Tape Loading Error 1 - Do It Yourself

Computers have come a long, long way in the last 70 years. If you asked people to name the first examples of computers, they would probably come up with  things like Charles Babbage's Difference Engine from the early 19th century, or the 'Bombe' machine developed by Alan Turing to decrypt the German Enigma code in World War II. Others might remember devices called 'Colossus' or 'ENIAC' - number crunching behemoths the size of a house and weighing tons, powered by thousands of vacuum tubes, resistors, capacitors and inductors. These were creations of unique teams or individuals and primarily used by the military. It was the development of the transistor and then integrated circuits in the 1950s  - which in turn led to the development of the microprocessor -  which has transformed modern society.

Today there is more processing power in an iPhone that there was in the machines on board the Apollo mission rockets that took men to the moon. Computers (and the internet) are so inextricably woven into out lives and our homes that we interact with them hundreds of times a day, sometimes without even noticing. It wasn't always like this though and nowhere is this more obvious that in the world of home computers and video games. It's hard to believe in these days of market domination by Microsoft Windows and X-Box's and Sony PlayStation's and Apple Apps that there was a time over 30 years ago when the UK led the way with the development of home computers. When the most popular games 'console' in the UK was a rubber keyboarded thing the size of a hardback book with a massive 48k of memory. When game developers worked out of their bedrooms, and innovation was more important than realism. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's first go back in time to the birth of the devices that really founded the British home computer market...

By the late 1970s, thanks to the aforementioned  microprocessor, everyone in the UK was familiar with pocket calculators and digital watches. I remember getting my first ones of each with their distinctive red LED display around 1978 / 1979. We had also been exposed to some of the first rudimentary electronic games  - initially versions of the basic "pong" or tennis, with classics such as Electronic Mastermind, Merlin and Simon appearing later on toy shop shelves. But these were expensive gadgets that not everyone could afford and if you knew someone who had one, they were the most popular kid in school (I might do a whole separate post about the evolution of these games at some point).

However the initial attempts at producing an actual computer for the home market were aimed at the electronics hobbyist - mere kits requiring copious amounts of electronic components, wire and solder (and skill) to put together with the printed circuit boards and primitive silicon chips. Devices such as the Altair 8800, which appeared in 1975, could only be "programmed" by tedious toggling of multiple switches to set the instruction, loading that into the tiny memory and then repeating over and over and over again. The only output you got from all that hard work was the specific blinking of lights on the front panel.

By 1978, circuit boards and processors had developed sufficiently that a more sophisticated machine could be produced, leading to the appearance of the NASCOM-1. Still firmly directed at the niche enthusiast (as it required home assembly and the soldering of over 3000 joints) and costing a then eye-watering £200.00, it was based on the then new Z80 processor and boasted a real keyboard and suitable interfaces for connecting the machine to a TV display and a cassette player (tapes being a cheap alternative to floppy disks). Both the Z80 chip and the tape recorder would form an integral part of the success of the home machines to come.

With hard work and more than a little patience, users could even create rudimentary games on the NASCOM machines:

Of course games created by bored mainframe programmers had been around for decades. "Spacewar!", designed by some of the first "hackers" on  the PDP-1 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1961, is credited as the first widely available computer game - but there are many others such as "Hunt The Wumpus (1973) and of course Colossal Cave Adventure (1976) that are equally well known. I can remember that even when I first started work in the mid-1980s, the company mainframe still had a copy of "Adventure" on it (if you know who to ask)..

It's also at this point in 1978 that inventor, entrepreneur and all round genius Clive Sinclair comes into the picture. His company 'Science Of Cambridge' produced the MK14 - the first really cheap mail order computer kit in the UK, retailing at £39.95 plus tax. It was not as powerful as things such as the NASCOM-1, being more a machine designed for learning about programming. With a then reasonable 256 bytes of RAM (expandable up to 512), a *very* basic keyboard,  plus interfaces to allow it to connect to a cassette player for storage and a standard TV set for display (at additional costs of £7.99 and £33.75 respectively), it was originally expected to only sell in small numbers. Demand was vastly underestimated and from an initial production run of 2,000 units, it went on to sell ten times that (accurate totals vary) - significantly expanding the user base of hobbyist computers. The MK14 was so successful in fact that it gave 'Science of Cambridge' the capital to embark on their next venture - a computer with wider mass market appeal.

Having dabbled in building simple electronic projects like Crystal radio sets, sound effect generators, door buzzers,etc  I was aware of the MK14 from trips to stores like "Maplins" to pick up supplies of components. But for whatever reason, building something like that didn't really appeal to me. Having visited science and computer fairs as part of school trips, I was really interested in something that was a bit more "complete".

Following the success of the MK14, Clive Sinclair looked to the US, where there were three big machines dominating the computing market - the Apple II, the TRS-80 and the Commodore PET. These were proper desktop computers used in offices but were hugely expensive and Sinclair knew that to target a wide enough market he would have to come up with something innovative. Two years later in February 1980, "Science of Cambridge" released their next project - the ZX80. As with the MK14, the idea was to provide a cheap entry point to personal computing. Available in kit form for £79.95 or ready assembled for under the magic, consumer-pleasing, £100, this indicated a real shift towards a more general audience. It even came with a fully functioning keyboard- albeit a membrane one - and was completely enclosed within a stylish case. It had only 1K of RAM out of the box, but crucially could be expanded up to 16k via an external expansion pack, which simply plugged into the back of the machine, requiring no soldering or electronics experience. As was now becoming standard, connections to a cassette player for storage and a TV for viewing were provided.

One of the limiting factors of the ZX80 however was that there was no sound and the display was still black and white and flickered constantly. The hardware was unable to hold the screen image and process other tasks at the same time - if you wanted it to do a calculation, the screen went blank until it was completed (oh and it could only deal in whole numbers). A counter to this was that the machine came with "Sinclair BASIC" - it's own programming language based on the ANSI standards co-developed by Microsoft founder Bill Gates. For the first time the general user (with the support of the included user manual) could write their own programs!  Books started to be published with listings of all the BASIC commands necessary to create your own software. 

