The Dalek Invasion of Earth

"The Dalek Invasion of Earth" arrives at the start of Doctor Who's second season, and so is probably a sound place to stop and look at how things had moved on since the series started a year previously. Interestingly, the characters of Ian and Barbara hadn't changed at all, perhaps partly due to their ingeniously simple original outlines or maybe down to credit due to the performers in question.

Ian, certainly, is a straightforward character, friendly, protective and reasonable. It would therefore be very difficult for the actor to screw him up. Even on the occasions where he does seem slightly more jocular than you'd imagine he would be if a tighter director was in charge, for example his extraordinary hand jiving in "The Chase" or the "Cockylickin'" quip in "The Rescue", it's not inconceivable that we are simply seeing the more playful side of the schoolteacher. Where-as Russell's portrayal is character-proof, Jacqueline Hill's doesn't even need to be due to the quality of her performance. They'll be enough Barbara worship before we bid farewell to her in a few weeks time, but suffice to say that she is imbued with enough pathos and care as to make almost every moment of her screen time seem genuinely real.

It's when we look at the Doctor and Susan that things take a dive, or at least get interesting. Naturally, the alien characters are going to be the hardest to uphold with integrity since they are the furthest removed from the natural personalities of the actors playing them. But it's interesting to see that, far from the myths perpetuated by Doctor Who Weekly and other forces for propaganda in the early eighties, Hartnell is "crotchety" for about ten minutes before we get to know him. Well, maybe that's not quite true. There are plenty of moments where the Doctor is brusque or totally defensive towards his companions throughout the rest of the era. But to anyone paying any attention at all, it's quite clear that this is a front, a defensive mechanism for hiding his true feelings. The key scene arrives at the end of "The Chase", where he suddenly becomes his crabby, downright rude, old self as soon as Ian and Barbara threaten to leave, even calling them "stupid". As soon as they are gone, he is thoughtful and admits he'll miss them.

After watching Carole Ann-Ford's Susan, learning that the production team considered Jacqueline Hill a more disposable asset becomes baffling. Ford is fond of recalling how she was playing a sixteen year old girl, but was often also treated as one by Hartnell off-camera as well. In fact, she plays Susan as if she were ten, scampering around in "Giants" and crying like a wretched baby in "The Keys of Marinus" when she almost paddles in a pool of acid. One could possibly understand her being unable to carry on the demanding task of portraying an alien from the forty ninth century, but it's not asking too much to assume she might manage to play her at least like a human adult.

The scripts have been subsequently blamed by the actress for the descent of Susan to a screaming five year old who appears to have mental problems in "The Keys of Marinus" when unable to cope with the sinister movement of a small vine. But surely the maximum influence the writers had was to invent the words she spoke, and any small amount of control over her delivery should have avoided turning Susan into the special-needs case she became.

It's doubly unfortunate then, that they chose to marry Susan off, rather than, for example, having the Doctor finally admit that she was a retard he had rescued from his home planet to prevent her being sectioned, or simply having her tumble, in character, down a big hole where she'd remain forever. It's decidedly uncomfortable watching the odd, south-American hillbilly David Campbell take Susan as his wife at the end of "Dalek Invasion of Earth". It should be illegal, surely? It's a feeling only pacified by imagining that when they did get to bed, all he did was read her a bedtime story and tuck her in.

Still, Susan's departure did at least forge the lengthy tradition of the Doctors ever-changing female sidekick, and with Vicki just around the corner, the slate could be wiped clean to give them another try...