N.B. there might (or might not) be spoilers in this article!
That my overriding memory of first watching The Time Monster is being violently ill whilst it was on TV (UK Gold in the early 90’s) doesn’t necessarily reflect my opinion of it. After all, the other thing that I remembered clearly about the story was Ingrid Pitt’s cleavage. In fact, and this isn’t necessarily related to the latter point (which probably says more about my being a teenager when I first saw it than anything else), I remember rather enjoying this serial.
“Oh, you know, the Minotaur and all that Cretan jazz.”
Jo, The Time Monster: Episode One
True, The Time Monster is a bit disjointed: as it tries to tell three different stories – the Wootton experiments, the TARDIS Time ram stuff, Atlantean politics – in one go. It’s a little self-indulgent at times, a bit too pleased with itself and occasionally the dialogue comes across as glib or at least sprinkled with the odd throwaway line of scientific gobbledygook. And whatever the Doctor constructs out of the things lying around Stu’s apartment in order to hinder TOMTIT, it looks bobbins.
There’s even a face-off with a returning enemy who’s cranking it up to eleven in the melodrama department and, as if that’s not enough, there’s an omnipotent ancient being from the dawn of time.
In short, a lot of the criticisms I find myself levelling at 21st century Who apply here.
“Logically, it just shouldn’t happen.”
The Master/The Doctor, The Time Monster: Episode Three
But it seems almost because of these flaws that I like The Time Monster so much – far more than The Dæmons, which often is held up as the apotheosis of the era. (It seems Son of Unearthly Times agreed, hardly making any notes, yet rating it as one of the best Third Doctor stories yet. As he was also a big fan of The Dæmons I have a feeling he’s going to like The Green Death too.)
Whilst my attitude towards The Time Monster might be said to veer towards Truthiness – I feel as though I like it even though my empirical observations initially suggest I shouldn’t – I can find plenty to back up that feeling.
Some of the dialogue sparkles. Whilst some of the feminist exchanges are well-meant but a bit clunky, Dr Ingram’s withering instruction for Benton – “You just stand there and look pretty” – is a cracking subversion of what we’d had in The Invasion when UNIT asked if Zoe could be kept on because she was ‘much prettier than a computer’. I also like how once we get to Atlantis, the drama develops a bit more of a BBC Classics feel to it. Galleia’s comment that the Master would not ‘cloy upon the tongue’ is a good example, a lovely turn of phrase that emphasises the immediate attraction between the queen and the Doctor’s arch-nemesis. (Or am I guilty of carrying Ingrid Pitt’s voluptuous performance from Countess Dracula into my reading of this?)
Actually, I was surprised by how little of this story was set in Atlantis, which perhaps highlights that for me this is the strongest section of the story. Indeed the Doctor’s reminiscence of his as-yet-unnamed home planet is arguably one of the key scenes of the Third Doctor’s whole era.
“Ah, well. It was fun while it lasted.”
The Doctor, The Time Monster: Episode Three
Finally, remember how I mentioned the possibility of the TARDIS slipping into a mythological meta-universe back when I watched The Myth Makers? (What do you mean ‘No’!). I wondered if the latter episodes of the The Time Monster – those set in Atlantis – inhabit the same universe? This is the second Atlantis the Doctor has visited. (and the third to be mentioned if you include The Dæmons).
Still, if you accept that an ancient civilisation might have been destroyed and submerged by cataclysmic events (such as the end of the most recent ice age if you believe your Graham Hancock), it’s not inconceivable that there could be more than one such civilisation, although admittedly their all having been named Atlantis is a bit of a stretch!
Occasionally, my daughter sits in on the viewings and draws pictures based on the story. With this one, in Episode One it seems she immediately clocked the tone in the lab between Dr Ingram and Professor Thascalos.
"I thought the speeding car was funny."
"I also liked the idea of bringing soldiers back from the past to fight UNIT."
"In fact I liked pretty much everything about this story!"