Even though the machine was inferior to its rivals, sales were impressive: over 50,000 units. The ZX80 really turned the market on its head. The sub-£100 price point and the fact that one could simply walk into a shop, buy one, plug it in and use it was unheard of at the time. It's success demonstrated that there was a massive potential market out there for a cheap consumer-friendly home computer. I desperately wanted a ZX80, but had to satisfy myself with visiting my friend David after school, because his parents had splashed out and bought him one. We used to sit their in awe as he proudly showed off his hours of programming skills by making a minimalist text game or Breakout, or something that was meant to be a flight simulator. It was the dawn of a new age. A black and white one with no sound maybe, but still a new world of possibilities.

In the next episode - we reach 1981 and I take my first steps into the world of home computing...

The Reminiscence Bump 1 - Blue Cats & Happy Monsters

It's music time on Ravings From The Rubber Room and I've been promising myself to write this post for a long, long time. The power of music to evoke emotions and memories is undeniable, and the first songs or instrumental pieces you really connect with as a child shape your listening choices for the rest of your life. I have a pretty wide ranging taste in music, but initially I was going to write just about a specific LP from 1978 that was a near childhood obsession (some may already have guessed which one it is from a teaser image I posted some time back). The thing is, the more I thought about it and trawled my memories and did some research, the more I realised that I wanted to cover a lot more of the music from my early years. There is a (sometimes vague) connection between those early singles / albums. What was going to be a few words about one record has turned into a multi-part post and is possibly even more self-indulgent than usual. I make no apologies for this - it's been a huge amount of  fun reliving all these sounds from forty-odd years ago, and hopefully it will invoke some memories and raise a smile from some of you out there (or at least a "what the hell were the Brits listening to?" from non-UK readers). This is by no means an exhaustive list of what was around at the time (I have deliberately excluded the more mainstream "pop" records) but it should give a flavour of things.

I'm going to start off with the novelty songs and children's LPs that made the biggest impression on me as a kid...

<<<<< cue wavy lines and a 'wheezing, groaning' sound >>>>>

Musically my very early childhood had been sound-tracked by my parents (and grandparents) choices and the artists they liked and had grown up with - so lots of stuff from the 40s, 50s and very early 60s. I vaguely recall the  LPs seemed to be mostly Christmas compilations of crooners such as Dean Martin or Frankie Vaughn or piano noodling's by Russ Conway, with a massive collection of other stuff (Elvis and the like) existing on tapes recorded on a huge 'reel-to reel' tape recorder the size of a suitcase - that seemed to have a built in oscilloscope for some reason. I clearly remember that one tape had Alvin & The Chipmunks singing "Ragtime Cowboy Joe" on it and I must have driven Mum & Dad  insane, requesting that they play it over and over again. There was also a big pile of 7" 45 rpm singles that sat in the corner of the living room. My parents tell a story of how, long before I could read, they would ask me "put X record on" and I would toddle over to the pile and pull out exactly the right one. Somehow I could recognise each record just by the company logo and combination of shapes on the label in the centre.

(a similar tape recorder - excluding oscilloscope)

I started to have "my" records when family and relatives bought kids albums and "novelty" singles as presents. One of the earliest I can remember was "Grandad" by 'Dad's Army' actor Clive Dunn which was number one in November 1970.  I would have been three and a half:

The following year (1971) it was "Ernie, The Fastest Milkman In The West" by comedian Benny Hill:

This was the first record I owned that "told a story", and one that would have a big impact on things to come. Indeed in 1972, aged 5, I was bought what became one of my favourite albums - the abridged soundtrack to the film "Dougal And The Blue Cat", featuring the characters from the hugely popular kids TV series "The Magic Roundabout".

Now I could write five thousand words on what "The Magic Roundabout" meant to me and other kids in the 1970s - and adults too. How watching Dougal, Zebedee, Brian, Mr Rusty and the others helped form a huge bond between myself and my grandfather (and goodness knows that wonderful man needs a post dedicated to him). The programme was, and remains, a British TV cultural icon. I urge you to go here to read all about it. Sadly the original LP I had is long gone (I tried to clean it with household polish when it got scratched and warped it forever!) and it has never been released on CD. There are copies on eBay but my record player is stored in the loft and - well, you get the idea. Instead let's have a snippet from the film with a song from the lovely Florence...

(very Burton / Elfman - esque)

Also in 1972 came my first exposure to more electronic music, with the number 5 instrumental only hit "Popcorn" by Hot Butter. This was like nothing I had ever heard before and I still think it's fantastic today. It's also another piece of the puzzle that helped define my musical tastes:

Moving through the decade things continued in the same novelty vein with "Tie A Yellow Ribbon Round The Old Oak Tree" in 1973. More importantly this was the year when The Simon Park Orchestra sold a million copies of "Eye Level" - the theme to the detective series "Van Der Valk". This wasn't the first time an instrumental track had reached the top end of the charts, but it would be the last for decades. As much as I liked "normal" pop songs with lyrics, for some reason I *adored* this track. I think it cemented my love for TV themes and soundtracks, long before I became interested in movie composers:

1974 arrived with the twin hits of "The Wombling Song" and "Wombling Free" from those furry denizens of Wimbledon Common.  I was beginning to be much more musically aware, as the the mighty Abba had arrived along with boy-band The Bay City Rollers (definitely *not* my thing, but they were everywhere. They even had their own board game. I know this because some family member weirdly thought it was a good Christmas present for a seven year old boy!). Oddly though, my album of early 1974 was an LP of cover versions of those Womble songs plus things like "The Happy Wanderer", "High Hopes" and "Gilly Gilly Ossenfeffer Katzenellenbogen By The Sea" by puppet superstars Pinky & Perky.

Yes, two of the best-selling record stars of the 60s and 70s were anthropomorphic puppet pigs that sang in high-pitched squeaky voices and were created by a couple from Czechoslovakia. Pinky and Perky had originally been TV stars with their own show on the BBC between 1957-1968 and then on ITV until 1971, but their recording career lasted a good few years longer. They were probably the UK equivalent of Alvin & The Chipmunks (the same technique of playing original voices at twice the speed was used), so I guess those child memories of "Ragtime Cowboy Joe" played a part. What can I say? I was young. I'm not going to subject you to their musical  delights don't worry.

Of course the other important thing that was happening in 1974 was my interest in a little show called Doctor Who. I've written about the moment I started regularly watching the show here, but my love of fantasy and SF was growing exponentially - and would soon start to influence my musical choices.

