The Ark in Space

"The entire human race in one room..."

Writer: Robert Holmes 

Format: TV

Broadcast: 23rd January - 15th February 1975

Season: 12.02

Featuring: Fourth Doctor, Sarah, Harry 

Synopsis 

Many thousands of years in the future, Earth becomes uninhabitable. Aboard space station Nerva, the remaining survivors of the human race drift amongst the stars in suspended animation.

The Doctor, Sarah and Harry arrive to find the vital systems have been sabotaged. As mankind begins to awake from its enforced deep sleep, the Doctor discovers that they are not alone...

The Wirrn are an insect race that inhabit the cold depths of space. But they too have found the Ark and its sleeping occupants. Can the Doctor prevent the last of the human race from becoming the Wirrn's new source of food...?

Verdict 

The Ark in Space was a very good Doctor Who serial and served as a fantastic way to fully introduce viewers to Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor. Of course, they were already familiar with him following the broadcast of Robot but now this brand new incarnation was off travelling through time and space in the TARDIS. We also got to see Harry's first venture into space as companion which was great and I just liked the feel that this story had. That really was a high point. I loved part one and I think it was probably the best individual part of the story. It was excellent that other than a couple of extras in brief moments, the entire episode consisted of just the main cast. With it being a space station setting as well, that very fact alone made things have a much more eery feel which was good. Sarah getting split up from the Doctor and Harry early on and I liked the way it was done. Elisabeth Sladen played the drowsy effect on her character with apparent ease. In pretty much every story that she appears in it's easy to see why she is arguably the most popular companion of all time. Considering this was only Tom Baker's second story as the Fourth Doctor, I thought he played the role wonderfully well and everything that you would associate with his infamous incarnation was present which I actually found impressive. It made me think that considering how long he would go on to play the role that he must have been remarkably consistent over the seven seasons that featured him. I thought the cliffhanger resolution to part one was quite humorous with the big reveal of the dead Wirrn actually just being the corpse falling out of a cupboard. We would later see the species very much alive though and the design was obviously a little reminiscent of the Zarbi from The Web Planet but rather than actually trying to be ants, things worked a lot better. They could speak and were actually pretty intelligent which is always good. The Doctor's proclaiming that the entire human race was in one room was quite difficult to fathom given the futuristic setting as it just seemed totally inconceivable. However, the best thing to come from the Doctor in this serial was his epic speech about the indomitable nature of the human race. That really was memorable. The slow emergence of the dormant human beings was good and I liked how once Vira and Noah were revived, things started to get very interesting and it was not long before the TARDIS trio were accused of doing something. It was clear from the outset that there was something mysterious about him and that would be realised throughout the story with his disturbing transformation into a Wirrn. I thought Harry was actually very good in this story and wasn't outdone by the Doctor which can sometimes be the case. Vira having to adjust to some pretty big changed shortly after waking up a few thousand years too late must have been tough but she didn't really have another choice and the Doctor was quick to point that out. The climax was very good with the courageous sacrifice and the use of electricity as a weapon throughout was pretty good too. I liked the ending with the lead in to The Sontaran Experiment and overall, this was a very good story!

Rating: 8/10