An almost-perfect revisit to Doctor Who's 'gothic' era...

Tradition's a funny old thing, isn't it? For no good reason some people cling to the same old routines year in year out, like some moth-eaten comfort blanket. How else can you exlain the horror that is New Year's Eve - AKA The Most Pointless Event In The Yearly Calendar. The same old boring routine: Paying extortionate amounts for a pub or restaurant ticket and thus being unable to move from a fixed position because of the crowds. Or staying in at home and getting annoyed when someone wants to watch Roland Rat soundalike Jools Holland and his annual festive self-indulgent flatulence. And then Auld Lang Syne, what the hell's all that about? All this big hoo-haa for...!

A clock changing.

Boggles the mind - especially the next day when the festive hi-jinks have proven too much for any sane person to bear. Just one example of why tradition is never a good thing. Even Doctor Who doesn't care much for tradition - just look at season 21 two-parter The Awakening, in which a simple visit to see Teabag's uncle ends up going awry. The trouble is, they've landed in the village of Little Hodcombe, where the muppet vilagers think it's a jolly lark to recreate a series of war games that took place long ago - oh, and to burn a woman at the stake, as you do.

If you want to trace the roots of this idea, then look no further than the 1971 Pertwee classic, The Daemons. Both stories feature a church that houses a malevolent being hell-bent on causing destruction. Both stories take place in an isolated village chock-full of people who don't seem to connect well with reality. And of course, both stories feature a beardy baddie, in thrall to the Big Bad In The Church. And while The Master did the honours in The Daemons, this time around, it's Sir George Hutchinson.

Ah, Sir George. Another in the long line of hammy, shouty panto villains. Strutting around like a man who's just come fourth in a Captain Hook lookalike contest, Sir George's lunacy knows no limits. He's perfectly happy to let the villagers take part in the war games, so that his master - a giant devil face thing called The Malus - can feed off all that hatred to grow in power. He's also perfectly happy to restart the odd tradition of burning the Queen Of The May - in this case, it's poor old Teabag who's been chosen to become the toast of Little Hodcombe. What's more, we learn that Sir George is a lawyer - a stark warning for anyone who thinks that lawyers just might be decent human beings.

Unfortunately, Sir George just doesn't quite work. It's a casualty of both the script and the acting. We never really understand why Sir George is in thrall to the Malus in the first place, apart from a rather clunky info-dump in the final confrontation scene. The general suggestion is that the Malus has promised him great power, but that's about it. And Denis Lill's performance seems to comprise one-note shouting and very little else. He starts off with the Manic-Ometer turned up at 1000, and as the story progresses, the dial on the Manic-Ometer goes up to maximum and then completely goes off the radar. Difficult to work out which Sir George bit is the silliest - it's probably the bit when he's on the horse, clutching his head and shouting out "NAAAAAWWWWW!!!!" at the top of his lungs, while other people stare at him like he's a plant from Beadle's About.

"The Awakening is actually a tautly-plotted, fast-paced 50 minutes of gothic horror and little village scares"

So that's a shame, but the Sir George problem is about the only cog in the wheel. The Awakening is actually a tautly-plotted, fast-paced 50 minutes of gothic horror and little village scares. There's no deep subtext or significant moral message (apart from of course, that Tradition Is Bad - much like one of the underlying messages in the previous season's Snakedance), but it's a welcome return to the mid-70s style of story of scaring kids. There's a greater emphasis on horror and macabre imagery than of late. The centrepiece is of course, The Malus. With its giant leering demonic face, its the sort of thing that would have sent the kiddies to bed with quaking nightmares. Add to that, the Mini-Malus and its infamous green spew, and you've got one of the most memorable monsters of the Davison years, not to mention a masterpiece of visual effects design.

There's also other creepy visuals scattered throughout the story like dormant bats. The weird sequence of the old hippy head in the disused barn. The phantom soldiers and their very sharp swords. And of course, the wince-inducing sequence in which the luckless baldy trooper is beheaded by the phantoms. The original sequence was edited for watershed reasons, but what we end up with is still nasty enough, thanks to Christopher Saul's blood-curdling scream and Teabag's horrified reaction. All of which add up to another example of season 21 trying to push the envelope that bit further with horror and violence. The previous couple of seasons had generally eschewed too many sticky ends (bar the odd story like Earthshock) but it's nice to see season 21 redress the balance.

Unless your name is Steven Moffat.

The characterisation is an improvement on Warriors Of The Deep. Colonel Wolsey is a good example, a genuinely decent sort, who at least knows when to quit when things get too tough. Glyn Houston is very good at these kindly bluff old cove roles, following on from his turn as Watson in 1976's Hand Of Fear, and he turns in another fine performance. Polly James is generally fine as Jane Hampden - note how the production team have teamed Davison up with the other Liver Bird after Kinda's Nerys Hughes. Although James is OK, she's not quite in the same league as Hughes, and that awful, prolonged shriek at the end of part one seems to go on for about 11 years. Out of the guest cast, it's Keith Jayne as Will Chandler who steals the show. Most grizzled 30-somethings will recognise Jayne as Stig Of The Dump, and he plays a Stig-esque rascal, who's managed to end up being transported from the past through to the present day. Jayne is excellent, striking a balance between serious drama ("Malus come!") and subtle comedy (his comments about tea at the end). Ironically, both Will and Jane are this story's companions, since both Teabag and Turlough are locked up most of the time. Poor old Mark Strickson - one minute, you've got a lot to do as the Rogue Companion From Hell, the next, you're locked up with a shuffling, floppy-fringed old git in a skanky shed. Although it always cracks me up when Strickson tries to get the most intense drama from shouting out "Guard! GUARD!!"

"If you're a fan of The Brain Of Morbius and The Masque Of Mandragora, then you won't go wrong with The Awakening"

Even if the production team have tired of the companions, there's still plenty to enjoy in The Awakening. Michael Owen Morris' lone contribution to the show is magnificent. Like all good directors, he knows how to make a sunny English village become a place of terror. He's also very good with the action and fight sequences (such as the hijack of the Queen Of The May in part two), and has assembled a very good team to bring the story to life. Peter Howell's creepy score is excellent as usual, while for the last time, Barry Newbery creates some outstanding gothic sets for the church interior, which are well on a par with his work for The Brain Of Morbius and The Masque Of Mandragora.

If you're a fan of these two stories, then you won't go wrong with The Awakening. It's probably the most successful of the early 80s two-parters, even with Sir George shouting the place down and the rather overlong Scooby Doo-style explanation in the TARDIS at the end. At the moment, it's probably only remembered by casual viewers for that ridiculous outtake when the horse and cart manages to take a whole archway along for the ride. Hopefully when the DVD ultimately emerges, it'll bring back all of those Malus memories in a flash. A little masterpiece, at least The Awakening puts season 21 back on the map with a tip of the hat to the good old days of Doctor Who.

John Bensalhia limbered up for this mammoth task with a full four-series review of Blake's 7, and writes professionally and recreationally all over the web. Check out his portfolio of work at Wordprofectors.

Check out John's previous Doctor Who review, Warriors Of The Deep

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