By the time 1975 rolled along, the charts were full of Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, 10cc, Roxy Music, Eurovision winners Brotherhood of Man and lots of Abba. But amongst this were out-of-left-field hits for "Kojak" star Telly Savalas with his spoken word version of the song "If", originally by American group Bread:

(sunglasses, chest hair, smoking and alcohol - what a man's man !)

Oh and how can I forget the delights of Windsor Davies and Don Estelle - stars of the BBC's situation comedy set in India in World War II, "It Ain't Half Hot Mum" - crooning The Ink Spots 1940 song, "Whispering Grass":

I'm going to end this first post with probably my strangest children's album of all from 1975. Released on the Happy House label, "Happy Monsters" was billed as "Funny songs, sounds and stories about a pleasant adventure into the impossible land of Ooog!". The bizarre story on the A side concerns Bobby and Betty's adventures in Ooog as they meet the Happy Monsters, who talk with klaxon's and squeaks and seem to have a love of the marches of John Philip Sousa! What is even trippier is the B side, where there are cover versions of classics such as "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag" but replete with comical bells, parps and whistles. Delia Derbyshire would have loved the almost musique concrete stylings. It's probably from a crazier, trippier time in 60s America, but I just cherished it. Thank goodness we had headphones by that point or I think my parents would have disowned me. Listen for yourself (be warned it's 15 minutes long):

(James Brown would *not* have approved...)

So what have we learnt from this first trawl through my youth? -

• I liked a good novelty song
• I had a burgeoning interest in electronic music
• I had a fondness for songs that tell a story
• I loved science fiction and fantasy
• I am beginning to really like TV and film themes and soundtracks

Next time, things step up a gear when we get to 1976 -  thanks to two Frenchmen, a pioneer from Japan and a maths teacher...

The 800 Day Project - Day 526 - 553 - Farewell, My Doctor

Finally I get to season 18. I'm going to be honest here - writing about these stories (which I actually watched back in June and July 2015) has been a struggle. Not because I didn't enjoy them (I did), or that they are not very good (they are) but more because the blog is so wide-ranging and I have so many things that I can't wait to write about that being the thousandth person to write a "review" of classic Doctor Who stories seems like I am covering old, old  ground. The "800 Day Project" was never conceived as having a companion blog and it doesn't have a "hook" like "Adventures With The Wife In Space" or "No Complications"- it's simply me on my own enjoying watching all the episodes in order, one a day. I don't even have any interesting personal anecdotes from my youth to accompany (most of) these particular stories, so how can I possibly say anything different to all those other people that have come before? I hit a bit of a mental block and it's taken a long time to work through it. Anyway, that's a bit of a long winded way of apologising for being so behind and for my comments on season 18 possibly being bit scattershot and not up to my usual (self-imposed) standard. Must try harder...

The Leisure Hive through to Logopolis

I'll admit I have a soft spot for the new Peter Howell / Sid Sutton opening titles and theme arrangement. It probably stems from having heard it so many times during my many re-watches of the Davison and Colin Baker era stories (and of course the DVD menus), but even so I think it still stands up as one of the best versions, with the 'middle eight' in the closing credits and that final "explosion" being particularly memorable. Of course as I revealed last time, I didn't actually see or hear the titles until eight weeks later than many other fans, having being seduced to the dark side by "Buck Rogers".


The Leisure Hive

Let's gloss over that stupidly long panning shot of Brighton beach shall we and move on to the core of the adventure - and boy is there a lot going on. A space leisure centre built on a planet devastated by nuclear war. A hostile takeover bid by the very enemies the Argolin's fought against - gangster lizards no less. Accelerated death cause by radiation poisoning. The Doctor accused of a murder he didn't commit. Foamasi agents disguised as humans. A xenophobic clone determined to raise a new empire. Multiple replication by tachyon manipulation. A little bit of basic computer science. Oh and a Doctor aged by 500 years into an old man.

It's an ambitious tale and to go along with that we have a grumpier and more serious Doctor - both in front of and behind the cameras. Much has been said about the difficult working relationships between the star of the show and his companion and his producer. It seems clear to me from this story that Tom wasn't happy at all about the changes. JN-T and Christopher HAMILTON Bidmead thought they could tame the wild beast and push Tom's excesses back into their box, but I think that in their ideological zeal to "remove the silliness" from the show they also removed some "spark" from their star, to the extent that he just comes across as being weary and bored with the whole thing.

Having said that, the costumes and sets are of a high quality and the model of the Hive is pretty impressive. The Pangolin are also a good attempt at creating an alien species with a convincing backstory, haunted by atrocities from a generation before. The Fomasi might be a somewhat generic reptilian monster, but by limiting their appearances in the early episode to occasional glimpses of a claw or an eye, director Lovett Bickford heightens the tension for their eventual reveal - and I actually like their design, even if we have the traditional Doctor Who problem of how they get those huge heads into the tiny human masks.

It's also all change on the incidental music front. Gone is Dudley Simpson's traditional score, replaced by the Tangerine Dream inspired music from Peter Howell. Later attempts at using all electronic music during this era of the show fail terribly, but here at least there is a feeling of something really new and different. There is a kind of ethereal cinematic quality to the music which fits beautifully with the world of the Pangolin.

I think my one main problem with "The Leisure Hive" is that it isn't a terrible story - in fact it's core concept is quite unique -  but it's not a great one either. It's just...okay. I have no strong reaction to it either way. There are also some fundamental questions left unanswered - Why did the Doctor not get torn to pieces by the Recreation Generator?  Why did that Foamasi spacecraft explode? How does he return from being 1250 years old back down to 750 anyway, and without anyone noticing? Perhaps I'm being picky but these are the kind of cracks that normal 'hand waving' and fan acceptance can't paper over.


Meglos

Apparently Meglos is considered by many to be the "forgotten" story from season 18. Certainly the only thing I really knew about it in the years since it's original transmission (before I got to watch it) was that famous picture of Tom Baker's face covered in cactus spikes and that Jacqueline Hill was the guest star.

Tonally it does seem to somewhat of a throwback to the style of the previous season after the massive reinvention of "The Leisure Hive". Once you get past the batty idea of a sentient evil cactus wanting to take over the universe, Meglos himself is much more of a clichéd villain in a plot full of familiar themes (doppelgangers, religion versus science, an ineffective bunch of intergalactic space pirates...). Granted, there are few ideas thrown into the mix, including the time loop - sorry, "chronic hysteresis" - and an all-powerful macguffin with a great name, the Dodecahedron. 

