Four weeks ago today Doctor Who fans I not only started something but I made a promise to myself which was to review each episode of season 23 AKA The Trial Of A Time Lord. Well as of today I have fulfilled that promise and I have to say it's been an interesting journey to go on full of ups and downs and alot of big hair and so I am finally pleased to present to you all my review of the season 23 finale The Ultimate Foe.
The plot of the episode is The Doctor's trial reaches it's conclusion but something is wrong and it's up to The Doctor to figure out what it is and to put a stop to it. Now here I would normally tell you my thoughts on this one story however given that season 23 has been one long story I can't really do that and so my thoughts on the season long story is that it is an interesting story filled with many twists and turns and for the time telling one story all series long was a rather bold move and so I have to give them credit for taking that risk however I do feel that this final serial should have been at least three or four episodes long just to wrap everything up.
This was the last serial and the last series to feature Colin Baker as The Doctor and while it's not his strongest serial it's a serviceable ending for his take on the character. Also starring in the serial is Bonnie Langford as Mel Bush , Lynda Bellingham as The Inquisitor , Michael Jayston as The Valeyard , Anthony Ainley as The Master , Tony Selby as Sabalom Glitz , Geoffrey Hughes as Popplewick and James Bree as The Keeper of the Matrix.
In terms of what I thought about the acting it was pretty decent that's honestly something which I can say has been strong across all of the season. The actors who you expect a great performance from in this serial do indeed deliver but alot of these solid actors just aren't given that much to do in the serial Lynda Bellingham only appears in a few scenes and the same goes for the main bad guy Michael Jayston which is a shame because they were really fun to watch.
Just like how everyone has their Doctor which is usually whichever Doctor they grew up with for me my Master is Anthony Ainley. The guy is just so fun to watch it's clear to me that he's having such a good time playing the character he really does get the character down in my opinion and while there will always be fans of the Roger Delgado or any other version of the character for me Anthony Ainley simply IS The Master.
For some reason this end serial is only two episodes long which for me just wasn't long enough to conclude the story in a satisfactory way. I honestly do feel that the serial would have worked more if it was three or four episodes long since then things that didn't get explained in the finished product like how The Master found a way into The Matrix and how The Master managed to locate two characters from The Doctors own adventures could be explained and even woven into the story for added effect.
I have to say I don't like Mel with her hair up it just doesn't suit her at all in my opinion I very much preferred the look that she had in Terror Of The Vervoids just because I feel that it suited the character more. That being said I do feel that she was slightly handled better in this episode then her introductory episode simply because she didn't get on my nerves as much this time around where as in the last episode she really did annoy me.
Alot of that I feel comes down to the fact that the first half of this serial was written by the late and great Robert Holmes. He gives the character some solid dialog and tries his best to make her a more rounded character but all of that hard work goes to waste in the second half of the serial thanks to writers Pip and Jane Baker who had to take over after Holmes sadly passed away which also means that alot her great dialog goes as does all the steps to make her an actually good character.
As well as being the last story for Colin Baker the first half of the episode was the last story for script editor Eric Saward with producer John Nathan-Turner being the uncredited script editor for the second half. It was during my watch of this episode that I realised that alot of the stories that I liked in this season all had Eric as the script editor and the one I didn't like Terror Of The Vervoids had John Nathan-Turner in the role gee I wonder if there's any connection.
Now I did promise in my last review that I would go into more detail about the actual trial and I intend on living up to that promise. However before I do I want to say that to me alot of this episode just looked cheap which is something that I should never say since Doctor Who has always had the budget of a Cheese Burger (I know some people prefer something to do with shoes but Cheese Burgers are cheaper) but those other stories always turned that into an advantage here tho they just showed us is how cheap everything looks.
Let us finally talk about the trial itself I liked how they did the trial by having the Valeyard present The Doctor as this evil person it makes us question The Valeyard even tho he's for all intense and purposes doing his job. However as the series goes on we find out very slowly that there's more to him then meets the eye and I love the banter he has with The Doctor in those early trial scenes they add in some much needed humour in my opinion.
I also liked that kind of as a way to rub it in The Doctor's face he knows the The Inquisitor's first name even going as far as to refer to her by it on several accusations. I did like that The Valeyard is a possible incarnation of the doctor which is a really interesting idea and it does make me wonder if the character will ever show up in the newer series of the show , however I do feel that the character could have been handled a bit better since his motivation makes no sense since if he kills The Doctor he'd also kill himself.
Overall this is not only the end of Colin Baker era but it's also the end of this mini review series and it's been quite a ride but I can now finally put my Season 23 blu-ray to rest. As for what I thought about this episode it was a serviceable ending to the story but like I said it needed a few more episodes just to really do it justice and on a side note I hate that they use the current logo for these classic collection blu-rays and DVD's I honestly that it would have been more fitting if they used whatever logo was used for that season or era as for this episode it gets a 7 out of 10 from me.