The celestial toymaker (1966)

Review
More about Doctor Who
More about this serial

Review

This was a four-part serial, first broadcast between 2nd April - 23rd April 1966. A brief and somewhat spoiler-ish summary of the plot: the Doctor, Dodo and Steven find themselves in the realm of the Toymaker, an omnipotent being who plays games in order to relieve his boredom. To regain their freedom, the Tardis crew must play against the Toymaker and win - though winning may not be enough to save their lives.

What I've seen:

Part four. The other three episodes are missing.

The good bits:

it's a clever story

The not so good bits:

the one remaining episode of this serial is surprisingly dull. We spend most of the episode watching Dodo and Steven play a life-size but less-than-exciting board game with one of the Toymaker's minions, while the Doctor solves a logic puzzle and has a less-than-exciting conversation with the Toymaker
apart from the story idea there's no wit or whimsy here, and although we know that the Toymaker can destroy the Tardis crew or keep them prisoner forever, there's very little real sense of danger. (The latter remark may be a bit unfair since I've only seen part four. The experience of someone seeing this episode after having listened to the audio versions of the first three episodes may be different.)
Hartnell tries to make the most of it but everybody else's performance is mediocre, not helped by the script
though this isn't particular to this particular serial, Steven and Dodo aren't the best of companions. Dodo is a feather-brained female on a par with Jo Grant, while Steven comes across as one of those well-meaning incompetents in a P.G. Wodehouse novel

My verdict:

Interesting.

Seen in isolation, the one surviving episode of 'The celestial toymaker' is disappointing. Listening to the audio versions of the first three episodes first, might improve the experience.

More about Doctor Who

An introduction:
Doctor Who reviews: introduction

More "interesting" Doctor Who:
Doctor Who reviews: interesting

More from the William Hartnell years:
Doctor Who reviews: 1963 - 1966

Similar stories:
Doctor Who reviews: fantasy

Original version of this review:
06/10/30

More about this serial

Episode guides:
BBC Cult

Serial reviews:
Outpost Gallifrey

DVD reviews (of the 'Lost in time' boxed set):
Outpost Gallifrey

With the exceptions listed here, all content © 2006 D9D1E2.COM. Please read the disclaimer, copyright information and terms of use. On this page Transitional HTML 4.01 and CSS 1 are used. If you're seeing this text you either have CSS switched off in your browser, or you're using a browser that can't handle CSS. If you're using an older browser version, you might want to consider upgrading.