5.5: The Web of Fear
- Doctor: Patrick Troughton
- Companions: Jamie, Victoria
- Creators: Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln (Writers), Douglas Camfield (Director), Peter Bryant (Producer)
- Season 5
What's the rating?
Worth Watching.
What's interesting about it?
It mostly exists! Two Troughton stories in a row recovered some 45 years after being filmed. The third episode is still constructed from telesnaps.
This is a follow-up to a story that is still missing, alas -- The Abominable Snowmen -- and it does seem to assume you've seen the previous outing of the Yeti fuzzballs ("Get out of my way you walking carpet!"), casually dropping bizarre plot points without explanation. Well, what kid doesn't know that the abominable snowman is a robot with a control sphere and some connection to The Intelligence?
The first episode starts the story off in an unusual manner, seemingly dumping us into a 1920s horror film without apology. Unfortunately this includes some serious Jewish stereotyping.
There's a delightfully crusty old scientist -- Travers -- who eschews the usual cautions of the scientist speaking to a journalist and says things like, "It's more than likely we may not be able to defeat this menace and that London, in fact the whole of England, might be completely wiped out. There, did you get that?"
Countering the unfortunate Jewish character (who is only around for a bit of the first episode) is the scientist's daughter, a serious scientist who is played as a human being and not either a cold bitch or a simpering screamer (ah, Victoria, how long before you blissfully get dumped as a companion?)
The first couple of episodes really zoom along, challenging the viewer to keep up with what's going on, as it seems to be assumed we understand how an alien invasion by furry robot Yetis spewing web-stuff as their main attack would proceed when combined with the England Underground system. The actual invasion is skipped and we start with things well in progress; this is an interesting technique that worked excellently in The Dalek Invasion of Earth but ends up adding to the confusion here. About half-way through the story the various elements are finally explained well enough for the story to more or less make sense, at which point it turns into an intriguing and satisfying mystery about who among the humans is a traitor helping out the Yetis.
Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart is introduced in this story, destined to be the longest serving character in all of Doctor Who, perhaps also the only character to receive a military promotion during his tenure.
The Great Intelligence eventually reveals itself by taking over the body of one of the characters and the result is quite creepy. Much scarier than if he'd shown up in a bad monster suit.
A six episode story requires a strong extra plot element to make the final two episodes worth it (as occurred in The Enemy of the World) and we don't get that here. Ultimately there is too much repetitive "running in corridors" (it's the story actually designed around that concept!) for me to consider it a Must See, but it's definitely worth watching. As a four-parter it might have been outstanding.
What do others think?
Seems to be considered one of the best stories in Doctor Who. Perhaps on multiple viewings I'll come around...