Customer Reviews

Doctor Who - Invasion of Time [VHS]

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

A terrific performance by Tom Baker. Dr. Who arrives unannounced on Gallifrey and claims his title as Lord President of the Time Lords. He moves so swiftly that no one challenges him and he is sworn in. He then turns around and invites the Vardens, an alien race that can travel along EM waves, to take over Gallifrey. He banished Leela and appoints a toady sycophant as Vice -president. A civil war erupts between the Time Lords, with Leela leading the revolt. Dr. Who creates a hole in the force field around Gallifrey for the Vardens to bring their invasion fleet.
Dr. Who learns of the Vardens home planet and traps it in a time loop, freeing Gallifrey and becoming the hero.
Suddenly, THe Sontarans appear, wrecking havoc. During the battle, Dr. WHo creates the most powerful weapon in the universe to destroy the Sontarans. He succeeds in turning the invasion and promptly forgets everything. Leela decides to stay on Gallifrey with Ardend, and K-9 stays to look after the mistress.
It is a satisfying adventure but it does leave many questions and possibilities unanswered. Tom Baker is superb as the manipulating Dr. Who, playing everyone against each other in order to destroy the Vardens and Sontarans. The violence is high as several people die that Dr. Who should have been able to save but in war etc...Gallifrey is depicted as 2 distinct cultures, the Citadel, full of bureaucrats and self-important Time Lords and those who have dropped out, living on the outside at a primitive level. Full of possibilities never followed up and the outsiders are never mentioned again in later episodes.
Leela's departure is abrupt and unexpected, with no hint until the end.
The last episode drags in places.
It is worth getting

This has always been my favourite of The Dr. Who series. Finding out that it was coming to video was very exciting, and I anticipated its release with much vigor.

Tom Baker really shows his ability to play dual-natured characters--a considered mark up, in reference to his already excellent portrayal of the hobo time lord. In the start of the show, as he arrives on his home planet, you believe he is there to hand it over to a trio of power hungry alien beings, who are going to pay him very much. Then, you discover it was a set up, to defeat these aliens.

The plot is quilt of secrets, characters, powers in conflict; and diverse, settings of intrigue. The discovery of an all powerful weapon of Rassilon, the invasion of the Sontaruns and the betrayal of the High Council are just some of the interesting twists which keep the plot fresh, alive and exciting until the final moments, when the doctor says goodbye to an old friend.

Saving his home planet, the same planet that cast him off, exiled, imprisoned him on earth and constantly pressured him into doing their dirty work, showed the great goodness the doctor was capable of.

Buy this one. The Invasion of Time is one of the best Dr. Who videos, and it is the start of a great set of seasons: The Key to Time and The E-Space Trilogy.

The closing story of FDoctor Who's fifteenth season begins with the unthinkable. The Doctor signs a contract with three unknown and unseen aliens in space. He has ordered Leela inside the TARDIS. When he comes in, she is bursting with questions. The Doctor tells her to ask K9 to tell her to shut up. When she starts to comply, she catches herself with an angry "How dare you?"

His behaviour becomes more erratic. He sees Borusa, his former teacher and now Chancellor, played with dry and acerbic aplomb by Leonard Arnatt, and arrogantly claims his birthright, demanding to become inaugurated president of the High Council of Time Lords. The presidential investiture ceremony echoes that of a bishop or pope being sworn in. And when he's told, "I give you the Matrix," the network containing the sum total of knowledge and memories of dead Time Lords, I found myself thinking, "Good thing it doesn't have Keanu Reeves in it."

With the aliens fully in control, he then instigates a full-scale purge of Time Lords who could be construed as troublemakers to his regime, even ordering Leela banished into the "barbaric garden" of Outer Gallifrey. He is aided in this by the Castellan Kelner, whose obsequious surface masks motives of self-preservation, as he is quick to switch allegiances. Kudos to Milton Johns for his portrayal.

Like The Deadly Assassin, there's another incompetent Guard commander, Andred. He's played by Christopher Tranchell, who previously appeared in the no-longer existent Who story The Faceless Ones. However, he isn't as brutal as his predecessor.