Speaking of the "chronal hysterectomy", being able to play the same piece of footage multiple times must have done wonders for the budget (a shame they didn't spend it on the sets as it's certainly the shoddiest looking story of the season). I'm still not totally sure how repeating your actions and words gets you out of the loop. Just ask Mr C. Hamilton Bidmead -  he'll know. Ultimately all it means that the Doctor and Romana don't get to the main events until half way through episode two. Is that a bad thing? Well probably not, as the plot is so slow moving that by the time the Doctor gets to Tigella the various factions have probably only just decided who should make the coffee.

The guest cast is not up to much in this story either, but that is probably the fault of the script rather than the acting. Jacqueline Hill may be playing high priestess Lexa -  a role far removed from Barbara -  but to be honest the role is so one note and has nowhere to go that she is totally wasted. She does her absolute best with what little she is given but it's such a disappointment. Her death is also utterly pointless. Bill Fraser meanwhile manages to make General Grugger into a bit of an over the top buffoon, but that's okay as the pirates are really only there for comedy value anyway. You can hardly be fearful of a bunch of cut-throats who can't even figure out that a plant is impersonating a humanoid or where an extra burgundy coat came from. Having said that, Brotodac's constant obsession with it is very amusing. 

At least Baker makes up for all this by turning in a great performance as Meglos. His mannerisms and facial expressions are all subtly different from those of the Doctor and you do believe that the anthropomorphic cactus is arrogant and insane. It's the only saving grace in an other wise lacklustre production though which soon degenerates into a standard run-around with the villain grabbing a powerful weapon.  Part four last just 18 minutes, which can only be because everyone wanted to get this nonsense over with as quickly as possible.


Full Circle

It's incredible to think that Andrew Smith, was only nineteen when he wrote possible one of the most interesting and original stories of the JN-T era. It also deals with some complex themes of evolution and fear and how we as humans change as we learn from our past. This is the opposite of the residents of Alzarius, who seemed doomed to learn nothing because of the Deciders unwillingness to change and the huge effort they have taken to  to hide the truth about their own origins - all while speaking in hushed tones about supposedly important things in capital letters. Mistfall. The System Files. The Embarkation. Maintenance. It's almost religious (the running theme through this season it seems).  It's also a pretty unique story in that there is no behind-the scenes cackling manipulator, just misguided humanoids - with the scientist Dexter being the closest the serial has to a real villain with his attempts at the vivisection of the helpless Marshchild.

Speaking of which, as the rubber-suited "monsters" of the piece, the Marshmen are wonderful, especially in the part one cliffhanger as they rise in slow motion from the mist shrouded swamp. Director Peter Grimwade really makes the most of  the moment and the creature design to heighten the fear factor. The thing is, the Marshmen are not evil either -  just primal, instinctual creatures protecting themselves - and there is a lot more to them that meets the eye. It's another example of the shades of grey in Andrew Smith's script. He also takes care in drawing clear parallels between the behaviour of the humanoids and the Marshmen - Varsh is overwhelmed and killed by the swamp creatures yet the Marshchild is overwhelmed and killed by the humans. Who do you root for?

Elsewhere there is some really good guest casting. George Baker especially is excellent value as Login and James Bree gives a nice understated portrayal of the man at the top burdened with responsibility. Richard Willis is worthwhile as Varsh but the other Outlers are all a bit forgettable. This story is of course best remembered for introducing Adric the boy genius. Matthew Waterhouse's debut on screen is... not bad. Yes he's annoying, but then many teenagers are (I know I was). We're not yet at the point where poor characterisation and underdeveloped acting talent make the character more of a liability that an asset. Maybe it would have made more sense to leave Adric on Alzarius (perhaps assisting the Deciders) but that's not what we got...


State of Decay

This is a blend of the old and the new. Uncle Terrance writes a traditional script that wouldn't have been out of place in the Robert Homes era  - evil tyrants, downtrodden peasant rebels and lashings of gothic horror ripped from the Hammer template with gay abandon. Yet it's also suffused with the patented Bidmead love of scientific explanations and made up jargon. Of course the Dicks spin on the vampire element is that the Three Who Rule are the lost crew of the spaceship Hydrax, given eternal life by the Great Vampire of Gallifreyan legend.

There is a classic example of the "power behind the throne" going on here. Zargo and Camilla may seem to be the King and Queen but they don't really do very much except float around and bare their fangs every once in a while (as creepy as that is). No it's Aukon who is really in charge, barking commands and oozing menace and very good he is at it too. Emrys James turns in an excellent performance as possibly the season's best villain, but all three actors portray the vampire creatures with a somewhat sensual subtext. Certainly Camilla and Aukon seem to be interested in Romana and Adric for more than just their blood. I also love the red eye makeup on all three - it works particularly well on Zargo and Camilla.

The story  revels in the clichés and melodrama and atmosphere of its horror roots. A chase through dark woods by blood-sucking bats? Check. Creeping into a cobweb strewn chamber trying not to wake the sleeping monster? Check. A vampire being stabbed by a knife only to pull it out of its chest and toss it away? Check. A monstrous creature rising from the depths after an eon-long sleep? Triple check. It's all wonderful stuff. Add in some revealing nuggets of Time Lord history (does *everything* have to be named after Rassilon?) is the icing on the cake.

Tom puts in a wonderful performance as the Doctor with all traces of the flippancy of the previous season gone by this point. It's very clear that Baker and Lalla Ward were extremely close by this time and their chemistry shows on screen - most obviously in the scene where the Doctor and Romana are locked in a cell together. For Matthew Waterhouse this was the first story he recorded and although it isn't his worst performance, he's sadly not in the slightest bit convincing when he "betrays" the Doctor and Romana. I guess they were still trying to play up the (supposedly) morally dubious, "Artful Dodger" aspects of his character, with him changing sides dependant on who he saw as having the upper hand. Or it could all have been a big bluff. You just can't tell.

All in all "State of Decay" is probably one of my favourites of the season. I'm even willing to overlook the slightly dodgy ending with the rocket ship because the rest of the story is so much fun. One thing did puzzle me - and I'm willing to accept that this just might be me being unobservant - what exactly was "The
Wasting"? Is it ever explained?


