Maybe in the future, I should judge what films I watch based on if I crack a smile or not looking at the synopsis, because when I noticed that The Doom Busters was about British citizens serving in the Home Guard uncovering an alien presence during World War II, I […]
Pop Culture
The Last Sacrifice (Glasgow FrightFest 2025)
On Valentine’s Day, 1945, the body of a man named Charles Walton, was discovered on the grounds of the farm where he worked on the edge of Meon Hill, Warwickshire. Walton’s demise had been a particularly gruesome one – he had been murdered with a pitchfork and bill-hook in a […]
Doctor Who A-Z #59: The Daemons (1971)
For the second time in as many years, Doctor Who closes a season by closing the book on a particular version of the show. And just like the last time, there isn’t much of a change in the cast and crew to explain the tonal shift. When Season Nine of […]
Doctor Who A-Z #58: Colony in Space (1971)
It’s strange that Colony in Space tends to be the forgotten soldier of Season Eight. It is, after all, the story in which the Third Doctor gets to travel to an alien planet for the first time, ending an Earth-based format which a considerable number of fans find hard to […]
Doctor Who A-Z #57: The Claws of Axos (1971)
Bob Baker and Dave Martin have a reputation in Doctor Who fandom as undisciplined writers, a reputation that comes in part from the production of this, their first script for the show. The Claws of Axos was originally intended as a Patrick Troughton seven-parter and ended up being broadcast as […]
Doctor Who A-Z #56: The Mind of Evil (1971)
A contemporary audience would not have seen The Mind of Evil as a throwback. Two stories in to Jon Pertwee’s second season, and Doctor Who is already hard to recognise as the same show Patrick Troughton and William Hartnell starred in. Don Houghton’s story also features the show’s newest ingredient, […]
Doctor Who A-Z #55: Terror of the Autons (1971)
Here he comes, folks. The Autons might be the headline monsters but there’s no question who steals the show. In introducing the Doctor’s most frequent enemy, Terror of the Autons makes good use of the show’s recurring props, with a gently modified version of the TARDIS materialisation sound effect heralding […]
Doctor Who A-Z #54: Inferno (1970)
Season Seven is one of those seasons of Doctor Who that’s cherished, in part, because it has a unique tone which the show immediately moved on from. You can think of other examples: seasons Fourteen, Seventeen, Eighteen and Twenty-Six have the same air, as do series four and ten of […]
Doctor Who A-Z #53: The Ambassadors of Death (1970)
Despite only being Jon Pertwee’s third story, The Ambassadors of Death is a story defined by endings. This is true in a narrative sense: the final moments of the serial, where the Doctor simply walks off and leaves the Brigadier to sort out the diplomatic fallout, feels like something that […]
Doctor Who A-Z #52: Doctor Who and the Silurians (1970)
The Jon Pertwee era gets some stick for showing the Doctor working alongside the military, but in a strange way it’s the series’ essential anti-militarism that makes this work. At no point does the Doctor reject the principle that invasion, colonisation and enslavement are the acts of villains, and since […]