Big Gay Longcat reviews Doctor Who: Battlefield Part Three

The Doctor wakes up and does something with the controls to send Ace up through the roof of the studio, then the special effect comes back and hits him again. There are some odd editing choices made in this scene, including the use of some shots more than once, and I suppose we have to put that down to being forced upon the makers by the studio accident that almost killed Sophie Aldred (the cracked glass is visible in at least one such shot) as examined in More Than 30 Years in the TARDIS.

Peter the archaeologist is telling Ancelyn about Excalibur and the Lady of the Lake (it is left ambiguous whether Ancelyn already knows all this and is merely humouring Peter, or if the version of the story as it exists in our dimension is genuinely new to him) when Ace rises out of the lake holding Excalibur. I think the "Boom!" scene was cleverly inserted into part one so that this would appear to be subtle by comparison.

The Doctor is still being chased by the special effect until Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart comes in and stands on a prop, causing the special effect to vanish in line with the BBC Technicians' Union rules at the time.

"I just can't let you out of my sight, can I, Doctor?"
"Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart. So you recognise me, then?"
"Yes, who else would it be?"

This moment of reunion is slightly spoiled by the way the Doctor sounds a bit drunk when he says the Brigadier's name.

Speaking of drinking, Mordred is trying to get drunk at the hotel, and then he sexually harasses the Brigadier's helicopter pilot for a bit until Morgaine comes in and uses mind-control and mind-reading powers on her to find out all about UNIT. This causes the pilot to go

and then Morgaine electrics the body into ashes, before paying for Mordred's drinks by curing Elizabeth's blindness. This is a rather nasty scene, and it reminds us that Morgaine and Mordred are baddys and that what code of honour they do have is a twisted one, so they can be nasty one minute and nice the next.

Morgaine's henchmannys attack to try to capture Excalibur. UNIT decides to evacuate some of the minor characters so we don't have so many to keep track of - Peter, Pat and Elizabeth have all served their purpose in the plot so off they go.

Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart has a speech to the Doctor about the new UNIT, a very efficient way of highlighting what has changed since the 1970s, and so it is a shame that Battlefield stands as the only story of this new era as it could have been interesting to see.

"Armour piercing, solid core, with a Teflon coating - go through a Dalek. UNIT's been very busy, Doctor. We've also got high-explosive rounds for Yetis and very efficient armour-piercing rounds for robots. We've even got gold-tipped bullets for you-know-what."

Sounds like Voldemort's in trouble if he ever shows up.

"No silver?"
"Silver bullets?"
"Well, you never know."

Brigadier Bambera and Ancelyn get cut off from the others by the baddys. The Doctor and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart plan to go to their rescue in Bessie, and the Doctor gives Ace a piece of chalk with which to draw a circle to protect her and Shou Yuing from Morgaine's magic. This is almost too subtle, but the low-tech (bordering on no-tech) chalk is in contrast to the technological weaponry that the Brigadier had just been showing off to the Doctor.

Morgaine scries on them in her magic giant lightbulb and sees that Excalibur has been left with Ace and Shou Yuing. Her plan appears to be to summon a demon (I'm not quite sure how that helps), but we only see its shadow on the wall for the moment.

At the hotel, Ace and Shou Yuing get scared by thunder and lightning (and who can blame them?) so Ace draws the magic circle. It then gets dark... outside the circle.

Morgaine uses magic to get Ace and Shou Yuing arguing to try to get them to come outside the circle, but when Ace nearly falls out of it they see it is a trick and make up with a hug. This is a good scene in which we are left to infer the extent of Morgaine's influence, even if Ace gets a bit racist for a moment.

There is a brief action scene of UNIT and the baddy knights fighting, including one gratuitous somersault in classic HAVOC fashion (nice to see not everything has changed since the '70s). Ancelyn challenges Mordred to single combat and they charge at each other, but the Doctor runs in between them and shouts

"Stop! I command it! There! Will! Be! No! Battle! Here!"

It's like he's channeling William Shatner and BRIAN BLESSED at the same time.
Mordred immediately spills that this is only a diversion while Morgaine does their real plan of going after Excalibur.

Morgaine and her demon, the Destroyer, go into the hotel room and menace Ace and Shou Yuing, and as the cliffhanger moment we get our first proper look at the Destroyer.

Scary face!

The Destroyer is a properly scary monster, although - and this may just be me being obsessed with Eurovision this week - he does look like he could be in the band Lordi, who won Eurovision for Finland in 2006.

Part three has a fair amount of padding, albeit well disguised as action scenes of fighting or escaping from the baddys, or the scenes with the minor characters. There are also good scenes, most of them involving Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart who has really taken over this story.

While Doctor Who has never shied away from the trope of Sufficiently Advanced Technology being like unto magic, it is used a lot in this story, with the chalk circle and the demon summoning battling each other over which one is the ultimate example of this.

Back when I reviewed his previous story I mentioned that the writer was a fan of the tabletop Role-Playing Game Ars Magica, and the protective magic circle ward is a notable feature of that game. Its first edition came out in 1987, so I do wonder if he was already being influenced by it by the time he wrote Battlefield?



It's tomorrow, I'm so excited!