Warriors Gate

Not only is this a story which boldly has nothing but a blank white space as one of its major sets, but for the second time this season it also throws every normal convention of what a Doctor Who villain should be out the window. Instead of  a mad scientist or aliens attempting world domination, we have a ruthless space captain who is just frustrated and driven crazy at not being able to get home. I've worked with similar kinds of people -  just one bad day away from going nuts and bashing their heads against the photocopier glass or attacking the receptionist with a stapler, because the simplest things irritate them to the point of mania. In complete contrast, Rorvik's crew are just a bunch of workmen who get on with the job with a resigned sigh and look forward to their next lunch break. Aldo and Royce remind me of the main characters from Tom Stoppard's "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead" - only tangentially involved in the main plot but commentating on events from the side-lines with a world weary and cynical attitude. "It'll all end in tears, mark my words...". What is also interesting about the Privateer crew is that - just this once, everybody dies (spoilers!) . While no one is fully good or evil, all of them are guilty of something, even if in Aldo and Royce's case it's just apathy, where they allow the Tharils to needlessly suffer as they revive them.

Warrior's Gate also has one of the more well realised and morally ambiguous races seen in Doctor Who. The Tharils start off as seemingly innocent creatures, but as the story progresses we learn that they have been rulers of their own cruel and oppressive regime. It also seems that even though they have the unique ability to walk between alternate timelines, they still ended up trapped in slavery to the humans. Perhaps the universe is punishing them for their prior arrogance and tyranny. The creature makeup and costumes are extremely effective. The lionesque appearance immediately conjures up the idea of a noble people. But just like the earth-based big cat, the calm façade hides the true savage beast within.

Despite there only being minimal sets, the costumes, make-up, design and direction is superb. The Gundan robots are a wonderful creation, the Privateer sets look suitable grungy (don't you just love that slow panning shot through the corridors at the start of episode one?) and the Tharil banqueting halls look both sumptuous and dilapidated dependant on the time period. Lovett Bickford really tried to bring a cinematic sensibility to a cash-strapped BBC studio production and despite the well documented behind the scenes problems, I personally think he succeeded admirably.

Of course the departure of Romana (and K-9) is a sad one, but it seems a natural progression of the character. She has seen too much to return to the stuffy corridors of Gallifrey, and wants to make a difference in the universe like the man who has influenced her so much. It's a wonderfully underplayed scene between Baker and Ward and like the departure of Leela, the Doctor seems genuinely upset to lose his companion.


Keeper of Traken

It's time for a story that mixes the Brother Grimm with the Old Testament (plus the return of an old foe), to great effect. Romana and K-9 are gone and the Doctor is left with just a precocious teenage boy to help him. The fairytale elements are there right from the start as the Keeper relates the backstory and history of Traken. All that is missing is a "Once upon a time...". His powers may be science based but he might as well be a wizard for all the sense they make. This mythic feel continues when we set foot on Traken itself, with beautiful princesses, wicked stepmothers and walking statues - and don't forget magical rings which have to be brought together in order to access the Source. It's all wrapped in a pseudo-Shakespearean society where despite the technological marvels at hand, everyone spends their time making friends and tending their rosebushes. It can't last of course. There is a veritable serpent of evil in the alien 'Garden of Eden'...

As the voice of Melkur / The Master, Geoffrey Beevers is having a wonderful time, his voice dripping with malevolence and insincerity. Inside the evil looking statue is....something even more evil. The reveal in part 3 is a genuine surprise. The charm of the old Master is still there as well. You can believe that his silky tones would convince Kassia to do his bidding even without the control collar. Hers is really a classic tragedy of a woman blinded by love into making a deal with the devil - resulting in her having to do evil things -  so it's a shame that Sheila Ruskin is simply not good enough, with her performance being hugely uneven and bordering on cringeworthy at times. In contrast Anthony Ainley gives a lovely low key and sensitive performance as Tremas. I think that his acting skill gets lost somewhat in later years amongst the Master's machiavellian "heh-heh-heh's", but here he is very restrained. The Master's absorption of Tremas is still a wonderful shock to end the story on. It's also probably fair to say that this is Adric's best story. He has a few nice lines with the Doctor in the TARDIS at the start and actually has something constructive to do in the story. Sarah Sutton is also excellent as Nyssa despite the fact it's obvious she wasn't conceived as a companion. In fact she has more to do in this this story than in most of her other regular appearances.

As well as the primary plot of Melkur trying to gain control of the Source, there is an underlying theme of change - the old being replaced with the new and being uncertain about the possible outcome. The ancient Keeper (almost a god-like figure) is replaced by a new individual and the instability that will bring to the Traken Union. Kassia doesn't want her life to change and to lose Tremas. The Master finally succeeds in cheating death and gets "a new body at last". Nyssa's life will never be the same again. And of course in the show itself JN-T has brought in sweeping changes and the Doctor  is about to be replaced by a different man...


Logopolis

This is of course a milestone in the history of Doctor Who. It's the end of an era and only fitting that the story is about a threat to the entire universe. There is a pervading funereal atmosphere and sense of impending doom as the Fourth Doctor realises that not only did he get things wrong in his previous adventure and allow the Master to escape, but now the consequences are huge and add to that he is running out of time. His own fate is unimportant and he must give his life to stop the destruction of everything. The idea of a bunch of strange haired old men sitting in caves and mumbling quadratic equations to themselves to hold back the end of the universe is a great one even if - despite all the attempts to "science it up" by chucking in mentions of entropy and  heat death - it's total nonsense. The Monitor does look like Noel Edmonds though.

(Deal or No Deal ?)

Equally the concept of the TARDIS's inside each other ad infinitum, each one getting darker and darker, is very effective and creepy. Then we have The Watcher. Is it the Master? Rassilon? The White Guardian? It's kept deliberately vague until the very end and adds to the feeling of foreshadowing and predestination. The show will try this kind of thing again with the "four knocks" at the conclusion of David Tennant's run, but it's here that it works best.