The interior of the Doctor's TARDIS, and I'm not just talking about the control room is one of the best reasons to watch this story, as one finally gets the idea of dimensional transcendentalism. The scene involving the storage room is reminiscent of Monty Python's deja vu sketch, giving it a surreal edge. However, for a real design triumph, the Doctor's funky-looking presidential office is a masterpiece.

Along with the usual manic grins and jokes by the Doctor, there are two funny exchanges. When the Doctor's bodyguard protests that he'll be shot by the Castellan for leaving his side, the Doctor responds with. "That's all right. I'll have him [the Castellan] shot." Later, Andred tells him, "You have access to the greatest source of knowledge in the universe." Doctor: "Well, I do talk to myself sometimes, yes." Andred: "I mean the Matrix." Doctor: "Oh, that old thing."

The Invasion Of Time sees the farewell of two popular companions, and an unrewarding one on the part of Leela. She really proves her mettle here, being the tough warrior, believing in the Doctor despite his odd behaviour, and overall, has been one of the most intrepid and fearless companions of the Doctor, yet she suffers the fate of companions Susan, Vicki, and Jo Grant. WHY?? Her scenes with Rodan, a young Time Lord, not a gigantic double-crested barking pterodactyl from Toho Studios, are great. Rodan seems to be a prototype for Romana I, who would be the Doctor's companion in the following season. Hilary Ryan does a good job being the technically-skilled but sheltered counterpart to Leela's hardy experienced person.

This six-parter is one of the all-time classics, although it's probably best to first watch The Deadly Assassin, probably more classic than this story, in order to remember Gallifreyan institutions and Borusa. The Invasion Of Time adds more information on Gallifrey.

One of Doctor Who's producers, the immortal John Nathan Turner, once complained that the problem with six-part Doctor Who serials is that they are really nothing more than a four-part story and a two-part story linked together. (This was one of Turner's reasons for cutting out the six-part stories during his tenure as producer)

And "The Invasion of Time" is certainly one of the most damning examples of this trend in Who history.

The premise is interesting enough--the Doctor reutrns home to Gallifrey and demands to be made Lord President. Once he assumes the role and is given access to the Matrix (not with Keanu Reeves, thank you!), he betrays Gallifrey and allows it to be invaded by a mystersious race known as the Vardans. Why? The Doctor has his reasons and before you know it, he's turned the tables on them. This seemingly interesting plot takes place over the course of the first four-episodes and then comes to a swift, convincing resolution. But just as you think it's over, the Sontarins shows up and we've got two episodes more to go that include a lot of running around corridors (the Doctor Who Olympic sport).

It's a shame really as the first four episodes are quite good--entertaining and interesting. It's just the final two that are such a major disappointment turning a potential classic story into a mockery of all things Who. Yes, the Vardans look cheap and some of the sets are a bit wobbly--but this is Doctor Who we're talking about here where great special effects aren't the name of the game. It's the story that matters most.

And here, the story gets lost along the way.

