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Doctor Who: The Seeds of Doom
Feb. 8th, 2021 11:23 pmThe Seeds of Doom is, in addition to being one of my favourite Doctor Who stories, the first one I have any conscious memory of seeing. One Saturday afternoon some time in the mid-eighties, I went to the neighbours' place and made it about ten minutes into Part Four before I was so terrified I didn't care how much the neighbour kids jeered at me for leaving the room. I refused to watch the show for a decade after this scarring experience, and would flee the room if the theme song was played. To this day, I am amazed that I managed to pick one of the scariest ten-minute blocks in the entire Hinchcliffe era to be terrified by.
On the one hand, I'm sure seeing it at a vulnerable age has a lot to do with the lasting impression it made, but on the other, even as an adult I think Keeler's transformation is among the most genuinely horrifying things in the entire show. It really feels like Robert Banks Stewart had a spare idea for The Avengers lying around when called on to write this - dangerously eccentric Harrison Chase, his hard man Scorby and morally compromised coward Arnold Keeler all feel more like Avengers characters than Doctor Who ones, and this is also the story where we get the Doctor suggesting someone's arm be cut off and the sinister compost machine. Which is not a bad thing! It makes a nice break from unofficially adapting Hammer horror films, at any rate, and the result is definitely memorable.
In particular, it's one of Sarah Jane Smith's very best appearances, and maybe the only time she really fulfils her promise of being an overtly feminist character. The scenes were she's braver and cleverer than the hardened mercenary who is rapidly falling apart under the threat of the towering alien menace are some of her greatest moments.
More than that, though, I just love the terrifying Krynoid and wish we'd see more of them. On TV. The spin-offs have done some interesting stuff with them, but now that CGI is cheap we could see giant plants menace so many things!!! Not to mention traumatising whole new generations of children.
On the one hand, I'm sure seeing it at a vulnerable age has a lot to do with the lasting impression it made, but on the other, even as an adult I think Keeler's transformation is among the most genuinely horrifying things in the entire show. It really feels like Robert Banks Stewart had a spare idea for The Avengers lying around when called on to write this - dangerously eccentric Harrison Chase, his hard man Scorby and morally compromised coward Arnold Keeler all feel more like Avengers characters than Doctor Who ones, and this is also the story where we get the Doctor suggesting someone's arm be cut off and the sinister compost machine. Which is not a bad thing! It makes a nice break from unofficially adapting Hammer horror films, at any rate, and the result is definitely memorable.
In particular, it's one of Sarah Jane Smith's very best appearances, and maybe the only time she really fulfils her promise of being an overtly feminist character. The scenes were she's braver and cleverer than the hardened mercenary who is rapidly falling apart under the threat of the towering alien menace are some of her greatest moments.
More than that, though, I just love the terrifying Krynoid and wish we'd see more of them. On TV. The spin-offs have done some interesting stuff with them, but now that CGI is cheap we could see giant plants menace so many things!!! Not to mention traumatising whole new generations of children.