Survival (1989) Review

"Yo, I can see into your companion's mind and she is filthy as fuuuuuck!"
"I can see into your mind, dimwit. Did Glitz really make you catalogue his fanfiction
so he'd help you escape the Matrix?"
"... shut up."

Survival...
The end of an era...

WRITTEN BY

Rona Munro, a Scottish writer who holds the honor of being currently the only person to write an episode for both the original and revived runs of Doctor Who.

PLOT

The Doctor and Ace return to Ace's hometown of Perivale to find that all of her old friends have disappeared after she left. Suspicious, the Doctor decides to investigate and falls into the Master's(hell yeah!) trap, who has used the powers of the Cheetah world to kidnap him so he could devise a method for them both to escape.

Meanwhile, the living Cheetah world infects them all, and it's only a matter of time before they either start to kill or be killed...

ANALYSIS

Survival has a lot of great things going for it: from a retrospective view, it's great that the final story of the series brings back the Master for an explosive confrontation. Having the Doctor and Ace come under the influence of a corrupting force that they cannot simply expel with the goodness of their hearts(since the Cheetah world isn't directly evil, but channels their feral, animalistic side) is a wonderful idea and allows, once again, for us to see the characters in a new light. I love, love, love how the Cartmel era constantly tests and prods its heroes from different angles.

Not to mention that the setting of Perivale is a clear precursor to the Powell estate from the early RTD era(Jackie Tyler even basically cameos at the end). From somewhere, Cockney lingo like "mate" and "oi!" and "you lot!" have made their way into the show, smoothly transitioning over to Rose Tyler's tenure.

The music and special effects for this story are top of the line. I think just about every fan loves the electric guitar score, and the Cheetah world looks attractive and brutal, what with the pink skies, volcanoes and corpses littered around.

That being said, Survival also has an irritatingly naff side. I say irritatingly, because the rest of the story is so good that you can very clearly see the flaws like a few wrong pieces in an otherwise beautiful jigsaw puzzle. The first and worst thing are the Cheetah costumes, which look like mascot costumes. Not only do they not inspire fear whatsoever, but they also look completely ridiculous when we see the Cheetahs on horseback.

The third episode is also a letdown. All you really remember after watching it is the amazing Doctor-Master confrontation on the Cheetah world, but the whole storyline about him somehow taking control of a youth club(who scamper at the first sign of trouble, great thugs indeed) and forcing them to participate in some kind of motorcycle jousting with the Doctor is ludicrous. I like that there's some build-up to the Doctor and the Master having their big fight, but it's just poorly done and poorly executed.

CHARACTERS

It's a bit of a shame for the final story, but I can't actually think of much to say about McCoy's performance. It's a bit formulaic. Start with enigmatic mutterings, "Aaaaaaace!", some comedy hijinks, growled warnings... unlike the last two seasons, there doesn't appear to be any Cartmel masterplanning going on nor does he manage to unite all the various characters under his authority the way he did in season 24, so it leaves him a little adrift.

Also, having McCoy face off against Ainley's Master feels kind of odd. His oldschool, moustache-twirling villainy(albeit influenced by the Cheetah virus) doesn't really have a place in the complex world we've been building over the last two years and he feels like a lesser foe than he should. Perhaps that is the genius of it - the Master is diminished, no longer the Doctor's arch-nemesis in a universe of Fenrics and Valeyards and Gods of Ragnarok. We've seen the Doctor go to further and further extremes to assure victory, and take control of the universe in his own subtle way. That leaves the Master - as a dark reflection of the Doctor - impotent and unnecessary, even pathetic. The scene where he defiantly announces that he has full control over the Cheetahs only to quickly duck into a tent once they see him as the only prey around speaks volumes.
So here he is again as a nothing more than a nasty thorn, the Doctor's last unfinished business from his old carefree life, a final test for him rather than Ace like the other stories, before the two characters, strengthened and victorious, can wander off into the sunset.

It almost makes me imagine an alternate universe where Ace went on to inherit the Doctor's mantle as the savior of the universe whilst the Doctor ended up collapsing under the weight of his assumed responsibilities and becoming the Valeyard. Now there's an Unbound story for Big Finish.

As for Anthony Ainley's performance, it's certainly something different. It's hard to say whether or not some of his occasional flat line deliveries are intentional, because the Master is certainly spending most of his energy on maintaining control over himself. I would like to think that it is, and Ainley's subdued acting merely represents the Master forcing himself to keep up the facade of civility. He is very withdrawn, especially in comparison with the animated McCoy and is composed entirely of bitterness this time around.

Sophie Aldred's Ace gets to be as sexy as ever, running around smelling the blood in the wind and indulging in lesbian subplots with Lisa Bowerman. Speaking of the famous lesbian undertones of this story, they're pretty prevalent once you realise they're there. No offense, but once you see Karra's head bobbing up and down Ace's lap, you kinda know what you're in for, and that's not even mentioning the dialogue.
I'm just saying, if they had ditched the cumbersome cheetah costumes, this story would probably be recognised as softcore porn.

Lisa Bowerman, bless her, still manages to act underneath her costume and brings the seductive, dangerous Cheetah world to life almost all on her own. I've yet to hear her portray Bernice Summerfield, but she's clearly a talented actress and I'm glad she went on to such success.

I must say, I feel sad about the way the story treats Julian Holloway's gruff Sergeant Paterson, as I found him quite endearing. Even though Paterson is a hopelessly blind and overconfident character, he's clearly only interested in the welfare of those around him and wants to be a strong and inspiring leader. Holloway has a rough, but warm screen presence(he's almost like a streetwise version of the Brigadier) and I wish Munro kept him alive to learn his lesson and maybe even defend Ace from the youth club of doom.

