The Invasion of Time
Previous: Underworld
The Invasion of Time
It just occurred to me that watching this AFTER The Deadly Assassin might've been a better idea. Oh well, here we go...
Now this is unusual: starting the Doctor of in the middle of an adventure instead of landing in the TARDIS.
LEELA! Always wonderful to see you again! On the other hand...dear god, that is the tribal miniskirt to end all tribal miniskirts.
Also, somehow I don't think K-9 is sulking. I think you just turned him off. Along with the rest of the TARDIS.
Oh wait, I was wrong. AAAAAAWWWWWWWWW... #savagesandtheirrobotdogs #themostadorableever
Whatever Four is signing, it appears to be giving someone "complete control of the Time Lords." That sounds like the opposite of good.
Also, his scarf seems to have magical teleportation powers. Considering this is Four we're talking about, this shouldn't surprise me.
"Order K-9 to tell you to shut up."
"K-9, the Doctor said you're to tell me to shut up. ......how DARE you."
Drama drama drama.
Why hellooooo Andred. May I say you're looking mighty fine today? Also, I'm afraid those pants leave far too little to the imagination.
(No, seriously, those pants.)
I'm pretty sure I mentioned this in my Shada commentary, but Gallifreyan writing seems to looks different nearly every time we see it.
"Where's Leela?"
"Immersed, master."
"What?"
"Totally immersed in H2O."
Wait, so she's taking a ba-OH GOD HELLO FANSERVICE FOR THE DADS.
So THAT'S the TARDIS swimming pool. Wow. Leela's wet-scene is almost more suggestive than the boys from Full Circle. Skin-colored leathers.
On the other hand, her swimming around with the inflatable pool toys is kind of adorable.
Huh. According to the InfoText, this scene was originally supposed to show a Gallifreyan city outdoors. That would've been cool!
"We're here to arrest you."
"Well let's get on with it! Come on, Leela."
This scene is weird even by Tom Baker standards...
"I claim the Presidency of the Council of Time Lords!" ...and now he's just striding in and declaring himself HBIC. ...Well okay then.
K-9. BAD DOG. YOU DO NOT TALK TO SEXY LIKE THAT.
*goes to Wikipedia* Now I'm not sure if this "I am the President" stuff actually does have to do with The Deadly Assassin...
Wow. I spoke too soon. Yes, this is more or less a sequel to The Deadly Assassin.
Sweet baby jesus. Either Tom is acting his balls off like never before, or he's on something STRONG (and I might just want some.)
Castellan, what are you gloves even?
Also, I love how he's being the complete opposite of Borusa in the kissing-the-Doctor's-ass department.
Four seems to be asking for a lead-lined bedroom. Well okay then. (I'm going to be saying that a lot this serial, aren't I?)
Leela does not like playing dress-up. Kitty wants her claws back.
"But...Leela, if you could avoid killing anyone, it would help." Kitty has her claws back!
And now, Two Random Time Lord Dudes present: Talking About Science.
Awww, I should've done another Counter of Rassilon for this story.
I think I am rendered physically incapable of taking this scene seriously whenever that music plays. What is that, anyway, a pipe organ?
I mean, normally pipe organs are awesome, but this is a Space Pipe Organ that's having a bad day and is drowning its sorrows in coffee.
So Tom's been looking dazed and hung-over as all hell the entire episode but it isn't until the cliffhanger that he actually falls over.
Yikes. It sounds like the matrix is literally burning Four's brain o_o
Also, what is it with Time Lord gloves. Seriously.
Leela, by now the Doctor should've introduced you to the expression "don't bring a knife to a gun fight."
Okay, I'm going to go ahead and make this joke: RUN, LEELA, RUN.
Four, did you have a bad drug trip? Four, are we going to have to have an intervention? We love you very much, but you have a problem.
I'm pretty sure I mentioned this in Arc of Infinity, but Gallifreyan guards aren't really that good at their jobs, are they?
Wait a sec...Fourth Wall, where did you go?
Four, are you talking to the chair? Or yourself? Or your imaginary friend we've never met before? Explain yourself, boy.
Or is this guy actually a duplicate Four and he's talking to the real Four who's invisible for some reason? I don't even know.
Yikes. So THAT'S what @TARDIS_Tara meant when she said the scarf from this season was over a foot wide.
("It was Tom Baker's idea to walk with moves from hopscotch.") Offfff *course* it was.
"Bow to the Sash of Rassilon."
"...I'm with him."
Leela. LEELA. I love you and everything you chose to be.
Showing fear in the face of danger? Now this isn't like you at all.
I forgot how much I missed Four/K-9 banter. This scene is just golden. Trying hard not to quote the whole thing.
Now I have to ask: when did Time Lords suddenly become obsessed with brightly colored plastic chairs?
