Doctor Who “The Moonbase Part 2”

You know, even with the animation, it is so much better seeing these in live action again.  There’s a whole bit in this episode where the Doctor goes around taking samples from the moonbase’s personnel that probably wouldn’t have worked as well animated given the overall quality.

Regardless, there is a kernel of a plot here.  Jamie is injured and delirious in the medical bay, thinking he’s seeing the Phantom Piper come to claim him.  He isn’t.  It’s a Cyberman come to claim a patient with the mystery illness.  Polly sees it and starts screaming, scaring the thing away…or it was leaving anyway with some poor sap.

Point is, the Doctor is inclined to believe Polly.  So is Ben.  They’ve dealt with Cybermen before.  The base’s director Hobson thinks the Cybermen all died out, but he’ll give the Doctor 24 hours to find the source of the mystery disease.  See above on the biological samples.  Of course, Hobson thinks the Doctor and his friends are up to no good since all their problems started when the Doctor showed up in the first place.

By the by, this station controls the Earth’s weather through tide manipulation.  I feel like there should be a lot more factors involved than that, but the problem is if the tides aren’t fixed, it could mean a lot of deadly weather on Earth as a result.

However, the Doctor is smart, and he does figure things out.  He also seems a lot more mature in this story than I am used to seeing him, but I can worry about that later.  Or not.  Maybe it was just because they were still trying to figure this Doctor out.  I mean, Ben and Polly are more traditional companions to a more traditionally heroic Doctor.  This Doctor is much more inclined towards overall silliness, but it’s possible that the show hasn’t gotten there yet.  It doesn’t help that Jamie is largely out of it.  I mean, this Doctor advised caution when the other three wanted to explore the moon.  Later stories would show him run out to play in the surf while his companions watched him behave like a child.

Oh, the point is the disease was coming in through poisoned sugar.  The Doctor figured it out only after he asked Polly to make some coffee for everyone.

Wait, he asked the lone woman to make the coffee?

Never mind.  The Doctor might be on Hobson’s good side now, especially since some of the guys he sent off to fix an antenna never came back.  That’s what happens when the Cybermen ambush you in space.

OK, so where in the base are the Cybermen hiding?  One came out to grab another guy and zapped both Polly and the delirious Jamie unconscious.  The Doctor asks if they checked every room.  He’s told yes.  Then he asks it about the infirmary where they’re all hanging out.  Well, no.  There are people in there.

And a Cyberman hiding under a blanket on one of the beds.

Oops.