To add to the Doctor's woes, this incarnation of the Master is not the debonair charmer from before - he's now a power crazy maniac and his actions directly affect the Doctor's companions. Tegan's aunt is shrunk to death and Traken is destroyed - plus several other innocent Earth people and Logopolitans lose their lives, not to mention the countless millions wiped out by the now unchecked forces of entropy. The Master has murdered before but it has never been this personal and never on such a scale. Creepily, the Master also impersonates Tremas to confuse and manipulate the distraught Nyssa. It would have been interesting to see more of Nyssa's horrified reaction to the loss of her planet and an evil alien walking around in her fathers body, but there was obviously limited screen time and we have the introduction and development of Tegan to deal with. Janet Fielding makes a reasonable début and her emotional shrieking is nowhere near the annoying decibel levels of the first Davison year. At least she is reacting with some reality to a terrible situation.

The new Master might be more ruthless but his plans are no better thought out. Did he not realise that if he destroys Logopolis that he'll not have a universe left to dominate? Plus if he is talking to the entire population of the universe to hold them to ransom using a 1980s tape recorder, how does he expect them to answer back? Look, there are lots of plot holes and odd things going on in "Logopolis" - Nyssa appearing from nowhere, Adric being reduced to reading out a bunch of sums, the strange plan to get rid of the Master by flushing him out with a large helping of Thames water. The thing is it doesn't matter. The reason? Tom Baker is simply magnificent. It's possibly the most solemn and intense performance of his long tenure on the show - that of a man who knows his fate and is still determined to see it through and stop his arch enemy no matter the cost.

Part of that cost is being forced by circumstance to team-up with his enemy.That cliffhanger at the end of part three is simply chilling. A simple handshake that must have made the viewers at the time really sit up and think "this time it *must* be serious". There has always been (intentionally) a touch of the Holmes / Moriarty relationship between the Doctor and the Master and it's never been more obvious than their final tussle on the top of the Pharos Project gantry with it's echoes of the fight at Reichenbach Falls. The difference is that in this case there is no miraculous escape for the Doctor, and his Fourth incarnation is no more.

Tom Baker was and always will be *my* Doctor. I grew up with him - starting as a innocent seven year old through to being almost fourteen by the time his end came. It's no wonder then that the Fourth Doctor's regeneration was the most emotional one I witnessed - and I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a tear in my eye and a lump in my throat. Oh I was old enough and savvy enough to know that it was just a change in actor and that Peter Davison would be along soon enough, but even so it was like part of my childhood was leaving. Time to at least pretend to grow up I guess. That final scene, that music, those flashbacks, the ultimate realisation of who the Watcher really is as we hear those words "It's the end...but the moment has been prepared for", are all embedded so deep inside me now that I only have to hear the electronic notes as the camera pans down to the Doctor's prone body on the grass, and I'm back in 1981. It's truly one of the most spine tinglingly sensational moments in Doctor Who history and as far as regenerations go only one other has even come close to making me feel the same way.

Farewell Doctor.

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Hello Doctor.

View from The Fifth Row 5 - Our Man Flint

Something a bit more well known this week - one of my all time favourite spy movies starring one of my all time favorite actors....

Forget James Bond. Forget Matt Helm, Harry Palmer, Maxwell Smart, Bulldog Drummond and even Austin Powers. The toughest, sexiest, greatest secret agent of the 1960s was only one man. A karate champion, brain surgeon, swordsman and nuclear physicist. A man able to talk to dolphins and make love in 47 languages. A man who thinks a Walther PPK and an attaché case with a concealed throwing knife are "crude". The man who put the SUPER in super-spy. Derek Flint.

In the late 1960s, in the wake of the huge success of the first three Sean Connery films, other studios wanted a piece of the Bond-mania action and came up with their own take on the secret agent franchise. Of course there had been early attempts at aping the genre Bond made so successful but these were mostly out and out comedies or broad farce - Dirk Bogarde as "Agent 8 3/4" or "Carry On Spying" - plus of course TV legends Morecambe & Wise in "The Intelligence Men". Rat Pack lounge crooner Dean Martin would basically be himself as the booze-loving, easy-going, wisecracking playboy Matt Helm in four films from 1966 onwards. But when director Daniel Mann needed someone to play laconic master spy Derek Flint, he turned to James Harrison Coburn III.

Coburn first came to prominence as the knife-throwing cowboy Britt in the classic 1960 western "The Magnificent Seven" (even though he has only eleven lines of dialogue in the whole film) and followed this up with several memorable tough guy roles in "Hell Is For Heroes", "The Great Escape", "The Americanization Of Emily" and "Major Dundee". He also just missed out on the lead role in "A Fistful Of Dollars".  His lanky frame, Cheshire Cat grin and thatch of silver hair meant that he perhaps wasn't a conventional Hollywood leading man, but he exuded an aura of confidence mixed with a touch of insubordination, turning him into the embodiment of 1960s effortless cool.

I'm sure I was aware of Coburn as an actor through TV viewings of some of his films in the mid 1970s but it was really two other factors that primed me for what is still (in my mind at least) his most iconic role. Firstly I became a big fan of spy novels and films, particularly the James Bond series. Around eleven or twelve years old I discovered and devoured the original Ian Fleming books, borrowing them in batches from the local library. The films were also turning up on TV on a regular basis and I always made time to watch them whenever I could. I also clearly remember a thrilling trip to the cinema with my grandfather in the school holidays to see a double bill of "Live And Let Die" and "The Man With The Golden Gun". Roger Moore was *my* Bond and I still think that those are his two best movies. The second important thing (as has been repeated throughout my life) was a comic strip. In 1979, in Prog 140, 2000 AD began their adaptation of Harry Harrison's first "Stainless Steel Rat" novel - scripted by Kelvin Gosnell with art by the incomparable Carlos Ezquerra. It's a fantastic story with many twists and turns -  and the design of the Rat himself, aka 'Slippery' Jim diGriz, is clearly based on James Coburn...

Ezquerra's depiction of DiGriz through this and two subsequent comic strip sequels ("...Saves The World", and "...For President") is so ingrained in my mind that I cannot picture anyone but James Coburn in the role. Even when I read the novel and it's many sequels and prequels, it's James Coburn delivering those lines.  It's such a shame then that a film or TV version never managed to get off the ground. Even in his later years Coburn would still have been the perfect choice. Anyway, it was not long after that initial 2000 AD story that I first discovered the delights of "Our Man Flint". I was astounded that I had not seen or heard of it before. Here was a film that combined the spy genre with a sprinkle of science fiction elements and a slightly futuristic comic book feel. It could almost be a 'Rat' story if you squinted a bit - Slippery Jim was just in disguise.