A Time Lady appeared! And she and Leela are having a nice little chat about the nature of non-intervention. Bechdel Test: Passed.
Aww, Andred's first Jelly Baby. He likes it!
Suspicious Castellan is suspicious.
And that, sir, is why you do not mess with K-9 even when you're not actually messing with him.
Those were surprisingly dynamic (and filmed?) shots of K-9 blowing things up.
Oh noes! Gallifrey is being taken over by GIANT SHEETS OF TIN FOIL!
This is a Tom Baker's Evil Laugh Appreciation Post.
Interesting choice for ladies holding hands and running away together.
Ah, Four's got his lead-lined room, maybe NOW we'll finally know the method to his madness?
Okay, I *think* I get it now... also, nice cloaks, ladies.
Huh. I didn't know they had British quarries on Gallifrey.
Also, I didn't know said quarries had roaming bands of Gallifreyan savages.
I have to admit, they've done a nice job of capturing the red-ness that every description of Gallifrey included.
Poor Rodan, massive culture shock just outside your own city can't be easy, can it?
"What color would you prefer, sir?"
"Orange."
"There doesn't appear to be an orange one..."
*SLAM* "...One grows tired of Jelly Babies..."
Okay, despite all the power Four claims they have, the Tin Foil Lords are next to impossible to take seriously. I mean...wow, guys.
The Time Lord they're expelling says he's in his 10th regeneration. I wonder if the folks running the show then knew they'd get that far...
Four, the way you're using that sash I'd almost think you were a flasher.
BAMF Andred is BAMF.
Time Lord commander barging into your TARDIS with a gun? Sic your robot dog on him in the calmest way possible. Problem solved.
Oh riiiiiiight, this must've been a story where the TARDIS's state of temporal grace was actually working.
"But you have access to the greatest source of knowledge in the universe!"
"Well, I do talk to myself sometimes, yes."
"I mean the matrix."
Aww, K-9's only your second best friend, Doctor?
Interesting how Four and Andred hanging out is bringing out the extremes in each other: Andred seems more bland and Four seems more nuts.
On the other hand, watching Andred growing more and more puzzled is fairly entertaining.
Umm...why are you two looking indirectly at the camera and not at each other?
"We will now trace the circuit again and fuse it."
"But the circuit is part of the Academy! Instruction and investigation control!"
"We will give them a day off school. Blow it."
THIS IS A K-9 APPRECIATION POST.
I know I've made fun of the "costumes" already, but speaking of the Vardans themselves, honestly what threat do they pose?
I mean, we haven't seen them really DO anything yet. Their only real power seems to be mind-reading. So what do they do with that knowledge?
Tom, this is no time to be fellating electrical equipment. Save that for the giant green man-bits in Creature From the Pit.
And Andred, I think when K-9 says "helmet," he wants you to actually put the helmet ON.
And now we finally get to see the Vardans' true forms. I think Four's reaction put it best.
I only just realized: all the rogues are wearing furs, so what kinds of wild animals are there on Gallifrey?
Is this our first orbital view of Gallifrey? If so, I can see where the imagery from The End of Time came from.
TOM BAKER YOU ARE A COSMIC MANCHILD AND WE WOULDN'T HAVE YOU ANY OTHER WAY.
For most of this, Castellan has had One Of Those Faces I Can't Place and his actor's name looks familiar...
"What was that?"
"Someone vanishing!"
*eyeroll*
Because that is exactly how you react to that sort of news.
Aaaaand that's it for the Vardans!
BUT THEN THERE WERE SONTARANS.
I was going to mention this at the end of the last episode, but I'm glad they have the middle eight in the credits for this serial.
Huh. When. did the Sontarans. start talking. like William Shatner?
Apparently when you get shot non-fatally by a Sontaran laser pistol, you become temporarily engulfed in red velvet.
Ooookaaaaay, and when did all the gears and lead-lining disappear from Four’s President room?
Oh, never mind, there it is.
Ugh. Castellan. You are kind of a slimeball.
In other news, aww, Borusa’s so proud of his student.
“Oh! That was a prodigious throw!” #understatement
I still don’t get what’s up with all the brightly colored low plastic chairs. Is this a Time Lord citadel or a pediatrician’s waiting room?
…ah. Forget what I said earlier about being proud.
Never mind yet again. Borusa, you confuzzle me just a bit.
And now the Sontarans are talking like Ice Warriors.
Also, did they really think that just throwing themselves against a solid door would break it down? Oh wait…
Speaking of things sounding like other things, K-9 is suddenly sounding like a dentist tool I can’t quite put my finger on.
I hereby challenge someone to give me a story with a “this item is a legend and no one has found it” plot where they actually DON’T find it.
