Originally Posted by BritCanuck
If you want, I could tell you why I thought "Delta and the Bannermen" was my favorite Season 24 episode…
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Originally Posted by Danny Stewart
Sure, go ahead.
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At Danny's request, here is
Brit Canuck's review of "Delta and the Bannermen".
Disclaimer: bear in mind that I labeled this as my favorite Season 24 story, not the best Season 24 story.
Well, okay. Upfront, this was part of Season 24 of the Classic Series, widely regarded as the worst season in terms of quality, not to mention the season with the most British TV celebrities shamelessly guest starring (wacky comedian Ken Dodd had a glorified cameo in the first episode of this one). And the whole idea of running around a holiday camp in South Wales dodging alien mercenaries and bounty hunters will sound to some even more laughable than much of the plot of "Partners in Crime".
There was also children’s TV personality Bonnie Langford ("Saturday Starship") to contend with, but to be fair, a) her successor was also a children’s TV personality who lucked out and got better scripts than Langford, and b) everyone pointed and laughed when Catherine Tate’s return at the beginning of this past season was announced, and she quickly proved most of them wrong, so let’s give Bonnie the benefit of the doubt for now.
Here’s what I thought "Delta and the Bannermen" did have in its favor.
1) A strong, capable supporting heroine.
Delta, the Chimeron Queen, played by acclaimed (and also doomed-"Krull"-villainess-turned-goodie) actress Belinda Mayne, most of her race wiped out, baby daughter with an astronomical growth rate and a singing voice louder than an opera singer in tow, being chased around the galaxy by Don Henderson, with Sylvester McCoy coming to her rescue. Argubly a dramatic plot going there. Seems like a damsel in distress, but able to hold her own in a couple of battle scenes. Characters like that are few and far between on the New Series, and their survival rate is usually kind of low, too.
2) A fairly good supporting character who was actually, genuinely considered as a new Companion.
Rachel (aka. Ray), the girl with the motor scooter and the satchel full of every conceivable tool ever known to mankind (even a Dinky Allen Key, if I remember correctly), played by then-future "Emmerdale" actress and later home shopping channel personality Sara Griffiths. (Never saw "Emmerdale", but wasn’t Sara’s character romantically linked to a character played by Frazer "Jamie" Hines?) Ray was just a supporting character, but spent a good amount of time with the Doctor throughout the story and developed a small but passable rapport. With her bag of tools and his bottomless pockets, they would probably have made a good pair together in the TARDIS, had Bonnie made up her mind a little quicker.
3) Don Henderson.
The Bannermen leader Gavrok made a pretty good villain, not one of the usual bwah-ha-ha-ha types, but ruthless (vaporizing his own hired bounty hunter instead of paying him) and cunning (always one step behind our heroes), but interesting in many respects, from his willingness to join his troop of hapless extras on the front line, to his fondness for raw meat. (Plus, he’s the one who finally gets rid of Ken Dodd’s character, making him a hero to many critics.)
You’ll also find some similarities to an average RTD story here, including a silly love story involving two different species (Delta + Billy = Doctor + Rose), a gratiously high body count (including an entire busload of wacky space tourists), and an almost total lack of sense, sensibility and logic. It’s a shame RTD isn’t remaking this, really – could he do better or worse than original scribe Malcolm Kohll?
And before I forget, there’s that infamous cameo by music man Keff McCulloch as that doo-wop backup singer.
Overall, "Delta and the Bannermen" is light years away from being the best episode of "Doctor Who" – in fact, it’s more likely one of the downright silliest episodes. But throughout it all, there’s a sense of relatively upbeat fun, and perhaps a little nostalgia for those who have actually spent a week at a holiday camp on a high school trip, as I once did. Coming in the middle of Season 24 as it did, "Delta and the Bannermen" is still unexpectedly full of fun.
Originally Posted by Danny Stewart
Just because (the clam in "Genesis of the Daleks") looked cheesy doesn't make it horrendously flawed on a conceptual level ("Partners in Crime").
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I love the way you think sometimes.