The story starts with a series of natural disasters caused by a weather-control device operated by the 'Galaxy' organisation, who are led by a trio of mad scientists. They threaten more disasters if their demands to take control of the planet and set up a 'utopian' scientifically regimented new world order are not complied with. A conference of world leaders meets with Cramden (Lee J. Cobb), the head of Z.O.W.I.E. (Zonal Organization for World Intelligence and Espionage) to discuss the crisis and they use their UNIVAC super-computers to figure out what to do next. Every single computer votes that there is only one man up to the task of stopping 'Galaxy' - ex Z.O.W.I.E. agent Derek Flint. But Flint is retired  - happy to spend his time is his groovy Manhattan bachelor bad with his every whim tended to by a bevy of women of varying nationalities. Cramden also thinks he is too much of a loose cannon who plays by his own rules and dismisses the idea -  until the president calls on his red phone and over-rules: "Get Flint!".

Ah now, that red phone. That unmistakable ringtone. You know it. I know it. It seems to have seeped into the public conciousness. It's this one:

That ringtone has appeared frequently in the "Austin Powers" movies of course, but it also cropped up in the criminally under-rated "Hudson Hawk". Bruce Willis has another link to "Our Man Flint", but we'll get to that later. Back to the plot...

Flint initially refuses to help, but when an attempt is made on his life with a poison dart while he is out dining with his 'playmates', he decides to investigate. A chemical trace on the dart leads the super-spy to Marseilles, then a specific brand of cold cream takes him to Rome and eventually to the secret base on Galaxy Island in the middle of the Mediterranean (hidden inside a volcano of course). This global chase includes one memorable scene which sees Flint engaged in a mock fight with Agent 0008, who bears more than a passing resemblance to a certain Mr. Connery. Naturally S.P.E.C.T.R.E. is namechecked and ruled out as the masterminds behind Galaxy's nefarious plot!

Flint is a master of - well, everything (which infuriates Cramden no end for some reason). He can fence with two opponents at the same time, and practice martial arts with five. He dances with the Russian ballet. He is a master of disguise. He turns down all the standard spy weapons in favour of his self-designed cigarette lighter which has 82 different functions - "83 if you want to light a cigar". While hunting the lab coated bad guys Flint also performs impromptu surgery, jumps starts a man's heart via a light bulb socket and traces a bouillabaisse recipe to just one specific restaurant on scent alone - all this while keeping his suits spotless, his demeanor unflappably cool and every woman satisfied (often with a single kiss, including his would-be assassin, Gila).  Oh and he can put himself into suspended animation and slow his heart rate to fake death (waking himself with his modified watch). He's a cross between Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, Doc Savage  - and Hugh Hefner.

Sneaking into the Galaxy complex, Flint must not only save the world but also rescue his four 'companions' who have been kidnapped by the misguided scientists. His cover is then blown by an eagle that's been trained to spot and attack Americans ("An anti-American eagle. It's diabolical...") and he is taken before Galaxy's trio of leaders. Refusing a chance to join their new world order, he narrowly avoids disintegration by using his nifty all-purpose lighter (slipped to him by the now loyal Gila). Flint sabotages the weather-control machinery and escapes the island with his playmates and Gila as the volcano erupts and the base sinks below the waves forever...

It's hard to put into words how much I love this film, but I'll try. I just have a huge James Coburn sized grin on my face every time I watch it. I think it's doing a great disservice to the movie to call "Our Man Flint" a James Bond spoof. Yes, it has elements of that, in that it takes the tropes of a 007 adventure and exaggerates them by turning the dial up to eleven, but to be fair the majority of the Bond movies are hardly serious drama. "Flint" walks the line just the right side of parody to make it a very entertaining homage and a great secret agent movie in its own right. The film capitalises on the hip "Coburn cool" - he oozes charisma and his magnetic presence dominates the screen. He's also pretty impressive in the fight sequences. While he seems to be flinging his arms and legs around while howling and making crazy faces (all without breaking a sweat), Coburn did train in the martial arts with Bruce Lee, so there is an underlying skill to these scenes. The actor also plays things as if he knows the inherent ridiculousness of the character but is having far too much fun to care. There is also one trick  - where Flint 'relaxes' by suspending himself between two chairs with no support - that Coburn was able to perform himself, needing no stunt double or special effects. What a guy!

Yes there is a certain amount of 60s sexism present (such as woman being captured by 'Galaxy' to be hypnotised into being "pleasure units"), but Flint himself seems to treat his harem of ladies with great respect - even though they do seem to constantly pester him for sex all the time (poor guy) to which he always replies "Later..." It's unfair to criticise a film for being a product of it's time though. Also worth mentioning is the fantastic Jerry Goldsmith score which is incredibly catchy and really pulls the whole film together.

The film was so successful that a sequel was released just a year later. "In Like Flint" is just as bonkers although possibly even more sexist, with a group of beauty salon executive women plotting to take over the world from the men that are ruining it. I still enjoy watching it but it hasn't stuck in my memory quite as much as Flint's first outing. Sadly it was nowhere near as popular at the box office and this disappointment along with Coburn's wish not to become typecast led to a potential third move - "F Is For Flint" - being canned.

The thing is, the impact of the Flint pair of movies is far more wide ranging than you might suspect. There are the obvious influences on the Austin Powers films of course, plus it beat Bond to the hollowed out volcano lair idea by two years - but the weather-control plotline was also used in the 1998 Ralph Fiennes version of "The Avengers" (although perhaps the less said about that the better). Better yet there is the name of the bald Galaxy agent who Flint kills in a bathroom in Marseilles which turns up in the classic action thriller "Die Hard". His name? Hans Gruber. See, I told you Bruce Willis was a fan...

The Idiot's Lantern 1 - Connections

So this is the part of the blog where I'm going to talk about TV shows that are not Doctor Who. However I couldn't resist using  the name of a David Tennant episode of the series as the overarching umbrella title for this section - it just seemed to fit. The intention is not really to talk about other science fiction or fantasy shows (although they may make the odd appearance) but to focus on the more unusual or important things that have captured my interest over the years.

I alluded to some of these in my "Things To Come" post back in April 2015, so now it's time to start the ball rolling. To begin with let's go all the way back to the 1970s...

There are some TV shows that stick with you because of their characters. Then there are others where the plot is so absorbing that you get lost in the narrative. There are those which make you marvel at the beauty and wonder of the world around us or astound you with their sheet audacity and originality. And there are those  - like the one I'm writing about today - which change the way you think. Possibly forever.