In other words, calling it now: Four finds the Key of Rassilon before the end of this serial.
“Leave me, Leela, save yourself!” Ah, we’ve reached that stage of dialogue, have we?
This conversation is making me more glad that I’m not doing these episodes on Twitter during the riots.
Well, I was partly right about the key. Four does find it, in a manner of speaking, but Borusa had it all along.
“…and I’ll kill you before I let that key fall into the hands of the Sontarans.” Kids, this is not your Eleven-with-a-jammy-dodger.
Now that I look at it, the Great Key kinda reminds me of the One Ring: massively powerful, but perfectly ordinary-looking.
“Chancellor’s personal forceshield. Unfortunately, the batteries seem uncomfortably low. So what would you suggest we do?”
“Run?”
“Run.”
“Let’s do that.”
I wonder if all TARDISes are equipped with suites for the various types of Time Lord leaders
Costume Fail of the Day: You can see VERY clearly the break between the Sontaran prosthetics and the actor’s real face.
And naturally we go out on Tom Baker gurning at the screen.
You know if I didn’t know better I’d say Tom just ran off the console room set to hit that switch (since when is there brick in the TARDIS?)
When Leela said that everyone was “in the bathroom,” I had to take a second and remember it means something different in the UK.
Sontarans = always ugly as balls. (Although I have to admit, New Who cleaned them up pretty well.)
Now this is interesting: usually when we see other parts of the TARDIS they still have a uniform design. THIS IS VERY DIFFERENT.
I wouldn’t be surprised if half Tom’s dialogue in that last scene was ad-libbed. There was something very...jerky about it.
“If I had a dog like you in my unit...I’d make him a sargent.” Andred, that’s probably the most epic thing you’ve said so far.
I will never not be amused by Leela turning into a loving mother-figure around K-9. #themostadorable
Um, Four, was it really necessary to put Rodan in hypnosis before running off?
Time Lords chilling poolside in full garb while drinking blue stuff through a twisty straw and reading about the Titanic. This show.
To clarify, yes, Borusa is reading a newspaper from the time of the actual Titanic sinking. Because.
Sontarans invading your poolside area? QUICK, THROW LOUNGE CHAIRS AT THEM!
Andred, with all due respect, I COMPLETELY fail to see how they could’ve missed you back there. Oh wait, the helmets…
On the other hand, kudos for keeping quiet when they accidentally shot you.
(“Then ‘a vine-type plant’ waves its tentacles at the Doctor, who responds, ‘Oh, it’s you again, is it? Want to make yourself useful for a change?’ Tom Baker was so pleased with the idea of the vine as a non-human traveling companion that he suggested that Leela’s replacement should be a talking cabbage sitting on his shoulder.”) OH TOM, YOU WOULD.
Im in ur tardis, nomming ur sontaruns.
Apparently the Doctor has an art museum in his TARDIS. This really shouldn’t surprise me.
Also, it’s becoming increasingly apparent to me that this episode is almost solely running around and almost zero advancement of the plot.
On the other hand, it’s the last episode so there isn’t that much plot left to advance.
Press a button on a sculpture’s ass and suddenly all the art disappears. Well okay then.
Ahhhh, THAT’S why he needed to put her under hypnosis. Also, wow, when did Four get so trigger-happy?
Well, to be fair, yes the Doctor does go shooty-shooty on people sometimes. There’s a whole video montage of it (NSFW).
Welp. That plan worked.
Woah, hang on, has Leela been left-handed this whole time?
Ahhhhhhaaaaaaaa, so THAT’S what mrtonylee meant in The Forgotten when Ten said that a side effect of the Key of Rassilon was amnesia!
“I’m staying.”
“What? Staying? Here? Why?”
*holds Andred’s hand*
“Ahhhh, I see.”
;______;
“Come on, K-9.”
“Negative. I remain.”
“Here?!”
“Affirmative!”
“Why?”
“To look after the mistress!”
AWWWWWWWW… #k9isthebestdogever
“Doctor?”
“Yes?”
“…I will miss you.”
*closes doors* “I’ll miss you too, savage.”
“Will he be lonely, K-9?”
“Insufficient data, mistress.”
GEE, I WONDER WHAT COULD POSSIBLY BE IN THAT K-9-SIZED BOX?
So THAT’S where the “cloud of happiness with teeth” gif came from!
Good ol’ Four, going out with a smile. Leela, we’ll miss you too. You were one of the best. And the Doctor won’t forget you either.
(No seriously, I’ve been really happy that nearly every time the Doctor goes back to Gallifrey after this he mentions checking up on Leela.)
Aww, I could’ve been watching this with the CGI turned on! Oh well…
Next: Season 16: The Key to Time Part 1: The Ribos Operation