A Journey Of A Thousand Eons...: 45. Crisis (Planet of Giants, Episode Three)

This half hour might not be as satisfying as the previous two...but it still has its moments.

...and I just love how there is this ‘villain’ plot that would have played out pretty much exactly like it does without the crew’s participation.  If anything, their attempt to call the police actually delays the local constable from arriving.  But I get ahead of myself...

The Doctor and Susan manages to escape their fight by hiding out in the overflow pipe, and the crew do reunite.  Using their wit and pluck, they endeavor--and fail--to call the police, and use an aerosol can to create an explosion that will attract the attention of said police.  Lucky for them, the officer was already on his way due to Forester’s plans not working and Smithers having a convenient attack of the conscience.  The crew do escape and Barbara is cured, as her increase in size and mass minimizes the peril to her body.

A lot is time is spent in problem solving--particularly trying to figure out how to use the telephone to get help.  The crew spend so much time in problem solving that the solution to our ticking clock is, well, sort of anticlimatic.  And considering Louis Mark has already set the unraveling of our villain’s plot into motion (the cop’s wife, who is the town telephone operator--ask your parents...I mean grandparents--doesn’t find Forester’s imitation of the murder victim convincing and sends the cop to check out what’s going on), we get the feeling that our quartet has been running around in the fringes of the plot not being able to do anything to impact it.

 

This isn’t as much a buzzkill as you might think.  The propwork is still great, even with the return of ‘the guys stand in front of a giant poster of what they’re supposed to be standing in front of.’  And the character work is still pretty solid; I particularly like the way the four leads collaborate in their problem solving so that no one is standing off to the side looking useless.  

While I would say that this last episode diminished the serial a little, it doesn’t change the fact that it is lots of fun, and a change of pace from the alternating historical/alien structure of last season.  And, as we’ll find out, that structure--both on screen and off--was about to change.