As a child, as much as I loved science fiction and fantasy novels I was also fascinated by real world science and technology. I think the wellspring of this was the BBC series "Tomorrow's World" which my dad watched religiously every week. This was the BBCs premier popular science programme running for a staggering 38 years from 1965 to 2003. Slotted in between the early evening news and the music chart run-down of "Top Of The Pops", the show covered a wide range of new ideas, developing technologies, achievements, failures and down right daft inventions, via studio demonstrations and location films. It also introduced the unsuspecting British publish to technology that would one day become commonplace such as the alcohol breathalyser, the pocket calculator, the digital watch and (in the early 80s) the personal stereo and the compact disc (with presenter Kieran Prendiville memorably spreading jam on a Bee Gees CD to prove its indestructibility!). By the time I guess I was old enough to understand things properly (around the mid 1970s), the series was in what many consider to be its most popular phase, with presenters Raymond Baxter, Michael Rodd, Judith Hann and William Woollard (with Prendiville joining in 1979) and attracting millions of viewers every week. For people of my age, *this* was the definitive set of 1970s opening titles:

The other key ingredient to this story is James Burke. A former English lecturer based in Italy, Burke had been presenting shows on the BBC for many years. He was one of the original Tomorrow's World team alongside Raymond Baxter and was the key BBC anchor for the coverage of the US and Soviet "space race", including the historic moon landing in 1969 (famously broadcasting for up to 30 hours in one stretch). His quietly intense, somewhat eccentric style was very popular with younger audiences of the time. Capitalising on his popularity, Burke left Tomorrow's World in 1969 and went on to present a series of illustrated science lectures in front of a studio audience called "The Burke Specials". Between 1972 and 1976 these shows covered a wide spectrum of topics on modern life and where it might be headed, including ID cards, test tube babies and super-computers, alongside informative but slightly mad studio demonstrations - all presented in Burke's trademark enthusiastic style. He was the Professor Brian Cox of his day. Just with a white safari suit and far less gazing off into the sunset.

By the time 1978 came rolling along,  I was eleven years old and in the first year of senior school. Science fast became my favourite subject (thanks in part to an excellent teacher whose name sadly escapes me - Mr. Keene perhaps?). I have fond memories of being part of one of the after school clubs and building water powered jet rockets and going to technology fairs to marvel at very early Apple machines. My parents bought me electronic project kits and I even had a build your own computer (I so wish I could find a picture of that - it had sliders and a plastic housing with different paper inserts and light bulbs which flashed when you "programmed" it to answer questions by moving the wires around). The teacher even starting lending me his copies of "New Scientist" magazine. Yes, I was that guy.

I'm sure I was too young to watch some of these early episodes of "Tomorrow's World" or "The Burke Special" when they were first transmitted  - or if I did sit there with my dad in front of the TV a lot of it may have gone over my head. The thing is something must have sunk in, because I was well aware of who James Burke was when he returned to television in 1978 after a two year break with what was to be his masterpiece...

Subtitled "An Alternative History Of Change", "Connections" was unlike any science documentary I had ever seen before. This wasn't a staid chronological retelling of the birth of modern science. Instead over ten programmes Burke circled the globe, carving a path through the history of technology to educate the viewer on subjects such as what on earth improvements in medieval castle fortifications and ivory billiard balls had to do with the creation of the movie projector - all through a series of what might seem to be random leaps of logic - the connections of the title. What's more he asserted that you could make these kind of links between just about any two historical discoveries or events if you looked hard enough. The series could be about anything and everything and it all mattered because a cascade of seemingly random events had lead to a major invention that changed our world forever - it was the butterfly effect in technological terms. The whole point was that you couldn't consider one thing in isolation. It's true - Everything *IS* Connected.

Further examples of Burke's genius lectures during the series were:

• how telecommunications exist because Norman soldiers had stirrups for horse riding and scientists tried to stop mine shafts from flooding.
• how you get from Greek astrological manuscripts to the modem day production line
• how the invention of a 16th century Dutch freighter led to the discovery of nylon

Burke also postulated that if new innovations develop because of the connections between past events and discoveries, then as time goes on the number of connections will multiply, and the speed of development of new technology will increase exponentially. Change causes more change. But what happens when this rate of change is too much for a person to handle? How will they cope? This was a concept I'd already come across in comics. The "Judge Dredd" strip in those early issues of 2000 AD had a name for it - "Future Shock" or "Futsie" (although they didn't invent the term - that was futurist Alvin Toffler is his book published in 1970). Hey, comics could be educational too !

To say that this series blew my mind was an understatement. Suddenly I could see that I wasn't an isolated individual, but part of something larger and greater stretching back into history and forward into the years to come. It made the young, innocent me *feel* connected, because what I did with my life might seem mundane or meaningless right then, but an insignificant moment could have potentially massive ramifications in the distant future. What's more this was a TV show that made me want to work hard to understand it because I was so fascinated. It might be a documentary but it was also a detective novel or a puzzle - could I work out what connected these seemingly random things with the final invention before Burke revealed it at the end? To keep viewers like me interested he would lay red-herrings and clues along the way, often questioning his theories, changing his mind mid sentence or memorably suddenly dismissing everything he had been saying for the last five minutes by walking off screen and then ducking back into shot to quip “except, that last bit isn't true at all..." or suddenly declaring “what this programme is *really* about is....”.  What is even more amazing is that you don't realise just how connected the series is until the last few minutes of the last episode, when Burke pulls back the curtain and reveals what linked all the innovations he has talked about together. Just stunning.

The series was incredibly successful both in the UK and overseas and led to an indirect sequel "The Day The Universe Changed" in 1985. This was a more chronological series concerned about the philosophical effects of science and technology and how we "change" the universe around us by altering our perception of it through the acquisition of knowledge. I was older then and just starting my working career, but I still lapped it up. Two further series of "Connections" followed in 1994 and 1997 but I am not sure they were ever shown in the UK as they were made for the American "The Learning Channel". Certainly I've not seen them as yet, but I will be seeking them out.

I can honestly say that there are two series which fundamentally changed the way I think about the world and made such an impression on me as a young man that the memories and reverberations have lasted for over thirty years. One is Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" (and trust me we will get to that in time). The other is "Connections".