This is perhaps the most maligned of the Tom Baker - Louise Jameson Dr. Who episodes and the justification is aptly deserved: Jameson's Leela, my personal favorite of all the Doctor's companions, makes a major whimp-out of an exit from the series in a scene that was arrived at, not written. Reportedly, Jameson decided during the production to have it be her farewell episode but the director apparently failed to consult the scriptwriters before the cast and crew shot the passage where she and the Doctor part ways, and it's abrupt ineffectiveness mars and distracts from what otherwise is a quite satisfactory -- if overlong -- adventure. The Doctor brings Leela to Gallifrey where he brusquely stakes his claim as Lord President of the Time Lords, then inexplicably has her banished from the Citadel to what appears to be a sand pit by a drainage ditch. Meanwhile, the Doctor and K9 embark on a plan to ensare the Vardans, shimmering Alien Menace creatures depicted as bits of wrinkled cellophane with a light reflecting off of them, who have designs upon the Time Lords that Baker's Who never seemed to have bothered asking about. So all of a sudden there is civil war in the Citadel as some side with the Invaders and another sect sides behind the unremittingly dull Commander Andred, the swine that will end up winning Leela's heart during romantic scenes that are never shown. Why? Because the plot is too busy having the Sontarrens pop up out of nowhere, claiming that the Vardens were just their pawns [you following this?] and that they are there to achieve victory over Time itself. Uh-huh. I wouldn't have had a problem with any of this if the all important question of just when did Leela and Andred hook up? was answered. In fact, she spends the majority of the adventure running around with the pretty but aloof Rodan [that's right, the same name as the giant rubbery Japanese space monster] and acting tough in front of the local outcast Time Lords who live in the sand pit by the drainage ditch, subsisting on walnuts. All of that is so unnecessary but somewhat redeemed by what I look upon as a clever segment set inside of the Tardis where the Sontarrens stomp around and look menacing while our heroes get lost in the endless corridors and storage rooms, which all look suspicously the same. Much scorn has been levied against this part of the episode because it was shot on found locations rather than decorated movie sets, but I actually find it intruguing, demonstrating how the Tardis really is infinite in the space it contains and not all of it necessarily has to look like the control room. But all criticism with this episode has to boil down to Leela's exit and our displeasure with how offhandedly it is treated. Someone we have grown to respect and care for steps aside and says goodbye to shack up with the most boring man on Gallifrey for NO apparent reason, and I just don't buy it. Still, the installment is another tour-de-force for Baker as the Doctor, has some great scenes involving K9 [whom I usually find annoying, I must admit] and a delightfully slimy character in the person of Castellan Kellner. Overlong and overwrought and bittersweet because of the Leela cop-out, but still worthy, and a must-have for Jameson fans. It's not her fault. Recommended.

"The Invasion of Time" is a guilty pleasure, but that's what makes it a classic in my eyes. "Doctor Who" lets slip embarrassing moments at the best of times so it's best not taken too seriously. Yes, you'll see aluminum foil aliens, spacecraft with brickwork and crazy drinking straws. But all that leaves Tom Baker's Doctor to carry the whole thing, which he does delightfully well. John Arnatt's portrayal of the Time Lord Borusa is my favorite and Milton Johns' Castellan is required viewing for Americans who don't know what a 'toady' is. I've read that the producer was at his wit's end and had to write part of this himself; it shows in the furious outbursts The Doctor delivers (reason enough to buy this one) and his companion's departure, both of which are notably uncharacteristic. Also of note is how Contoller Rodan was a prototype for Romana, the Doctor's companion in the following adventure.

I think The Invasion of Time was based on a sound premise. However, it fails to follow through. It starts with a sturdy notion that the Doctor has, for his own reasons, chosen to sell out the power of the Time Lords in exchange for the Presidency of Gallifrey. The story uses threads left dangling from the episode The Deadly Assassin, which I think is a skillful stroke on the part of writer David Agnew (really team writers Graham Williams and Anthony Read). By making the show self-referential, we were able to get a feel for how things are happening and why.

However, the show doubles back on itself and is stuffed with filler material. An important part of the problem was that this serial was written very quickly after a script by David Weir proved unworkable. The design to work in Gallifreyans who aren't Time Lords was a good idea, but in the final script, the people of Outer Gallifrey are simply given too little screen time. They contribute little material to he script and were obviously included to fulfill somebody's vision of what makes good TV. Also the setting, a Surrey sand pit, looks pretty sorry -- it's no wonder Rodan (an interesting predecessor to Romana who, I think, should have been brought back at least once) finds nature unpleasant if that's all she's ever seen.

I've heard repeated complaints that the departure of Leela at the end of the serial seems abrupt. It was. Louise Jamison wanted to leave the series, and this serial shows that the potential of the character was all but tapped out; but the producers wanted to hold out the hope that the character could be continued. The decision was made right there on the set to remove her, and last-minute changes were made in the script. Jameson said she wanted to see the character killed, but that would have gone against the grain of the series (no sidekicks had died since the serial The Dalek Master Plan, and none would die again until Adric went to the great math class in the sky). The decision to have Leela fall for Commander Andred was made at the last minute, and has little to do with preceding material. However, the producers were running out of allotted studio time and couldn't reshoot anything. The romance had to be simply implied, with the natural unsatisfying results.

