") - it is a truly unique piece of television. Often copied but never bettered. An absolute stone cold classic.                                                                                                                                                                    

• Space Hostages by Nicolas Fisk

The pen name of British author David Higginbottom, Fisk wrote a number of science fiction novels for children, including the well-regarded "Grinny". I've never read that book but for some reason my local village library had a copy of "Space Hostages". The basic plot concerns a group of kids who are kidnapped by a critically ill Flight Lieutenant aboard a top secret spacecraft and have to try and pilot the craft home by themselves.  It's not really an SF story, more a character study of the resulting conflict between the nerdish Brylo and the super-confident Tony - a scenario than many school kids could empathise with. Maybe the SF title font and that evocative painting of people running away from a flying saucer triggered my UFO interests of the time. Maybe I was just a sucker for anything with "space" in the title. What I do know is that the story has stayed with my ever since - and when I tracked down a copy many, many years later it still holds up remarkable well.

We're All Stories In The End 9 - Blood Heat

A tale of old friends and even older enemies  - although no one is quite who you remember...

Blood Heat by Jim Mortimore

Seventh Doctor Adventures number: 19

Originally published: October 1993

Companions: Ace and Benny

"Not men, Ace. Silurians. The original rulers of the Earth"

The TARDIS is attacked by an alien force; Bernice is flung into the Vortex; and the Doctor and Ace crash-land on Earth.

An attack by dinosaurs convinces the Doctor that he and Ace have arrived in the Jurassic Era. But when they find a woman being hunted by intelligent reptiles, he begins to suspect that something is very wrong.

Then they meet the embittered Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, leading the remnants of UNIT in a hopeless fight against the Silurians who rule his world. 

And they find out that it all began when the Doctor died...

The author of this one is a familiar name - whom I last encountered a few months ago when reviewing the 8th Doctor story "Beltempest". Back then, I sort of liked his writing style, even if I wasn't won over by the story he was trying to tell.

Will this one also be a disappointment ? Let's see…

Well let's get the good news out of the way immediately - I *really* enjoyed this book.

Sure it's an alternate Earth story - one where the Third Doctor died during the events of "The Silurians" and things turned left from there -  but that's fine, many a great novel has been spun out of a simple "What If ?" scenario.

It helps that Mortimore's reptile-ruled world is beautifully realised. Neither side in the conflict is evil, but equally, neither is entirely sympathetic. Everyone's motivations have emotional weight and are logical and complex.

It would have been easy to just cut and paste the 1970s UNIT crew into a bleak 1993 - but you can see throughout the story that they have all been changed by the experiences of the intervening twenty years.

Liz Shaw may still fundamentally be the same caring scientist, but you can sense the fear and weariness  - and sometimes abject terror - in her actions. The grizzled Brigadier has become a obsessive, furious with "his" Doctor for dying and leaving him to with do what he thinks is "right", Benton is a borderline psycho - and let's not dwell on poor, poor Jo Grant.

Once again with Mortimore's writing, I find myself greatly enjoying his descriptive prose. As with "Beltempest" he really invokes a sense of place - but this time everything feels that much more cohesive.

Yes, there are action set pieces and violent acts involving multitudes of dinosaurs  - and characters striving against tremendous odds with death lurking around every corner, but it all feels in service of the story and the losses *mean* something..

And Jim actually does some interesting things with the Silurians - making them feel far more real than any of the television stories.

Ace's discovery of the Doctor's corpse in the Cyclotron base felt suitably horrific yet very, very melancholic - and she actually  has a great role in this story. I liked the flying Nitro-9 smart bombs - definitely something that the modern TV series would do. But gosh, Ace really is an angry young lady isn't she ?

Benny is served far less well, but hey - companions get side-lined all the time, so while it's a shame, it's not a problem story-wise.

If I have niggles, it's that Mortimore seems to be going for the madcap loon version of the Seventh Doctor - all whirling arms and pratfalls, which is not a take I particularly enjoy. Plus he seems to have a bit of an obsession with the Brigadiers swagger stick, since it gets a mention in almost every scene, as if it's an extra character!

Oh and the alternate universe getting destroyed by a Time Ram is, well, a bit of a cop-out - but I guess it was necessary as part of the larger tale the various writers are telling across these novels.

Clearly there is more to come here, with the original TARDIS lost into a tar pit (maybe to become a fossil à la classic DWM comic strip "The Stockbridge Horror" ?) - and whoever is behind the creation of alt-Earth is still to be revealed

It's going to be good while before I get to any answers though.

All in all, "Blood Heat" is a big step up from my last Jim Mortimore book, and probably the book  I have enjoyed most overall since I read "All-Consuming Fire" way back in post 2 of this strand.

So much so that I might even be curious enough  to seek out the non-Doctor "Directors Cut" version that was released some twenty years later….