The Awakening
by Eric Pringle
Originally Broadcasted: January 19th-20th, 1984
The Doctor, Tegan, and Turlough arrive in the quaint English village of Little Hodcombe with the intention of visiting Tegan's grandfather. But strange things are afoot in Little Hodcombe. The town's leader Sir George has enacted a reenactment of the English Civil War to gain the power of the Malus...
It's been a few years since I've seen a new-to-me Peter Davison story. In fact, before seeing this story, there are only two I haven't seen: This, and
Frontios. So going into this I was pumped to see where it will fall in.
The Awakening is a rare two-part Doctor Who serial, meaning things have to be rushed quite a bit. In fact, this story was originally written as a four-parter, so in this case it was even more rushed. I agree with the opinion of most of the cast and crew shared on the making of special on the DVD: The first part is pretty good, while the second is still good, but feels really rushed to conclude things at the end. It's really unclear on just how the Malus is defeated, why has he been behind the church wall the whole time, and a lot of other important plot points. The character Will Chandler seems to only be introduced into the story in case John Nathan Turner decided he was to become a companion like was rumored. One plus to this story is Peter Davison. His performance is (as pretty much always) phenomenal. He gets some fantastic one liners that really sum up why I like his Doctor so much. And aside from the plot holes, the Malus is actually a pretty unique and cool villain for Doctor Who. The well done design helps its appeal as well. Overall a relatively strong story by the standards of the 1980s, but it still could have been better. A four-parter would have been too much, a two-parter was too little, so why not a three-parter?
Luke's Rating:
8/10
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