N.B. there might (or might not) be spoilers in this article!
Watching The Keeper of Traken with the benefit of hindsight, there’s a moment towards the end of Part Two — where Melkur speaks to the Doctor in the grove — that you’d swear was the Doctor realising who the actual villain was.
“Time reveals everything, Adric.”
The Doctor, The Keeper of Traken: Part One
But it’s not.
And in fact the Master taunts the Doctor well into the final episode before revealing his identity. As I say, hindsight (as well as general belief in the Doctor’s omniscience in these matters) give the Doctor’s reaction to hearing Geoffrey Beevers’ mellifluous Melkur for the first time more weight than was actually intended.
Well, for me at least.
From the early scenes in the TARDIS with the Doctor and Adric (and the Keeper) to the great revelation and twists of Part Four, The Keeper of Traken is a marvellous story. Its machinations of court and theatrical side conversations put you of a mind that this is Doctor Who doing its pretending-to-be-Shakespeare thing again (last seen in The Masque of Mandragora if memory serves).
Shakespeare in space isn’t an idea Doctor Who invented, but it seems regularly able to pull it off with aplomb; The Keeper of Traken is no different in that regard.
It always seems that the supporting cast revel in these nods to the Bard. Here again, The Keeper of Traken is no exception. Anthony Ainley as Tremas is worthy of especial praise, but there’s no shortage of great performances: Sheila Ruskin as the misguided Kassia or the aforementioned Geoffrey Beevers also stand out amongst a uniformly excellent company.
“Traken … a whole empire held together … well, by people just being terribly nice to each other. “
The Doctor, The Keeper of Traken: Part One
The story too is engaging from the off. Traken society, a blend of ancient tradition and advanced science (much like Doctor Who), is approaching a time of great change (again much like Doctor Who). The old Keeper is dying and the time to appoint a new one is at hand.
That this once again ties in with the themes of the season is no longer surprising, but it’s fair to say it’s also just the kind of scenario you’d expect the Master to turn up in and try to take advantage of.
My son pronounced The Keeper of Traken the best of the eighteenth season so far. Alongside Warriors’ Gate, I’d have to agree with him.
