Part two kicks off with a big impressive fight between the Nazis and the cybermannys, which the cybermannys win easily because they have pewpewpew guns and the Nazis (in contravention of a number of science fiction genre tropes) do not.
Lady Peinforte joins in the fight by shooting a cybermanny with an arrow and it goes
The Doctor says
"A Cyberman killed with an arrow? But that's ludicrous!"Thus preempting the cries of Doctor Who fans down through the years since this was made.
"Unless, of course, the head's made of gold. The only substance to which they're vulnerable."he adds, so that's all fine then. The Doctor recognises the arrow as being one of Lady Peinforte's, so now he knows she is here. In the confusion of the fighting, the Doctor steals the silver bow from out of De Flores's special case, and Lady Peinforte and Richard spot the Doctor so now they know he is here too.
Lady Peinforte knows it is the Doctor as soon as she sees him, so that means either he met her since his last regeneration or else she has the ability to know him no matter what he looks like.
Lady Peinforte shoots an arrow at the Doctor and Ace as they run back to the TARDIS but it only hits the indestructible TARDIS door, where it sticks out of it ready to come in useful later on in a classic example of Clarke's Arrow (a dramatic device named after the writer of Silver Nemesis, Kevin Clarke).
De Flores and his son Karl are the last surviving Nazis on the scene, so they run away with the special case, not knowing the bow is not inside it any more. The Doctor and Ace go back to 1638 Windsor for a pointless scene that they could easily have done earlier, but the pacing and editing of this middle episode are not as tight as they maybe could have been.
Lady Peinforte and Richard wander around 1988 Windsor in their 17th century clothes looking cool but very conspicuous. Two mannys mistaik them for "social workers" and try to rob from them, which does not end well for the mannys since Richard is finally able to comprehend a situation that is not so different from his own time - what he does to them happens off screen, but they are next seen by us tied upside down from a tree wearing only their pants, lol!
This bit is, at first glance, pure padding the same as the scene with the Doctor and Ace in 1638, but it actually serves an important purpose in showing Richard's emotional journey coming to terms with his situation. Also it show that Richard is not to be fucked with.
By now back in 1988, the Doctor and Ace use the jazz music from part one to jam the cybermannys trying to send a message to their reinforcements in space. Then they find the two mannys in the tree, who still think Lady Peinforte and Richard were social workers. Teh satires!111
Lady Peinforte and Richard are following the arrow pulling them towards the main body of the Nemesis, which at the end of the fighting was taken by the cybermannys. They see Richard's gravestone, which Lady Peinforte recognises at once for what it is, and this scares Richard even more than he was before.
"He saw worlds end and begin."
Lady Peinforte has her own tomb, a much bigger one, nearby. This is where the cybermannys have taken the Nemesis. Unlike Richard, Lady Peinforte is not at all worried about being near or even in her own grave - she is more annoyed by not finding the Nemesis inside.
"My lady, where are your bones?"
"What matter?"
The cybermannys are confused that Lady Peinforte has not been driven mad by "the fact of her death" and then their plan goes even more wrong when Richard shoots one of them with a gold arrow and so the rest retreat.
The Doctor and Ace find the cybermannys' spaceship and Ace blows it up with Nitro Nine. This serves to keep them away from the main plot while the antagonist factions fight each other. The Doctor takes this opportunity to give Ace (and us) some more exposition about the Nemesis:
"Listen, Ace. The Nemesis generates destruction. It affects everything around it. I launched it into space, but unfortunately with an orbit that brings it back to Earth every twenty five years. Take the twentieth century. It appeared in 1913."Only two stories ago, Remembrance of the Daleks featured a MacGuffin superficially similar to the Nemesis in the form of the Hand of Omega. But while the Hand of Omega was a Gallifreyan "remote stellar manipulator" that, in the wrong hands, could be used as a powerful weapon of mass destruction, the Nemesis is an actual Time Lord weapon, "created as the ultimate defence for Gallifrey, back in early times." The way the Doctor describes its powers to Ace makes it sound like the One Ring: what exactly it does is vague, but so strong it influences events even when it is not actively being wielded, and everybody wants its power for themselves sooner or later.
"The eve of the First World War."
"Twenty five years later?"
"1938."
"Hitler annexes Austria."
"1963?"
"Kennedy assassinated."
"1988?"
De Flores and Karl do a deal with the cybermannys but obviously both sides plan to betray the other as soon as they have taken the Nemesis back from Lady Peinforte. De Flores and Karl run in to capture Lady Peinforte, but Richard distracts them by giving in so quickly - surrendering both the statue and the silver arrow - that he and Lady Peinforte can escape down her tomb's secret passage.
The statue comes to life long enough for its hands to grasp the arrow. Still mostly unseen but glowing like a ghost out of Dark Towers and accompanied by incidental music to match, combined with the Doctor's earlier warnings of its power, the Nemesis already has a strong presence at the heart of the story.
De Flores thinks he has won but his special case is empty (he and Karl do a comedy double-take when they find out) and so he still lacks the bow to have the complete statue. The cybermannys come in and betray him.
With the tape deck they are using to jam the cybermannys, the Doctor and Ace see the cybermannys have a lot more spaceships out in space. This is an attempt to end part two by upping the stakes to make the story look and feel a bit more "epic" in scope, but it is not a very successful way to conclude the episode as it lacks any sense of immediate peril for our heroes and the stakes have not been raised in any meaningful way.
Part two of Silver Nemesis is a mixed affair. It contains too much padding and it feels like the Doctor and Ace are separated from the main storyline for too much of the time, even if this is technically necessary to allow for infighting between the baddy factions and for the Doctor to have the time to give out vital exposition.
But the scenes with Lady Peinforte and Richard in them are excellent, and really well acted by Fiona Walker and Gerard Murphy. We may only be two episodes into their story, but they have already become two of the most interesting supporting characters in all of Doctor Who that aren't played by Paul Darrow. I am left wanting to see more of them and know more about them.
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