The Randomiser: Inferno

So from the Pertwee story fan wisdom has proclaimed the worst, to the Pertwee story fan wisdom has proclaimed the best - although fan wisdom, as I have perceived it, is probably less unanimous on that point.

( Cut because longer than usual )

We've now watched all of season 7 of Doctor Who. I do think it is an interesting, and generally extremely high quality, Doctor Who season and it definitely feels rather different (to me at any rate) to anything that came before or after. People often describe it as more "adult" but I'm not sure that quite captures it. I think it is trying to depict UNIT, and therefore the Doctor, as embedded in a wider network of organisations and institutions and, to an extent, portray that network in a more complex fashion than Doctor Who normally attempts (the three longer stories are full of multiple incidental characters with varying perspectives and agendas). I get a sense in a lot of these stories of a plot that is driven by the actions of mutiple characters (chief of which is the Doctor), rather than a plot that is driven primarily by the actions of the Doctor and an antagonist (obviously a format encouraged particularly by the imminent introduction of the Master).

Season 7 is also working quite hard to avoid the problem that the "only" present-day Earth stories you can tell are alien invasion or mad scientist. While Spearhead from Space (the shortest of the four and the new Doctor's introductory story) has a fairly straightforward alien invasion plot, the others all have interesting things to do with the basic tropes they are working from.

We get echoes of Season 7 through the remaining UNIT stories, but from here on the show becomes more focused on UNIT primarily as the Doctor's military backup, the problems he faces become more straightforward, and the Doctor moves more centre stage. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but I do wonder what the show would be like if it had continued making stories in the style of Season 7 a bit longer.