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With the exception of a few short clips, The Underwater Menace provides those of us who weren't alive in the mid 1960s with their first glimpse of Patrick Troughton's Doctor. Even then it's only a fleeting glimpse as only episode 3 has survived the BBC's archive purge. Storywise, The Underwater Menace has long been regarded as a bit of a clunker, and this audio presentation doesn't really change things. We might not have to cringe at the BBC's attempt to represent Atlantis on Doctor Who's budget, but the story itself is hardly that impressive anyway. In this form, episode 3 also loses the Fish People's ballet sequence, which might be largely pointless but at least looks quite nice. Plot-wise, The Underwater Menace is very poor, probably the weakest of the entire Second Doctor era. The late addition of Jamie to the regular cast means some there's sharing of lines. Polly in particular is very poorly served here, spending most of her time crying and screaming (although the end of episode 1 is quite effective). The guest characters are all equally poor as well. It's typical of Doctor Who to get someone like Colin Jeavons onto the show and then waste him in rubbish like this, while Joseph Furst's Professor Zaroff is probably the most over-the-top villain in the show's history, especially during the cliffhanger to episode 3. On the technical front, Mark Ayres has performed his usual sterling work on the audio front, and Anneke Wills' narration is fine. As with the more recent Missing Story CDs there's also an interview tagged on after the final episode where Wills discusses the making of this particular story. Despite this good work, this release has to get a poor mark as the original story is so poor. One for the completists only, I'm afraid. back to the top |
THE UNDERWATER MENACE |
