N.B. there might (or might not) be spoilers in this article!

In The Happiness Patrol, the Doctor displays a degree of ruthless efficiency worthy of the Spanish Inquisition. He’s heard disturbing rumours about Terra Alpha, so he pays a visit and dismantles Helen A’s regime in one evening. It’s impressive stuff.

“Happiness will prevail.”

The Doctor, The Happiness Patrol: Part Four

In fact pretty much everything about The Happiness Patrol is impressive. With a script that’s righteous but not preachy, an excellent guest cast (Sheila Hancock, Georgina Hale, Rachel Bell, Lesley Dunlop — and that’s just among the Happiness Patrollers!) and a demented villain (in both concept and realisation) in the Kandyman, what’s not to love! The scene where the Doctor disarms the sniper guards simply by talking to them has long been rightly praised.

It’s a shame the production had to be studio-bound, but overall they managed to keep the lights down low enough to maintain plenty of atmosphere, with Earl Sigma’s melancholy harmonica punctuating an excellent incidental score from Dominic Glynn.

There were hints of this Doctor in season twenty-four, especially in Paradise Towers, but in The Happiness Patrol, Sylvester McCoy’s performance is perfect: playful when he wants to be, tough when he needs to be.

For the second adventure in succession we see a more manipulative Doctor, whose knowledge of events around him appears to be greater than we’ve previously seen. For someone who rediscovered Doctor Who in the era of Virgin Publishing’s New Adventures, I know that this is fertile creative ground indeed.

The Happiness Patrol is Doctor Who doing what it has always done — taking risks (and not just with the threat of copyright theft) — and that, amongst its many other qualities, makes it rank amongst my favourites of this era.