Will Barton's Midge is just priceless. He's supposed to be playing this tough punk guy, but he says everything in dead-eyed monotone. There are moments when this is eerie. And then there are moments when he barges into the youth club in an oversized suit(probably belonging to his dad) and shades to try and "intimidate" them. Ahh, he's probably my favourite Master sidekick. Barton is still acting(he was in Eddie Redmayne's Stephen Hawking biopic), so I vote we bring him back. Just the start, Midge. Just the start.

NOTES

*You have to love the classic horror movie attacks on the Perivale residents, where the victims are stalked by the all-powerful POV shots that completely paralyse their nervous system, causing them to lose control of their legs almost immediately.

*There seems to be no manipulation on the Doctor's part in this story - or is there? In the opening, it's established that he took the TARDIS to Perivale against Ace's wishes(she'd simply wondered what her old friends were up to out loud). Once there, he recognises the Kitlings' presence pretty fast, but also seems to have no clue what they're doing on Earth specifically, meaning he couldn't have known the Master was responsible. So, I guess he was just curious about Ace's home(probably looked for another way to traumatise her, the old imp).

*The Cheetahs began attacking Perivale residents several weeks before the Doctor even got there. How did the Master know he'd arrive there? Has he encountered Ace before in his timeline and just knew where to look? If he can control where the Kitlings go as he suggests, why not attack someplace more obvious, like UNIT? And if he can't, what a massive coincidence.

*I do hope season 27 had some kind of resolution in mind with Ace's mother, because it seems like the show was building up to it, what with several mentions of Ace hating her and here, Paterson shaming her for not letting her mother know where she was after she listed her as a missing person.

*Just about everyone in Perivale making metaphors related to survival of the fittest is just bad writing.

*I never knew what the Doctor meant by "Can you smell that? Not a very efficient way to hunt, is it?
All that noise and pantomime just to slaughter one little animal." when he was speaking to Ace and
Ange, but according to Wikipedia, Ange was collecting money for fox hunt saboteurs. Could've made
that clearer. Actually, I still have no idea what the Doctor was smelling.

*So, um, what exactly does the Doctor do to Paterson with his one deadly finger?

*How did Ace's friends last for weeks without converting into Cheetahs?

*I'd love to know who built all those tents. The Master would only have constructed one, for himself.
Were they left over from the previous inhabitants?

*Ace questions why the Cheetahs only hunt out in the open and ride on roads... and it's never
answered. But that's a good question! They're animals, why do they do these things?

*Apparently, Derek was meant to be having a nervous breakdown, thus explaining why Midge and Paterson both get suspicious of him being the runt of the litter(oh great, now I'm doing the jungle references). However, this seems to be completely forgotten by both the actor and the director, so the others just come off as being randomly paranoid.

*At one point, the Master explains that the Kitlings were bred by colonists, "with minds they could talk to, eyes they could see through the way I do". And now they've somehow become a vital part of the Cheetahs' hunting process. So...

1) What were the Kitlings originally created for?
2) How did they become part of the Cheetahs' hunting process?
3) It's heavily implied that the Cheetahs themselves are all converted colonists, so who infected them? Some earlier incarnation of Cheetahs or the influence of the planet itself?
4) If it was the planet, why Cheetahs and not something else?

*Why does the Doctor think Ace will become like the Cheetah people forever if she takes her
prey home? Would leaving the planet manually(for example, by a spaceship) have caused the
virus to simply wear off? Also, the Master doesn't take anyone home until at the very end and he
clearly retains the virus on Earth. Or is the teleport itself that finalises it?

*I love how Ace brings everyone home... right next to the TARDIS.

*How does Paterson know he's late for self-defence class?? If he thinks nothing he saw on the Cheetah world was real, wouldn't his last memory be trying to catch the Doctor on the same day he already had self-defence class? And he can't have two classes every Sunday, because he clearly stated "it's self-defence every Sunday afternoon now". Meaning it was Monday by Part 3. Hang on, wasn't he giving self-defence on Monday nights for older gentlemen? Those are the most sprightly-looking old gents I've ever seen! And they're a wee bit early, no?

*Okay, I have to ask: wtf is up with Midge's suit? Did he really snag that from his dad?

*I love that the Master collects his sunglasses for some reason after he dies.

*What was the point of sending Midge to the youth club anyway? Even pretending that he was in any shape or form intimidating, would you really go to kill some old professor and a young girl for this guy based on a speech? Was he infecting them with the Cheetah virus? The Master could've done that. And why kill Paterson? Surely he would've been more useful anyway than the rest of these geeks.

*Cartmel's closing monologue is just precious. Has anyone ever discovered what the original lines were, though?

BEST QUOTE

"I wouldn't be that age if you paid me again, would you?" - Paterson
"I can't remember, it was too long ago." - The Doctor, in a detached, sad tone.

CONCLUSION

Doctor Who's final classic story combines cheap and cheesy production values with a strong script elevated by terrific actors and a great director. Is that not the most Doctor Who thing ever?

And so we bring season 26 to a close. Oh, along with the entire classic series. Boom! Done!
Anyway, this was a pretty great sendoff year, and it solidified the Cartmel era as unique in Doctor Who history. I'd imagine that with another year, they could've sorted out the somewhat frenetic form of storytelling that was the only real plague on this series of stories. But there's no denying in my eyes that the Cartmel Masterplan is the greatest story arc in Doctor Who history. I salute all involved.