The interior of the TARDIS in the sixth and final episode is profoundly unappealing. Using existing tunnels found around the studio area in London, the TARDIS was made to look like the workings of a factory. The visual characteristics had little, if anything, to do with previous and later views of the TARDIS interior, which closely resembled the businesslike, antiseptic look of the control room. Also, because all of this took place outside a studio, the director was limited in his control of sound and light; much of the dialogue is very muddy, and the characters frequently wind up in shadow, making the episode hard to watch.

The interior of the Citadel of the Time Lords is a little better looking, but not much. The set designer tried to extend the enclosed look of the set from The Deadly Assassin, but with pure Seventies trappings. Among these are inflatable chairs, rococo architecture, and Chancellor Borusa's very silly stone-look desk. Also, the entire Citadel looks very new. Previously, the Citadel had looked very old; you could almost see the stone sweating. This was much more in keeping with the supposed age of the building, and the appearance has also dated much better.

The inclusion of the Sontarans at the last minute was intended to get people to watch. The Vardans, the prior villains in the series, were very contrived and the writers didn't like them (neither did the viewers when the annoying cellophane images dissolved into men in Star Wars reject costumes). Involving the Sontarans would, they hoped, get long-term viewers to watch. Instead, they were merely annoying and distracting, and slowed down what was essentially a completed story. The chases through the Citadel and the interior of the TARDIS added nothing of value to the show, and only served to confuse many viewers, especially because of Castellan Kelner's unexplained complicity. Though the serial was already compromised, it could have been partly salvaged by shaving off the episodes with the Sontarans. This wouldn't have made the show better, but it would have made it drag less obviously.

All in all, it starts well, but it doesn't carry through. The serial feels rushed, because it is, and the characters behave in a stilted way, because they weren't given an opportunity to experiment and express best the potential of the story. Though there were worse in the history of the series, and even worse within the Tom Baker years, all things considered this serial should have been much better than it was. I'm glad I had an opportunity to see it so that I could see how Leela was retired from the show, and get a little more of a glimpse at Gallifrey, but this isn't going to be one of the episodes I watch repeatedly.

A landmark Doctor Who episode only because it involves an in-depth look at Gallifrey, and marks Leela's (Louise Jameson) departure. Also worth a look if you're a Tom Baker fan --he gives one of his most intense performances as the Doctor. Following the events of the previous season's superior "The Deadly Assassin," the Doctor returns to his homeworld to claim the Presidency on a technicality. What then transpires is enough to keep everyone in the dark as to his real motives --by the end of Part 2 we're wondering if that power-mad dictator really IS the Doctor!

However, all of that aside, this episode is somewhat of a disappointment. A six-part serial, it drags unbearably in some places, and breezes through the plot in others. The Vardans are such an original idea on paper and in concept, but the way they are realized on screen is dreadful. The Sontarans make a surprise entrance at the end of Part 4, but an entire squad of them is far less menacing than Kevin Lindsay's excellent solitary Sontaran of the earlier serials "The Time Warrior" or "The Sontaran Experiment."

A pity, because some of the performances in this episode are worth a look --Milton Johns excels as a toady subservient Castellan and John Arnatt plays the best incarnation of Borusa in the entire series; his mischevious side really shines through, and there's a distinct sense of understanding just where the Doctor may have gotten some of his own wry sense of humor. The low points of the episode are, as usual, the endless corridors of Gallifrey and the even more endless corridors of the TARDIS itself (shot very unconvincingly on location in a gasworks, of all places). My personal favorite is the unique design of the Doctor's Presidential office with its lead relief work.

Sorry, folks. Diehard Tom Baker-era Doctor Who fan here, but I have to call it as I see it: but for its pivotal position as a departing-companion episode, "The Invasion of Time" is not worth owning. Rent or borrow, by all means.

Long awaited and finally on tape!!! I havent seen this episode in years and have impatiently awaited for the BBC to release it. This is a wonderful story set on Galifrey. The Time Lords are invaded, treachery runs amok, Leela is turned out, Sontaruns, and poor Barusa. Another Tom Baker masterpiece.

My favorite Dr. Who stories are the ones where they do cool things with the TARDIS. The final chase scene is fascinating and hysterical. I love the Sontarans. And Tom Baker's performance is absolutely brilliant as the Doctor messes with Leela's (and everyone else) mind hardcore. Truly one of the high points of the Tom Baker era and of Dr. Who in general. Get it.