Meglos

"Thanks be to Ti!"

Writers: John Flanagan & Andrew McCulloch

Format: TV

Broadcast: 27 September - 18 October 1981

Season: 18.02

Featuring: Fourth Doctor, Romana II, K9

Synopsis

On Tigella, two opposing factions are irrevocably divided over one fundamental issue: the Dodecahedron, a mysterious artefact which provides the entire planet's energy. With the Savants and the Deons locked in a crippling stalemate and their civilisation on the brink of collapse, the Tigellan leader Zastor seeks the Doctor's help. But he and Romana have been trapped aboard the TARDIS in a vicious time loop by Meglos, the last of the Zolfa-Thurans. He will stop at nothing to steal back the awesome power of the Dodecahedron. 

Verdict

Meglos was a very good serial to complete my roundabout blogging of Season 18! I am so near the end of this television run of randomness on my BritBox free trial now which I am excited about because I am really missing other formats. However, I've still got some good (and not so good) ones to come. Anyway, to the story at hand and I thought it was a really solid story from start to finish. I love the pairing of the Fourth Doctor and Romana in her second incarnation and the pair worked wonderfully well together here. Their efforts to repair K9 were good and after some recent Season 17 stories, it was brilliant to have John Leeson back voicing the metallic dog. I was quite surprised that for the entirety of part one, the Doctor and Romana were contained to just being in the TARDIS. It worked though because they could be interesting almost anywhere! Once they got stuck in the time loop by Meglos, things improved! I really loved that concept and it was nice that the pair had a few moments after the repetitive sequence to gather their thoughts and work out how they would break the loop. What they did was very clever in putting the loop out of sequence by repeating their actions themselves and the humour that came with the Doctor almost forgetting his lines was very amusing. Meglos made for a ver good enemy and the idea of an evil cactus, as that is essentially what he was, worked surprisingly well. The imagery of the spines coming out of Tom Baker's face and hands once Meglos had duplicated the Doctor's appearance was quite superb. It looked fantastic and exactly what you want from something evil! His association with the Gaztaks was really good even if they did share a somewhat tumultuous relationship. It was clear that there was absolutely no trust between each party. The setting of Tigella was brilliant and the conflict that was occurring on the planet between religion and science over the dodecahedron was tremendous. I was a big fan of that and I rather enjoyed the subtle ridicule the scientists enacted on their religious counterparts. However, it was wonderful to see Jacqueline Hill back in the series after so long away, even if she wasn't playing the role of Barbara. Romana and the Doctor inevitably were separated early on and the way the former lead the Gaztaks into a trap by using the planet's anti-clockwise rotation to her advantage was very good and intuitive. The screens of Zolfa-Thura coming into play once Meglos had the dodecahedron was pretty impressive in terms of visuals and I really did like the concept behind it. Meglos was out to get revenge and the Gaztaks decreed that Tigella would be the first to fall at its power. Brotadac was a humorous bandit character and his longing for the Doctor's coat was some nice lighthearted humour in the latter stages of a pretty serious story. The Doctor nearly giving himself up when he'd impersonated Meglos in front of the Gaztaks was humorous, only for the both of them to be quite comically taken into the cell. That image of the face off was decent, but I do think the moment could have been a bit more powerful after a long build. Zastor was also a pretty useless character and I was surprised that his past association with the Doctor was seemingly forgotten. The ending was very good though in dealing with all of the underlying issues and I think its sudden nature made more of an impact. Meglos had let go of his human captive and we saw him revert to that cactus shape, only for the whole of the ship to be blown apart by the very power he had stolen and put into action. Overall, a very solid serial! 

Rating: 8/10